A platitude is something people say so often that it seems to mean nothing. A command is something we must do. This page asks: are these words of Jesus platitudes, or commands?
What is this page about?
The man who writes this site heard a sermon. He tells us what the pastor said, as well as he remembers it. He does not say who the pastor was, or which church. This page does not try to guess.
The pastor made fun of three sentences: “People should forgive.” “You shall love your neighbour.” “You shall love your enemies.” He read Proverbs 15:2, which talks about fools. He said a wise person does not just repeat these sentences. A wise person thinks about them first.
Forgive, neighbour, enemy, mock
To forgive someone means you stop holding a wrong against them, and you do not try to pay them back. Your neighbour is any person near you who needs help. An enemy is someone who hates you or hurts you. To mock means to make fun of something, to make it look silly.
Maybe the pastor had a good reason. Some people say “just forgive” in a careless or unkind way. This page takes that seriously. But it asks: is it right to make fun of the words themselves?
What this page holds
These are commandsThe words come from Jesus. Christians must obey them. We should think carefully about how to obey them. We should never use them to hurt people.
What this page tests
Making fun of the wordsTreating the words as silly. Saying that only a fool would say them plainly. Using a verse from Proverbs to show it.
Six points
- These are Jesus’ words. Jesus said “Love your enemies” and “Love your neighbour.” He told us to forgive.
- Proverbs 15:2 is about how we speak. It does not say that these words are silly.
- Proverbs also says to love your enemy. It says: if your enemy is hungry, give him food.
- Jesus made these commands bigger, not smaller. When people asked for limits, he gave them more to do.
- The Church thought hard about these words. It always asked how to obey them. It never asked whether to obey them.
- People can use these words badly. That is wrong. But the answer is to use them well, not to make fun of them.
This is my own opinion. A pastor should warn people not to use Jesus’ words in a careless way. But making fun of the words is different. People remember the joke. They forget the careful point.
Whose words are these?
Many sayings are just old sayings. Nobody knows who said them first. “Time heals all wounds” is like that. It is not in the Bible.
But these three sentences are different. Jesus said them.
But I tell you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who mistreat you and persecute you,
Matthew 5:44 · World English Bible
In simple words: Love the people who hate you. Say good things about them. Do good things for them. Pray for them.
A second likewise is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.
Matthew 22:39–40 · World English Bible
In simple words: Love other people as much as you love yourself. This is one of the two most important commands in the whole Bible.
Jesus also said: “Forgive, and you will be forgiven” (Luke 6:37, in simple words). So “People should forgive” is what Jesus taught too.
A writer named C. S. Lewis said something wise about this. Everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea, he said, until they have something to forgive. Then it becomes very hard. He called it “this terrible duty.” These words only sound easy when we are not trying to do them.
These are not old sayings. They are commands from Jesus. Saying them often does not make them less important.
What does Proverbs 15:2 say?
This is the verse the pastor used:
The tongue of the wise commends knowledge, but the mouths of fools gush out folly.
Proverbs 15:2 · World English Bible
In simple words: A wise person says true things in a good way. A fool lets silly words pour out of his mouth.
In the Hebrew language, the verse says the wise person “makes knowledge good.” It is about how we say true things. It does not say that true things are silly.
Look at the verse just before it:
A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
Proverbs 15:1 · World English Bible
In simple words: Gentle words calm people down. Hard words make people angry.
This whole chapter of Proverbs is about speaking gently, at the right time, after thinking. Proverbs also has a name for a person who makes fun of things. It calls him a “scoffer” or “scorner,” and it does not praise him (Proverbs 15:12).
Proverbs 15:2 is about how we speak. It does not say that “love your enemies” is foolish.
Proverbs says to love your enemy too
The book of Proverbs teaches the same thing that Jesus taught.
If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat. If he is thirsty, give him water to drink;
Proverbs 25:21 · World English Bible
In simple words: If your enemy needs food or water, give it to him.
Paul uses these same words in the New Testament (Romans 12:20). Proverbs also says: do not be happy when your enemy falls (24:17). Do not pay back evil (20:22). Love covers wrongs (10:12).
