The Bible, Shmelke of Nikolsburg

One of the most famous teachings from the Bible is, "Love your neighbor as yourself." It sounds simple and in a way easy to do. Many people think that this teaching is saying, "Treat others how you would like to be treated." The Schmelke of Nikolsburg reading brought up a lot of good questions like, "How can we love our neighbor as ourself if our neighbor has wronged us?" Are we supposed to just let people treat us as horrible as they want while remaining kind and loving to them? Easier said than done! I guess that I (and probably a lot of other people) have a tendency to think "loving" someone is being nice and making that other person happy. When I was younger I thought that if someone wanted to eat Chinese food for dinner (while I was craving Italian and did not want Chinese at all) I would go along with it. To me this was "loving" someone. I often times would not mention what I wanted to do in order to let others be happy and have their needs and desires met. I am not saying that I was this great person that always put others first or anything. I just tried really hard to love others and saw this as the best way how. I think now that it is definently okay to sometimes do what you want to do and ask people to sometimes give up their desires for you. So back to the dinner thing... I know think it is okay to try to convince people to go to Italian for my sake even though they may really want Chinese. I know it is not the best example but I think you get my point. I like how the rabbi answers, "Love your neighbor like you yourself are. For all souls are one. Each spark is from the original soul, and this soul is wholly inherent in all souls, just as your soul is in all members or your body." I think before I was missing the point when I focused on all the little things like where I will eat dinner. Yes, it is good to sometimes happily do something because someone else wants to. That can go along with love. It seems like the bigger point about, "Love your neighbor as yourself" is having a deep respect and care for those around us because we all originated from the same place and in many ways are much alike.