Below is the service Brian led at First Church Belfast this morning.
Love Your Enemies? Wrestling with Luke 6:27-38
During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Immaculée Ilibagiza hid for 91 days in a tiny bathroom with 6 other people during which time her whole family was murdered, except her brother who was out of the country studying in Senegal. In the years that followed, in an act of profound courage and grace, she chose to forgive the perpetrators, saying that harbouring hatred would only destroy her own heart.
Luke 6:27-38 is probably among the most challenging passages in the Gospels. In these verses, Jesus calls his followers to love their enemies, to do good to those who hate them, to bless those who curse them, and to pray for those who mistreat them. He goes on to instruct them to turn the other cheek, to give freely without expecting anything in return, and to extend mercy just as God is merciful. These teachings cut across the grain of our natural instincts for self-preservation, fairness, and justice. They challenge us to reflect deeply on the nature of love, mercy, and discipleship.
This passage is part of Jesus' Sermon on the Plain, which mirrors the more well-known Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's Gospel. Luke places a particular emphasis throughout his Gospel on God's compassion for the marginalized and the poor, the call to radical love and mercy, and the inversion of societal norms. Luke’s Jesus also invites his own disciples to a life of radical simplicity which enables them to live with a much greater freedom of spirit unencumbered with a constant preoccupation with material possessions. Combined with this Luke's Gospel presents a vision of a kingdom governed by grace, not retribution.
In this passage, Jesus offers a concrete expression of this vision: love without limits, mercy without conditions. It is a love that goes beyond human reciprocity and mirrors the boundless compassion of God. "For God is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked," Jesus reminds us (vs 35).
This radical teaching naturally raises difficult and uncomfortable questions. Does this passage require Christians to be pacifists? Historically, the Christians of the first two centuries interpreted it as such. Early Christian writers like Tertullian and Origen argued that Jesus' command to love one's enemies prohibited participation in war and violence. For the early Church, the cross was the defining symbol of self-giving love, not the sword.
But what about the complexities of history? What if Nazi Germany invades your country? How does one respond to such an aggressive and oppressive force? Is it possible to defend one's country while remaining faithful to Jesus' call to love one's enemies? Can one fight without succumbing to hatred?
These are not easy questions. Some Christians, like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, concluded that opposing the Nazis through direct action was a tragic necessity to prevent greater evil. Yet even Bonhoeffer struggled with the moral implications of his decision. Others have sought to embody a non-violent response, figures like Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr. and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who all drew on Jesus' teachings to resist injustice without dehumanizing their oppressors.
Further questions it might raise is whether Jesus' command to love our enemies and to turn the other cheek means that his followers should passively accept injustice or allow harm to go unchecked. Feminist writers in particular have raised deep concerns how these teachings have been used to keep victims of domestic violence and abuse within abusive situations preventing victims of abuse from setting healthy boundaries or from leaving their abusive partners.
In the year 2000 I did a module of study on domestic abuse and was asked to write an assignment how these realities should inform and even challenge simplistic interpretations of Christian Theology. The reading material for the assignment contained numerous stories of women in abusive relationships from a variety of religious backgrounds and how in reaching out to pastors, priests, ministers and rabbi’s for help, they were told they needed to go back to their abusive partners and forgive or that this was simply the cross in life that they had to bare. It was suggested that in such instances clergy become accomplices in domestic abuse and religious teachings have been used in such a way to enable the abuse to continue unchallenged. We might well ask the question, is that really what Jesus had in mind if indeed Luke the Gospel writer has accurately conveyed the teachings of Jesus accurately in this passage? (Such insights and questions can be equally applied to situations where men are the victims of such domestic abuse).
As we wrestle with these and potentially other questions, I wonder if at the heart of these teachings of Jesus in Luke’s Gospel is an attempt to work out the radical implications of the true nature of love. And the clue is in the text itself in verse 32 “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ do that.
These verses challenge the transactional nature of much of human love — the instinct to love only those who love us back or to do good only towards those who do good back to us. Jesus points out that such love is not extraordinary; it is common, even among those who are not particularly spiritual. In fact it is an ethic that even gangsters and the mafia abide by. What Jesus is suggesting is that only loving those who offer love in return is ultimately in fact self-centred and self-serving and thus love given for purely transactional purposes, for getting something back in return, is not in fact true or pure love at all.
