Mt 5:43-48
[Jesus said to his disciples,] 43“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, 45that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. 46For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have? Do not the tax collectors do the same? 47And if you greet your brothers only, what is unusual about that? Do not the pagans do the same? 48So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
LOVE YOUR ENEMIES: The call to love one’s enemies is the climax of the antitheses in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. The summons to hate one’s enemies is hardly heard in the Law and is probably corollary to the principle “Love your neighbor” (Lv 19:18). This commandment to love was always interpreted so as to apply to fellow Israelites, not to aliens. To be sure, love was also commanded toward any resident alien, even by God himself (Lv 19:33-34; Dt 10:18-19), but because of the Israelites’ traumatic experiences at the hands of foreign occupiers and the efforts of consolidation and purification on the part of some of their leaders, non-Israelites were often looked upon as enemies and foreign “virus.”
In commanding the love of enemies, Jesus demolishes all fences that divide peoples (Jews and goyyim [pagans]) as well as confine love to those who are lovable. The basis for this is the love of the heavenly Father who does not discriminate: all are his children, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether good or bad. Moreover, love does not remain a mere feeling, but is a product of the will that issues into action. When one’s hands are tied during persecution, the greatest expression of love may well be prayer. Prayer places one in the presence of God and opens one to be moved by love.