(17) You shall not hate your kinsfolk in your heart. Reprove your kinsman but incur no guilt because of him. (18) You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your countrymen. Love your fellow as yourself: I am the LORD.
היך עבידא הוה מקטע קופד ומחת סכינא לידוי תחזור ותמחי לידיה. (ויקרא יט) ואהבת לרעך כמוך. רבי עקיבה אומר זהו כלל גדול בתורה. בן עזאי אומר (בראשית ה) זה ספר תולדות אדם זה כלל גדול מזה.
What is an example? Someone was cutting meat and laid the knife on his hand. Would he in turn cut the other hand? (Leviticus 19:18) "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." Rabbi Akiva says: This is the great principal of the Torah. Ben Azzai says: (Genesis 5:1) "This is the book of the generations of Adam" is the great principal of the Torah.
2) How does the metaphor of one cutting their hand with a knife depict the big picture of humanity?
3) Who in your life do you struggle to respect as a human and how can you possibly reconcile that relationship?
Rav Naḥman says that Rabba bar Avuh says: The verse states: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), teaching that even with regard to a condemned man, select a good, i.e., a compassionate, death for him. Therefore, even though the one being executed is likely to die from a fall from a lesser height, a platform is built that is twice the height of an ordinary person in order to ensure a quick and relatively painless death. The Gemara challenges: If so, they should raise the platform even higher. The Gemara answers: This is not done, because if the condemned man were pushed from a higher platform, he would become seriously disfigured, and this would no longer be considered a compassionate form of death.
2) If an individual was sentenced to death, why struggle so much with the manner in which they are to be executed?
3) Was there a time in your life when you held power over someone who had previously wronged you? Did you act with compassion?
There was another incident involving one gentile who came before Shammai and said to Shammai: Convert me on condition that you teach me the entire Torah while I am standing on one foot. Shammai pushed him away with the measuring stick in his hand. The same gentile came before Hillel. [Hillel] converted him by saying to him: "That which is hateful to you do not do to another; that is the entire Torah, and the rest is its interpretation. Go study."
2) What does the quickness of Hillel's reply indicate about his belief in the central message of the Torah? How does this relate to what Rabbi Akiva said in the earlier passage from Jerusalem Talmud Nedarim 30b above?
3) Can you explain the main theme of how you live your life in under 15 words, (like Hillel does with the Torah)? If so what is your theme? If not, why not?
"You, you just couldn't let me go, could you?" - The Joker
Towards the end of the film, the protagonist, Batman, has the opportunity to kill his nemesis, The Joker. Rather than allowing The Joker to plummet to his death, Batman catches him with a grappler and ties him up to be caught by the police.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oPsvq81n2A (Watch from 0:00 to 2:00)
2) The Joker causes mass chaos throughout the film, causing hundreds of human casualties along the way. Does he deserve to live? Why does or doesn't that matter?
3) Have you ever treated someone with compassion despite your opinion of their character?