True love, according to Jesus, is not self-serving or conditional. It is generous, extending itself beyond the boundaries of relationship, of affinity, or of expected return. Jesus words, according to Luke, are suggesting that for love to be true and pure it ultimately needs to be self-less.
What then does one make of Jesus teaching here in Luke, that we should love our enemies? Jesus does not suggest that this is optional for his followers. Why does Jesus think it is necessary? Why might it be important?
And perhaps there might be two responses to these questions:
And the first response is about the nature of hatred, and here the Buddha’s teachings are helpful. According to the Buddha, hatred is what he calls one of the three poisons – which also include greed and ignorance. As such, hatred is poisonous to the one who holds it and carries it in their own hearts. To harbour hatred according to the Buddha is to bring suffering upon oneself. Where there is hatred, there can be no real and deep happiness. Hatred according to the Buddha poisons the pool of our own joy and happiness. As some have said, it is like holding onto a burning coal while hoping it will hurt one’s enemy. And interestingly advances in holistic medicine that take seriously the connection between body and mind, have also begun to show that harbouring feelings of anger and hatred not only poison our minds and our hearts, but they also poison our bodies, leading to diseases including cancer if harboured within us for long enough.
The second response to the question, why love for enemies is important, comes from Jesus, because Jesus in both Luke’s and Matthew’s Gospels suggest that in loving in this way we are becoming vessels and channels for Divine Love. And by implication, to the extent that we limit our love, as all of us actually do, is the extent to which we limit our experience of the Divine…
But there is some really good news in all of this for those of us who are struggling to love in this way… according to Jesus in these verses, our falling short of the way of Divine Love, does not diminish the Divine Love towards us. It might limit our experience of the Divine Love, but it cannot and will not limit or change the Divine Love towards us. For as Jesus says in this passage: “The Most High is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.” When I hear these words of Jesus in Luke and the parallel words in Matthew’s Gospel, I am not sure how any Christian can take seriously the idea of God casting sinners into some kind of hell for all eternity. Such a view of God seems quite antithetical to the view that Jesus gives in this passage. And how can it be possible that Jesus should call us to love our enemies if in the final analysis God does not hold Godself to the same standard?
Getting back to Luke’s Gospel, rather than inviting his followers to passively accept abuse, some theologians and biblical commentators suggest that the words of Jesus in this passage were meant to be understood as non-violent acts of resistance towards an oppressive and abusive occupying army. In a situation of oppressive and brutal occupation, such as the Jews experienced under the Romans, violent resistance would only bring about more violence and even harsher treatment. When an oppressed and occupied people have no other options available to them, then turning the other cheek can become a chosen, non-violent act of defiance and a chosen, dignified act of free will in the face of violence.
But advice and teaching given to an oppressed and an occupied people living under a brutal empire that cannot be escaped is not necessarily good advice to be given to a person living in an abusive domestic relationship, where a better option would surely be to leave the abusive relationship, and to set boundaries in place to protect one from further harm.
Is it also possible, that under certain circumstances, for example when the Nazi’s are invading one’s country, it might in fact be necessary to take up arms to resist the spread of an evil regime? And is it possible to do so while not allowing one’s own heart and soul to be poisoned by hatred?
Words from the Tao Te Ching, the little book of Chinese Wisdom, give a thought provoking perspective on these things.
Chapter 31: Weapons are instruments of fear; they are not a wise person's tools.
They use them only when they have no choice.
Peace and quiet are dear to their heart,
and victory should not bring them joy.
If you rejoice in victory, then you delight in killing.
The wise person enters battle gravely
with sorrow and great compassion
as if attending a funeral.
And a final question… is it also possible that Jesus might be pointing us towards an inner joy and an inner happiness that does not depend on outward circumstances or possessions at all, an inner joy that once discovered can never be taken away because it is rooted not in temporary external things but in a timeless and formless spiritual dimension… otherwise known as The Eternal - what Jesus refers to as the Kingdom of God within.
Just some food for thought today on a very challenging passage. It feel like we have only but scratched the surface and that there are more perspectives to be considered.
