• Editor’s note: “Spiritual leaders answer on…” is a weekly column inviting Kaua‘i’s religious and spiritual leaders to share their doctrines’ perspectives on a suggested subject. Every Friday a topic is printed inviting a response. Submissions are edited for content
• Editor’s note: “Spiritual leaders answer on…” is a weekly column inviting Kaua‘i’s religious and spiritual leaders to share their doctrines’ perspectives on a suggested subject. Every Friday a topic is printed inviting a response. Submissions are edited for content and length. Thoughts or suggestions for future topics are always welcome. Next week’s topic is leap of faith. The topic at the end of the column is for the following week.
Rev. Dr. Olaf
Hoeckmann-Percival
Waimea United Church of Christ
Beloved old Mrs. Evdokia lived next door to me on the small Greek island of Alonissos. Most every afternoon in the ancient hilltop village she positioned herself on her front stoop with a display of baklava, calamata olives, feta and lemonade to entice any passers-by that they might yield and share company with her. Once engaged, she might as well bring out her cherished bottle of ouzo. If the passer-by be not charmed to share of her graces, she would still bless him or her with the widest of smiles and a hearty “kali spera” (good afternoon).
One Saturday morning as I headed out, I saw that beloved old Mrs. Evdokia had scattered men’s clothing all about the entrance to her house. I asked her if she were selling the clothing. No, she was kicking her good-for-nothing husband out. She was angry. This was the first time I had seen her without her customary smile. If I wanted to buy the clothing, she said that I could have it all for 10 drachma. I gathered up the clothing and brought it back to my house to give to Mr. Evdokia when he came back from his fishing expedition. By the afternoon, she was on her stoop with baklava and lemonade for the neighbors once more.
A month later, I heard screaming coming from Mrs. Evdokia’s house. I went to her door and looked in. From the ceiling I saw her two legs dangling through. The old boards of the upstairs floor had given way. She was tightly lodged in the resulting hole. I went upstairs to calm her as other neighbors appeared at her door to consider the gravity of her situation. Most of her was still upstairs, so we decided to lift her out from the top, not knowing if the floor would support our effort. First myself and Nikos attempted to lift her up. Takis and Georgios then braved the perils of the collapsing floor to help heave. Years of daily baklava hampered the effort. Finally she was free and was surprisingly none the worse for the catastrophe.
That afternoon she invited the neighborhood to come by for baklava, lemonade and her cherished bottle of ouzo — out of gratitude for her rescue. She smiled broadly as every passer-by passed not by but rather stopped to talk about the incident and to share her fine company. Her good-for-nothing husband was busy in the house repairing the floor for her, so I was able to give him back his clothes.
The Baha’is of Kaua‘i
All religions teach that we should love one another; that we should seek out our own shortcomings before we presume to condemn the faults of others; that we must not consider ourselves superior to our neighbors. If all people were to follow these norms, as described in the passage from the Baha’i writings that follow, religious, racial and class intolerances would cease to be blots on human affairs:
“Be fair to yourselves and to others, that the evidences of justice may be revealed, through your deeds, among our faithful servants. Beware lest ye encroach upon the substance of your neighbor. Prove yourselves worthy of his trust and confidence in you, and withhold not from the poor the gifts which the grace of God hath bestowed upon you. He, verily, shall recompense the charitable, and doubly repay them for what they have bestowed.”
Lama Tashi Dundrup
Kaua‘i Dharma Center
To practice neighborliness in spiritual disciplines we adopt the qualities of being a good neighbor by extending respect, generosity, patience, tolerance, concern for their well being, wishing them happiness, being compassionate, extending loving kindness, and finally motivating them to bring them to the level of buddhahood or total enlightenment in this life time. This is how one acts towards one’s neighbors on this island and planet.
Pastor Wayne Patton
Anahola Baptist Church
What is the “Royal Law of Scripture?” It is the command to love your neighbor as yourself. James 2:8-9 reads, “If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.”
There are a lot of different ways of defining favoritism. A simple way of looking at it is as something that we notice on the outside of a person which keeps us from loving the inside of that person. This is the principle that James is laying down about loving our neighbor as ourselves. It is very similar to what the Lord told Samuel in 1 Samuel 16, when Samuel was comparing Jesse’s sons. The Lord said, “Do not consider his appearance or his height… Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”
Favoritism might be skin color, body piercing or tattoos. It might be age or size. It might be related to health and disability issues. It might be style of clothing, language, accents or dialects. Anytime we let something we notice on the outside of a person keep us from loving the inside of a person, we violate the royal law of Scripture.
We need to rediscover the royal law of Scripture and love our neighbors as ourselves.
Topic for two weeks from today
• Will you speak to us on competition?
• Spiritual leaders are invited to e-mail responses of three to five paragraphs to pwoolway@kauaipubco.com.
• Deadline each week is 5 p.m. Tuesday.