So the book the pastor used actually teaches love for enemies.
You cannot use Proverbs to make fun of loving your enemies. Proverbs itself tells us to do it.
When people asked Jesus for limits
Some people asked Jesus questions to make his commands smaller. One was a teacher of the law:
But he, desiring to justify himself, asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?”
Luke 10:29 · World English Bible
In simple words: He wanted to know who he had to love, so he could know who he did not have to love.
Jesus told him a story. A man was hurt and lying by the road. A man from Samaria stopped and helped him. The Jews and the Samaritans did not like each other. But the Samaritan helped anyway. Jesus said: “Go and do likewise” (Luke 10:37).
Peter asked Jesus: should I forgive my brother seven times? Jesus said: not seven times, but seventy times seven (Matthew 18:22). He meant: do not keep count.
In Jesus’ time, some people taught: “Love your neighbour, and hate your enemy.” The Bible never said “hate your enemy.” People had added it. Jesus took it away. He said: “Love your enemies.”
Some “buts” help us obey. “Forgive, but forgiving does not mean you must trust him again.” “Forgive, but still tell the police about a crime.” These are good.
Some “buts” make the command smaller. “Love your enemies, but only if they deserve it.” “Love them, but you do not have to help them.” Jesus did not allow these.
When people asked Jesus for limits, he gave them a bigger command, not a smaller one.
Who does Jesus call a fool?
Jesus said “Love your enemies” in a long sermon. At the end of that sermon, he told a story about two builders. One built his house on rock. One built on sand.
Everyone who hears these words of mine and doesn’t do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.
Matthew 7:26 · World English Bible
In simple words: The fool is the person who hears what Jesus says, and does not do it.
So who is the fool? Not the person who says “love your enemies” in a simple way. The fool is the person who hears it and does not do it.
Jesus says the wise person is the one who does what he says. A simple person who obeys is wise.
The first Christians
The first Christians did not think these words were silly. They thought these words showed what a Christian is.
- A very early book for new Christians, called the Didache, starts with these words: “Bless those who curse you, and pray for your enemies.”
- About 150 years after Jesus, a Christian writer named Athenagoras wrote to the Roman emperor. He said: some of our people cannot read well. Some are workers, and some are old women. They cannot argue cleverly. But when someone hits them, they do not hit back. They love their neighbours.
- A writer named Tertullian said that everyone loves the people who love them. But only Christians love the people who hate them.
The first Christians said these words plainly. Simple people who obeyed them were the best proof of the faith.
The Church thought hard about these words
The pastor said we must think carefully about these words. That is true. The Church did think carefully about them, for hundreds of years. But it always asked: how do we obey? It never asked: should we obey?
A preacher named John Chrysostom, about 1,600 years ago, said that loving enemies is like climbing nine steps:
- Do not hurt anyone first.
- If someone hurts you, do not hurt them more than they hurt you.
- Do not hurt them back at all.
- Be ready to suffer wrong.
- Give even more than they want to take.
- Do not hate them.
- Love them.
- Do good things for them.
- Pray to God for them.
Other teachers thought hard too. Augustine said: if your way of reading the Bible does not help you love God and love people more, you have not understood it yet. Martin Luther said: you may let people hurt you, but you must not let them hurt your neighbour. John Calvin said: do not ask if a person deserves love. Look at the image of God in them.
Thinking carefully is good. In the history of the Church, careful thinking always led to more love, not less.
Forgiving when it costs everything
Something that costs nothing to say is a platitude. These words have cost people their lives.
He kneeled down and cried with a loud voice, “Lord, don’t hold this sin against them!” When he had said this, he fell asleep.
Acts 7:60 · World English Bible
In simple words: Stephen was being killed with stones. He asked God to forgive the men who were killing him. Then he died.
Jesus prayed for the people who were killing him. James, a leader of the first church, did the same. Christians in France in the year 177 prayed for the people who hurt them. In 1947, a woman named Corrie ten Boom met a guard from the prison camp where her sister died. She found it very hard. She prayed, “Jesus, help me!” Then she shook his hand and said, “I forgive you, brother!”
