Comments on Thought Bubbles: Rob Wheeler thinks about... Loving your enemies

You might like to think that the word love refers ...

2007-05-11T16:12:00.000Z

You might like to think that the word love refers to a choice rather than a feeling. But is that what the word actually means? We cannot make up our own meanings for words. They gain their meaning from public use.

Imagine a friend were to say to you: "I love you but my heart is quite cold towards you. I simply choose to act well towards you". Would you feel that their claim to love you made any sense? The friend may act towards you kindly and benevolently - but why call that "love" other than for the reason I gave in my TBubble - that we need to render the words of Jesus literally true.

Rob Wheeler

I like to think of love as a CHOICE, not a feeling...

2007-05-11T15:07:00.000Z

I like to think of love as a CHOICE, not a feeling.

John Bulman says:"The implication is that no one c...

2007-04-26T20:13:00.000Z

John Bulman says:

"The implication is that no one can be 'hated', because they can't help being and behaving as they do".

This is the determist approach. If someone is not responsible for what they have done they cannot be blamed and so hating or punishing them is pointless. When the dog kills the child we regret the event and we may destroy the dog (for safety) but we dont *blame* it. It was simply acting in accordance with its nature. This is certainly one way of dealing with enemies and feelings of revenge. However, I am no sure that was Jesus' approach as he talks about forgiveness and that is predicated upon blame and responsibility. We don't blame the child-killing dog and so we don't forgive it.

I does raise for me, tho, the interesting question of Jesus' words from the cross, which are quoted by Peter Knight as a paradigm case of loving enemies.

Jesus says: "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do."

Now - taken simply as it stands - the utterance makes no sense. If indeed "they know not what they do" then no blame is entailed and so forgiveness is inappropriate. In courts of law we quite rightly excuse people from responsibility if they did not understand the significance of their action. For instance if a woman caring for he sick husband were to administer a fatal overdose of his prescribed drug due to faulty dosage instructions on the bottle then she would not be forgiven her action - she would be found not guilty.

The words of Jesus raise all sorts of fascinating questions:

Are the Jews around the cross baying for his blood thereby forgiven (and the Romans too)? If so - why have the Jews been persecuted as the "Murderers of Christ by the Church for so many years?

If they *are* forgiven then this is a demonstration of the possibility of forgiveness without either knowledge or repentence of sin on the part of the offender. If these few can be forgiven why not the whole human race? Does this not conflict with traditional Christian doctrine?

If they *are not* forgiven then we have to explain how Jesus could be praying for something that God, the Father, refuses to grant. This implies that Jesus is unaware of the will of the Father, which seems to go against the doctrine of the Trinity which asserts that the will of the Father and the Son are identical, being the same person.

These questions are, of course, ridiculouly pedantic - but this goes to show what absudities yiu get led into by an excessively close reading of scripture. The text just does not hold up to such nit-picking examination. You have to read it simply.

Jesus is not using "forgive" in the full meaning of the term, involving a two-way transaction of repentance and response. He is using it in the loose, everyday sense, simply meaning that he renounces resentment against his killers. The only important thing to note here is that Jesus does not die cursing his executioners.

Rob Wheeler

Carol Sherrard says:"I think you are right, Rob. W...

2007-04-26T20:12:00.000Z

Carol Sherrard says:

"I think you are right, Rob. What concerns me, though, is the sophisticated reasoning needed to reach this understanding. How is the unreflective person supposed to get there?"

I think the problem is that people come to the Bible (both believers and non-believers) with all sorts of presuppositions. They read back into the text what they expect to see there. The text is treated like a legal document, pondered over, and each word and sentence is squeezed like a sponge for deep meaning. My recommendation is that we take a simpler and *shallower* approach. Just read what is there and no more.

Rob Wheeler

Thanks for the thoughtful responses to my piece on...

2007-04-26T20:11:00.000Z

Thanks for the thoughtful responses to my piece on Loving Your Enemies.

