The Converted Catholic

A closer look at an often misunderstood Bible passage.

The first time I came across the Biblical passage where Jesus instructs his followers to turn the other cheek in response to being struck by someone (Matthew 5:39) I’ll admit I was perplexed. Was Jesus advising his followers to take abuse? Was the Gospel advising Christians against sticking up for themselves, and instead serving as doormats?

A closer look at the historical and cultural context of Jesus’ guidance on turning the other cheek suggests that passively accepting poor or disrespectful treatment is not at all what Jesus was suggesting. Below, a more thorough examination and clarification of what turn the other cheek really means.

Different Gospels.

In Matthew 5:39, about halfway through his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus advises his followers, “if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also.” Matthew’s detail of the right¹ rather than the left cheek is important here, as theologian and activist Walter Wink points out in his book Jesus and Nonviolence: A Third Way. Equally important are the cultural norms of Jesus’s audience, whom scholars² have presumed to be mostly Palestinian Jews³ and possibly some Gentiles. These norms included prohibitions against using the left hand⁴, an association of the left hand with impurity and unholiness^5,6, and an association of the right hand with superiority and righteousness⁷. 

Given these associations (not to mention the predominance of right-handedness in the first century, just like today) Wink points out that the vast majority of Jesus’s audience would likely be using their right-hand to strike another person. He then calls our attention to the modern bias many of us may have when reading this passage to assume that such a strike is an open-handed slap or a full-on punch. Consider, though, how a slap or a punch with one’s right hand would end up on a victim’s left cheek. (Mime it out yourselves if you must—though please don’t actually hit someone in trying to understand this.) For someone’s right hand to strike the right side of someone else’s face the striker’s hand would need to be coming from the left side of their own body (e.g., raised across their own body). From this positioning it wouldn’t be the open palm or fist that would hit the victim’s right cheek but the back of the striker’s right hand. (Again, mime it out for yourselves to better understand. Still with the same caveat as above.)

We see in the Bava Kamma—one of several Talmudic texts written around 500 AD addressing civil concerns such as torts and damages, and thought to reflect the social and political norms of previous centuries—that using the back of the hand was considered more degrading⁸ than a slap with the palm. This is evidenced by the fact that backhanding someone incurred a stiffer financial penalty (400 dinars) than did striking another person with an open palm (which incurred a penalty of 200 dinars). Rather than being deployed in a violent brawl or instance of relentless abuse, backhanded strikes were generally seen as a means of insulting another person, or putting someone “in his or her ‘place,’” Wink argues⁹. 

The fines for such an aggressive insult corresponded with the victim’s level of honor: the higher the status of the victim, the greater the degree of humiliation a victim was thought to suffer¹⁰ and thus the stiffer the penalties became for the assailant. Likewise, the lower the status of the victim, the lower the fine. Assailants were exempt from fines altogether if the person they struck was considered their subordinate or their property—think: wives vis-a-vis their husbands¹¹, slaves vis-a-vis their masters, and children vis-a-vis their parents, Wink goes on to say.

If a victim were to turn the other cheek in this context, they would be inviting the striker to have another go at humiliating them. Almost as if to say, go ahead, keep trying to insult me. It didn’t work the first time. A provocative challenge, to say the least. One that communicates to the striker that the struck person hasn’t, in fact, been put in some assumed inferior place or degraded. They are not cowering. They are standing firm. Not in the place the assailant has attempted to push them down into, but in their own place. On their own terms.

In giving the assailant the opportunity to strike him once again in the degrading manner that is the backhanded slap, the victim who turns his cheek is also forcing his assailant into a very difficult position. Recall the cultural norms of the times coupled with the meaning of backhanded versus open-handed whacks. If the victim offers his left cheek after being struck on the right, this forces the assailant either to open-handedly slap the victim (which itself would communicate that the victim is of a higher status than the assailant’s initial use of his backhand suggested) or to strike the victim with his left hand (an embarrassing cultural faux-pas that would place the assailant in a position of suffering his own humiliation). “Even if he orders the [subordinate] flogged,” Wink argues¹², “the point has been irrevocably made. The oppressor has been forced, against his will, to regard this subordinate as an equal human being. The powerful person has been stripped of his power to dehumanize the other.”

