The Sunday lectionary gospel reading for the Fourth Sunday before Advent in Year B is the dialogue that includes Jesus’ summary of the law in Mark 12.28–34. As we count down the lectionary year, preparing to enter Advent with its focus on Jesus’ return, Mark is counting down the days and hours to Jesus’ trial and crucifixion. We look in hope for his coming again, but can only do so because Jesus gave himself for us, and defeated the powers of sin and death on the cross, and was raised to give us new life and hope.
We have been here before, and quite recently too; last year, in the last Sunday of Advent, our gospel reading was the parallel passage in Matthew 22. The passage comes in all three Synoptic gospels, though in quite different places. In Matthew and Mark, Jesus is in the temple in the ‘week’ leading to the crucifixion, and it follows the parable of the wicked tenants, (the parable of the great supper in Matthew only), the test question about tribute to Caesar, and the test from the Sadducees about levirite marriage in the resurrection. In Luke, it takes place ‘on the way’, following the mission of the 72, and it leads into the parable of the Good Samaritan.
It is perfectly possible that this question was asked of Jesus more than once; as we shall see below, this was a common concern in Jewish thinking and debate. And we learned two years ago, when reading Luke, that his central section has been arranged more thematically than chronologically; having included it here, he omits it in Luke 20 and moves straight from the question of marriage in the resurrection to the woes against the Pharisees.
| Matthew 22:34-40 | Mark 12:28-31 | Luke 10:25-28 |
| Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” | One of the scribes came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?” “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” “Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbour as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions. | On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?” He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.” |
Whilst Matthew makes a point of alternating the attacks on Jesus between the Sadducees and the Pharisees, in Mark the questioner is a ‘scribe’, a member of the professional class who worked with legal documents but also paid close attention to Scripture; during Jesus’ ministry in Galilee, Mark sees the scribes as his main opponents, where Matthew identifies them as Pharisees, and the two groups will have overlapped.
Luke’s inquisitor seems more neutral, even if he seeks to ‘justify’ himself (Luke 10.29). Matthew interprets the question as hostile; the motive is to ‘test’ or ‘tempt’ Jesus (peirazo), the term Matthew has previously used of the Pharisees (Matt 16.1, 19.3) as well as the devil (Matt 4.1) and Jesus has used of them in the previous episode (Matt 22.18). But in Mark there is a more positive exchange, with Jesus and the questioner apparently exchanging as equal participants in the discussion. It is interesting to note that Mark has each party express the answer; Matthew is selective and only has the words on the lips of Jesus, whilst Luke is selective and only has the words on the lips of the questioner.
As is common, Mark’s account of the opening dialogue is longer and more detailed than either Luke or Matthew; Mark includes the introduction to the Shema from Deut 6.4 that Jesus quotes, and Jesus goes on to commend the ‘lawyer’ and note that he is ‘not far from the kingdom of God’, characterising the kingdom as an almost physical space (Mark 12.34). [We need to note the quite different sense of ‘law’ and ‘lawyer’ here; we are looking at a dispute about religious texts, and debates between the religious ‘experts’; and the ‘law’ was the first five books of the Bible, much of which was narrative.] Luke has interpreted this, possibly for an audience less familiar with Jewish theological terms, into the promise that ‘you will live’.
Summarising Scripture is an age-old activity. Andrew Wilson, of NewFrontiers, offers a 12-verse summary of the whole of the Bible here, and I have recently been making use of a very good, short summary of The New Testament in Seven Sentences by Gary Burge. (In fact, Burge actually summarises the NT in seven words, each with a verse attached, which connect the message of the NT with the OT and the whole narrative of scripture: fulfilment; kingdom; cross; grace; covenant; Spirit; completion.) This kind of ‘big picture’ summarising is actually an important part of our ‘biblical literacy’, helping us to read well. Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart identified two key skills in reading Scripture in How to Read the Bible for All its Worth—to have an overview of the big picture, and to be able to focus on the particulars of any passage, and then in reading well to move between the one and the other.
So it is not surprising that we find, within Scripture itself, summaries of Scripture! In rabbinic discussion (b Mak 24a) it was thought that there were summaries in Ps 15 (in 11 points), Is 33.15–16 (in six points), Micah 6.8 (in three), Is 56.1 (in two) and in Amos 5.4b and Hab 2.4b in one. The summary in Micah is well known in Christian reflection:
He has shown all you people what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God (Micah 6.8)
and Paul makes key use of the one in Habakkuk 2.4 ‘the righteous shall live by faith[fulness]’ in Rom 1.17 and Gal 3.11. Many Christians have ‘life verses’ or summaries of what they think the good news of God is about, and it might be interesting to compare them!
