Resist Not

 

"Resist not the evil one... Love your enemies." ~Master Jesus

Jesus did not speak these words for our enemy's sake, but for our sake. He came to save us, not from our enemies, but from ourselves. Yet his words of healing make us very uncomfortable.

Ironically, the deepest comfort of the mind is having an enemy. The sensation of resistance against an other makes our ego feel alive. The ego is most at home when it has an enemy.

Each of us might ask, "To what extent is my identity formed by resistance against an other? Who would I be if I had no enemy?"

To encounter the other in a love that has no enemy, because it holds no resistance, is the purest political action, more radical than any ideology of the left or the right. For ideology does not inspire action, but re-action, using the other as a stereotype to confirm our belief.

The most radical act is to be present. Presence is the revolutionary breath of love. In this destroying fire, the other is no long judged as a 'white' or a 'black,' a Muslim or a Christian, an immigrant or a native, a Republican or a Democrat. The other is a Person.



Painting: Face of Jesus by Rembrandt