The challenge
Love is one of the buzz words of our times: "It's all about love."
But in reality, this noble emotion is not always that simple to profess. Sure, it's easy and fun to love people you enjoy, but how about those you dislike and loathe? How do you love the people you hate?
The answer requires discipline and inner work. What follows is a six-step program, culled from centuries of Jewish writings, that might assist you on your journey toward escaping the traps of hate and guide our collective attempt to quench the blazes of discord and animosity that plague so many a community and family, as discussed in last week's essay, "Flames of Hatred".
Step One: Know Thy Self
Much anger and hate stem not from another person's misbehavior, but from our own shortcomings. When we suffer from insecurity, or from an inflated ego, it is emotionally painful to handle another person's distinct identity and success. We then justify our hate by finding fault with the other person, but its true cause lies in our own inability to make peace with ourselves and our position in this world.
One of the great spiritual masters once said, "When you are short and you wish to feel tall, you have two choices. You can stand up on a chair, or you can shove your friend into a pit."(1) Another master once remarked to a Jew who complained that everybody "steps" on him: "Your ego is spread all over the place," said the master, "so wherever anybody treads, you perceive it as though he were treading on you."(2)
To avoid these pitfalls, we must cultivate a genuine relationship with ourselves and with G-d. People with aplomb learn to tolerate the otherness and success of a second individual without feeling the need for animosity.
When you are certain (through your own honest assessment, as well as the assessment of an objective, non-biased person) that it is indeed the other person's actions, not your ego, that is fueling the hate, it is time for step two.
Step Two: Changing the instinct to condemn
Upon observing another person doing or saying something we perceive as undesirable or destructive, many of us instinctively assume that negative motives are compelling these acts and words. We naturally believe that the person is aware of the damage he is creating, and despite this he is doing it for his own benefit.
This attitude has plagued us for millennia and has caused untold harm and divisiveness in communities. Learn to judge people favorably, to attribute positive, or at least neutral, motives to their acts and words.(3) Say to yourself, "His (or her) behavior might appear wrong; but in his own mind and heart he really thinks he is doing the right thing."
This approach of condemning the behavior, but not the person, is counterintuitive, but it is tremendously beneficial for two reasons:
A) When you are able to alter your attitude, you will not become resentful. When you attribute evil motives to a person performing a negative act, your brain instinctively swells with negative energy. On the other hand, if you train yourself to view the person, unlike his behavior, in a positive light, you save your heart from being consumed by ire; and
B) You will be in a much better position to communicate your feelings to this person without compelling him to construct defense mechanisms and reciprocate your rebuke with stubbornness and anger. When he feels that inside your heart you don't view him as a "bad guy" who craves destruction, only as a "good guy" who made an error, your criticism will most likely be more effective.
This means that if you are truly bothered by what this person did, the best way to eliminate such behavior in the future is to judge him favorably. People who judge others negatively make it more difficult to effect a change in their attitude and behavior.
Step Three: Open Discussion
Now, once you attribute positive motives to the person who caused hurt, you ought to confront this person and make it known to him what made his behavior or verbiage objectionable, since in his mind it may have been a constructive act. Make sure that he fully grasps your message and perspective. As long as you have not spoken to him, he may continue to assume that he is doing the right thing. Oftentimes, even if you have spoken to him, he may have misunderstood or disagreed with your message. He may see things differently than you do. Therefore, even if he repeats his former behavior again and again, you have no justification to hate him, since in his own mind he is still acting meritoriously. He is not an evil man; he is a man who makes mistakes, sometimes big ones.
A personal example might crystallize the point. I once worked for a person who would yell at me publicly. First, I attempted to judge him favorably (step two). Then, I proceeded with the next step and confronted this person, explaining to him why this behavior was unacceptable. After a while, however, I realized that this person was suffering from so many psychological distortions, that he was not in the position of understanding the world as anything but his own mirror. I have since created firm boundaries in order to protect myself, but I know very well that I have no justification to hate this person.
Only after you are one hundred percent certain that the person involved fully understands that his behavior was wrong, and you find that he repeats the behavior, are you entitled to conclude that he is acting viciously. Only then have you demonstrated that the evil behavior stems from evil intent.
What do you do now?
Step Four: Hate and love
In our society, we are often instructed to "hate the behavior but love the perpetrator." However, unless you are dealing with yourself or your child, where the intense love makes you turn a blind eye to negative behavior, this approach is more of a sound bite than a reality. If you really hate the behavior, you must hate its progenitor -- the evil within the person that initially gave birth to this behavior.