Peter Knight says:

"The word for love attributed to Jesus in this case is agape, which is very different from erotic love or affection for family and friends".

I'm not sure that is entirely accurate. I know it's the received wisdom that we tend to hear from pulpits but I've just looked it up and among the Greeks it was used to denote love of family and spouse and therefore did have a feeling component. Like the English word "love" it has changed and it's meaning has been stretched in different contexts.

"Instead it is about service, risk, giving of oneself and sacrifice"

These are all virtues, I don't deny, but they do not neccessarily entail love - or require love as a pre-condition. We can quite easily imagine someone acting virtuously like this without feeling any kind of love at all. Indeed a good Stoic would do all this out of duty without the slightest twinge of any feeling!

Ray Mutch suggests that Sydney Carlton's self-sacrifice at the end of a Tale of Two Cities may be a case of agapaic love in action. He offers this as an example of "emotionless" love from a novel in response to my challenge. Well - as far as I can recall SC acts out of duty not out of love. He certainly does not mention love.

I wonder if the Christian is not in danger of interpreting all virtue as "love" so that agape and virtue become synonymous? Or worse still - perhaps everything that's "good" must involve "love" at some point? Love is one virtue but it's not ALL virtues rolled into one!

"I may have to take defensive action, but it must not be about revenge or retaliation. Despite my enemy’s apparent lack of respect for me, I must respond in a way that is respectful, compassionate and conciliatory. I must endeavour to discover why my attacker is attacking me and see if that can be changed. I must work for shalom. If only this had been the response to 9/11".

It seems to me that you are doing the very thing I have been referring to - interpreting agape as a species of love which entails no emotion and "reading back" into the text what modern Christians want to see. What I am trying to do is *just* read the text to what is says on its own - and don't see a lot. For instance where in that little text does it say that we must be conciliatory? You also say that we may indeed resist an enemy. If he attacks me - may I take up arms and kill him? In what sense is that "loving" my enemy? Is it OK to kill my enemy so long as I don't harbour feelings of hatred while I do it?

What you say is a legitimate proposition as its stands and is worthy of consideration - but they are "your" words and ideas - not those of Jesus. It's not what *he* says. That's important for as soon as we start claiming that we are interpreting the words of Jesus we start arguing about authority. What's more important is to know what's the best thing to do in a situation - not what an authoritative source has uttered. It might have helped if he'd explained *why* we should love our enemies but all he does is follow up the saying with an obscure reference to getting a reward.

I wonder what would you say to my Jewish friend? That he should warmly embrace Hitler and the Nazis as fellow humans? Should he take no retalitory action? What the Jews and allies did after the war was to give the Nazi hierarchy a fair trial. They were not lynched by a mob like Mussolini in Italy. This was fair and generous and I would suggest is in line with the generosity recommended in the saying of Jesus. But surely it would be absurd to say that it amounted to "love"?

I think the danger of your position - that of taking the saying as embodying a substantive moral injunction - is that we *think* we have an answer to the issue of how to treat our enemies. What we should do is simply use it as a starting point to ask questions.

Rob Wheeler

I think you are right, Rob. What concerns me, tho...

2007-04-26T17:21:00.000Z

I think you are right, Rob. What concerns me, though, is the sophisticated reasoning needed to reach this understanding. How is the unreflective person supposed to get there?

On the other hand, I think even the earliest Christian writings (Gospels, Acts, Epistles etc.) were designed to be explicated by teachers. Most people would have been illiterate, and depended on priests for their understanding. It looks as if they haven't done a very good job.

CAROL SHERRARD

I suggest that we will embrace more warmly the 'Lo...

2007-04-25T10:38:00.000Z

I suggest that we will embrace more warmly the 'Love your enemies' doctrine, as we take in the gathering evidence that we human beings are not motivated by an inner 'self', any more than is any other object in the universe. We are governed by a a physically determined brain.
The implication is that no one can be 'hated', because they can't help being and behaving as they do.
This does not mean however, that as members of society we do not have to condition them, by whatever means we think best, to adopt our values.
The paradox, that however we feel we 'choose' the way we react to them implies our free will, can only be resolved this way: whatever our reactions, they are the workings of the universe through our entire organism. For us as for our enemies "It is 'God' who made us and not we ourselves".

