Sunday Readings: Leviticus 19.1-2,17-18; 1 Corinthians 3.16-23; Matthew 5.38-48
Jesus said to his disciples, “You have heard it said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. If anyone strikes you on the right check, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give the person your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.
“You have heard it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for God makes the sun rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matthew 5.38-43).
Talion, as the eye-for-an-eye moral code is called, makes punishment proportionate to a wrong. In this, talion takes a step forward from the code of vengeance, which sets no limits on retaliation for a wrong. In Sunday’s gospel Jesus asks us to take God as our standard in how to treat others. God makes the sun shine and rain fall on the just and unjust alike.
In this, Jesus goes beyond the golden rule which he quotes later in the sermon on the mount—“In everything do unto others as you would have them do unto you; for this is the law and the prophets” (Matthew 7.12). The golden rule makes us ourselves the standard of how to treat others. To respond to enemies and evil with conscious, gracious, undeserved compassion goes farther. This is how a lifegiving, loving, merciful God acts.
Jesus offers a prophetic alternative to violence; he wants us to make neighbors even of enemies. He calls us to community with our neighbors and active commitment to the well-being of all—to those who need coats and loans, to those biased against us, willing to hate and destroy.
To heal the fractures in our social world today, many schools and church have formed groups to identify their own systemic biases and build understanding across polarized aisles where they live. Explore the possibilities such groups might offer as ways to live the gospel.
What value have you experienced in turning the other cheek? When have you made a neighbor of a seeming enemy? What prompted the change?