Is there an excuse to Hate?

by Terry 23 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  Terry

  I think, very pointedly, people of "FAITH" can be taught and encouraged to feel quite comfortable hating those who God hates (according to their belief).

  Jehovah's Witnesses, for example, have no problem hating apostates and refusing to even pray for them.

  Why? The Governing Body teaches them to think and behave that way.

  Radical Islamists are submissive to calls for death to the Great Satan. Open destructive violence against Jews and Americans is pretty specific

  proof that religious motivation can give such an excuse to hate Divine Approval.

  When Protestants split from the Catholic church there follwed the Thirty Years War which was nothing but an excuse for bloody rampant violence based on

  viewing fellow christians with different beliefs and loyalties as hateful.
• 

  blondie

  The WTS likes the quote the scripture that they are to HATE WHAT is bad not WHO. But what about this? Of course David was just an adulterer and a murderer.

  *** w92 7/15 p. 12 par. 19***The obligation to hate lawlessness also applies to all activity by apostates. Our attitude toward apostates should be that of David, who declared: “Do I not hate those who are intensely hating you, O Jehovah, and do I not feel a loathing for those revolting against you? With a complete hatred I do hate them. They have become to me real enemies.” (Psalm 139:21, 22)
• 

  NewChapter

  I haven't read all the posts yet, but want to answer based on the question before reading. I'm sure this has been said, or something like it.

  Hate is an emotion. We come equipped with the ability, but I think we have romanticized hate the way we romanticize love.

  But if it is part of our makeup, there is likely a benefit to it. Unfortunately, it is taken to levels that are hurtful to others and the person hating. Perhaps it is some kind of warning system we have----like hating an abuser will help us to protect ourselves----because honestly, love is something that really complicates the abuse issue. A friend of mine witnessed a man backhand his girlfriend. He said he heaved a heavy sigh, because he could not watch that happening, yet he also knew if he stepped in, the woman would likely attack him because of this love. But he had to do what he had to do, so he stepped in, not with threats of violence, but simply firmly to tell the man that he could not stand by and watch this happen. And the woman started screaming at my friend to leave her boyfriend alone. My friend stayed calm, as he expected this reaction, and simply insisted that he would not stand by while one person hit another, and please stop.

  I've had a lot of friends who were police, and they say the same thing. They get a domestic violence call, generally a man beating a woman, but not always, and when they step in to make the arrest, they prepare themselves for the woman to come at them.

  What is this? Is this the obligation we have been taught to never hate and always love? It does seem twisted, and therefore the results are twisted.

  I have not hated many people in my life. But there are a couple who have proven to be so dangerous to my body and my psyche, that hate is the appropriate sentiment if it keeps me from allowing them back in to do their damage. People have tried to make me feel guilty for hating, but it is an emotion with a purpose. This silly notion that we should love everyone just doesn't make sense. There are some people who should repulse us, and I believe for good reason. Otherwise, we get this weird and disfunctional mixture of love/hate that leads to strange situations.

  Unfortunately, hate is an emotion that is easily manipulated, and that leads to some horrible things. I'm not in favor of that. But LOVE is also an emotion that is easily manipulated, and it too can lead to some awful things.

  JW's don't 'hate' people they shun (as a rule) but they 'love' the organization, the people, and the god who said they must shun. So OUT OF LOVE, they do disgusting things.

  Any emotions manipulated and used for some purpose are bad things. In their natural state, I'm not so sure.
• 

  frankiespeakin

  Hate has many shades not one hate. It has it's roots in ancient survival responses. As humans become more conscious, responses become less automatic as more inner introspection becomes conscious, and a response hiarchy forms that has levels of values so that more intelligent and creative responses are chosen, replacing the old primative and automatic.

  Hate maybe the chosen response even in a more highly evolved human but but far more rarer than in a less evolved human, as more options are able to get through to consciousness more choices better than the highly primal one.

  These changes occur at a much deeper level than just ego consciousness and so form a sort of conditionings to future responses, that has more compassion instead of hate or perhaps a balancing of opposites or of yin and yang.