Hi RobJust a thought on your post:You say: "But wh...

2007-04-24T10:08:00.000Z

Hi Rob
Just a thought on your post:

You say: "But what kind of a love is it that involves no emotional element? Have you ever seen it depicted in a novel?"

What about a Tale of Two Cities, or Braveheart (film) or Sommersby (film) or A Christmas Carol?

Ray

I agree and I disagree with Rob Wheeler. I agree ...

2007-04-24T09:04:00.000Z

I agree and I disagree with Rob Wheeler. I agree about the nature of many of Jesus' sayings - that they do not constitute an ethical system but rather are devices to make us think and see anew or, like Keats' Grecian urn, "tease us out of thought". But, I do think he lets us all off too lightly in his treatment of "love your enemies".

The word for love attributed to Jesus in this case is agape, which is very different from erotic love or affection for family and friends. Instead it is about service, risk, giving of oneself and sacrifice; that love which is said to be the very life of God (meaningful to both realists and non-realists?); that love which takes us in the Way of the Cross and prays, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Therefore, to say that love is not necessarily or all about feelings is not to say an empty or sterile thing.

Agape requires an act of the will. If I am to love in the agape sense, how I respond to anyone who opposes me or even attacks me may well be despite how I immediately feel. I must be concerned for my enemy’s welfare. I may have to take defensive action, but it must not be about revenge or retaliation. Despite my enemy’s apparent lack of respect for me, I must respond in a way that is respectful, compassionate and conciliatory. I must endeavour to discover why my attacker is attacking me and see if that can be changed. I must work for shalom. If only this had been the response to 9/11.

So, I suggest that “love your enemies” is much more than an aphorism or an attempt to prompt new thinking by means of contrast, paradox or overstatement. Neither is it a statement of an unrealistic ideal. It is a radical challenge and the stories of those who have taken it up to great effect are among our greatest reasons for hope. I have no desire to claim it as unique to the teachings of Jesus in the gospels, but neither do I believe that it is just one of the many pithy or stimulating things Jesus says. I do believe it is central to the Christian Way, even the human way, and that it is an authentic call for the best that we can be.

Agreed more or less 100% with your 'Jesus' theorie...

2007-04-23T20:41:00.000Z

Agreed more or less 100% with your 'Jesus' theories - most of this I've tried to teach my classes over 30+ years (what the sown seed ever brought forth is another question).

On forgiveness: I would go further.
1. It is neither logically nor morally required (even by Christianity I think) to forgive what is heinous. By definition that is UNforgivable.

2. A 'person' (moral agent) can be forgiven, but only if forgiveness is (genuinely) sought, and usually for crime or bad behaviour of lesser magnitude. Forgiveness, like promising, is surely a two-way process. It is a meaningless gesture (and one which brings ridicule on Christianity) to say into thin air that you forgive the unknown or impenitent or psychopathic perpetrator of serial murder etc. because that's what Jesus wants.

3. Finding explanations and mitigating circumstances may reasonably engender feelings of warmth or understanding in victims or observers but this doesn't amount to forgiveness. Often 'forgiveness' may not by any stretch of the imagination be an appropriate moral response to heinous crime or behaviour.

4. So 'Hate the sin, love the sinner' could be useful rule of thumb in the moral life, but this stance does not either entail or require 'forgiveness' in any but the weakest sense.

5. Weakening the meaning of forgiveness weakens the understanding of what can be one of the most powerfully healing (whole-making) of human responses to 'evil'.

Alison McRobb

Nice post, its a really cool blog that you have he...

2007-04-23T19:26:00.000Z

Nice post, its a really cool blog that you have here, keep up the good work, will be back.

Warm Regards

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