What Exactly is “Righteous Anger?”

“Do you do well to be angry?”

That’s what God asks Jonah in Jonah 4:4 after the prophet prayed an angry prayer. Jonah is sitting outside of Nineveh watching the city not get destroyed. And he’s hopping mad. He’s mad that they repented. And he’s mad that God relented from judging them.

The first time God answers the question Jonah doesn’t respond. At least not verbally. He built a shelter and sat down to watch. I’m assuming that Jonah wonders if his little fit moved the heart of God to destroy the Ninevites.

While out in the scorching heat, God provides for His stubborn prophet. A plant grows up and gives him shade. But then God decided to give mercy to a hungry worm. As that worm chewed up Jonah’s plant, the prophet once again becomes angry. When a scorching east wind settles upon the now exposed prophet, we hear another lament. Jonah wants to die.

God asks him another question. “Is it right for you to be angry about the plant?”

And then Jonah says it. “It is!” And in fact, God, “I’m so angry I wish I were dead.” I don’t want to live in a world where my plants die and those stupid Ninevites live!!! That’s what Jonah is essentially saying to the Lord. Jonah believes his anger to be righteous.

We can read this story and see that Jonah’s anger is unjustified. But I wonder if we read our own story through a similar lens. Is there such a thing as righteous anger? And if so, how do I know my anger is righteous?

Where Do We Find This Concept in the Bible?

You will not find the phrase “righteous anger” in the Bible. But we can develop this concept, at least when we talk about God, by combining a few things we know to be true. First, we know from Psalm 145:17 that, “The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his works.” Secondly, we can read in places like Numbers 11:1 that God’s “anger was kindled” against the Israelites for their foolish grumbling. If we combine this with a belief that God is always righteous — we are brought to the conclusion that God is righteous in His anger towards the Israelites.

We might say something similar of Jesus cleansing the temple in the Gospels. He is certainly righteous in this cleansing and it is clear that He is angry. Therefore, we see a human (yes, the God-Man) to be both righteous and angry. But can this be said of us who are not perfectly righteous?

Ephesians 4:26 seems to call us to anger. The NIV has softened this a little by saying, “In your anger do not sin.” But the original is an imperative. “Be angry” (ESV) isn’t an awful translation of an imperative. Many, then, take this to mean that we ought to be angry. Eugene Peterson in the Message even says, “Go ahead and be angry. You do well to be angry…” If that’s correct then I suppose there is a type of anger that is indeed “good” and righteous. Besides, Paul is just borrowing from David in Psalm 4:4.

James 1:19-20 also tells us to be “slow to anger,” which doesn’t exactly say “never be angry.” Maybe there are some things of which anger is a proper emotional response. Maybe we do well to be angry on occasion.

If there is righteous anger, how do I know my anger is righteous? How do I know I’m not being a Jonah?

How Do You Know if Anger Is Righteous?

We must acknowledge from the beginning that our anger isn’t “righteous” simply because we feel justified in having it. Or that we can build a case for why we have been treated unfairly. Jonah could have done both of those things. Jonah was convinced that his anger was a good thing for him to hold onto. And Jonah was wrong.

We’re not the best judge of whether or not our anger is righteous. We are quick to be deceived. That’s why it is helpful to have at least some baseline biblical criteria for how anger could be righteous. I like the summary Robert Jones gives in his book, Uprooting Anger. He gives us three criteria:

• Righteous anger reacts against actual sin
• Righteous anger focuses on God and His Kingdom, Rights, and Concerns, not on me and my kingdom, rights, and concerns.
• Righteous anger is accompanied by other godly qualities and expresses itself in godly ways

We might say that Jonah would have been right to be angry about the sin of the Ninevites. Their horrible treatment of people and their defaming of God was worth Jonah’s anger. But when they repented and he was still angry, that tells us more was going on. He didn’t want their redemption. He wanted their destruction. Why? Because Jonah’s heart was really offended for his kingdom and not God’s. Therefore, his anger wasn’t accompanied by those other godly qualities. And he certainly was right to be mad at God for his little plant dying.

Compare this with Jesus in the temple. He’s angry at actual sin. They are making the temple a den of robbers. But it’s not even about them turning the temple into a Wal-Mart. The bigger issue is they are blocking would-be worshippers out of the kingdom. They are trying to make a buck off the poor and vulnerable. Jesus’ words echo the heart of Jeremiah’s complaint — the people are unrighteous and building their own fallen kingdom instead of one which honors God and creates flourishing for even the weakest members of their society.

Jesus is angry at this injustice. His anger isn’t about Himself (at least not in His humanity). Even here I think we could argue that His heart beats for the repentance of the religious leaders. He didn’t sit outside Jerusalem waiting for their destruction, He bled there in hopes they’d come to repentance.

All this to say, I think there is such a thing as righteous anger. I’m just not sure we fallen humans are capable of it. At times our anger might begin with mostly righteousness, but it quickly morphs into something else. I’m not confident we’re all that capable of righteous anger, nor am I convinced it’s a characteristic we are supposed to pursue. A closer look at Ephesians 4:26 will be helpful.

Does Ephesians 4:26 Really Teach Righteous Anger?

“In your anger do not sin: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry.”

As you can see from some different translations of Ephesians 4:26, there is some debate about how to handle the imperative in that verse. Is it a command to be angry? Or is it saying something closer to the NIV, “In your anger do not sin…”?

An indicative is a statement. “The trash is smelly.” An imperative is a command. “Take out the trash!” But sometimes an imperative can be what is called a concessive. Take as an example John 7:52. Here the religious leaders are challenging people to go look at the Scriptures and see if a prophet comes from Galilee. The meaning is something like, “If you go check it out (imperative), you’ll find that a prophet doesn’t come from Galilee.”

Most Greek scholars believe that the imperative in Ephesians 4:26 is doing something similar. The main point Paul is making here is clearly that anger shouldn’t be maintained. I find it strange then that we would think this verse is encouraging people to pursue anger. “Pursue it, but drop it really quickly” seems like a strange command.

This is especially the case when we consider a few verses down we are said to “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger … be put away.” Why would Paul command the church to pursue something, drop something, and then a few verses down say to put every bit of it away? It doesn’t make much sense in the context. Maybe it would be better, then, to say, “You’re going to get angry. But when you do. Deal with it before bedtime. Don’t nourish this thing.”

Keep Your Eyes on the Gospel

There is much more that could be said here but I’ll sum it up this way: Yes, there is such a thing as righteous anger. But I doubt this side of glory we humans fully experience it. Sin is far too mixed, even in the heart of those declared righteous by Christ.

My thinking on this is that there will be times when true righteous anger will bubble up when we see or experience an injustice. Some of our anger will have righteousness in it. But it will seldom stay there. As soon as we declare ourselves righteous, we tend to lose sight of the gospel. And when we lose sight of the gospel, well, bad stuff happens in our hearts.

The problem with a focus on righteous anger is that we’re usually trying to declare ourselves righteous. And when we do this, we put ourselves in the position of Jonah. We are prone to stand outside of Nineveh comforting ourselves with our own righteousness until we are confronted with the God of mercy. Jonah could have been celebrating inside Nineveh. He could have been swimming in an ocean of grace. He chose His self-declared righteous anger.

The anger of man does not bring about the righteousness of God. But the good news of Jesus does.

Source
Robert Jones, Uprooting Anger, 29-30

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