As long as you attributed positive or neutral motives to the person (step two), you can condemn the behavior while casting its perpetrator in a positive light. But once it has been established (via step three) that evil motives caused the behavior and not ignorance or oversight, this differentiation between the person and his behavior is no longer rationally possible.
When evil exists within a human being, Judaism teaches that we ought to loathe and despise that evil.(4) We are permitted and instructed to hate that part of the person that compels him to engage in intentionally selfish and immoral behavior. To accept and embrace the evil within an individual is to ensure its continued existence; to hate and shun human evil is an act of morality and goodness.
Yet, coupled with our hate, we must always remember that individuals all have a duality. The human story is a tale of two souls. Each of us is a composite of Freud's Id and of Moses' Yid. Each of us possesses a beastly consciousness, a self-centered and self-oriented psyche, which, if not educated and refined, can develop into a monster. But we also possess a divine soul, a transcendental spirit, a "fragment of G-d," that yearns for truth and idealism.
Even while a person engages willingly in negative behavior due to the beastly, evil force controlling him, there is another part to his psyche, however latent, that is protesting his behavior at that very moment. And that part we must love and cherish.
When the Torah commands us(5) "Love your fellow man like yourself," it is referring even to the person whom the same Torah enjoins us to loathe. We must hate the evil and immorality within him and love the good and the G-dliness within him. In fact, on that level, we are one, since each of our souls is a "piece" of one G-d.
This dual approach advocated in Judaism has many powerful implications. For example, if the person you hate needs a favor, you will do it for him with a sincere heart. Since there is a part of him that you genuinely love, you can honestly treat him as a friend, not an enemy.
Step Five: Empathy for an exiled soul
But how do we love and hate the same individual simultaneously? Since intuitively, we do not view another human being as a composite of two distinct forces, but as a holistic unified organism, how do we sustain paradoxical emotions toward the same being? How do we ensure that our justified hate does not eclipse or eliminate the required love?
The answer is, by introducing the notion of compassion toward this person's inner divine soul.
Think to yourself: If I, a stranger, feel so much repulsion by this person's inner evil, how much suffering must his own G-dly soul be experiencing due to this evil? After all, I have the choice to separate from him, but his divine soul doesn't have this choice. Can I even begin to fathom how much pain the "fragment of G-d" within this person must endure by being exiled in an evil human prison?
When you learn to develop a feeling of empathy for the divine light existing within this human being, your love toward him, inspired by this inner divine light will not falter or die.
Step Six: Honoring the Struggle
One may love, one may hate (under the above unique circumstances), one may rebuke. But there is one feeling that the Torah urges one to avoid: the sense of superiority toward a fellow human being, even someone who has succumbed to the evil within himself and allowed it to take control over his behavior.
When you reflect on the truth that you have never experienced the circumstances and struggles of this sinner, you come to realize that, though his behavior may be negative and though he may be accountable for this negativity, you cannot be certain that if you had shared this person's life and challenges, you would not have behaved the same, or possibly even worse.
Our sages put it wisely: "Don't judge (meaning, don't feel superior toward) another human being until you reach his space."(6) Remarked one of the masters, the Sefas Emes: "And you will never reach his space."(7) He may be guilty, but you don't have the right to feel superior.(8)
[My thanks to Shmuel Levin, a writer and editor in Pittsburgh, for his editorial assistance.]
Footnotes:
1) Said by Rabbi Shmuel of Lubavitch to his six-year-old son, when he shoved his younger but taller brother into a pit.
2) Said by the Tzemach Tzedek to a disciple.
3) This is a directive given by our sages in Ethics of the Fathers, 1:6.
4) See Pesachim 113b; Rambam, Hilchos Rotzach at the end; Sefer HaChenuchMitzvah 80; Shulchan Aruch Choshen Mishpat 272:11.
5) Leviticus 19:18.
6) Ethics of Our Fathers, 2:4.
7) Commentary by the renowned Chassidic master Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter of Gur (1847-1905).
8) This essay is based primarily on Tanya (by Rabbi Schnuer Zalman of Liadi, author of the Schulchan Aruch HaRav) chapters 30 and 32, and his interpretation of the sources quoted in footnote # 4.
Copyright by Yosef Y. Jacobson
Love is one of the buzz words of our times: "It's all about love."