Rabbi Hillel (living just prior to the time of Jesus) was famously challenged by someone to recite the whole law whilst standing on one leg. He replied:
What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.
This is close to its inverse that Jesus has already offered as a summary earlier in Matthew 7.12 and (in a less Jewish form) in Luke 6.31, though not in Mark:
So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
It is notable that Jesus offers the positive version, and interesting that, in offering this summary, he appears to side with Hillel (whose rival Shammai refused to answer the man), where in other issues (especially on marriage and divorce) his teaching is closer to the conservative Shammai than the liberal Hillel.
There are several things worth noting about Jesus’ summary.
First, although it is quite different from the other summaries noted above, there is no particular reason to think that it was necessarily unique or original to Jesus. Several other rabbinical summaries have the two-fold focus on God and neighbour, and in fact this matches the ‘two tablets’ of the Ten Commandments, in which the first half is clearly oriented to God, and the second half oriented to social relationships. The Jewish philosopher Philo even appears (in his exposition of special laws Spec Leg 2.63) to suggest that the two tablets of the Commandments had these two concerns as headings on them, so that those who kept the first five commandments were philotheoi (lovers of God) and those who kept the second five were philanthropoi (lovers of people).
Secondly, unlike either the Golden Rule (in its positive or negative forms) or the summaries in the prophets, Jesus is here summarising the law from within the law. This actually diffuses the differences between the Pharisees and Sadducees, the latter of whom considered Torah alone to be scripture. But it also means that there is no suggestion here that the law is in any way displaced by the teaching of Jesus. Of course, the Golden Rule is very close to the command to love, since though the term is mentioned, this is clearly the motivation for ‘doing unto others…’
As Philip Jenson has pointed out (How to Interpret Old Testament Law) the law material within the Pentateuch varies in its degree of detail and generalisation, so that some regulations are very context specific, whilst others are much more high level and general. A key issue in its interpretation, then, is to note these differences and the relations between the different kinds of laws that we find—which is much more profitable than the traditional but rather arbitrary approach of trying to discern between the sacrificial, ceremonial and moral laws (as set out in Article VII of the Articles of Religion) since these three issues are not neatly compartmentalised in the Pentateuch itself.
Jesus picks out two such summary statements, the first from Deut 6.4 and the second from Lev 19.18. The first of these forms the central confession of Judaism, generally thought in this period to be recited morning and evening by all observant Jews (though there is some debate about when this practice became regular). Jesus is not telling his listeners anything that they do not know, and so here his teaching is in continuity, rather than discontinuity, with accepted practice and priorities. He is calling his fellow Jews back to their biblical roots, not away in some discontinuous new direction.
Thirdly, Jesus is thus offering, from within the law, a hermeneutical principle for reading the law.
They summarise not only the law (which was the question asked) but also the prophets, since the whole scriptural revelation is understood to witness to the same divine will… This does not mean, as some modern ethicists have argued, that ‘all you need is love’, so that one can dispense with the ethical rules set out in the Torah. It is rather to say that those rules find their true role in working out the practical implications of the love for God and neighbour on which they are based (R T France, Matthew NICNT, p 847).
It is surely no accident that Jesus places ‘love of God’ first and ‘love of neighbour’ second; whilst we cannot claim to love God whom we cannot see if we do not love our neighbour whom we can see (1 John 4.20), because of human sin and selfishness, which distorts both our perception and our action, we cannot truly love our neighbour unless we love God and attend to the pattern of life to which he calls us.
Mark and Matthew’s versions of Deut 6.4 follows the Greek translation for the first two aspects (‘heart’ and ‘soul’) though Matthew’s grammar varies slightly, using the Greek en (‘in’) rather than Mark’s ex (‘from’) which is a more literal translation of the Hebrew preposition b–. It is important to note, though, that in Deuteronomy and for Jesus, these terms have a rather different sense from our usual English language assumptions; there is a very good exploration of the meanings of these terms in the Bible Project videos on the Shema, on love, heart, and soul. Mark’s account of Jesus’ summary expands the final term in Deut 6.4, me’od, into two terms ‘mind’ and ‘strength’, and it appears as though Matthew has truncated the last in order to match the original three terms. But me’od is a difficult term to interpret, most usually being used as an adverb to mean ‘very’, and thus having the sense of loving God with all the abundance of things that you are and have. Within the rabbinical tradition, it is sometimes translated as strength, mind or even money—thus pointing to all the resources and power that we have. Again the Bible Project video on this term is excellent.