During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Immaculée Ilibagiza hid for 91 days in a tiny bathroom with 6 other people during which time her whole family was murdered, except her brother who was out of the country studying in Senegal. In the years that followed, in an act of profound courage and grace, she chose to forgive the perpetrators, saying that harbouring hatred would only destroy her own heart.
Luke 6:27-38 is probably among the most challenging passages in the Gospels. In these verses, Jesus calls his followers to love their enemies, to do good to those who hate them, to bless those who curse them, and to pray for those who mistreat them. He goes on to instruct them to turn the other cheek, to give freely without expecting anything in return, and to extend mercy just as God is merciful. These teachings cut across the grain of our natural instincts for self-preservation, fairness, and justice. They challenge us to reflect deeply on the nature of love, mercy, and discipleship.
This passage is part of Jesus' Sermon on the Plain, which mirrors the more well-known Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's Gospel. Luke places a particular emphasis throughout his Gospel on God's compassion for the marginalized and the poor, the call to radical love and mercy, and the inversion of societal norms. Luke’s Jesus also invites his own disciples to a life of radical simplicity which enables them to live with a much greater freedom of spirit unencumbered with a constant preoccupation with material possessions. Combined with this Luke's Gospel presents a vision of a kingdom governed by grace, not retribution.
In this passage, Jesus offers a concrete expression of this vision: love without limits, mercy without conditions. It is a love that goes beyond human reciprocity and mirrors the boundless compassion of God. "For God is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked," Jesus reminds us (vs 35).
This radical teaching naturally raises difficult and uncomfortable questions. Does this passage require Christians to be pacifists? Historically, the Christians of the first two centuries interpreted it as such. Early Christian writers like Tertullian and Origen argued that Jesus' command to love one's enemies prohibited participation in war and violence. For the early Church, the cross was the defining symbol of self-giving love, not the sword.
But what about the complexities of history? What if Nazi Germany invades your country? How does one respond to such an aggressive and oppressive force? Is it possible to defend one's country while remaining faithful to Jesus' call to love one's enemies? Can one fight without succumbing to hatred?
These are not easy questions. Some Christians, like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, concluded that opposing the Nazis through direct action was a tragic necessity to prevent greater evil. Yet even Bonhoeffer struggled with the moral implications of his decision. Others have sought to embody a non-violent response, figures like Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr. and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who all drew on Jesus' teachings to resist injustice without dehumanizing their oppressors.
Further questions it might raise is whether Jesus' command to love our enemies and to turn the other cheek means that his followers should passively accept injustice or allow harm to go unchecked. Feminist writers in particular have raised deep concerns how these teachings have been used to keep victims of domestic violence and abuse within abusive situations preventing victims of abuse from setting healthy boundaries or from leaving their abusive partners.
In the year 2000 I did a module of study on domestic abuse and was asked to write an assignment how these realities should inform and even challenge simplistic interpretations of Christian Theology. The reading material for the assignment contained numerous stories of women in abusive relationships from a variety of religious backgrounds and how in reaching out to pastors, priests, ministers and rabbi’s for help, they were told they needed to go back to their abusive partners and forgive or that this was simply the cross in life that they had to bare. It was suggested that in such instances clergy become accomplices in domestic abuse and religious teachings have been used in such a way to enable the abuse to continue unchallenged. We might well ask the question, is that really what Jesus had in mind if indeed Luke the Gospel writer has accurately conveyed the teachings of Jesus accurately in this passage? (Such insights and questions can be equally applied to situations where men are the victims of such domestic abuse).
As we wrestle with these and potentially other questions, I wonder if at the heart of these teachings of Jesus in Luke’s Gospel is an attempt to work out the radical implications of the true nature of love. And the clue is in the text itself in verse 32 “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ love those who love them. And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ‘sinners’ do that.
These verses challenge the transactional nature of much of human love — the instinct to love only those who love us back or to do good only towards those who do good back to us. Jesus points out that such love is not extraordinary; it is common, even among those who are not particularly spiritual. In fact it is an ethic that even gangsters and the mafia abide by. What Jesus is suggesting is that only loving those who offer love in return is ultimately in fact self-centred and self-serving and thus love given for purely transactional purposes, for getting something back in return, is not in fact true or pure love at all.
