This verse is a more extreme version of Matthew 10:37 (“He that loveth father or mother more than me”). In this case, I am not going to argue with the English translations. Even the Greek sounded pretty harsh to me when I first started studying it, but, after twenty years of studying the way Jesus uses the Greek, I see it very differently.
We start with the English translations of Luke 14:26:
KJV: If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.
NIV: If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple.
The shock here is the word translated as “hate.” It is so harsh. However, it only seems that way if we don’t think about how the word is usually used and, especially, how we use it in normal discussion.
Hate
To us today, “hate” is portrayed as a violent emotion, so bad that it is the label put on thought crimes. A “hate” crime is portrayed as something like murder. It is equated with burning down churches with children inside. However, more often, what it describes usually amounts to no more than hurting the feelings of some people looking to take offense. However, no matter what it is applied to, the word “hate” is characterized as wanting to kill people.
But is that what we usually mean? We more commonly say we “hate” spinach or spicy food. Does that mean we have an intense feeling? Of course not. We are expressing a dislike, not a passion. Daily, we hate stoplights, hate slow service, hate the weather, hate the price of gas, hate smokers, hate TV commercials, hate this or that type of music. Every teenager has said, “I hate my life” at one time or another. This list of the petty dislikes of everyday living is endless. If this “hate” was passionate, we would have a nervous breakdown every day of our lives.
We do occasionally use the word “hate” more emotionally, but much more rarely. When we have been emotionally upset, most of us have said that we hate teachers, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, best friends, and even our spouses. We say it to express the emotion of the moment. As we get older, we might say it a little more kindly, “Sometimes I hate you,” but we all start saying it bluntly as children, “I hate you! I hate you.”
The people of Jesus’s time were just like us. They used miseo with the same range of meanings and feelings. Usually, it means a petty dislike. Occasionally, it expressed temporary emotional upset. Rarely, it expressed a strong, lasting violent emotion. Of course, their society wasn’t advanced enough for thought crimes. And there was no media to promote that goofy idea.
Jesus’s Use
The question here is: how did Jesus use this word? I discuss this in detail in another article on this topic, but let me summarize it.
In Matthew 6:24, Jesus equates “hate”with another Greek word that means “look down on.” He uses it as the opposite of a Greek word that means “to care for.” In John 12:25, the other word for “love” is used. It means something more like “liking” or “enjoying.” If “hate” means “to look down on” and is the opposite of both “caring for" and “enjoying,” it is more like "despise” or “disrespect.”
In one-quarter of the verses in which Jesus uses this word, the one “hating” is “the world” or “society” (see this article). Society doesn’t have passionate emotions as such. A mob might have temporary emotions, but not all of society. Its most common meaning is a negative preference, something not cared for, or more likely, something society doesn’t enjoy.
This is what Jesus usually means when he uses this word. He is talking about hating broccoli, not mass murderers.
This Verse
Now, I get to talk about one of my favorite topics, humor. This verse has most of the hallmarks of Jesus's comedy. It is a more shocking and more lighthearted version of Matthew 10:37, where he expresses the same idea but in a nicer way. As a more version of the earlier verse, it was possibly inspired by someone asking about his earlier saying. It could also been inspired by someone else’s use of “hate,” that he was making fun of.
Here is my translation,
Listeners Heard: If anyone shows up before me, and he doesn't despise that father of his own, and that mother, and that spouse and those children and those brothers and those sisters. Still even more: that self of his own. He doesn't have the power to be my student.
This verse uses Jesus’s typical humorous style: an innocuous beginning followed by the shocking initial setup (“hating your father and mother”). Note that this is the worst because it goes directly against a commandment. This is followed by the repetitive series of relationships. The use of the repeated “and” is a pause point to further exaggerate it. At some point, this listing of those hated becomes funny and crosses from its initial meaning of “despise” into something more like a mocking of an emotional outburst.
Jesus then goes to his final setup. This is the “still even more.” Spoken, this would be followed by a pause so people could wonder what is “even more” than despising all your family members.
The punchline is despising themselves. That “self” is the self of what we call “ego” (see this article), what Jesus calls earlier in John 12:25, “that self of the world.” The comparison is that the person who hates his family should despise that self “more” than all those other people. Why? Because someone who despises his family, truly does despise himself.
Then there is a second punchline, as we often see from Jesus. It is “he doesn’t have the power to become my student.” Why is having an emotional outburst a source of power for becoming Jesus’s student? Because his teaching was for people passionate about a meaningful life. We need emotion to inspire us into action. His teaching is for people who are flawed and unhappy with their shallow lives in society.
Those of us who have hated aspects of our lives are those looking for a higher meaning, a more sacred form of living.