Thus Jesus’ summary of the law achieves a number of things. First, it connects the ‘vertical’ and spiritual aspects of discipleship with the ‘horizontal’ and social. Christian faith can neither be reduced to a social action movement, nor can it be restricted to the merely religious. The love of God comes first, but (in Matthew’s version) the second ‘is like it’.
Secondly, Jesus’ summary in Mark, by including the fourth term ‘strength’, points to the all-encompassing nature of the call he makes on our lives. New life in Christ, the life of the kingdom of God, comes to us as an unmerited gift, bought for us by the costly price of the life of Jesus—but receiving it makes demands on us too. We only receive this life, or enter into the kingdom, as we take on the well-fitting yoke of Jesus (Matt 11.29) and give ourselves to the love of both God and neighbour.
Thirdly, Jesus leaves us in no doubt that he has come not to abolish the law, but to fulfil it. The God who gave the gift of the law to Israel also gives us the gift of Jesus, and we cannot divide the two.
Fourthly, summaries are vitally important and function, like creedal statements, as an interpretive lens through which we can read the details of Scripture. But they are not slogans, and cannot be used in isolation from other parts of Scripture. We are called to love, but to know what that love looks like, we need everything else that Jesus and his apostolic witnesses in the New Testament teach us.
(The picture at top is an extract from ‘The Pharisees question Jesus’ by James Tissot, part of his series on the life of Jesus.)
Come and join Ian and James as they discuss these issues in the weekly video:
Jesus, fully God, fully man is the only One who can and has perfectly fulfilled both commandments on our behalf. Otherwise it is impossible for us.
Only He lived in that perfect sinless righteousness, active and passive obedience, in Spirit and in Truth which is ours in Union with him.
As put by Donald McLeod in Christ Crucified, believers are as righteous as Jesus!
Do we get offended a the very Idea. Even in light of the liturgical prayer of confession that we have not so loved, loved in ‘That’ unique way, on those other ways, even our enemy neighbour.
It is unlikely to take long to find out.
(Conviction of breach of the first, led to my salvation!)
How did Jesus do so?
In reality, in history, in various ways and means for redemptive life purposes.
Is there a risk of our own passivity in our own lives? Certainly, hence the
liturgical confession.
Several other rabbinical summaries have the two-fold focus on God and neighbour, and in fact this matches the ‘two tablets’ of the Ten Commandments, in which the first half is clearly oriented to God, and the second half oriented to social relationships.
No Sirs! I agree, of course, that the first five are man/God and the second five are man/man, but all ten commandments were on each of the tablets; one tablet for God and one for Israel. Each party much have a copy of any covenant or contract.
I’m all in favour of the all-England summarise scripture contest! I have a 68-word summary, a 138-word summary, an 847-word summary and a 8072-word summary (OT: 4258 words; NT: 3814 words). Here is the 68-word:
There is an all-powerful righteous God who made you, so be sorry for all you have done wrong and believe in him and his son, through whom you may approach him. Come, repent and be changed! You will be forgiven all you have done wrong, and you can start again with a clear conscience, this time with God on your side instead of against you for your sin.
And here is the 138-word:
There is one God who made everything, including the human race, so he has rights over us. He made us clean, but we fell into sin. He tells us to search out our sins, which are shown up by the righteous laws He gave to Israel, and be sorry for them. Out of love He sent his only son, one in divinity with him, as a human like us but sinless, Jesus Christ of Israel. All who believe in him are forgiven through his self-sacrifice; are helped not to sin by his Holy Spirit; and live forever after Christ returns to give judgement against sin and put the world aright. Christ came back to life after being put to death as a sacrifice for sin, and many who saw him dead then alive have died for their witness.
No eschatology here?
Plenty in the 847-word summary, but that would be trespassing on Ian’s hospitality a bit. I’d like more on Israel too.
“we cannot truly love our neighbour unless we love God and attend to the pattern of life to which he calls us.”
Wrong way round. We cannot understand the pattern of life to which God calls us without loving our neighbour. Our motivation will be misguided unless we love God.
Love is the key to understanding the law, rather than the law is telling us how to love. Hence, Paul in Romans 13 explains that love is the fulfillment of the law because love does no harm to a neighbour.
Our love of God is responsive. He love us first. While we were his enemies Christ fied for us.
AJB, yours is the inversion, it is suggested.
