Love is the Fulfilling of the Law

ON GOD; Part CLI

 We have so far covered the theme word of Values, Truth and Justice and saw the relationship of this idea to that of virtue and we understand that these items listed below are those values that should be expressed in the lives of ALL as they are the expression in time and space of the teachings of the Master about Love and the interaction of a man with his brothers, his neighbors around the world. There is no space in the words of the Master for the dissecting of the human family into those we wish to treat well and those that we do not want to treat well and in this ‘treating’ we should find our words on Love and see their expression in our saying on Love which includes benevolence, GoodWill, favorable thoughts, kindness, justice and mercy. These are the very things that we want from others and yet so many are unwilling to offer in return or, as it must be, in advance. We noted in a recent post how Emmet Fox, a Christian writer of the New Thought Movement, framed the saying by the Master that we call the Golden Rule; he says as part of his Fifteen Points on Living In Truth: I PRACTICE, the Golden Rule of Jesus instead of merely admiring it. He said, “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.” The important point about the Golden Rule is that I am to practice it whether the other fellow does so or not**. And this is the importance of this most profound saying by the Master, a saying that we use to interpret and understand His commandments on LOVE.  

Values to Live By

A Love of Truth—essential
for a just, inclusive and progressive society;

A Sense of Justice—recognition
of the rights and needs, of all.

Our next point to cover here is in regard to a word that is a necessary component in the idea above regarding the Golden Rule and that is that we must not require others to exhibit this before we respond though this is unfortunately the way than many view this important precept. This is of course the:

Spirit of Cooperation—based
on active goodwill and the principle of right human
relationships;

This is not a hard idea to grasp but it is a difficult one for many to achieve because of the way that the sense of self permeates the human mind and emotions. This is a function of the illusion and the glamour of the world in which we live and of a reliance on the misplaced thought that we are this body and this personality. It seems that none are willing to follow the reality of the Master’s words and this is True even to the heights of Christian religious experience and in this we should see on of the great difficulties of discipleship; overcoming this sense of self. The Master’s teachings are rather clear in regard to our attitude toward others; He tells us that no matter what evil may be done to us, that we should not reciprocate in kind but that we should LOVE. He tells us this in a series of statements which should reverberate in our psyche and show us the reality of the Golden Rule and our required ACTIVE participation in it which is that we do not wait for others to do unto us. The Master tell us:

• “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire” (Matthew 5:21-22). The key part here is not in the ideas of Raca and fool but in the idea of anger being a precursor of killing and an unwanted emotion and this especially when there is no cause. Does this then tell us that we can be angry? in a way it does but, as we shall see further on, this anger is not to be a tool for retribution. We should then understand anger in the Master’s context as displeasure and resentment which words are among the synomyms offered by Webster’s¹.
• “Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee; Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift” (Matthew5:23-24). Can we see the GoodWill in the Master’s statement here? Can we see the importance of making amends for the things that one may do to another and this regardless of the severity? What is the message here? do not even approach God if you KNOW that you have differences with another and this even if there is nothing that you did wrong.
• “Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:38-39). Can we see the point here? Can we see the very meaning of meek in this statement? not the meek of the world but meek as it is intended to be understood by the Master and which we have defined as Positive Harmlessness along with our other term Humble Restraint. This is as the Master showed us to do as well; He never fought back, He never harmed another, although He could, which we can understand in His Power and as He said: “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?” (Matthew 26:53). 
• “And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away” (Matthew 5:40-42). What is it that we see here but that we should give and give yet again and for most any reason and what are we giving but those things which are of little or no benefit to one’s spiritual Life. These are most difficult sayings and they are among those that keep so many from the reality of discipleship.
• The Master speaks also about adultery which is a bane of mankind and of divorce which is much out of control and both of these are related to a man’s focus upon the carnal life and the fulfillment of the desire nature which again brings us back to that sense of self and man’s utter forgetfulness regarding the Golden Rule. The Master sums ALL things up for us in this last saying which should furnish for us ALL the root of Cooperation and a practical understanding of the requirement for active goodwill as one’s outward expression and the practice of the principle of right human relationships. He tells us “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you” (Matthew 5:43-44). In this we should plainly see LOVE for ALL.

The idea of cooperation is a simple one; Websters tells us that it means: The act of working, or operating together, to one end; joint operation; concurrent effort or labor; as the cooperation of the combined powers; the cooperation of the understanding and the will¹. and with this the modern dictionaries agree except that the word is expanded to also include more or less active assistance from a person and willingness to cooperate*, diluted meanings which take away from our intent in this phrase which is active goodwill and not more or less and it is actual right human relationships and not just a willingness to do so. On the whole however we should be able to understand the intent of this cooperation in things that are of the Good, the Beautiful and the True which we call GoodWill and Right Human Relations and that this is the intent of the Master’s teachings and, as we see in His words above, this is regardless of how we are treated by another. This understanding should make the thoughts of Mr Fox above exceedingly clear as he tells us that we should not wait for others to treat us right before we do so to them while the Master tells us that we do so to them even when we are openly treated wrongly.

Our next topic is one that is not outwardly discussed by the Master insofar as the way that it is stated here.