There is another element of Jesus’s guidance here that I believe Christians can find inspiration in. Jesus is instructing his followers neither to react to a wrong by mimicking it (responding to aggression or humiliation with the same aggressive or humiliating act) nor to cower in a fear that conveys acceptance of a wrong behavior and its implied inequitable power dynamics (submission to humiliation or aggression). Instead, Jesus is offering what Wink calls a “third way” of responding (not reacting) to degrading treatment and abuses of power. By turning the other cheek and forcing the assailant into a position in which he himself would be humiliated (as a consequence of his own actions), the assailant experiences a shame comparable to that of the victim. This creates a possibility for (though by no means a guarantee of) empathy in the assailant—a seeing through the eyes or from the vantage point of the victim. By turning the other cheek, a victim is laying the grounds for a learning or teaching moment, wherein the potential exists for a form of conversion to occur in the assailant—a change of heart or a recognition of the wrongness of his actions, brought about by seeing and experiencing his behavior from a different point of view (that of the victim). This, in fact, was the means by which St. Peregrine is believed to have been converted: When a priest came to St. Peregrine’s hometown of Forli, Italy, in the 13th century to implore its inhabitants to return to God, St. Peregrine (then just Peregrine Laziosi) spoke out against the priest and slapped him across the face. When this priest turned his other cheek in response, St. Peregrine was himself struck—with the realization of what he had done. Moments after this event (after Peregrine had walked away) he experienced a Holy vision of a cross raised above his head, which galvanized him to seek out the priest he had slapped and beg for forgiveness. This launched his conversion to Catholicism and enrollment in a Servite monastery in Siena.

What a beautiful illustration of the Christian way. The teaching or modeling way. The non-reactive way. The loving way. Truly, Jesus is illustrating in Matthew 5:39 how it is we can love even our enemies¹³: by creating for them an opportunity to change their ways (via revealing to them a perspective they typically ignore). 

Footnotes

_{1. Matthew is more detailed in identifying exactly which cheek is in question here, unlike Luke who recalls the same speech without discerning between right or left: “If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also” (Luke 6: 29).} 

_{2. Han, S., & Mitch, C. (Eds). Ignatius Catholic study Bible. Ignatius Press. (p. 4).}

^{3. The sermon is organized to mirror (and thus update and revise) the five books of Law (the Torah) given to the Jews via God’s revelation to Moses at Mount Sinai….Turn the other cheek is embedded in a teaching on retaliation: This teaching begins with a nod to the laws set forth in Deuteronomy 19:21, which outlines the punishment for false witness, and Exodus 21:23, which clarifies the punishment in response to causing injury to a pregnant woman above and beyond a miscarriage}.

^{4. Gillihan, Y. M. (2009). Posture or gesture? A note on לשח/לשוח in the Qumran penal codes. Revue de Qumrân, 24(2), 291-296.}

^{5.  Mishnah Zevachim 2:1: “If he collected the blood with his left hand, he disqualified the blood for offering.”}

^{Shabbat 88b: “To those who are right-handed in their approach to Torah, and engage in its study with strength, good will, and sanctity, Torah is a drug of life, and to those who are left-handed in their approach to Torah, it is a drug of death.”}

^{6. Wink references the Dead Sea Scrolls.}

^{7. Jacobs, J., & Eisenstein, J.D. (2021). Right and left. The Jewish Encyclopedia, 419-420.}

^{8. Mishnah Bava Kamma 8.6: ”If he slapped another on the cheek, he must give him two hundred dinars. If he slapped him on the cheek with the back of his hand, which is more degrading than a slap with the palm, he must give him four hundred dinars.”}

^{9.  Wink, W. (2003). Jesus and nonviolence. 1517 Media (p. 14).}

^{10. Mishnah Bava Kamma 8.6:: “This is the principle of assessing payment for humiliation caused to another: It is all evaluated in accordance with the honor of the one who was humiliated, as the Gemara will explain.”} 

^{11. Graetz, Naomi. (1999). Wifebeating in Jewish tradition. Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women.}

^{12.  Wink, W. (2003). Jesus and nonviolence. 1517 Media (p. 16).}

^{13.  Which He instructs us to do in Matthew 5:44}

Copyright The Converted Catholic September 3, 2022

Today’s (August 5th, 2022) Gospel reading from Matthew (16:24-28) finds the disciples listening to a difficult calling from Jesus—one many Christians to this day puzzle over how to adhere to and one I assume is often misunderstood.