The first 11 chapters of Romans is in the indicative mood, the Good Newd of Jesus. Only therefter is there is there is something of the imperative.
Out of common grace, atheists may demonstrate love of neighbour without first loving God, rejecting the love of God, in Christ Jesus.
No, it’s correct. We cannot truly love our neighbours unless we first love God. Trying to love our our neighbours while ignoring God is the essence of modern secular socialism. It fails because those who follow this route (immanent, without transcendence) end up loving some people and hating others – as modern socialism and communism have shown us.
Loving God is only meaningful when it is fleshed out in obedience to His will.
And ultimately James, it is the impossiblity of salvation by performance, works, which Jesus, as in the sweep of Ian’s articles, underscores in exchanges in slightly different ways and emphases.
I must point out that the encounter described in Luke has the summary of the Law not from Jesus but from the “expert in the law”, with Jesus commending his answer. This suggests that the summary was known apart from Jesus’ use of it.
Some years ago, I came across an excellent challenging sermon/ talk by Henri Blocher , on loving neighbour centring on Christ.
Thought, a link was kept, but perhaps not, or is on unused laptop.
In his commentary on Mark’s gospel, a Reformed scholar from a previous generation, (commenting on Jesus’ response to a scribe’s questionings re the commandments [12:34] namely by declaring “you are not far from the kingdom of God ” ) said this : “If the scribe —– would now take one more step —– and believe in *Jesus as his Saviour and Lord* he would be ‘not far from’ but actually ‘inside’ the kingdom!”.
I still find it astonishing that the terms ‘Lord’ and even ‘Saviour’ should be taken out of context in this way. I wonder what our erstwhile scholar would have made of Luke 10:28; if he (the commentator) ever pondered the significance of Jesus’ response to the lawyers question re eternal life [Luke10: 25-28]: “You have answered correctly (said Jesus); do this and you will live.” Perhaps he might have thought -*Do* this? Do what? Answer? Obey this summary of the law [Deuteronomy 6: :4 and Leviticus19:18]? But does this not contradict the doctrine of justification by faith? Is this not justification by *works*?
So exactly where is Jesus in all this? Much of the foregoing discussion in this post has revolved the concept of law in judicial/ legal terminology. With that in mind, I would make the following points:
(1) What has been called the Pentateuch is in Hebrew called the Torah ( translated as law in English). Torah embraces justice, judgements and legislation. But it includes narrative, teaching, prophecy, etc. Moreover we need to remember its positive aspects- witness Psalm 119!
(2) There still exist polemical reasons in some quarters for assuming that the OT is primarily about law. The Torah says otherwise! (a) Exodus 15 -(The Song of Moses) reminds us, not only of the majestic holiness of God but it also contains the first scriptural reference to *chesed” God’s covenant love! . Hence (b) the 10 Commandments do not begin with ‘law’; they begin with an affirmation of God’s sovereignty and Lordship, followed by clear statement of *his covenant love revealed in redemption*! Thus law “follows” covenant , but nevertheless, the two are inextricably bound together. And finally (c) we cannot forget Jesus’ intimate knowledge of the OT, not least Deuteronomy. His testing in the wilderness bears a powerful witness to this; given that preceding his temptations, in his anointing in his baptism he represents Israel as God’s ‘chosen one’ [see Deut.7:6; Psalm 2:7 and Matt.3:17].
Deuteronomy 6 :5 contains what is described in Mark 12: 28 (alongside Leviticus 19:18) as “the most important [commandment] of them all”. However in the next chapter of Deuteronomy we read in vv6f a profound statement of the Lord’s covenant love to his people; not to mention a crystal clear manifestation of the meaning and nature of Israel’s (and our) love to Him (see 9b f). In Galatians 4:4 it says that Jesus was “born under the law”. This means much more than *obeying or even fulfilling* the law. Jesus lived by the law of Moses , but he understood implicitly that behind the law was the Mosaic Covenant highlighting God’s unbridled love for his people. That covenant and that law are now rendered obsolete by the New Covenant (see Hebrews 8: 8 – 13). But God’s promises, delineated in the Abrahamic Covenant, and revealed through our Lord Jesus Christ have not!. In the final analysis, our God does not change His mind.
Interesting Colin,
Having only skimmed it, it may be needful to read it more carefully.
Are you certain that Jesus was saying that it was possible to perform in his own strength, or that it was impossible
Even then, the Holy Spirit had not yet been pored out.
