The Gospel According to Spiritism, chapter 12: what it means to love one's enemies

“Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who persecute and slander you.” It may be the Gospel's hardest command, and chapter 12 of The Gospel According to Spiritism, by Allan Kardec, tries to say exactly what it does, and does not, ask of us.

This piece summarizes the chapter, which combines Kardec's commentary with messages attributed to spirits. Spiritual obsession, past lives, and the influence of spirits are teachings of Spiritist doctrine and are not presented here as proven facts. The subject of dueling, which takes up a good part of the chapter, only makes sense against the backdrop of its time: in the nineteenth century, settling insults with a bullet or a blade was still an accepted practice in many countries.

Loving without faking affection

Loving one's enemy, Kardec explains, does not mean feeling the affection one has for a friend, which would be unnatural. The commandment asks for something else: not hating, not wishing for revenge, forgiving sincerely, wanting good rather than harm, staying open to reconciliation, helping in times of need, and avoiding harm through words or deeds. The chapter sums up the ideal this way: repay evil with good, without humiliating.

The logic of forgiveness

For someone who does not believe in life after death, the chapter says, an enemy is a threat to be eliminated. In the Spiritist view, the enemy serves as a trial and a lesson: this present life is only a moment, and injustices are part of earthly trials. The harm that reaches us today could echo mistakes from the past. Forgiving, in this framework, means rising morally above the offender.

Hatred after death

According to the doctrine, death does not erase hatred. Enemies from other eras, now without bodies, could pursue the living and cause obsessions and moral disturbances. Sincere forgiveness would break the fluidic bond that draws them together. The message is that blood does not extinguish hatred; only love and forgiveness do.

The duel

A duel is a fight between two people, usually over an insult to honor, with set rules, seconds, and, almost always, casualties. A famous case took place on July 11, 1804, in Weehawken, New Jersey, when U.S. Vice President Aaron Burr wounded Alexander Hamilton, a former Treasury Secretary, who died the next day. Wikipedia notes that Uruguay was the last country in the Western world to keep dueling legal, until the 1980s.

The spirits cited in the chapter condemn the practice as revenge with legal cover, incompatible with Christian morality. Whoever duels kills out of pride, not justice: a murderer if he wins, a suicide if he dies. Many act, according to the chapter, out of fear of others' judgment, a social prejudice passed off as courage.

Honor, they argue, is not repaired with blood, but with the sincere acknowledgment of a wrong. It is nobler to be insulted and stay silent than to answer with violence, and forgiving proves courage and greatness.

Several messages reinforce the point. The spirit Gilles Olivier treats revenge as barbarism in disguise, and the duelist as a moral coward. Adolphe, bishop of Algiers, sees in the duel a deliberate crime dressed up as honor, and recalls that God gave no one the right to kill. Saint Augustine sees courage in those who bear an insult with humility and faith, and cites Jesus, who prayed for those who killed him. Francisco Xavier answers those who claim to seek reparation: spilling blood does not undo slander; forgiving does.

The courage to forgive

The chapter concludes that loving one's enemies is the key to freeing the spirit from the cycle of hatred. It proposes replacing the duel with charity, the wish for revenge with indulgence, and the insult with an opportunity for elevation. Kardec warns that this is not passivity: it is, in the text's words, the most active of virtues, a love that holds itself above every offense.