Discussion about Turn The Other Cheek

To understand the principle Jesus is getting at, we must understand both the summary that He gives as well as all the examples:

Summary: "Do not resist an evil one"
The significant term here is "resist". It is used in different contexts, but often in the context of rebelling against an authority. Thus, it might be translated as "do not rebel" or "do not stand against the authority". It is used in this way in Ephesians 6 when we are told to "stand against" or "resist" the devil. Thus, we are told in one place to resist, but in another place not to. Of course, this fits Jesus' example who did not resist arrest, but constantly resisted Satan and the demonic authorities.

Examples:
Whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.
In the ancient world it is a common punishment for an authority to slap his underlings. Masters slapped slaves, fathers slapped children, guards slapped prisoners and magistrates slapped (or had slapped) anyone who was under their authority in a court situation. To "turn the other cheek" is to offer oneself to be slapped more. In the context of an authority, a single slap would be considered acceptable, even a just punishment. But if one was slapped again, it would be oppression and an acceptable situation for an appeal. Jesus, in the trial before Annas, was actually questioning the justice of being slapped at all. This is what the turning the other cheek is doing as well, questioning the righteous judgement of the authority. If they give into it and slap you again, they have proved their unrighteousness.

If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also.
Those whom were owed were considered the authority over those who were in debt. The one who is owed had the right to throw the other into prison (see Matt 18). According to the law, there were strict guidelines as to how much a debtee could receive from a debtor. The debtee could not put the debtor into danger, by, for instance, taking his coat overnight (Exodus 22:26-27). Should a debtee take too much so as to threaten the life of the debtor, then the debtor can cry out to God and God would judge the debtee. Thus, inviting a debtee to take one's only covering is to invite the debtee to display his unrighteousness and so be judged.

Whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two.
In the ancient world, a Roman soldier had the right to "volunteer" any non-citizen of Rome to carry his pack for a mile. But the law is strict about it being only one mile. Should the Roman insist upon two miles, then he would be judged. This is offering a soldier to do injustice according to the law and so be judged by the law.

Give to him who asks of you,
and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you.
Roman soldiers could also take possessions from non-citizens. These possessions are to be "borrowed", but often they never came back.

All of these examples are legal oppressions. A magistrate has the right to slap. A debtee has the right to take clothes from the debtor. The soldier has the right to have one carry his pack or to take the possessions of a non-citizen. These are all oppressions and they ar all legal, according to human law. The point here is to not only accept the legal oppression, but to go extra in creating a super-legal situation. The law covers a single slap, a coat, a single mile. But Jesus is saying that the oppression must be obvious, beyond recognition.

Why? Because if we resist the evil authority for the legal oppressions, then we are rebellious and we will deserve what punishments we get. But if we are in a place where we are being punished to the extreme and we don't deserve it, then God will step in. God is interested in justice and will step in if injustice is done. So Jesus is recommending creating a situation of obvious oppression to which we may appeal to God (as stated in Exodus 22), and God will step in, take away the oppressor and give us justice (Luke 18:1-7, and Mark 12:1-9)
Steve K




steve, your posting has been very interesting.
and i think that it makes sense, actually

but i have a couple questions for you, if you would continue posting, please

i understand your posting to mean that this mostly applies only to unequals, cop/offender, judge/defendant, parent/child, etc.
where if i complain because he did something that he is legally allowed to do, that is resisting
but if i give him the opportunity to prove that he is unrighteous by taking me up on my offer, then i can appeal to God and he will defend me because i have been unjustly treated?
that sounds like baiting someone so that i can turn around and blame him for doing wrong

so this doesnt particularly mean equals need to turn the other cheek?
as in, a mugger wants my purse, i'm not obligated to give it to him, because he is my equal.
i can see, tho, that offering him more than he asked for, would prove that he was unrighteous.