But in reality, this noble emotion is not always that simple to profess. Sure, it's easy and fun to love people you enjoy, but how about those you dislike and loathe? How do you love the people you hate?
The answer requires discipline and inner work. What follows is a six-step program, culled from centuries of Jewish writings, that might assist you on your journey toward escaping the traps of hate and guide our collective attempt to quench the blazes of discord and animosity that plague so many a community and family, as discussed in last week's essay, "Flames of Hatred".
Step One: Know Thy Self
Much anger and hate stem not from another person's misbehavior, but from our own shortcomings. When we suffer from insecurity, or from an inflated ego, it is emotionally painful to handle another person's distinct identity and success. We then justify our hate by finding fault with the other person, but its true cause lies in our own inability to make peace with ourselves and our position in this world.
One of the great spiritual masters once said, "When you are short and you wish to feel tall, you have two choices. You can stand up on a chair, or you can shove your friend into a pit."(1) Another master once remarked to a Jew who complained that everybody "steps" on him: "Your ego is spread all over the place," said the master, "so wherever anybody treads, you perceive it as though he were treading on you."(2)
To avoid these pitfalls, we must cultivate a genuine relationship with ourselves and with G-d. People with aplomb learn to tolerate the otherness and success of a second individual without feeling the need for animosity.
When you are certain (through your own honest assessment, as well as the assessment of an objective, non-biased person) that it is indeed the other person's actions, not your ego, that is fueling the hate, it is time for step two.
Step Two: Changing the instinct to condemn
Upon observing another person doing or saying something we perceive as undesirable or destructive, many of us instinctively assume that negative motives are compelling these acts and words. We naturally believe that the person is aware of the damage he is creating, and despite this he is doing it for his own benefit.
This attitude has plagued us for millennia and has caused untold harm and divisiveness in communities. Learn to judge people favorably, to attribute positive, or at least neutral, motives to their acts and words.(3) Say to yourself, "His (or her) behavior might appear wrong; but in his own mind and heart he really thinks he is doing the right thing."
This approach of condemning the behavior, but not the person, is counterintuitive, but it is tremendously beneficial for two reasons:
A) When you are able to alter your attitude, you will not become resentful. When you attribute evil motives to a person performing a negative act, your brain instinctively swells with negative energy. On the other hand, if you train yourself to view the person, unlike his behavior, in a positive light, you save your heart from being consumed by ire; and
B) You will be in a much better position to communicate your feelings to this person without compelling him to construct defense mechanisms and reciprocate your rebuke with stubbornness and anger. When he feels that inside your heart you don't view him as a "bad guy" who craves destruction, only as a "good guy" who made an error, your criticism will most likely be more effective.
This means that if you are truly bothered by what this person did, the best way to eliminate such behavior in the future is to judge him favorably. People who judge others negatively make it more difficult to effect a change in their attitude and behavior.
Step Three: Open Discussion
Now, once you attribute positive motives to the person who caused hurt, you ought to confront this person and make it known to him what made his behavior or verbiage objectionable, since in his mind it may have been a constructive act. Make sure that he fully grasps your message and perspective. As long as you have not spoken to him, he may continue to assume that he is doing the right thing. Oftentimes, even if you have spoken to him, he may have misunderstood or disagreed with your message. He may see things differently than you do. Therefore, even if he repeats his former behavior again and again, you have no justification to hate him, since in his own mind he is still acting meritoriously. He is not an evil man; he is a man who makes mistakes, sometimes big ones.
A personal example might crystallize the point. I once worked for a person who would yell at me publicly. First, I attempted to judge him favorably (step two). Then, I proceeded with the next step and confronted this person, explaining to him why this behavior was unacceptable. After a while, however, I realized that this person was suffering from so many psychological distortions, that he was not in the position of understanding the world as anything but his own mirror. I have since created firm boundaries in order to protect myself, but I know very well that I have no justification to hate this person.
Only after you are one hundred percent certain that the person involved fully understands that his behavior was wrong, and you find that he repeats the behavior, are you entitled to conclude that he is acting viciously. Only then have you demonstrated that the evil behavior stems from evil intent.
What do you do now?
Step Four: Hate and love
In our society, we are often instructed to "hate the behavior but love the perpetrator." However, unless you are dealing with yourself or your child, where the intense love makes you turn a blind eye to negative behavior, this approach is more of a sound bite than a reality. If you really hate the behavior, you must hate its progenitor -- the evil within the person that initially gave birth to this behavior.
