what is love ?

[Slider]

I really have to not agree with your fundamental point.

"43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven." (Matthew 5: NIV1984)

I presented them more as talking points rather than fundamental points. Reading your quoted verse, how do you propose we do that based on examples from the Bible?

Romans 12:20 is one way to do it:

"therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head."

It's an interesting suggestion... "Be kind to him so you can make him angry at himself", so to speak....

And along the verse you gave is Luke 6:27-33 which explains if we don't we are no better than them.

HOWEVER...

Paul (the Apostle whom I quoted in Romans 12) said in 1 Tim 1:20 he delivered Hymenaeus and Alexander unto Satan that they may learn not to blasphemy. We learn in 2 Tim 4:14-15 of Paul praying and "loving his enemy":

14 Alexander the coppersmith did me much evil: the Lord reward him according to his work:
15 Of whom be thou ware also; for he hath greatly withstood our words.

This is how Paul prayed for two particular enemies. We see him turning the situation over to God, and him warning Timothy about them.

Let's not forget about Jesus with the whip and his calling his enemies everything from children of the devil to vipers.

Finally, we could talk about David and a number of different prayers he gave in Psalms, in which he asked God to crush his enemies. One of which is Saul... Yet we see David sparing his life on more than one occasion.

I'm not against the concept of "being kind" to your enemies, because it was said, at least by Jesus and Paul. Again, I support the concept with the notion that you don't really know if your enemy is (at the moment) really a brethren. However, the "love" that they had was not a "sweetypie" type love. In fact, the love they did have was more towards God's Word and against those who were against it.

<dir>
</dir>