Is Ethnocentrism a Sin?

A common trend I’ve seen from cuckservatives is pointing to verses in the Bible, like Galatians 3:28, to say ethnocentrism is bad.  Some will even stretch “no other gods before Me” (Exodus 20:3) to mean nationalism is bad.  The latter is obviously absurd, given what God commanded the Israelites to do to surrounding tribes after giving the Commandments. 

Others have written on why this is an absurd argument, but I thought I’d go in a bit more detail on this, both because I’ve heard this anti-racist argument a couple times recently and because edgy neo-pagans also love making it. 

Galatians 3:28 does not only say there is no Jew nor Gentile, but also says that there is no “male nor female.”  I’ve yet to hear this as a justification by conservatives for no divisions between men and women, though I’m sure that National Review article promoting unisex bathrooms based on Galatians is coming.

We know that this verse does not mean there are literally no distinctions between Jews and Gentiles for another reason.  The fact that Gentiles should not be circumcised or follow Jewish dietary laws, though seemingly Jewish converts could still keep the old traditions, is a good indicator that, yes, these groups are distinct (Acts 15:19-21, Galatians 6:12).

There are other verses we can point to defend ethnocentrism.  After all, ethnocentrism is simply in-group preference.  Your ethnic group or your nation is simply an extension of your family.  There are numerous quotes that clarify that in-group preference is not only okay, but is Biblically mandated.  You can basically point to any part of the Old Testament, particularly in Deuteronomy 7, but this is also clear in the New Testament.  “Give these instructions to the believers, so that they will be above reproach. ‘If anyone does not provide for his own, and especially his own household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.’” (1^st Timothy 5:7-8).  “His own” can mean a few things, but it seems clearly a sort of tribal loyalty that takes precedence. 

Edgy atheists and neopagans love the interpretation of the Bible where it is said that Jesus wants to turn you against your family to further prove this point.  After all, if you are to turn against your family, then how can you justify ethnic bonds that extend from your family? They take out of context verses like Luke 12:53 or Matthew 10:35, but let’s look at these with more context.  “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rise against their parents and have them put to death. You will be hated by everyone because of My name, but the one who perseveres to the end will be saved” (Mark 13:12).  Jesus is saying you must follow God even though it will put you at odds with your family who reject him.  We see those who follow Christ being betrayed by neighbors and family members and set upon by the authorities.  This is one of those issues of cherry-picking verses. 

Jesus does not literally want you to hate your family, as people conclude from reading Luke 14:26 in a vacuum.  We know this because he also says, ” Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen” (1^st John 4:20).  What does this mean?  Compared to the love you have for God, the love you have for others should not appear like hate.  You must love God more than anyone else, but you should still love others.  That’s a great difference from the stance “hurr durr, we have to hate family, think of ourselves like Jews, and gender is a social construct.”  After all, Abraham almost killed his son Isaac not because he hated Isaac or because child sacrifice is good (it’s not, child sacrifice is satanic) but rather that you should love nothing and no one more than God.

The words of Jesus are like what the Old Testament prophets said: we live in a sinful time and many will reject the Lord.  Even your family may reject the Lord, but it is important you stay firm.  We saw this in the Soviet Union and we also have seen it recently: children reporting family members for going to DC on January 6^th or neighbors reporting people for going to Church when there were local government orders not to go out because of COVID.  We also see that these people, who act against Christians, believe that they are actually the righteous ones (John 16:2).

Again, it isn’t that there are no distinctions, but that the most important distinction is between believer and nonbeliever.  This can create a murky territory when it comes to intermarriage. When the Bible talks about breeding outside one’s ethnic group or race, it’s usually in the context of God explicitly encouraging a union or discouraging it (in the case of the tribes of Israel in Deuteronomy 7 or Joshua 23:12) which seems to indicate no hard and fast rule. The story of Moses and the Cushite wife might be used by some to argue that critiquing interracial marriage is wrong, but that whole story is odd. Some scholars argue that this was just an attribution to his Midianite wife, whereas the Talmud supposedly explains it by saying he married a Cushite, but never had sex with her because it was forbidden for children of Abraham to marry descendants of Canaan (which reaffirms the anti-mixed race argument). Some people have argued that Deuteronomy 23:2 doesn’t refer to bastards/illegitimate births, but rather that the translation should be people born of “forbidden union” and actually refers to people of mixed blood. Ultimately, God did ordain for there to be different nations, so it certainly does not seem right to encourage mixing. Likewise, I see no practical nor Biblical ground for arguing that discouraging interracial marriage is sinful.

Even taking the more liberal view on interracial marriage necessitates it is only done with fellow Christians and not the stranger who is still led by foreign gods.  Additionally, when we look at the “Christianity” as it is often practiced in Africa, it is a strange and foreign faith.  We need only look at the story of magic penis thieves or ministers who claim God blessed their vaginas to heal others through fornication to see that – no, those are not Christians and you should maintain healthy division and separate nations from them. 

All the verses above mean what the Bible as a whole means: God comes first. Nothing is to matter more than God in your life. The physical world matters less than the spiritual one. After all, the blood of Abraham does not save the tribes of Israel (Matthew 3:9/Luke 3:8).  It is only faith in Christ and accepting God’s grace that will save you. This shouldn’t trouble anyone reading this because it’s consistent with our general worldview.  Southerners are a Christian people. Southern Nationalism is a Christian mindset and cannot work divorced from Christianity.  It is right to preserve our faith, our families, and our folk.