Nonviolence or "law of the gift"? (Matthew 5:38-42)

"Turn the other cheek" is one of those phrases that come to mean something quite different from what they were intended to say in their original context. Once this happens, a clear reading of the original context can become difficult to achieve as well. In this gospel (Mt 5:38-42), we conventionally understand and react to Jesus' words in one of two ways, at least in part because of our familiar reactions to the expression "turn the other cheek." First, we might pay lip service to a kind of passive non-violence, a meek self-resignation that supposedly mimics what Jesus would do. This is a reading that has given a bad name to the Christian faith, incidentally, as testified by the likes of Friedrich Nietzsche's vehement critique of a pusillanimous Christianity, a religion for weaklings and failures. Alternatively, we are tempted to explain away this passage as a case of Jesus' well-known use of hyperbole: "of course he does not really mean that we should give our cloak to someone who sues us ... he is only trying to teach us the right attitude. After all, there are times when we really have to defend ourselves ..."

Although the non-violent reading can be redeemed from its weakness in the light of Gandhi's active non-violence guided by satyagraha, and although there are certainly occasions when natural law not only permits but requires that we defend ourselves, both directions of interpretation might be missing the central point of the passage. Let us read it carefully. Jesus first introduces the "one who is evil" (Mt 5:39), who first strikes us, then we offer the other cheek; who first sues us for our coat, then we are to give him our cloak; who first compels us to walk a mile, then we willingly go a second. Curiously, we are to give our enemy what he actually might not want even if he could have it! We grant him not only what is compelled, what he sees as justice for his cause (n.b. that Jesus began this passage with a reference to the lex talionis, the equal balancing of "eye for eye" and "tooth for tooth" [Mt 5:38]), but also something that we give freely, that he did not request (and might even reject as unwanted or uncomfortable!): the other cheek, the unsought cloak, the extra mile.

Seen in the light of Pope John Paul II's idea of "law of the gift" (i.e., that our ultimate fulfillment as persons comes from the gift of ourselves to others, just as the person of the Trinity give themselves to each other), we can begin to understand "turning the other cheek" in a new way. The "other" compels me to something. Neither passive nor active non-violence is a complete response, however. Jesus challenges me to make a free gift of myself, after having given under compulsion, for only in freedom can love be expressed, and only love can establish the personal, personalist relationship with the "one who is evil." God has chosen to use this relationship, in turn, to communicate his love even for the malicious sinner, the unjust persecutor.

It is telling that this passage ends with Jesus' command to "give to him who begs from you, and do not refuse him who would borrow from you" (Mt 5:42). We would not instinctively classify the beggar as "evil," yet the context of the passage suggests that Jesus identifies the one who begs or borrows as an extension of the selfish enemy. So, then, the "one who is evil" is a person in need, who by his striking us, taking us to court, compelling us to walk the mile, is actually begging, begging so often without knowing, longing for the love than only God can give--a love that God has chosen to impart through us when we make that gift of self to others, no matter how undeserving they may seem. We are frail instruments, but are nevertheless God's hands and arms in the world of men.

Honesty with Jesus (Mark 11:27-33)

So often, when we read of Jesus' encounters with "scribes and elders," we are quick to assume on their part a conscious hypocrisy, a deliberate ploy to trip Jesus up, to catch him in his words and expose him as a fraud. Then, we read Jesus' response as a piercing, almost Solomonic repartee which exposes the bad faith of his questioners. Several examples from the gospels come to mind: the attempt to trick Jesus about the lawfulness of taxation (Lk 20:20-26), the disingenuous query "But who is my neighbor?" (Lk 10:25-37), and the episode at hand (Mk 11:27-33) in which "the chief priests and the scribes and the elders" demand to know "by what authority" Jesus performs miracles and teaches the people.

In this last example, it is tempting to identify the questioners' motives as a mix of intended deceit and excessive legalism. Their obsession with authority betrays the true type of their religion: a cold, empty system of laws that constrict the freedom proper to the life of the spirit. Threatened by Jesus, they aim to silence him by a question that will force him either to make an outrageous claim about his own identity or to retreat in humiliation.

So runs a usual reading, and probably much in it is correct. But what if we take the side of the scribes and elders for a moment? What if we give them the benefit of the doubt that, in the beginning at least, they meant their question seriously? For honest believers of any faith, "authority" is not a dirty word, but rather an idea that must be taken in earnest. It is a question of nothing less than the source of truth itself, and hence of the reliability of the truth one strives to accept. Jesus' words were compelling, and certainly had much of the ring of truth about them. Even (or especially!) the scribes and elders sensed this. Hence, their question was not unreasonable. Indeed, one could argue that it was necessary, that they would have been irresponsible not to ask it.

Seen in this light, Jesus' counterquestion about the source of John the Baptist's ministry was not so much a tactic to expose the questioners' legalistic religious or intent to deceive (or both), as rather a test of their courage. Their deliberations reveal that they believed that John's baptism was from men, not God. Had they truthfully admitted this to Jesus, in brave honesty, an authentic conversation might have ensued, as for example in Jesus' encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well (Jn 4:4-42). But fear of human respect (what would the people say if the authorities declared John's baptism to be not of God?) led them to a cowardly "We do not know."

We can converse with Jesus only if we are honest with ourselves and with him, and if we are willing to be so--and this is the most difficult part--even in the sight of others. This is all the more difficult when we are "at odds" with Jesus (and who of us is not?), as were the woman at the well and the scribes and elders in the gospel at hand. Ultimately, honesty flows from trust, and leads to a joyous humility that transcends worry about what others will think. Herein lies the crucial difference between the reactions of the Samaritan woman on the one hand and the authorities questioning John's baptism on the other. The woman trusted Jesus with the shameful details of her broken past and present, so much so that she ran back to tell her neighbors excitedly about Jesus, simultaneously but without embarrassment reminding them of her sinful personal history: he "told me all that I ever did" (Jn 4:29). And this holy humiliation in turn opened her eyes to tne possibility of Jesus' messiahship: "Can this be the Christ?". The scribes and elders, on the other hand, feared too much to acknowledge to Jesus their honest, even if mistaken, appraisal of John the Baptist. Consequently, their only committal is to professed, pretended ignorance: "We do not know" (Mk 11:33).

As Jesus warns elsewhere, lukewarmness--in this case, the refusal to commit oneself to an honest answer, for fear of the consequences--is far worse than being on the wrong side as hot or cold (Rev 3:16). Honesty with Jesus may at first find our hearts not in unison with his. However, it is an indispensable prerequisite for an authentic dialogue, a conversation that may and should continue until our last breath, and lead us to everlasting communion with this great lover of souls.