As long as you attributed positive or neutral motives to the person (step two), you can condemn the behavior while casting its perpetrator in a positive light. But once it has been established (via step three) that evil motives caused the behavior and not ignorance or oversight, this differentiation between the person and his behavior is no longer rationally possible.
When evil exists within a human being, Judaism teaches that we ought to loathe and despise that evil.(4) We are permitted and instructed to hate that part of the person that compels him to engage in intentionally selfish and immoral behavior. To accept and embrace the evil within an individual is to ensure its continued existence; to hate and shun human evil is an act of morality and goodness.
Yet, coupled with our hate, we must always remember that individuals all have a duality. The human story is a tale of two souls. Each of us is a composite of Freud's Id and of Moses' Yid. Each of us possesses a beastly consciousness, a self-centered and self-oriented psyche, which, if not educated and refined, can develop into a monster. But we also possess a divine soul, a transcendental spirit, a "fragment of G-d," that yearns for truth and idealism.
Even while a person engages willingly in negative behavior due to the beastly, evil force controlling him, there is another part to his psyche, however latent, that is protesting his behavior at that very moment. And that part we must love and cherish.
When the Torah commands us(5) "Love your fellow man like yourself," it is referring even to the person whom the same Torah enjoins us to loathe. We must hate the evil and immorality within him and love the good and the G-dliness within him. In fact, on that level, we are one, since each of our souls is a "piece" of one G-d.
This dual approach advocated in Judaism has many powerful implications. For example, if the person you hate needs a favor, you will do it for him with a sincere heart. Since there is a part of him that you genuinely love, you can honestly treat him as a friend, not an enemy.
Step Five: Empathy for an exiled soul
But how do we love and hate the same individual simultaneously? Since intuitively, we do not view another human being as a composite of two distinct forces, but as a holistic unified organism, how do we sustain paradoxical emotions toward the same being? How do we ensure that our justified hate does not eclipse or eliminate the required love?
The answer is, by introducing the notion of compassion toward this person's inner divine soul.
Think to yourself: If I, a stranger, feel so much repulsion by this person's inner evil, how much suffering must his own G-dly soul be experiencing due to this evil? After all, I have the choice to separate from him, but his divine soul doesn't have this choice. Can I even begin to fathom how much pain the "fragment of G-d" within this person must endure by being exiled in an evil human prison?
When you learn to develop a feeling of empathy for the divine light existing within this human being, your love toward him, inspired by this inner divine light will not falter or die.
Step Six: Honoring the Struggle
One may love, one may hate (under the above unique circumstances), one may rebuke. But there is one feeling that the Torah urges one to avoid: the sense of superiority toward a fellow human being, even someone who has succumbed to the evil within himself and allowed it to take control over his behavior.
When you reflect on the truth that you have never experienced the circumstances and struggles of this sinner, you come to realize that, though his behavior may be negative and though he may be accountable for this negativity, you cannot be certain that if you had shared this person's life and challenges, you would not have behaved the same, or possibly even worse.
Our sages put it wisely: "Don't judge (meaning, don't feel superior toward) another human being until you reach his space."(6) Remarked one of the masters, the Sefas Emes: "And you will never reach his space."(7) He may be guilty, but you don't have the right to feel superior.(8)
[My thanks to Shmuel Levin, a writer and editor in Pittsburgh, for his editorial assistance.]
Footnotes:
1) Said by Rabbi Shmuel of Lubavitch to his six-year-old son, when he shoved his younger but taller brother into a pit.
2) Said by the Tzemach Tzedek to a disciple.
3) This is a directive given by our sages in Ethics of the Fathers, 1:6.
4) See Pesachim 113b; Rambam, Hilchos Rotzach at the end; Sefer HaChenuchMitzvah 80; Shulchan Aruch Choshen Mishpat 272:11.
5) Leviticus 19:18.
6) Ethics of Our Fathers, 2:4.
7) Commentary by the renowned Chassidic master Rabbi Yehudah Aryeh Leib Alter of Gur (1847-1905).
8) This essay is based primarily on Tanya (by Rabbi Schnuer Zalman of Liadi, author of the Schulchan Aruch HaRav) chapters 30 and 32, and his interpretation of the sources quoted in footnote # 4.
Copyright by Yosef Y. Jacobson