Those Who Love Him Like the Rising Sun in Its Might

"But they that love Him shall be as the sun going forth in its might" (Judges 5:31). Our rabbis taught: Those who are insulted but do not insult, who hear themselves reviled and do not answer back, who act out of love and rejoice in their sufferings — of them Scripture says, "But they that love Him shall be as the sun going forth in its might." And even though Rabbi Yochanan said in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Yehotzadak that any disciple of the wise who does not take vengeance and bear a grudge like a serpent is no disciple of the wise — that is in a case where one holds it like a snake's bite until others appease him on the matter. "But they that love Him shall be as the sun going forth in its might" — this is one of six things that were taken from the first man [Adam], and so on (as written elsewhere).