Taking Revenge- Part 1

Chapter 25 Verse 21/22

“If your enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he be thirsty, give him water to drink. For thou wilt heap coals of fire upon his head, and God will reward thee.”

The Pshat-
1) The pasuk seems to be giving advice on how to deal with an enemy, or more precisely how to take revenge (a method).
2) The method the pasuk gives is to be nice and help your enemy. This advice will help you fulfill your goal of taking revenge.
3) There will be an additional reward for taking revenge in this manner.

Questions: How is being nice to your enemy the best method for revenge?

I am not referring to enemies who hate each other for philosophical or extreme reasons. This pasuk will probably not work on a nazi.

Enemies
People choose to cause other people harm in many ways with many methods. In some cases they will be more open about it (bully) and in others they will hurt you in less confrontational manners (lashon hora). However, it seems that in all cases there is an underlying pattern; the person tries to exert superiority over someone else. Sometime that can also mean putting the other person down by highlighting their weaknesses. Lashon hora for example, is a very powerful tool because it can truly define a person's existence in the eyes of other people. Other times, it is displaying one's own power over the other person (beating someone up).

Problem
Generally, people run into a problem. On the one hand they wish to take revenge but they know that revenge is forbidden. They suppress it, and continue to be hurt by the personality.
On the other hand they can choose to ignore their reason, and to take revenge escalating the situation.

Both possibilities seems to bring a lot of conflict.

The Response
As children, when kids bully us, we are often taught just to ignore them. It's good advice because it recognizes that the bully is craving a sense of superiority over you. By responding, you are fulfilling his wishes. By ignoring him, you are hurting him because you are denying the fulfillment of the pleasure that he seeks.

The advice in our pasuk is an extension of this idea. Not only do we not respond to an enemies attempts to put us down and to claim superiority over us, but we are also nice to them. We give them food and water becoming their benefactor. They are indebted to us. This will frustrate them even more because now they will feel inferior. We will have achieved our objective of revenge by not only not fulfilling their wishes, but acting contrary to them.


Question: What are the additional benefits to taking revenge in this manner? Why will God reward such a person?

Justice- Although we are fulfilling our desire of taking revenge to cause harm to another person, we are also committing an act of justice. To help those in need, even if they are your enemies, is just.
By understanding the nature of our enemies we are able to do true justice in a way that fulfills our personal selfish desires.

The ego- Why does a person become bothered by an enemy?
Someone who knows that he is stronger than the bully will not be bothered. The person is secure in the fact that the bully cannot exert superiority over him, and therefore he is not bothered. Similarly, a chacham will not have many enemies because he is secure with himself. He will not feel inferior to them and thus hate them. Only someone who is insecure will have many enemies. Every remark will appear to be a personal attack on his ego. He will feel intimidated by the bully because he knows that he is weak.
Ironically, the bully is suffering from the same conflict. He always feels inferior, and always feels like he needs to exert superiority over others to convince himself that he is not weak. In essence, by bullying, the bully is giving in to the same emotion that the person in our pasuk is overcoming.

The person who follows the advice of the pasuk can truly feel superior to his enemy. He did not let his insecurity get the better of him. His enemy did. Our guy can now feel a little less insecure.

Eventually the person will even be able to overcome his inferiority complex. Situation after situation, he will apply the advice of pasuk until he does not even have the desire to take revenge.