AGAINST NATURE
“But I say unto
you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate
you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.” Matt. 5:44
Non-resistance to evil is profoundly offensive to our
nature, but to obey the teachings of Christ means that our nature will come to
feel disgust for what now pleases us, and find happiness in what now fills us
with horror and only comes from a true salvation. His every word takes for
granted this total renovation of the human spirit: He fearlessly contradicts
our most ordinary inclinations and the deepest of our instincts. He praises
what everyone avoids. He condemns what all men seek. He not only gives the lie
to what men teach (often very different from what they really think and do),
but He contradicts what they actually think and do every day.
Jesus
does not believe in the perfection of the natural soul, of the original soul (Matt. 5:48). He believes in its future
perfection, only to be reached by a complete overturning of its present nature.
His task is the reform of man; more than that, the making-over of man. This is
His threefold work that He came to perform for the Godhead. With Him begins the
new race; He is the model, the arch-type, the Adam of humanity remodeled and
recast. “And so it is written, The first
man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.”
(1 Cor. 15:45). The first Adam was
the head of a race. The last Adam is the Head of a race, and He is the last,
because there will be no new departure, no other federal headship, and no other
race.
Socrates
tried to reform the mind, Moses the law, others went no further than altering a
ritual, a code, a system, a science; but Jesus did not aim at changing one part
of man but the whole man from top to bottom, changing the inner man who is the
motive-power and origin of all the facts and the words of the world. Therefore
we need not expect Him to compromise or to charm. He will make no concessions
to evil and imperfect nature; He will not find specious reasons to justify it as
the philosophers do. You cannot serve Jesus and the old nature. He who stands
with Jesus is against the old animal nature and is working for the higher
nature which must conquer it. Everything else is idle talk, dust and ashes.
Nothing is more common among men than the thirst for
riches. To heap up money by any means, even the most infamous, has always
seemed the sweetest and most respectable of occupations. But he who wishes to
come with me, said Jesus, must go and sell that which he has and give it to the
poor and he shall have treasures in Heaven. Poverty is the first requisite for
the citizenship of the Kingdom. “Jesus
said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to
the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.” (Matt.
19:21)
All men anxiously take thought for the future. They are
always afraid lest the ground give way under their feet, lest there may not be
enough bread to last to the next harvest. 'They fear that they will not have
enough clothes to cover their bodies and the bodies of their children. But
Jesus teaches us, "Take therefore no
thought for the morrow: sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." (Matt. 6:34)
Every man would like to stand first even among his
equals. He wishes to be superior to those who surround him, to command, to
dominate, to seem greater, richer, handsomer, and wiser. The whole history of
men is only the terror of standing second; but Jesus teaches us, "And whosoever of you will be the greatest
shall be servant of all." (Mark
10:44) The greatest is the smallest, the most powerful shall serve the
weakest, he who exalts himself shall be humbled, and he who humbles himself
shall be exalted. (vs. 43)
Vanity is another universal curse of men. It poisons even
their good actions, because nearly always they perform those insignificant good
actions so that they may be seen. They do evil secretly and good openly. Jesus
commands us to do just the opposite. "But
when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth; . .
. And when thou pray, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to
pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that
they may be seen of men. . . . But thou, when thou pray, enter into thy closet.
. . . Moreover when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance:
for they disguise their faces that they may appear to fast. . . . But thou,
when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face." (Matt. 6:3-7) The
instinct of self-preservation is the strongest of all those which dominate us.
No shame, cruelty or cowardice is too much for us to pay for the safety of this
handful of animated dust. But Jesus tells us: "For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever
will lose his life for My sake the same shall save it." (Matt. 16:25) For what we call life is
not true life and he who gives up his soul ruins also the flesh which houses
it.
Every one of us has a hankering to judge his fellows. To
sit in judgment makes us feel that we are above those judged, better, more
righteous, innocent. To accuse others is like saying, "We are not thus." As a matter of fact
it is always the hunchbacks who first cry out on those whose shoulders are a
little bent. But Jesus says, "Judge
not that ye be not judged, condemn not and ye shall not be condemned, forgive
and ye shall be forgiven." (Luke
6:37)
Every man boasts of being really manly, that is, a grave,
mature, wise, and substantial, worthy person, who understands the nature of
things and who can reason and have an opinion on all subjects. A speech that is
too sincere is said to be childish; a simple person is scornfully called
childish. But when the disciples asked Him who is the greatest in the Kingdom
of Heaven, Jesus answered, "Verily I
say unto you, whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God as a little child
shall in no wise enter therein." (Luke
18:17)
The serious-minded man, the devout, the pure, the
Pharisee, avoids if possible the company of sinners, of the fallen, of the
defiled, and receives as equals at his table only the righteous. But Jesus
tirelessly announces that He has come to seek for sinners and not for the
righteous, the bad and not the good, and He feels no shame in sitting down to
dinner in the house of the publican, where a prostitute anoints his feet. The truly pure man cannot
be corrupted by the corrupt, and does not feel that for fear of soiling his
garments he needs leave them to die in their own vileness.
The greed of men is so great that everyone
tries to take
as much as he can from others and to give back as little. Everyone
seeks to possess; praises of generosity are only an attempt to cover
professional beggary with a decent mask; but Jesus affirms, "It is better to give than to
receive." (Acts 20:35)
All of us hate most of the people we know. We hate them because they have more than
we, because they will not give us all we would like to have,
because they do not pay enough attention to us, because they are different from
us; in a word, because they exist. We even go so far as to hate our friends,
even our benefactors. And Jesus commands us to love men, to love them all, to love even those who
hate us.*
No one who disobeys this command can call himself a Christian; though
he is on the point of death if he does not love his slayer, he has no right to
call himself a Christian.
Love
for ourselves, the origin of our hatred for others includes all other
tendencies and passions. He who conquers self-love, and the hatred toward
others, is already entirely transformed; the rest flows from this as a natural
consequence. Hatred toward oneself and love for enemies is the beginning and
end of Christianity. The greatest victory over the fierce, blind, brutal man of
olden days is this and nothing else. Men cannot be born again into the
happiness of peace until they love those who have offended against them. To love your
enemies is the only way to leave not one enemy
on earth.* (Matt. 5:44)
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