“If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me,” Jesus says. “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”

What does Jesus mean by “deny themselves?” Many of us may be able to understand the call to take up our crosses and follow Jesus, but does self-denial mean we should suppress all of our needs, wants, and desire? Forgo food and drink? Renounce all ties to that which brings us joy and pleasure?

I do not think that the denial Jesus speaks of here means an extreme self-abnegation or suppression. God, I believe, speaks and works through our desires, hopes, dreams, and needs—all elements of our humanity—so to completely deny all of them would be to cauterize channels of God’s will. Nor do I see the denial Jesus calls us to embrace as an encouragement to starve ourselves, push ourselves well beyond our limits, or reject any enjoyment or satisfaction whatsoever. Rather, I see this invitation as a reminder to be mindful of our very human tendency to push our own agendas, so much so that we not only become blind to the needs of those around us, but also to what God hopes and desire for us—to love and to feel love, as Jesus tells us in John 15:12-17¹—and what we truly need to do to realize this.

As Christians we are called to be Christ-like. And each piece of guidance Jesus issues to his followers is an instruction for how we can do this. I see the guidance to “deny” oneself here as an invitation to emulate Jesus’s divine acceptance of God’s will in lieu of one’s own human will. This supplanting of one’s own will with that of God’s is exemplified in Jesus’s agony in the garden, when he calls out to God the Father: “if it is possible, let this cup pass from me” (Matt 26:39). This plea is so human. So understandable. So relatable. Take this suffering away, God! Exempt me from having to endure it. Yet immediately Jesus follows this human plea with a very divine wisdom, acknowledging and accepting: “yet not what I want but what you want.” In this we see the 100% human and 100% divine nature of our Lord, coming together to guide his prayer and subsequent behavior. We also see one of the clearest examples of acknowledging what we want and then letting go of that (or at least making space for the possibility that we may need to let go of it) so that God’s will can be enacted through us. What does Jesus do shortly after moving aside his own will so that God’s will can play out? He takes up his cross and allows God’s plan to unfold: He is betrayed, arrested, denied, interrogated and wrongfully accused, mocked, beaten, and crucified.

This, I believe, is what is meant by Jesus when he advises his disciples to do likewise via self-denial: Be willing to consider that what you want might not be what God wants, as painful as that may be. Follow me in making space for the will of God, and for allowing his will to play out through you, even though this may entail suffering—suffering that will not be for nothing. Suffering that may be necessary for your own transformation as well as the transformation of others and the world. (Not to mention the wellbeing of your soul and the promise of eternal life.)

What about the seeming riddle “those who want to save their life will lose it?” Here I see an acknowledgement that those who truly wish to be saved by Christ can only be saved by letting go of how they have lived contrary to a love-oriented engagement with the world around them. To be saved, in effect, is to renounce who you once were—not to wallow in shame over your past (go to confession, yes, but do your penance, and accept forgiveness, please, so you can move on!) but to be transformed by the love that God seeks to endow all of us with.

Next up: “and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” Similar to the above: To truly follow Christ we often do have to give our own agendas. That includes our identities in many cases. Who we thought we were, perhaps the person we once fantasized about being in a secular context, will need to be exchanged (lost) for the person we will become in Christ. And only in doing so can we truly “find” that (eternal) life Christ promises us, provided we follow his teachings and hew to his path.

When I read “For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life” I am reminded of Ecclesiastes 2:1-11². Here Jesus seems to be underscoring the futility of self-denial when it is applied to worldly and not spiritual aims. Perhaps it is implied in his next statement (“Or what will they give in return for their life?”) that if we realize this futility after our life is sacrificed for the wrong purposes, we will give anything and everything to get that life back—so that we might be able to re-live it by orienting that self-sacrifice towards non-material ends (charity, peace-making, etc).

