How many times has each of us heard the modern equivalent to this? “Don’t be Judgmental” is something that many of us have heard and even said to others. Why is it so hard not to be? It is natural to judge situations and things, but we also judge persons who react differently than we do to those situations and things. This, I feel, is where this Maxim speaks to us with its warning to not judge people as we do not know why they are acting the way they are or speaking the way they are.
We cannot know a person’s experiences in the manner that they do. We cannot tell if their experiences are at war with the teachings they had as a child. I can only imagine what a person raised in the Westboro Baptist Church would feel if they realized they had an attraction to people of the same sex and that their own family was therefore judging them as evil. I realize that this is an extreme example, but it does illustrate what damage judging someone could conceivably do.
My father told me as a child “Do not point your finger at people because you have one finger pointing away and three pointing back” I would say this is good advice and am working on taking it to heart each and every day. (Although sometimes I still fail miserably). Can we all accept the challenge of this Maxim?
