This morning’s sermon in church was based on Luke 14:25-35. Kevin Murray began by noting that many have trouble with the way Jesus expresses himself in verse 26:
If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters – yes, even his own life – he cannot be my disciple.
It is pretty obvious for any fair-minded person who is familiar with Jesus’ teaching that he is not really asking people to treat their family members with contempt. For example, elsewhere Jesus insists on the importance of honouring one’s parents and he even requires his disciples to love their enemies. But even in making such prefatory words I am in danger of diluting the force of what Jesus is saying. So let’s put such a qualification to one side for the moment and ask ourselves how we should interpret verse 26 in a way that does justice to what Jesus is saying.
There are different ways of explaining this:
1. That when Jesus speaks of “hate” he really means “love less.”
Some argue that the verb translated as “hate” here, namely miseo, is better rendered “love less”, but this is a weak attempt to explain things away given the force of the verse that immediately follows: “And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.” Besides, Jesus statement does not involve a direct comparison. That is, Jesus does not explicitly speak in terms of loving family members and self less than loving himself, even if this idea is implicit.
Similarly, some argue that for the Jewish people there was no word for “liking” someone; that they spoke in absolutes so that to say “hate” is effectively to mean “love less.”
There is some basis for this position. In Genesis 29:30 we are told Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah, while the very next verse states: “The LORD saw that Leah was hated.”
2. That Jesus is using hyperbole.
The first explanation is wooden and reads Jesus’ language in a literalistic fashion. As we have noted the ensuing context makes it clear that Jesus is deliberately using words that have shock value. To say that Jesus means “love less” or to re-translate the sentence replacing “hate” with “love less” is to fail to come to terms with the impact Jesus is seeking to have upon his hearers. It is rather the case that Jesus is using hyperbole, deliberate exaggeration. This is a perfectly acceptable way of communicating and it is a pity that Christians who lack an adequate feel for the rich way in which language can be use, feel uncomfortable with Jesus using hyperbole, perhaps because they to them it smacks of inaccuracy or even falsehood.
However, what is often missed by commentators is the fact that Jesus’s language is not merely an instance of hyperbole but is also recasting a famous Old Testament text. In Deuteronomy 13:6 God communicates through Moses the following demand:
If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods that neither you nor your fathers have known, gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far, from one end of the land to the other), do not yield to him or listen to him. Show him no pity. Do not spare him or shield him. You must certainly put him to death. Your hand must be the first in putting him to death, and then the hands of all the people. Stone him to death, because he tried to turn you away from the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. Then all Israel will hear and be afraid, and no one among you will do such an evil thing again.
These words belong to a context in which such enticements are God’s way of testing his people “to find out whether [they] love him with all [their] heart and with all [their] soul” (Deuteronomy 13:3). Note carefully the very next words: “It is the LORD your God you must follow, and him you must revere” (verse 4).
The significance of who Jesus is radically changes the way in which this test will work. No longer is the preservation of the purity of theocratic Israel the thing that matters. So Jesus now inverts the direction of Deuteronomy 13 in a most extraordinary way that explains why he adds “and even his own life.” For following the Lord now requires not the killing of family members who commit idolatry, but rather the willingness to forfeit one\’s own life. Indeed, Jesus even implies that the ‘hating’ of family members involved in following him as Lord, may well place one’s own life in jeopardy. World and contemporary history is replete with examples of people who have been murdered by their own families simply for deciding to follow Jesus. Every year this fate befalls many thousands of people around the globe.
Jesus’ reworking or updating of Deuteronomy 13 carries massive implications. Jesus implicitly identifies himself with Yahweh and he insinuates that to fail to follow him and to put family first before him is idolatrous behaviour.
www.facetofaceintercultural.com.au
Posted November 22, 2009
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