We end this reading with a final statement that the Son of Man will come in the glory of God with angels to repay “everyone for what has been done,” a nod to the final judgment. Followed by “Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom,” which is likely a nod to the Resurrection and Pentecost (which many of the disciples present will still be alive to witness once these events come to pass).

The real takeaway for me from this passage is the importance of remaining aware of our very human tendency to cling to our own worldly concerns and agendas so stringently that we lose sight of the higher purpose(s) to which we may be called. How can we enhance this awareness, discern between our stubborn will and God’s, and emulate Jesus in embracing the latter? Prayer, confession, scriptural readings, spiritual direction, and attendance of Mass, for starters. Building relationships with other faithful persons and, I believe, making more space for civil conversations with others we may not agree with can also help enlighten us to whether our earthly agenda is or is not aligned with God’s preferred plan. If nothing else, all of these activities can at the very least help us consider perspectives other than our own and make space in our hearts for more than just our own opinions.

^Footnotes

^{1. Yes, love is defined in John’s Gospel as a willingness to “lay down one’s life for one’s friends” but love is not predicated on actually being killed or killing oneself. To offer oneself up for the sake of another is perhaps the ultimate expression of love, but not all of us will be called to do so}

^{2. Ecclesiastes 2:1-11:}

^{I said to myself, “Come now, I will make a test of pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But again, this also was vanity. 2 I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?” 3 I searched with my mind how to cheer my body with wine—my mind still guiding me with wisdom—and how to lay hold on folly, until I might see what was good for mortals to do under heaven during the few days of their life. 4 I made great works; I built houses and planted vineyards for myself; 5 I made myself gardens and parks and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. 6 I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. 7 I bought male and female slaves and had slaves who were born in my house; I also had great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. 8 I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and of the provinces; I got singers, both men and women, and delights of the flesh, many concubines.[a]}

^{So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem; also my wisdom remained with me. 10 Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them; I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure from all my toil, and this was my reward from all my toil. 11 Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was vanity and a chasing after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.}

Today’s Gospel reading (August 2, 2022 | Matthew 13:22-36) depicts the moment where Jesus walks on water. We enter the text at the end of a very long day for both Jesus and his disciples. They have just fed approximately five thousand people¹ who have flocked to Jesus for healing, just when Jesus was attempting to go off and pray by himself upon learning that his beloved cousin John the Baptist had been murdered. Having forestalled this needed alone time in order to heal and feed the masses, Jesus instructs his disciples (once everyone has had their meal) to hop in a boat and traverse the sea of Galilee so that he can dismiss the crowds and finally get up a mountain to pray.

The disciples dutifully obey, remaining in the boat for several hours, well into the early morning. It gets windy. The boat starts to sway. Already on edge from a likely lack of sleep combined with some ominous weather, it’s no surprised that they’re freaked out when, some time between 3 and 6:00am², Jesus calmly saunters towards them—on the water’s surface.

“It is a ghost!” they declare (Matt 14:26). Jesus allays their fears, invoking the phrase God uses to identify himself that we find throughout the Old and New Testaments³ “it is I” or “I am”—”ego eimi” or ἐγώ εἰμι in Greek.

Ever the one to speak out of turn and hastily express his own doubts, Peter pipes up to ask Jesus to prove it: “Lord, if it is you, bid me come to you on the water” (Matt 14:28). Jesus obliges him, saying only “Come.” Peter gets out of the boat and is able to walk across the water’s top just as Jesus does—for a moment, at least. The minute Peter becomes fearful of the mounting winds he begins to sink, begging Jesus as he becomes increasingly submerged, “Lord, save me.” Again, Jesus obliges, this time gently chastising Peter for failing to fully believe: “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” (Matt 14:31).

The scene wraps with Jesus and Peter boarding the boat with the rest of the disciples, all of whom worship Jesus and proclaim his divinity.

At Mass today my pastor reflected on the necessity of faith to keep us afloat and on track amidst the ever unpredictable waves of life. Remaining focused on Christ allows us to resist being submerged by the waters, as Peter’s temporary faltering of faith led him to be, momentarily.

