Desire for vengeance
Jer 20:10-13; Ps 69:8-10, 14, 17, 33-35; Rom 5:12-15; Mt 10:26-33
You’ve probably heard the line: “Resentment is like drinking poison and hoping that your enemy will die.” While this sentiment might carry the sting of truth for many of us, I am particularly impressed when its lesson is actually embraced and lived by someone who seemingly has the “right” to feel vengeful or to hold a grudge, such as Nelson Mandela, who quoted the line to great effect.
Jesus himself, of course, provides an ideal witness for this approach toward our enemies.
If our desire for vengeance is so harmful to us and relatively ineffective toward our enemies, then why is it so easy to yield to this powerful emotion?
The desire for vengeance is often sparked by a feeling of loss of identity. To be hurt so deeply that we want to reciprocate in kind — rather than simply seek justice or restitution — can result from feeling that we’ve lost our dignity or self-worth; that we’re no better than our inability to prevent whatever injury or insult has befallen us.
Shame works this way. If someone humiliates us, we feel reduced by our shame or embarrassment. We imagine that the pain of our shame can be somehow lessened if the felt superiority of our tormentors can be diminished by our inducing a feeling of shame in them. With a perverse sort of logic, we think we can restore our own status by bringing them down to where we’ve been brought.
Another appealing aspect of resentment and the desire for vengeance is that it seemingly provides a source of stability and the restoration of order in response to what is often a very disorienting experience of being harmed.
If I bitterly resent you, then there is no question about roles: You are my enemy, full stop. I have you clearly defined and reduced to someone who only wants to wrong me. I am not interested in knowing about any of your redeeming qualities and I am definitely not interested in acknowledging that I might bear some responsibility for the injustice I am suffering.
The vengeful person lives in an either/or world. Even our language about resentment bears this point.
We have the idiom: “to hold a grudge.” Why do we “hold” it? We hold on to things when we are afraid of losing them. Sometimes we hold on to things because that is the only way we can remain stable and upright.
To let go is to invite chaos and loss of control. If I stop resenting you or desiring to harm you then I enter the ambiguous realm in which you and I have to begin to relate to one another, and relationships are always uncertain and risky undertakings.
In our first reading, Jeremiah’s enemies are quietly watching for an opportunity to pounce on him and exact their revenge. Why are they vengeful? Because the prophet has been continuously calling them to task for failing to be true to the Lord’s covenant, for failing to act as his chosen people.
Jeremiah is calling into question the authenticity of their claim to be true Israelites. He is challenging their professed identity and unmasking their hypocrisy (note how even their identity as Jeremiah’s former friends has been transformed). So his enemies are seeking his downfall and will eventually try to kill him. They are not interested in considering that there might be some truth to the prophet’s indictment of their ways.
But lest we be too harsh with Jeremiah’s enemies, we have to admit that the prophet himself expresses the desire to witness the vengeance that God will wreak upon them (Jer 20:12). None of us — neither saint nor sinner — is beyond sinking into the false comfort of vengeful thoughts.
We live in a cultural climate where vengeance seems to be commonplace and acceptable behavior. Persons in positions of authority at the highest levels regularly rant like petulant children against anyone who questions their decisions or actions. But, unlike children, their immaturity often brings with it devastating consequences.
Vengeance is never right and it’s never acceptable — in the heart of a prophet of Israel, in the heart of an apostle of Jesus and in any of our hearts today.