i think the biggest question i have tho, is the one that keeps floating around md
if your wife/daughter is being attacked, are you being resistant when you try to protect her?
if you see a stranger being attacked by someone on the street, are you being resistant when you try to assist that stranger?
that is the one that i can't quite get thru my head, the one that i still struggle with, in regards to non resistance as it is commonly taught.

if a policeman was accusing you of speeding, which he has every right to do, do you try to talk your way out of it, or do you accept it, pay the fine (thereby turning the other cheek), and ask God for justice?

please continue steve, i'm intrigued by what you have to say.
i'm not sure what i think about the "baiting," but maybe that's not what you meant to be gotten out of your posting."(i) don't try hard enough to earn the right to complain."
justme


I'm going to answer the easiest questions first:

Your conclusions that this only relates to authorities and not to equals is correct. The use of the term "resist" and the contexts all have to do with authority/underling relationship, not with a peer relationship.
The peer relationship is spoken of in the next of Jesus statments in Matthew 5, "Love your enemies." That is how you relate to one who is your peer and abuses you. If someone mugs you, you have every right to run away. No reason to "turn the other cheek" because they aren't an authority. You don't have to accept abuse from them in any way. Actually, it doesn't do you any good apart from being accepting humility in general. But it's along the lines of flogging oneself. Just not necessary.

But the policeman, we have to accept the fine or whatever. I don't think getting a speeding ticket is a great example, because we broke the law and now we have to pay for it. That's simple submitting to authorities.

But paying taxes is submitting to authorities. And if the authorities use those taxes to oppress me or my people-- such as the police attacking my homeless folks with my taxes-- then I have the right to cry out for an appeal. Or if I do all the policeman asks me to and they beat me, then I have the right to ask for an appeal.

As far as protecting one's family from an attack or whatever, that goes under the "love your enemies" catagory, which I would be happy to discuss seperately, but the issues are really different.

Now comes the hard part. Is what Jesus talking about really "baiting"? Well, kinda. I don't know that Jesus is really saying for us to tell the cops, "Go ahead, pop me one, see if you've got the guts" kinda thing. In other words, goading them into oppression. But I do think he is talking about openly providing the opportunity to be oppressed. If you think about it, this is exactly what He Himself did. He pushed them, openly insulted them (Matt 23), told Judas to go ahead and betray him, and stayed right where he knew they would find him. He didn't allow his disciples to fight back and either spoke or didn't speak at exactly the right points to make his case worse. He was innocent, but he created a context that if they were going to think the worst about him, they could. He created a situation for him to be oppressed. They had to follow through, and they did, readily. But if he had said the right thing before Pilate, the crucifixion never would have happened. But, of course, the crucifixion had to happen. And he did what he needed to make sure it did.

Even so, there are times that authorities are so unjust or corrupt that they need replacing. And in those times we can set ourselves as the scapegoat, so God will enact his Psalm 82 privilage and take out the oppressive authority. This is the same kind of thing we see in I Peter and in Revelation.

Okay, I'd better stop.
Steve K



By the way, I don't want you to think that I came up with this idea about the non-resistance passage on my own. It was William Higgins, a professor of Mennonite History and Theology that worked out this exegesis and he and I argued about it for a year before I was convinced he was right. He is now a pastor of a Mennonite church in Southcentral PA.
Steve K


no
please don't stop

its quite intriguing to consider that authority/underling is the focus here
that defending self against an equal is a different can of worms altogether, (and therefore, no need to address here the protecting of one's family as i suggested)

when you say you have the right to ask for an appeal, are you talking about an appeal to other earthly authorities, or an appeal to God?

but this idea of baiting
i can't quite grasp my brain around it just yet
that sounds really passive aggressive to me.
that sounds as if i have a beef with someone, so i deliberately bait them into oppressing me, so that i can get rid of them.

please, continue
in fact, i think i'm going to sit back and listen to you discuss it with a few others
i'll pop up with more questions, i'm sure.

just me

I am finding this discussion interesting.


