To read the texts click on the texts: 1 Sam 26:2,7-9,12-13,22-23;1 Cor 15:45-49;Lk 6:27-38
The
readings of today place before us two ways of proceeding. The one which calls
for achieving what one wants through violence, and the other which calls for a
peaceful way of getting what one is entitled to.
These
ways are narrated in the first reading of today and in the persons of Abishai
and David. Abishai knows no other way but the way of violence to achieve his
goal. Though David is aware of this way, he prefers to choose instead the way
of peace and concord. Abishai’s way would have polarized David’s kingdom. It
would have resulted in destroying the very thing that David hoped to gain.
Aware of this David chooses the other way namely the way which seeks to acquire
through peace, friendship and forgiveness.
This
is also the way that Jesus proposes in the Gospel text of today, when he
invites those who are willing to listen to him to love their enemies and to
respond to violence with non violence. As a matter of fact, Jesus goes even
further when he challenges his listeners to bless and pray for the very ones
who are violent towards them.
This
challenge is what Paul too places before the Corinthian community and us in the
Second reading of today, when he makes a comparison between the first Adam and
the new Adam. If the first Adam was limited, the new Adam Jesus Christ is
beyond limit. If the first Adam was of the earth, Jesus Christ is from heaven
and if the first Adam was physical and made from dust, Jesus is spiritual and
from above. The challenge then is to be imitators of the new Adam Jesus Christ.
All
too often non violence is seen as cowardice and weakness, and aggression and
violence as courage and strength. However, this is far from the truth. It is in
reality the aggressive and violent who are weak. To seize by force or violence
the objects or goals we desire is often to destroy the very thing we expect to
gain. This is true on the macro canvas of international disputes and also on
the micro canvas of family dynamics. It is sad, however, that on both these
levels the way of Abishai has prevailed and the majority seems to go that way.
One does not need to look further than the nearest newspaper or Television
channel relaying news to see how true this is. So many try to force their way
through various degrees of physical, political, and emotional violence. We find
it difficult to resist the temptation to force our will on others, to retaliate
and even the score. However, as the readings today point out, there is an
alternative way. This is the way of restraint that David practices. It is the
way of forgiveness and non violence advocated by Jesus.
However,
this alternative requires imaginative discernment of God at work in the midst
of our own actions. Qualities of compassion, righteousness, faithfulness, and
trust will appear only when we give up our own attempts to force the future and
instead choose partnership with God, who constantly gives us our future as a
gift and bids us receive it rather than grasp it.
In
our own modern experience, the tendency is to separate human and divine agency
in dealing with the issues of violence and power. There are those of us, on the
one hand, who expect God to make moral decisions for us or to take the crucial
moral actions. We pray for righteousness, peace, and justice but do nothing to
enable it. We treat the Bible as a prescriptive rule book through which we hope
God will direct us. On the other hand, there are those of us who imagine that
human resources and social action alone are adequate to build the future. We
trust only those possibilities that emerge out of empirical data or rational
analysis. We do not trust that God is also at work.
Thus
the challenge before us is to take to heart the way of peace that David took
rather than the way of violence advocated by Abishai. It is to take the way
advocated by Jesus who has shown in and through the Cross that the way of
non-violence and forgiveness is indeed not only the higher way, but the more
practical way. In doing so, we will follow the new Adam who even in the face of
seeming defeat and death has the ability to give victory and life.
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