ABSTRACT

This conclusion takes the moral claims of refugees and asylum-seekers seriously and calls inhumanity and injustice. It shows how an engagement with the Bible can shape the way one sees the world and makes some Christian sense of things. This may in turn inform people attitudes and behaviours as citizens as one reckons with the political forces that constrain and shape with regard to refugees. In the gospels, the ethical norms are interpreted in the life and teaching of Jesus. Matthew depicts Jesus expounding the Torah on the mountain, like Moses, debating with teachers of the law and teaching in parables. His teaching is his answer to the lawyer's question as to the greatest commandment and an unequivocal denunciation of those who fail to fulfill the law or who interpret the love commandment in an unloving manner. The double command to love God and one's neighbour, even one's enemy, is the driving force behind Jesus attitude to the law.