There is another meaning, that also fits into what Jesus said. 'Slapping' someone in many cultures was a form of insult. Thus 'when insulted, don't insult back'.142Thy righteousness is an everlasting righteousness, and thy law is the truth.

von


Now I am wondering . . . thought maybe you (Steve K) or someone here might have some insight . . .

How do we decide when to simply suffer the injustice, and when we have a case of "We ought to obey God rather than man" as Peter and the apostles did?

Also a note - I see that we are allowing others to demonstrate their unrighteousness. This is not because they'll "get what is coming to them" now, but because we are leaving it to God to judge them. Am I correct? Or is there a benefit for ourselves in eternity as well?

Hopenafuture


Very thoughtful posts, so far. I think that Stevek's point of view is excellent if we were literal pilgrims and strangers, not residents of a wealthy developed country with laws to protect us from conscription, slavery, etc. How does this passage apply to North American Mennonites who populate the world's wealthiest 2%?“The Bible contains six admonishments to homosexuals and 362 admonishments to heterosexuals. That doesn't mean that God doesn't love heterosexuals. It's just that they need more supervision.”
Lavner A King

To Von:
I think that it is clear that the slap IS an insult. To slap a person on the right cheek with the right hand (in the ancient mideast one would never touch another person with the left hand) is a backhanded slap. Thus it is destroying one's dignity and honor. This is worse than simple pain. To dishonor another person is a greater oppression than death. This is why the gospels don't even talk about Jesus pain or the amount of blood he shed (as opposed to the movie, The Passion), but rather the amount of indignities he suffered. Because those sufferings were more pertanent to the oppression Jesus was enduring than nails and blood.
Steve K



To Hopenafuture:
For your first question, I think that the passage you quoted in Acts 5 explains the process really well.

The apostles were brought before the Sanhedrin, led by the high priest, who voted to kill Jesus. Peter and the apostles very impolitely began to proclaim that God vindicated Jesus by resurrected him, in the face of the Sanhedrin's verdict. Jesus when he died, however, begged God to forgive them of the sin for they did not know what they did. So God, through Peter and the others, offered the Sanhedrin another chance to get right with Him and to repent of their sin. However, in the face of the apostles court testimony that Jesus was risen from the dead, they denied it and commanded them to shut up about Jesus.

There are two kinds of submission to human authority that we can do righteously. One is to just do what the human authority says. That is most common. But there are times when what our human authority says is opposed to God's clear command. So the apostles did what God commanded-- which we should ALWAYS do-- and then accepted the punishment of the Sanhedrien without complaint.

In fact, after the elders beat all the apostles with whips 40 minus 1 times, they went home celebrating because they "were considered worthy to suffer for the name." (Even as Jesus said they should in Matt 5:11-12) Thus, if we follow the teaching of Jesus faithfully, we WILL get in trouble with the authorities in some way. We must obey God in the most gentle, loving way we can and then accept the consequences the authorities give us, joyfully.

It is interesting what the apostles prayed in the midst of this incident, which might relate to your other question. In the middle of Acts 4, the apostles prayed Psalm 2, "why do the nations rage against Your king?" which they applied to the Sanhedrin and Herod. The leaders of Jerusalem have become Gentiles in the sight of the apostles and they are praying that way. But they pray no curse upon them. They just pray for God to do justice, and-- most importantly-- they prayed for boldness to do God's will, no matter what threats they received (not that I think they really needed the boldness, given their recent speeches, but God heard their prayer and sent them the Spirit anyway).

The apostles' understanding of non-resistance then is:
a. To do God's will
b. To be persecuted by the authorities for doing God's will
c. To willingly accept whatever punishment the authorities give them
d. To recognize God's blessing upon us for suffering for Jesus' name
e. To rejoice in that blessing
f. To recognize that God has already set aside the oppressive authorities
g. To recognize that Jesus is the true King of His people
h. To not pray cursings
i. To pray for justice
j. To pray for the ability to be more faithful to God.

Steve K