Who is this commentator so that thr commentary may be weighed? Are all reformers of that school?Some do not subscribe to the sweep of the whole canon. Some are of the replacement school.
How are you performing?
But I do really need to read it alongside your concluding points, with which, on first blush, I’d concur as you look to ground the in the OT, Pentateuch and the covenenants.
There seems to me in Christian circles whether reformed or no, to invert or confuse salvation/justification/righteousness and sancification.
Thanks. And thanks for the pause for thought.
I was looking a a picture of an ancient artefact. Next to it was a ruler so the viewer could understand it in context. Isn’t the Law of Moses just like that? Without the Law We would have nothing to measure Jesus by. The plum line agrees with the Building.
Jesus tells us to “Love your neighbour as yourself.” It’s easy to read that verse and think, “just love your neighbour.” But the modifying phrase, “as yourself,” tells us we need to love ourselves in order to fully love our neighbour.
We have to be physically, mentally, and spiritually balanced if we hope to love our neighbour. Jesus is telling us to be healthy, spiritually, emotionally, intellectually, and physically so we are able to love and serve our neighbour properly. We need a strong spiritual life to love and respect ourselves as creatures created in God’s image, as beings worthy of God’s Love through Christ.
We cannot “choose” to not love our self. We are going to love our self. The choice is how you are going to love our self. In a wicked self-love, we seek carnal pleasure and focus on goods that we desire for our self alone. How we love ourselves is going to determine how we love others. A person who loves himself rightly will love others rightly. If we relate to our self through a disordered love, we cannot into a deep union with others.
A disordered love or hatred of self hinders our service to and love of others. We need to recognise our place before God, acknowledge His power and our need for Him – Love Him. With His graces we can seek to overcome the effects of our fallen human nature; our weakness, sinfulness, and failures in love of Him, self and others. In humility before God we must embrace the gifts and graces He offers us – and extend these to others.
It’s not a trivial point, because Paul tells us elsewhere that we must deny our selves and even put them to death! Context is everything here.
@ Anton
How does that contradict properly ordered self love?
I’m not suggesting a contradiction, Jack.
Ultimately, denying self is submitting, giving self over, to Sovereignty of God, over and in our lives, his nature purposes, in his Triunity and indwelling, in trust and obedience, albeit imperfect.
Loving yourself, for me as a Christian is head shakingly, almost unbelievably so, based on God’s love demonstrated by Jesus ‘in that way’ for me…and you, even or especially through, in invariably falling short. missing God’s ‘targets’.
Exactly so, Geoff!
If you can’t love yourself, how are you going to love somebody else?
I never thought anyone would invoke RuPaul on this blog, least of all you Happy Jack…
Who?
A devout follower of Jesus?
Or merely a vexatious, referent?
This reminds me of Paul’s words – noone ever hated his own body. That may have been true in Paul’s day but not today. I think you are right, self-hatred and depression etc often leads to us not being able to love others very much, not to mention God. And of course it works both ways – God’s love and that from others often feels unreal.
An illustration, with one very narrow point.
Our church is in Ephesians, still in Chapter 1.
Sunday gone, after the service I was introduced to two adult daughters, with their chilren, returning to stay with their parents for half term by our mid-week group leader.
I asked one daughter how long they had known each other!
The father, clearly but quietly proud, “knew” and loved his daughter before she was born, without reciprical knowledge, love, work or merit. Having shared this with our midweek wattsapp the leader replied Amen! Yes he did.
How much more God our Father, who knew and loved those before creation born by him from above.
Having had clinical depression in the past, this need to be embedded in our psyche, mind will and emotions.
It is not centred on our feelings, as CBT emphasises, feelings often unbidden, can be traced to thoughts, often basic ones, triggered by something and with thought may not be immediately apparent, yet traceable to perhaps events days, weeks years earlier.
A Christian equivalent of CBT, would perhaps be ‘ ‘renewing the mind with the washing of the word’, or asay be put, replacement of thought, from which the ‘feeling derives with truth of God.
A challenging booklet is by Tim Keller. The Christian life is to revolve around, not so much as selflessness, but to think of self less! Easier said than done for some of us more than others.
A book which may have HJ’s approval from which I and others have benefitted from, though has been reread with
more discernment, is Abba’s Child by Brennan Manning.
On a simlar theme is, The Father Heart of God, by Floyd McClung.
Another is, The Return of the Prodigal Son, by Henri Nouwen. (Another commendation from HJ may come.
You may know all of them and that none represent bible scholarship, or systematic theology but they have been read with profit by many.