“Which commandment is the first of all?” Jesus answered, “The first is: Hear, Israel!
The Lord, our God, is One Lord; and you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your
heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. And after this
comes a second commandment: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is
no commandment greater than these two.” The teacher of the law said to him, “Well
spoken, Master; you are right when you say that he is one, and there is no other
besides him. To love him with all our heart, with all our understanding and with all our
strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves is more important than any burnt
offering or sacrifice.” Jesus approved this answer and said, “You are not far from
the kingdom of God.” And after that, no one dared to ask him any more questions.

Reflect

“Love of God and neighbor.” Today’s Gospel tells of the greatest commandment:
the love of God and love of neighbor. In the narrative, Jesus answered the teacher for
the law by citing the love of God and of neighbor as respectively found in Deuteronomy
(cf. Dt. 6:4) and Leviticus (Lev. 19:18). The Synoptic Gospels all narrate this particular
narrative (cf. Mt. 22:34-40; Lk. 10:25-28). Jesus, addressing the teacher of the
law, says, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” These words are exclusively
Markan. The teacher of the law further explained to Jesus that to do the
greatest commandment would be greater than making any offering. Hence, our
nearness to the kingdom of God is measured by our practice of the greatest
commandment and not by merely practicing external religious rituals. Many
believers already know what truly constitute the greatest commandment. However,
the challenge is to make this commandment operational in our everyday life by doing
acts of loving kindness. In our faith journey, there are times when we fail to live up to
the challenge of this greatest commandment. Worse, at times, we make use of our
ceremonial religiosity in order to cover up our failure of practicing Jesus’ greatest
commandment.

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