I like to think of faith as spiritual floaties that keep us buoyed especially during times of doubt and uncertainty. Floaties we don in Baptism—inflated by our sponsor, the Church, our godparents, perhaps—and re-inflated by various acts of communion with God, like church attendance, receiving the eucharist, participating in acts of charity, and praying. We will all face life’s many winds, some severe enough to capsize the boats we journey through life inside of. But faith enables us to persevere despite setbacks, and keep our heads above water through doubt. We may not be able to walk on water like Jesus (or Peter), but we can rise above the suffocating depths that many aspects of this world tempt us towards by keeping our faith full.

A persistent belief in God’s love for us and in Christ’s ability to forgive and heal the parts of us that time, circumstance, and sometimes other people may wound, enables us to persevere without giving up on ourselves or those around us. The result? Our continued flourishing and the flourishing of those we love⁴.

As Saint Paul reminds us in Romans 5, “since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ”—a statement scholars⁵ explain to mean that “by faith, they [those who were justified⁶ by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ] live in peace with God and have access to his grace⁷” (Rom 5:1). “Through him we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in our hope of sharing the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom 5:2-5).

Faith gives us the fuel to weather suffering, which builds our endurance—the crux and stuff of character⁸. Character is that collection of moral qualities, burnished by embracing and enduring life’s challenges⁹, accepting God’s love, and committing to being as Christ-like as we can in the world, that orients us towards what is good. Small wonder that this all increases our hope¹⁰—a “virtue by which we desire and expect from God both eternal life and the grace we need to attain it” (CCC, 1817).

We’ll drown without floaties. Yes, we can learn to swim and tread water. But ultimately we’ll tire and be unable to sustain ourselves without the help of the faith that keeps us afloat. We’re not in this alone. God keeps us buoyed. Let’s be sure we’re creating opportunities in our everyday lives to let Him fill us with his life-giving breath.

^Footnotes

^{1.This is the Feeding the Five Thousand, where the disciples attempt to dismiss the crowds teeming around Jesus as evening comes in order that the latter might go and purchase their own dinners. Jesus dissuades his disciples from this course of action, instead inviting them to bring what little food is present in their midst (five loaves and two fish) so that he can multiply them enough to feed (as the chapter’s title implies) “about five thousand men, besides women and children” (Matt 14:13-22).}

_{2. In the text we read “in the fourth watch of the night.” According to the Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: New Testament (Second Catholic Edition RSV), the fourth watch refers to one of four “watches” dividing the hours between 6:00pm and 6:00am. The fourth is the period between 3:00am and 6:00am}

^{3.God first reveals himself to Moses in the burning bush using this statement (ego eimi / I am) (Exodus 3:14). Here we see it appear in Matthew, through the mouth of Jesus. Later in the NT we see it appear multiple places in the Gospel of John when Jesus refers to himself thusly (8:58; 18:5, 6).}

^{4. Technically as Christians we are supposed to “love” everyone—friends, partners, enemies alike—as Jesus loved us. Note: To love everyone does not mean to let everyone and anyone take advantage of you nor to like everyone. Love can mean setting limits. It can mean saying “no.” It may be simply defined as an acknowledgment and respect for the inherent dignity in each and every person, and an effort to recognize that no matter who we are interacting with or talking about. Crudely speaking, this may just mean “don’t be a jerk.” More on this in another post. See CCC 1822-1829 for more on the Church’s definition of love (and its equivalence with charity).}

^{5. The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible (New Testament, Second Catholic Edition RSV), p. 263}

^{6. Put (as) simply (as possible), “justification” entails a cleansing (or detachment) from sin combined with an acceptance (via faith in Jesus Christ) of God’s love (and its rightness). The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines “Justification” as “The gracious action of God which frees us from sin and communicates ‘the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ’ (Rom 3:22). Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man (1987-1989).}

^{7. Grace being that “free and undeserved help that God gives us to respond to his call,” as defined in paragraph 1996 of The Catechism.}

^{8. The Catechism defines “character” as “the indelible spiritual mark of belonging to Christ” conferred by the sacraments of Baptism (CCC, 1272), Confirmation (CCC 1304), and Holy Orders (CCC 1582).}

^{9. Rather than fleeing or avoiding challenges and thereby failing to learn and grow from them.}

^{10. See also,The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible (New Testament, Second Catholic Edition RSV), p. 263 (footnote to Rom 5:1-5): “in hope they long for the glory of God that awaits them.”}