True love, according to Jesus, is not self-serving or conditional. It is generous, extending itself beyond the boundaries of relationship, of affinity, or of expected return. Jesus words, according to Luke, are suggesting that for love to be true and pure it ultimately needs to be self-less.
What then does one make of Jesus teaching here in Luke, that we should love our enemies? Jesus does not suggest that this is optional for his followers. Why does Jesus think it is necessary? Why might it be important?
And perhaps there might be two responses to these questions:
And the first response is about the nature of hatred, and here the Buddha’s teachings are helpful. According to the Buddha, hatred is what he calls one of the three poisons – which also include greed and ignorance. As such, hatred is poisonous to the one who holds it and carries it in their own hearts. To harbour hatred according to the Buddha is to bring suffering upon oneself. Where there is hatred, there can be no real and deep happiness. Hatred according to the Buddha poisons the pool of our own joy and happiness. As some have said, it is like holding onto a burning coal while hoping it will hurt one’s enemy. And interestingly advances in holistic medicine that take seriously the connection between body and mind, have also begun to show that harbouring feelings of anger and hatred not only poison our minds and our hearts, but they also poison our bodies, leading to diseases including cancer if harboured within us for long enough.
The second response to the question, why love for enemies is important, comes from Jesus, because Jesus in both Luke’s and Matthew’s Gospels suggest that in loving in this way we are becoming vessels and channels for Divine Love. And by implication, to the extent that we limit our love, as all of us actually do, is the extent to which we limit our experience of the Divine…
But there is some really good news in all of this for those of us who are struggling to love in this way… according to Jesus in these verses, our falling short of the way of Divine Love, does not diminish the Divine Love towards us. It might limit our experience of the Divine Love, but it cannot and will not limit or change the Divine Love towards us. For as Jesus says in this passage: “The Most High is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.” When I hear these words of Jesus in Luke and the parallel words in Matthew’s Gospel, I am not sure how any Christian can take seriously the idea of God casting sinners into some kind of hell for all eternity. Such a view of God seems quite antithetical to the view that Jesus gives in this passage. And how can it be possible that Jesus should call us to love our enemies if in the final analysis God does not hold Godself to the same standard?
Getting back to Luke’s Gospel, rather than inviting his followers to passively accept abuse, some theologians and biblical commentators suggest that the words of Jesus in this passage were meant to be understood as non-violent acts of resistance towards an oppressive and abusive occupying army. In a situation of oppressive and brutal occupation, such as the Jews experienced under the Romans, violent resistance would only bring about more violence and even harsher treatment. When an oppressed and occupied people have no other options available to them, then turning the other cheek can become a chosen, non-violent act of defiance and a chosen, dignified act of free will in the face of violence.
But advice and teaching given to an oppressed and an occupied people living under a brutal empire that cannot be escaped is not necessarily good advice to be given to a person living in an abusive domestic relationship, where a better option would surely be to leave the abusive relationship, and to set boundaries in place to protect one from further harm.
Is it also possible, that under certain circumstances, for example when the Nazi’s are invading one’s country, it might in fact be necessary to take up arms to resist the spread of an evil regime? And is it possible to do so while not allowing one’s own heart and soul to be poisoned by hatred?
Words from the Tao Te Ching, the little book of Chinese Wisdom, give a thought provoking perspective on these things.
Chapter 31: Weapons are instruments of fear; they are not a wise person's tools.
They use them only when they have no choice.
Peace and quiet are dear to their heart,
and victory should not bring them joy.
If you rejoice in victory, then you delight in killing.
The wise person enters battle gravely
with sorrow and great compassion
as if attending a funeral.
And a final question… is it also possible that Jesus might be pointing us towards an inner joy and an inner happiness that does not depend on outward circumstances or possessions at all, an inner joy that once discovered can never be taken away because it is rooted not in temporary external things but in a timeless and formless spiritual dimension… otherwise known as The Eternal - what Jesus refers to as the Kingdom of God within.
Just some food for thought today on a very challenging passage. It feel like we have only but scratched the surface and that there are more perspectives to be considered.
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