Eye For an Eye, Tooth For a Tooth

" You have heard it said, ' An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth'. But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also; and if anyone wants to see you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile.  . . You have heard it 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."  [ Matthew 5: 38-44].

This law of  "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" goes back to The Old Testament:  " If any harm comes], then you shall give an eye for an eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe." [ Exodus 21: 24].

When I was about three or four, I used to live by that law. I would play in a neighbor's sand box. My brother, only a year older, would throw sand in my face. I would run home, tears streaming down my face, crying to our mother. Our mother would wash my eyes out with water and dry my face. My solution? To run back down the street to the same sand box and throw sand in my brother's eyes. Then he would be the one running home, tears streaming down his face, crying to our mother.

This amounted to the " Sandbox Wars". It got to the point that our mother kept the eye cup on the kitchen windowsill, knowing that each of us, in succession, would be running home with sand in our eyes.

We outgrew this, thank God.

My next strategy was ignoring my brother. We had several years of what amounted to a Cold War.   We built a wall between us. We did not speak.

This sort of violence is not new. Certainly, there is an overwhelming amount of violence in the Bible:

 Cain killing Abel, because God prefers Abel's divine offering to Cain's.

 God asking Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac. Yes, there was human sacrifice in certain cultures at the time.

Isaac's son Esau hating his brother Jacob, because their father favored Jacob; to the point that Esau plotted to kill Jacob.

Jacob's son Joseph being thrown into a pit and left for dead.  Joseph's brothers then decided to sell him into slavery, because that seemed better than killing him.

Then, Jacob' daughter Dinah being raped at Shechem. To avenge Dinah's violent assault, her brothers kill all the males of Shechem.

And all of this occurs only in Genesis. What of the violence that occurs in the rest of the Old Testament?

Let alone the violence of Jesus' death?

It is hard to know how to respond to such violence in the Bible.

There is a dangerous attitude today that, if something happens in the Bible, it must be somehow sanctioned. We see horrific violence and we philosophize, " Well, Cain killed Abel. How are we any different today ?" Our complacency veers towards acceptance.

And today, with the constant streaming of media, violence is ubiquitous. What we would never
tolerate for our children to witness in real life, we cast as "entertainment". We not only accept villains as part of our landscape, we glorify them. Villains are more "complex". More interesting.  Heroes have become " boring".

It is clear that we cannot and must not ignore Evil. St.Paul says in Ephesians 5:11, " Have nothing to do with fruitless deeds of darkness but rather, expose them."  Speaking about Evil is NOT gossip, if the Evil is a criminal offense. We cannot remain silent.

In fact, Martin Luther King said, " He who accepts evil, without protesting against it, is really cooperating with it."

Nor should we fight evil with evil.  Leviticus 19: 17-18 says, " You may have to reprove your fellow citizen, but do not incur sin because of him." With St. Paul, this admonition becomes: " Never repay Evil with Evil. be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody."  [Romans 12:17].

This does not mean that we should let Evil overcome us. Romans 12:21 says, "Be not overcome by Evil, but overcome Evil by good."

Nor should we give up and ignore the evildoer. Jesus says, " If you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?" [Matthew 5: 47].

This is how Jesus' teaching on "an eye for an eye" is so radical. He counsels us not to take revenge by matching "an eye for an eye". No, He goes further. He urges us to love our enemies!

Is this even possible in this world?

I would say to you that it is. The late Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "To our most bitter opponents we say: 'We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We shall meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love you. Throw us in jail and we shall still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you."

I have always said that the Love in my heart is a constant. You cannot do anything to me, to make me hate. What would the world be like if there were only Love? How much Peace would there be if we vowed to love our enemies and prayed for our persecutors?

[Related Posting: "Love Your Enemies", February 22, 2011; " Fulfilling The Law", February 18, 2014].

(c) Spiritual Devotional 2014. All Rights Reserved.