how could you hate what a man did and not hate the man?
 C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952). copy citation

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Author C. S. Lewis
Source Mere Christianity
Topic hate
Date 1952
Language English
Reference
Note Adapted from a series of BBC radio talks made between 1942 and 1944
Weblink https://www.dacc.edu/assets/pdfs/PCM/merechristianitylewis.pdf

Context

“Now that I come to think of it, I remember Christian teachers telling me long ago that I must hate a bad man’s actions, but not hate the bad man: or, as they would say, hate the sin but not the sinner. For a long time I used to think this a silly, straw-splitting distinction: how could you hate what a man did and not hate the man? But years later it occurred to me that there was one man to whom I had been doing this all my life—namely myself. However much I might dislike my own cowardice or conceit or greed, I went on loving myself.” source