What Does it Mean to Love Your Enemy?

On Holding Up a Mirror

{Photo by Jarvin Hernandez for Scopio}

Where Christianity gets especially real, where our faith is put to the test, is right here: where Jesus says, “Love your enemies and do good to those who hate you” (Luke 6:27-38). Major world religions hold in common a ‘golden rule’ stating essentially: ‘Love your neighbor as you love yourself’—a command to love others that is almost universal. But Jesus goes a painful step further, telling us to love our enemies. It is hard hard business. Because it is so challenging, I want to explore this teaching that appears in Sunday’s lectionary. What is Jesus saying, and what is he not saying?

First, what Jesus is not saying. Jesus is not telling us to be blind, or to not see reality. Jesus called us to see and speak the truth. And Jesus is not telling us to forego feeling what we feel. Jesus was a human being who showed us what it means to incarnate God. But he was a human being; and he modeled the full range of emotions. Jesus became sad and wept. Jesus got so angry at injustice that he overturned tables in the temple of an unjust system. Jesus felt tired and needed to get away to solitude to rest. This Jesus, who knows what it means to feel as a human being, wants us to practice emotional honesty. If something is sad, it is okay to feel sad. If something is unjust and maddening, it is okay to feel mad.

Secondly, Jesus does not want us to accept injustice. Instead, Jesus wants us to use our gifts and the power of truth to right wrongs in our communities. Throughout his life, Jesus’ actions and the actions of his disciples challenged unjust systems. When Jesus welcomed and healed the perennially bleeding woman, he challenged systems that oppressed women. When Jesus and his disciples fed crowds considered outsiders unworthy of eating with his own people, he challenged systems of exclusion. Over and over again, Jesus stood up to oppressive systems. So by telling us to love our enemies, Jesus was not telling us to stop fighting against oppression or to accept systems of domination.

So what did Jesus mean by ‘love your enemies’? Jesus was talking about loving action—about actions that are the opposite of hatefulness. He was talking about love as an action, not love as a nice feeling. It is easy to stand up to an oppressor in a hateful way—to spit on them and call them hateful names and try to harm them. But this is not Jesus’ way. This is not what Jesus’ followers are called to. When Jesus stood up to oppressors, he was strong and bold and honest, but he did not try to demean them or do violence to them. We can say ‘no’ and be bold, while at the same time treating people with respect. In my own tradition (Episcopal), in our “baptismal covenant,” we commit to “honor the dignity of every person.” This doesn’t just mean those for whom we feel sympathy. We also commit to honoring the dignity of our enemies.

I personally have seen the power of this. When we stand firm in what we believe, but also act respectfully toward our enemies, sometimes we help them make shifts—sometimes subtle shifts, sometimes big. It is like holding up a mirror so they can see their own actions, because we refuse to lower ourselves to their level. It may not always bring change to our enemies. But it will always change us.

This is what it means to ‘love your enemy’ and ‘bless those who curse you.’

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