7th Sunday of Ordinary Time (Lex Talionis)

Today’s Gospel continues where last Sunday’s left off—laying out a Christian code of conduct that we’ve come to call the Sermon on the Mount. One of his teachings declares, “You have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil….” “An eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth’ comes from the Law of Moses (Exodus 21), a moral code that states, ‘you did this to me, so I will enact the same offense against you’.

         This is sometimes referred to as the lex talionis, the law of retaliation. While the idea of forcibly removing eyes and teeth seems barbaric to our modern sensibilities, this new standard that came through Moses was a big step toward civility. Prior to that law, when a member of one tribe injured a member of a different tribe, their vengeance often exceeded the original offense.

The Law established through Moses brought about a more proportionate and thus civilized response and was the moral code Jews upheld in Jesus’ time. Jesus took it farther, saying, offer no resistance when someone commits offense against you. Early Christians found this command difficult, and we still do.

But too often we tend to function according to the lex talionis, rather than rising up to where Jesus is calling us. When people treat us kindly, we tend to match their kindness, and likewise, when people are unpleasant to us.

Occasionally someone will describe to me that they and their spouse have grown tepid toward one another, distant hearts, and despite their desire for things to be better, they don’t know how to make it so. I tell them to just jump-in and display warmth and intimacy, even if it feels odd. I also tell them to not hold an expectation that somehow that warmth is going to be reciprocated, because what can so easily happen when it’s not, is that we feel hurt and once again resolutely determine to go back to the tepid state, hearts closed off. I tell them to stay with it, to keep expressing warmth and love, and that likely, over time, the other spouse will more likely begin to respond in kind.

In thinking about how we function in the lex talionis, I think of situations in which one spouse has admitted to using hurtful and insulting language to the other. Often this is born as a response to frustration or feeling hurt, due to negligence or lack of consideration from their spouse. In feeling hurt, their hurtful and insulting language, a dagger of sorts, serves as an indirect way of expressing their hurt. And what they tend to find is that it does nothing to improve the relationship, and further, while lashing out was momentarily satisfying, it leaves us feeling regretful.

Finally, I think also of how in the age of electronic communication, we can impulsively respond to an e-mail or post that hurts or offends us, doing so in kind. Wisdom tells us instead, to exercise temperance and to hold off before responding, perhaps even sleep on it.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus uses tax collectors as a standard, above which his disciples are called. For us, while the culture around us may settle for operating according to the lex talionis, Jesus is calling to something higher.

And as for loving and praying for our enemies—those we find it so hard to love—understand that we are not praying that they thrive in whatever way they trouble us. Instead, I suggest you pray for them this way: “God, I pray that he knows how much you love him and that he is your beloved son”. It's a beautiful thing to pray for anyone. If any of us truly understood how much God loved us and if we truly saw ourselves as a beloved child, it would change everything for us. And if your enemy or those you find it so hard to love truly understood it, they would no longer be your enemy or a source of angst.

          Jesus says, “… I say to you, offer no resistance to one who is evil.” Clearly, this command to rise above the evil perpetrated against us is not so much for the benefit of those upon whom we might exact our revenge, but instead for ourselves. The purpose of Jesus’ command is to protect our hearts, that they might not be shaped by anger and hatred, but instead be hearts that are being shaped for God’s eternity. For it is from such hearts that he will live in us and that His Kingdom will be built.