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Jesus said "hate" your father but "love" others?

Question: Jesus said to "hate" your father.(Luke 14:26) You cannot be a disciple of Jesus unless you hate your father and mother, your siblings, your children, your wife. (John 13:34-35) Jesus commanded us to love one another: in this way, all men will recognize his disciples (as in believers in Jesus).

Response: The Concordia Self-Study Bible NIV explains in a footnote to Luke 14:26 that the passage is "A vivid hyperbole, meaning that one must love Jesus even more than his immediate family."But, there might be more to it than that. Matthew 10:37 (NIV) says: "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me." The word "hate" in Luke 14:26, then, might not need to be defined as restrictively as we might define it in English, but perhaps in a broader sense of loving one thing less than another. After all, Jesus did command that we treat others as we would have them treat us. But, just before He said those words, He said that we should love God more than anything else.


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