People said these words at the hardest moments of their lives. The words are not silly.
The Lord’s Prayer
Christians everywhere pray the prayer Jesus taught. It says:
Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.
Matthew 6:12 · World English Bible
In simple words: God, forgive us, in the same way that we forgive other people.
For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
Matthew 6:14 · World English Bible
In simple words: If you forgive other people, God will forgive you.
This is the only part of the prayer that Jesus explained. Think about a church that makes fun of “People should forgive” in the sermon. A few minutes later, the same people pray “as we forgive.” That is confusing.
Every Sunday, Christians pray that they forgive others. The sermon should help them do it, not make it sound silly.
How we speak
The Bible asks us to speak in a kind way that helps people:
And be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving each other, just as God also in Christ forgave you.
Ephesians 4:32 · World English Bible
In simple words: Be kind. Forgive each other, because God forgave you.
Does the Bible ever make fun of things? Yes. The prophet Elijah made fun of a false god. Jesus made fun of religious leaders who said one thing and did another. But the Bible never makes fun of God’s commands.
Think about the people listening to the sermon. A man who is angry with his brother hears: “Only fools say ‘people should forgive.’” He may decide not to forgive. A woman who forgave someone hears it too. She may feel silly. The pastor did not want this. But jokes stay in our minds.
If a pastor wants to correct how people use these words, he can do it kindly. Making fun of the words teaches the wrong lesson.
The other side
The pastor may have had good reasons. These are real problems:
Like a thorn bush that goes into the hand of a drunkard, so is a parable in the mouth of fools.
Proverbs 26:9 · World English Bible
In simple words: A wise saying can hurt people when a fool uses it.
- Bad timing. Saying “just forgive” to someone who is crying, right after something terrible happened, is unkind.
- Words without help. Saying “love your neighbour” but never helping anyone is empty (James 2:15–16).
- Hurting victims. Some people have used “forgive” to tell someone to go back to a person who hurts them. That is very wrong.
Forgiving someone does not mean:
- you must trust them again
- you must stay quiet about what they did
- you must go back to a dangerous place
- they should not be punished by the law
But look carefully. Every one of these problems is about the person speaking, not the words. The Bible’s answer is to use the words wisely: at the right time, with kind actions, and with justice for people who are hurt. The answer is not to make fun of the words.
People can use these words badly. The answer is to use them well.
What does this show?
It does not show:
- what the pastor really meant, or what is in his heart
- that every warning about “just forgive” is wrong
- that these words can never be used badly
It does show:
- that these are commands from Jesus
- that Proverbs 15:2 is about how we speak, and that Proverbs also says to love your enemy
- that the Church always thought about these words in order to obey them
- that the Bible’s answer to careless words is careful words, not jokes
Here is how a pastor could make the same point kindly: “‘Love your enemies’ is the hardest thing Jesus asks. So we must never say it cheaply. Do not say ‘just forgive’ to someone who is still hurting. Do not use ‘forgive’ to send someone back into danger. Do not say ‘love your neighbour’ unless you are ready to help. Let us say these words less lightly, and do them more.”
This is my own opinion. The Church thought about “love your enemies” for two thousand years. Every time, it ended up on its knees, praying for its enemies, like Stephen.
You may see it differently. This page tries to help you decide for yourself.
“Love your enemies” is not a platitude. It is a command from Jesus. Say it carefully. Do it gladly.
Check it yourself
- Read Proverbs 15. How many verses are about the way we speak?
- Read Matthew 5:43–48. What does Jesus say about enemies?
- Read Luke 10:25–37. Who was the good neighbour?
- Read Matthew 7:24–27. Who is wise, and who is foolish?
- Think of one person you have not forgiven. Read Matthew 5:44 and think of that person. Then pray the Lord’s Prayer.
Want more?
The quick version has three short exercises. The full dossier has all the evidence and every source.
Quick version →Full dossier →Bible verses in boxes on this page come from the World English Bible, a modern translation that is free for everyone to use. Some other verses are given “in simple words”. The full dossier quotes all the verses from the Authorised (King James) Version.