Connection and Friendship

I think it was Sampson Raphael Hirsch who tried to define Love and Hate. My memory has it that he saw Love as the feeling that the presence of the other person made life more worthwhile while their absence would have precisely the opposite effect. Hate? Hate was the sense that the very presence of the other made life less pleasurable and, just maybe, their absence would contribute to a sense of wellness. When I was young and cheeky (before I became Old and Cheeky), I had a sign on my university office door: Never underestimate the value of homicide in solving human dilemmas.

It seems awfully dramatic, perhaps, but just like Happiness and Sadness, Love and Hate may well be these everyday/quotidian companions to the lived life. With those we love, perhaps, we revel in their happiness and in their successes, while even those who imagine themselves present at the Sermon on the Mount find difficulty in Loving their enemies (Matthew 5).

When I returned from my 4th of July four day weekend, there were, perhaps, three types of welcomes waiting for me.

• "Gladdened that you're back."

• "You abandoned me. I hate you."

• "Glad that you're back but, even so, I won't admit to it on a stack of Bibles .... Grrrr."

Feelings are queer experiences and experiencing them in the presence of another and especially in the presence of those to whom they are directed is difficult no matter in what Quarter one is Playing. In the Last Quarter, I can't tell whether it's easier or harder to offer up such expressions. As the air gets thinner and the time grows briefer sitting here in this First Pew, it does appear more important to me to express the Love and both the Glee and the Sadness parts. In Europe in the 19th C., there was a custom of writing an Ethical Will ... of leaving something other than things and property behind.

At the close of the Books of Genesis and Deuteronomy, Jacob and Moses (respectively) intermingle loving and hateful feelings (think it worth reading both) .... Jacob reviews his kids' failings and Moses, calling to the Heavens and the Earth to be witnesses and then announcing "This is the Blessing," reams the Children of Israel (eg, A stupid nation! and not wise ... grown fat only to kick their God) ... cuts them a new one, as folk are prone to say on the street.

I hope to do better.