A Sense of Personal Responsibility—for
group, community and national affairs;

The Master teaches us the idea of the equality of others from the perspective of the individual and in this lies our responsibility to ALL so that the community and the nation are as important as one’s local group or family. Jesus tells us that:

• “That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?” (Matthew 5:45-47). Do we see His thoughts here? that if God is fair and gives to ALL men that we should do so as well, that they should be our responsibility as disciples of the Lord as well as they are the Father’s. Here the Master takes us back to our last point as well in telling us that we should not wait for others to do unto us but that we should Love whether we are Loved or not and we should salute in the same way. This word salute should be seen in a deeper sense than just that of greeting as this would not be a relevant teaching for the Master; we should see it as what is behind the salutation, the GoodWill and, according to an obsolete usage from Webster’s, To promote the welfare and safety of¹.
• There is another use of this word salute in the Gospel of Luke which can shed some Light upon our understanding of the word. This saying is taken by many in the church to mean that the Master instructed His disciples to NOT greet anyone when they were sent out to preach; the Master says: “Carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes: and salute no man by the way” (Luke 10:4). Can we Truly see this as telling them not to greet any when their purpose in going out is said by the Master as: “And as ye go, preach , saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give” (Matthew 10:7-8). Are not these two ideas in opposition to one another; can we see that there must be more to this than we see? Vincent⁴ is in agreement with the idea of greet no man Strong’s³ gives us no better understanding of the word; Vine’s⁶ is the same and is silent as regards this verse from Luke. The lexicon however adds a bit of definition that may help to understand the Master’s words; they say that the Greek word aspazomai also means to draw to one’s self². In this we can see the Master’s instructions as to not let any man by the way be drawn to the disciple but that he be drawn to the Lord and this makes much more sense than that of a greeting by the way
• We have gone a bit out of the way with our pursuit of the ideas behind the word salute and this final conclusion is one that can make sense for us in both sayings as the words from Webster’s, To promote the welfare and safety of¹ and the words from the lexicon can both be seen in the light of taking the side of God in our dealings with group, community and national affairs; that our responsibility is to promote the welfare and safety¹ of our fellowmen; to say and to do what we can to promote such and not to shut one’s eyes as many a well meaning man has done. Can we see here the idea of taking the side of one’s brother so as to promote the welfare and safety of¹ him and others and can we say with the Master “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me” (John 12:32).  When a man comes to be able to show that he is responsible for his brother and takes his brothers peril to heart, he is likely Truly a disciple and as such he is “lifted up from the earth” into the Kingdom and by his very nature “will draw all men“. This True discipleship is very rare and, as the Master tells us, exceedingly difficult from the perspective of the man in form.

This idea of responsibility is an important part of Life and a thing that a man will do for his family. The Master’s teaching here is that ALL things that one would do for a brother or a loved one, should be done for ALL. Can we understand this as a High Ideal of discipleship and can we see that it is up to those who see the Light to act in the interests of ALL. This does not in itself mean that ALL should be in politics or in the church but it does mean that when we see a brother treated unfairly that one does not shrink away but takes his brother’s part. There is a saying that we will close with here that was written by a Christian pastor, a German who eventually rose up in opposition to Hitler. Martin Niemöller spent several years in German concentration camps and there are several versions of his saying which we take here from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum website:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out–
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out–
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out–
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me–and there was no one left to speak for me.

We can put any derided group in place of the socialist and the trade unionist and the Jew and this saying can be as readily seen in today’s treatment of the several groups that we as a society disagree with and ofttimes condemn and on most every level. Our responsibility as disciples of the Master and aspirants to that High Calling is to ALL men. Ponder on this.

We will complete our discussion of these Values to Live by in the next post.

Serving the Common Good— through
the sacrifice of selfishness. Only what is good for all
is good for each one.

The world of the future depends on what each one of us chooses to do today.

Note on the Quote of the Day

This daily blog also has a Quote of the Day which may not be in any way related to the essay. Many of these will be from the Bible and some just prayers or meditations that may have an influence on you and are in line with the subject matter of this blog. As the quote will change daily and will not store with the post, it is repeated in this section with the book reference and comment.

We leave this Mantram of  Unification again for today as it does go well with our topic.

Today’s quote of the day is a repeat of the Mantram of Unification which is an affirmation of the Oneness of the human family from the perspective of the disciple and the aspirant and any who hold these ideals as important. In this we find the essence of the two ideas that we have discussed from Values to Live By and that these are firmly grounded in the desire to Love not hate; to serve and not exact due service and to heal and not to hurt. It is Love shown as Truth and justice that is at the heart of this mantram.

Mantram of Unification

The sons of men are one and I am one with them.
I seek to love, not hate;
I seek to serve and not exact due service;
I seek to heal, not hurt.

Let pain bring due reward of light and love.
Let the Soul control the outer form, and life and all events,
And bring to light the love that underlies the happenings of the time.

Let vision come and insight.
Let the future stand revealed.
Let inner union demonstrate and outer cleavages be gone.
Let love prevail.
Let all men love.

• ¹    Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1828 and 1913
• ²    New Testament Greek Lexicon on BibleStudyTools.com
• ³    Strongest Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible – 2001
• ⁴    Word Studies in the New Testament; Marvin R Vincent D.D. 2nd edition, 1888
• ⁶   Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words, 1996
• *   “cooperation.” Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 01 Jul. 2012. 
• ** From The Fifteen Points by Emmet Fox; © 1932 HarperCollins Publishers Inc