Jesus of Nazareth: What He Wanted, Who He Was

Two examples are given here, and the cases are chosen in such a way that the second is an expansion of the first. In the first case, just bringing back a strayed ox or donkey takes time and goes against the grain for the finder. One could simply let the animal go on straying and so injure one’s enemy. But one is not allowed to want to hurt him or her. One must help. In the second case, there is significantly more at stake than simply bringing an animal back. Here, it is a question of cooperation: two have to work together to raise the donkey to its feet and distribute the heavy load better. And this you must do together with the person who hates you—what a task of overcoming one’s own self is presented here! But it could also be a step toward reconciliation.²¹

The word “love” does not appear in this text, but in its substance it quite clearly speaks of what love means. Love in the Bible is not primarily deep feeling and upwelling emotion but effective help. When, in the parable in Luke 10:30-35, the Samaritan raises up the robbery victim, pours oil and wine on his wounds and bandages them, brings him to an inn, pays the owner and assures him that he will make good on any additional costs, Jesus is describing exactly what he thinks of as love. Exodus 23:4-5 does the same.

Even as concerns love of enemies Jesus thus thinks and speaks entirely in terms of the Torah. He interprets it. He brings its scattered parts together. He thinks through “loving God” and “loving neighbor” to their utmost consequences. Precisely on the basis of the Torah he knows who God is and how, therefore, people in Israel ought to be also.

Certainly it was not a matter of course to read the Old Testament that way, because there are other voices to be found there as well. It can indeed speak of hatred and do so with elemental rage. In Psalm 139—to take only one example—we read:

Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD?

    And do I not loathe those who rise up against you?

I hate them with perfect hatred;

    I count them my enemies. (Ps 139:21-22)

We could say a great deal about this extract from a much longer psalm text. It is not about private quarrels and enmity. The one praying experiences how the people of God are being destroyed by “men of blood” (v. 19) who themselves are Israelites, and he or she wants to stand on God’s side. But above all we may not overlook the “prayer dynamic” of the psalm.²² The speaker has already asserted that she or he can never truly grasp God’s thoughts (vv. 17-18) and in the end begs God to test him or her and point out the way she or he should go (vv. 23-24).

And yet, at a later time people read Psalm 139:21-22 with some justification as a call to separation from and hatred toward God’s enemies. Anyone who entered the Qumran community had to swear “to love everything that [God] selects, and to hate everything that he rejects” (1 QS 1, 3-4), “to love all the [children] of light” and “to detest all the [children] of darkness” (1 QS 1, 9-10). It was forbidden to hate any member of the community (1 QS 5, 26), but one must nourish “everlasting hatred for the men of the pit” (1 QS 9, 21-22). The children of light are the members of the Qumran community, the children of darkness everyone else. That is how some people in Jesus’ time interpreted the Bible.

Only against the background of these voices can we clearly see the certainty, clarity, and absolute conviction with which Jesus understood Leviticus 19:18 at its heart and uncovered the whole import of that text: love of neighbor includes the enemy and precisely in its treatment of the enemy demonstrates itself as genuine love.

But Jesus not only taught love of enemies; he lived it in his behavior toward those who in his time were excluded and socially stigmatized: in his attitude toward the “tax collectors and sinners” (Luke 7:34), the “toll collectors and prostitutes” (Matt 21:31), the “thieves, rogues, and adulterers” (Luke 18:11). People in Israel at that time felt themselves morally superior to such types. They were despised in the name of God; people avoided them and as far as possible shunned social contact with them. Jesus did the opposite and so made them his “neighbors.”²³

Anger Is Forbidden

The antitheses in the Sermon on the Mount are especially important for the question of Jesus’ attitude toward the Torah; hence, our next sample will concern the first of those antitheses.²⁴ It begins as follows:

You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, “You shall not murder”; and “whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.” But I say to you that if you are [merely] angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment. (Matt 5:21-22a)