Love Your Enemies

DMLJ: …all our Lord says in the previous paragraph is that you must not hit back. … We are told we must positively love these people.  We are even to love our enemies.  It is not simply that we are to not strike back at them, but that we must be positive in our attitude towards them.  Our Lord is at pains to have us see that our “neighbor” must of necessity include even our enemy.

MHA: …our attitude toward someone should not depend on his attitude toward us; love should not be merely mutual; good cannot be merely reciprocal. …he should not merely react to the feelings and behavior of others, but should himself become a source of love and good.

Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Jesus Christ: His Life and Teaching, Vol.2 - The Sermon on the Mount, Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev

Matthew 5: 43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.

44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; 45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

There is no direct teaching in the Old Testament that says love your neighbor and hate your enemy; yet Jesus indicates this is the teaching that has been heard. 

MHA: The closest equivalent is from the book of Leviticus: “Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Lev. 19:18)

Yet the word “neighbor” here refers to a compatriot, one from Israel; this exhortation does not extend to foreigners or pagans.  So, your “enemies” within Israel you are to love, and this could help with the understanding of the teaching to which Jesus refers.

It is further possible that this teaching boiled down several passages and events, and summarized these into one short statement.  For example, when the Jews entered Canaan, they were told to exterminate the Canaanites.  The Amorites and the Moabites were not to be treated with kindness, and all memory of the Amalekites was to be blotted out. 

MHA: Hatred of their enemies was not simply a characteristic of the ancient Hebrews; it was a part of their identity, their outlook on the world.

MHA: The ancient Jews sincerely believed that if they observed God’s commandments, God would make their enemies his own enemies.

There are Psalms that call for curses called down on certain people: let mine enemies be put to shame; how long shall my enemies be exalted; rescue me from mine enemies.

MHA: But it is one’s ability to love one’s enemies that turns out to be the main indicator of how fully one has absorbed the Christian teaching on love and to what degree one is ready to put it into practice.

Jesus makes clear that when He speaks of loving one’s enemies, this includes all enemies, not merely those who happen to be of a common tribe.  Imagine the Pharisees’ reaction to such teaching.  Jesus teaches that the same attitude one should have toward others of the same nation must extend to all:

MHA: …Jesus understands “neighbor” to refer not only to people of the same faith and tribe; one’s neighbor is anyone who needs help, concern, and care. … he broadens the concept of “neighbor” in including the enemies in this concept.

How to resolve this teaching in the face of these various Old Testament actions?

DMLJ: …there is only one way of facing it and that is to regard all these various injunctions, including the imprecatory Psalms, as always being judicial and never something individual.

God loves His enemies: His love for a person does not depend on the behavior of that person.  He causes rain to fall on the just and unjust.  Yet, He also announces to His enemies that unless they repent, in the end they will be destroyed.  It is God’s prerogative to do this, not an individual action.  God is the judge; he judges out of love, not out of hatred or rage.

So, what of the positive element of this?  How are we to love our enemies?  Jesus tells us: bless them that curse you; reply to bitter words with kind words.  Do good to them that hate you; return benevolent action for spiteful action.  Pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; be so sorry for them that we have no time to be sorry for ourselves. 

DMLJ: It is the definition of what the attitude of the Christian should be toward other people. … it is, of course, the very climax of Christian living.

The root issue is our attitude toward ourselves, a denial of self.  Our treatment of others must not depend on what they are or what they do to us; it must be controlled by our view of them and their condition.  The perfect example is Jesus, and His crucifixion: His love did not depend on anything in us, on what we were or what we did to Him.  This is the kind of love we are to have:

MHA: …our attitude toward someone should not depend on his attitude toward us; love should not be merely mutual; good cannot be merely reciprocal. …he should not simply react to the feelings and behaviors of others, but should himself become a source of love and good.

DMLJ: He must be detached from others in the sense that his behavior is not governed by what they do.  But still more important, he should be detached from himself, for until a man is detached from himself he will never be detached from what others do to that self.

Instead of our lives being governed by other people, it should be governed by Christ and His example for us, while we were yet sinners.  Feel sorry for them, pray for them – they are in the hands of Satan.  This doesn’t mean we have to like them; it is an act of love. 

MHA: This is the conduct that Jesus himself displayed. … Not a single category of people was excluded from his attention and love, including the tax collectors and prostitutes.

Love is much more than a feeling, although it is that; it is also a doing, an action.  It is the story of the Good Samaritan, who loved his enemy when other Jews passed the injured man by.  This kind of love cannot be achieved by force; one cannot compel one’s self to love in this manner.  It certainly isn’t the perfecting of self-control.  We need help, and that help comes from above – the Holy Spirit.

Conclusion

MHA: The commandment to love one’s enemies can be called the quintessence of all of Christian ethics; in it, as at a focal point, Jesus’ other commandments are reflected.  It is no coincidence that it is placed last in a series of antitheses in which his teaching is contrasted with the Old Testament regulations.

John Chrysostom calls loving one’s enemies the very summit of virtue.  This call to pray for one’s enemies is well-reflected in early Christian literature. 

DMLJ: The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of love and joy and peace, is given to us, so that, if we are not like this, we are without excuse and we are doing great dishonour to our great and gracious Lord.

Yet, we should not feel condemned.  God sent His Son to save sinners, not saints.  We will fail, but we are failing at living like Christ.  We are not as we ought to be, but we must understand what we are meant to be. 

Epilogue

Per Metropolitan Hilarion, Origen would work through a hierarchy of love: we love Christ more than our children, our children more than our neighbors, our neighbors more than our enemies.  Later tradition did not support this view, although exceptions were made for heretics and in times of war.

This is not satisfactory to me.  At one extreme, heretics are first and foremost enemies of God; any punishment should therefore be left to God.  I hold to this view, as truth does not need violence or the force of law to win out.  It just need not be forcefully silenced.

At the other extreme, it might be lovely to not support a hierarchy as Origen proposed, but the alternative is to be indifferent between the perpetrator and the family member who is the potential victim in the face of an impending evil.

I am not indifferent.