Don’t hate me because I’m…
Since our church is participating in that One Prayer thing, I’ve been thinking a lot more about unity in the body of Christ, and also about unity in my life. You see, I like people. I like a lot of people. I love a lot of people. But there are some that I just don’t like - Even Christians (or should I say, especially Christians).
So then I run into this verse yesterday with my small group: 1 John 2:9-11 – “Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness; he does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded him.”
So here’s the thing – I like a lot of people, but even though I’m pretty friendly and like a lot of people, there are still some people in my life that I choose not to be around a lot for various reasons. I’m sure many of these people also choose not to be around me. One might even say that I don’t like them and they don’t like me. Simple question today for a simple Friday:
Is “don’t like” different than “hate”?
Related posts:
Of course “don’t like” is different from “hate”. Now, I doubt I’m a deep enough thinker to really make a dictionary-perfect definition. But I tend to use “don’t like” when I am talking about individuals and I use the term “hate” when I am talking about groups of individuals. So there are some individuals I don’t like, but I really don’t think there are any people I hate because when I think of hate, I think in terms of, say, the Nazis and the Jews. Or the Hutus and the Tutsis. Or the Palestinians and the Jews. Or what is now close to becoming the Muslims and the Western World.
OK… now, that said… I am very conscious of our ability to justify the most errant nonsense so we can think we’re doing the next right thing when we are, in fact, only doing what we WANT to be doing in the first place.
So… if there are people I really don’t like, how does that change the way I behave towards them? Well, there is a spiritual axiom that says, “whenever I am disturbed, no matter what the cause, there is something wrong with ME”. So, in the ideal world, I will try to think WHY it is that I hold a dislike for the person… and you know what? Usually it boils down to character defects. Now hold onto your horses… more specifically, it is usually some character defect in myself that I am seeing in another person that causes me to dislike them.
And when I can go through the whole process of analyzing all this crap, while I still may not like such people, I can at least understand what the reason is, and my behavior towards them does change from one of perhaps resenting them to being able to accept them for who they are, with their defects and all.
Some very interesting thoughts UR. Specifically your thoughts on not liking an individual but hating a group of people. I think that thought process breaks down eventually, but I see where you’re coming from as an illustration.
In the words of Vincent Vega, “I have my moments.”
Yes, “don’t like” is different from “hate”.
I think most people would agree that the opposite of “hate” is “love”, and that the opposite of “don’t like” is “like”. So if “don’t like” and “hate” were equal then “like” and “love” would be equal.
But I think it’s pretty obvious that “like” and “love” are not equal. For example, there are plenty of people that I love that I don’t like. I’ll cry at their funeral but I won’t go on vacation with them.
Another perspective… if you want to contrast love and hate. BOTH are action words. That character from the Saddleback church had a blurb on this in that book we did as a church… A Purpose Driven Life. So if I love my family, for example, by providing for them… what do I DO that exhibits hate for others? Simply not liking them, I think, falls short. There could be a sin of omission, I suppose, for example passing by someone I hate and telling them they’re #1 while they’re stuck changing a flat tire on the side of the road on a rainy day. But even that, I think, fall short of true hate. When I think of hate, I think of burning a cross in someone’s front yard, or a lynching, or, taking another example from the pre- Brown v. Brown era, the implementation of the policy of “separate but equal”. Those are actions that are much more indicative of what I call true hate.
But the point is, I try to boil down love and hate to ACTIONS, not feelings. In that respect, “dislike” is a feeling, while “hate” is an action.
Duh. Make that Brown v. Board of Education. It’s been a long week!
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=347&invol=483