Hate

HATE, Gen 24:60. To hate is to regard with a passion contrary to love, Jer 44:4. God's hatred is toward all sinful thoughts and ways. It is a feeling of which all holy beings are conscious in view of sin, and is wholly unlike the hatred which is mentioned in the Scripture among the works of the flesh, Gal 5:20. We must hate the evil, but love and bless our enemy, Matt 5:43. To hate sometimes means to love in a less degree. When our Saviour says that he who would follow him must hate father and mother, he means that even these dearest earthly friends must be loved in a subordinate degree; and in the same sense the follower of Christ is to hate his own life, or be willing to sacrifice it for the love and service of the Redeemer. A careful examination of the passages and the connection in which these words occur will best show their true force and meaning.

HATE, Gen 24:60. To hate is to regard with a passion contrary to love, Jer 44:4. God's hatred is toward all sinful thoughts and ways. It is a feeling of which all holy beings are conscious in view of sin, and is wholly unlike the hatred which is mentioned in the Scripture among the works of the flesh, Gal 5:20. We must hate the evil, but love and bless our enemy, Matt 5:43. To hate sometimes means to love in a less degree. When our Saviour says that he who would follow him must hate father and mother, he means that even these dearest earthly friends must be loved in a subordinate degree; and in the same sense the follower of Christ is to hate his own life, or be willing to sacrifice it for the love and service of the Redeemer. A careful examination of the passages and the connection in which these words occur will best show their true force and meaning.

Part of speech: noun (n.)

Strong aversion coupled with desire that evil should befall the person toward whom the feeling is directed; as exercised toward things, intense dislike; hatred; detestation; -- opposed to love. For in a wink the false love turns to hate. Tennyson.

Part of speech: verb (v.)

1. To have a great aversion to, with a strong desire that evil should befall the person toward whom the feeling is directed; to dislike intensely; to detest; as, to hate one's enemies; to hate hypocrisy. Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer. 1 John iii. 15.

2. To be very unwilling; followed by an infinitive, or a substantive clause with that; as, to hate to get into debt; to hate that anything should be wasted. I hate that he should linger here. Tennyson.

3. To love less, relatively. Luke xiv. 26.

Synonyms: Hate, Abhor, Detest, Abominate, Loathe. Hate is the generic word, and implies that one is inflamed with extreme dislike. We abhor what is deeply repugnant to our sensibilities or feelings. We detest what contradicts so utterly our principles and moral sentiments that we feel bound to lift up our voice against it. What we abominate does equal violence to our moral and religious sentiments. What we loathe is offensive to our own nature, and excites unmingled disgust. Our Savior is said to have hated the deeds of the Nicolaitanes; his language shows that he loathed the lukewarmness of the Laodiceans; he detested the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees; he abhorred the suggestions of the tempter in the wilderness.