Let’s clarify something else about Biblical Law — private property (i.e., real estate).
Keep in mind that the fundamental assumption is that ANE feudalism is God’s design for human government. With that comes a certain amount of social structure. God says that this is what He wired Creation for, and that includes human wiring. The closest we can come to this today is covenant feudalism. We proceed knowing that a great many folks we encounter will not be a part of the covenant and we have to make certain adjustments based on predictable outcomes. Legalism is illegitimate in Biblical Law.
In principle, you cannot own land. You can occupy and control it, even defend it against the wrong kind of trespass, but that’s a matter of guarding your dominion, not the land itself. The libertarian theory is entirely wrong on this point; libertarian theory is derived from Western feudalism. God alone owns all the earth. He grants us His permit to occupy and restrict usage based on divine calling, but we are required to thoughtfully make allowance for harmless passage.
Thus, even though the secular state has nearly zero credibility before the bar of God’s Law, it is nonetheless correct in principle to demand a public let for access to certain resources. Whether you want to prefer negotiation and compensation is a separate matter; reasonable access is required under Biblical Law. But we also have to rely on biblical precedent to understand what’s “reasonable.”
The issue is being neighborly even when those passing through aren’t literally your neighbors. Remember the principle of The Good Samaritan: Whose conduct appears heart-led is your neighbor. They are acting according to the covenant and are accorded the privileges of that covenant, regardless of any kind of agreed affiliation. But you can still deny passage to someone who threatens your mission from God. How you work out the details is between you and God.
This is how we rightly approach the question of things like the Keystone XL Pipeline fight in North Dakota. The protesters are right to resist the oil company because there is an abundance of proof that the oil folks are spitefully negligent in poisoning common resources like water. If the state were doing its job, those pipeline folks would already have been executed for the egregious harm they’ve done, but you and I won’t be seeing that. So it’s entirely biblical for those protesters to resist any way they can, and their general commitment to nonviolence puts them on solid ground in the sight of God. They have a divine duty to resist, regardless whether God also grants them victory. Pray for them.
By the same token, the asshole billionaire in California blocking access to the beach should be in jail. The state should also jail his guards, and even his lawyers for vexatious lawsuits. The state should simply take control of the road and maintain it themselves. But we know that California is easily the most fraudulent waste of oxygen we will ever see in our lifetimes.
It pays to remember that while the US Constitution is binding on the US, it is based on a rejection of God’s revealed Law. The whole concept of “rights” is anti-Christian thinking.
