Talk 37 Mark 12:28-34 The Greatest Commandment
Welcome to Talk 37 in our series on Mark’s gospel. Today we are considering Mark 12:28-34 where Jesus answers the question, Of all the commandments which is the most important? But before we read the passage it will be helpful to remind ourselves what has been taking place in recent chapters.
We have seen in Chapter 11 how Jesus cursed a fig tree which was not bearing fruit and I suggested that this was an enacted parable telling of God’s rejection of Israel. This is confirmed by the parable of the tenants in the opening verses of chapter 12. We saw also how Jesus drove the money changers out of the temple, and I suggested that this was a prophetic action declaring that the end of temple worship was near.
We have also seen how these actions annoyed the Jewish religious leaders and how they asked him various questions in an attempt to trap him. The Herodians tried to trap him by asking him a question about paying taxes to Caesar. The Sadducees tried to catch him out with a trick question about a woman who had had 7 husbands, and they asked whose wife she would be in the resurrection. Now, in today’s passage, one of the Pharisees asks him a question about the law.
Now there is an interesting verse in Acts 21:28 which is relevant to all this. There we read that Paul’s opponents shouted:
“Men of Israel, help us! This is the man who teaches all men everywhere against our people and our law and this place. And besides, he has brought Greeks into the temple area and defiled this holy place.”
This verse reveals three things which the Jewish leaders were most concerned about – Israel, the Law, and the Temple. But these three things were totally superseded by what Jesus came to do. The nation of Israel and the Jewish temple were superseded by the church as the true people of God, a living temple, comprised of all the Jews and Gentiles who came to believe in Jesus. But what about the Law? Well, that’s the subject of today’s passage:
28 One of the teachers of the law 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?”
29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
32“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33 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.”
34 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.
We’ll take this a verse at a time.
28 One of the teachers of the law 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?”
We know from Matthew 22:34-40 that this teacher of the law was in fact a Pharisee. He heard Jesus’ answer to the Sadducees’ question about the resurrection and was clearly impressed by it. Remember, the Sadducees didn’t believe in the resurrection but the Pharisees did. So, seeing that the Sadducees had failed to catch Jesus out with their question, the Pharisees got together and decided to test Jesus with a question about the Law.
29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
Jesus answers by quoting two passages from the Pentateuch. He begins with what was known as the Shema which is found in Deuteronomy 6:4-5. This begins with a declaration about God:
Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
He is the one and only true and living God, and that’s why we should hear (i.e. obey) him. Perhaps the greatest reason that people do not obey God’s commandments is that either they do not believe he exists, or that they do not really understand who he is. Knowing who God is gives us the greatest incentive to love and obey him.
30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’
This means that we are to love God with every faculty, every fibre, of our being. In Matthew’s account, Jesus describes this as the first and greatest commandment. In Mark it’s the most important one. At first sight this might sound a bit strange. Does God really ask us to love him more than our fellow human beings? Isn’t that selfish of God? Well, before we jump to that mistaken conclusion, let’s remind ourselves of two things.
First, we need to remember how much God loves us. He loved us so much that he gave his one and only Son to die on the cross to save us from our sins (John 3:16). God wants us to love him because he loves us so much. And, if you’ve ever been in love, you’ll know that, essential to the very nature of loving someone, you desperately want them to love you too. If you didn’t want them to love you, could you really say that you loved them?
And secondly, God knows that, if we truly love him, we will want to keep his commandment to love other people. It’s because Jesus loved God so much that he went to the cross. He knew it was God’s will, and he knew it was God’s will because he knew how much God loved us and wanted to save us. And, of course, Jesus went to the cross because he loved us too. There’s no conflict between loving God and loving others, because that’s exactly what God wants us to do. That’s why Jesus says the second is like it (Matthew 22:39). These two commandments are inextricably linked. You can’t love God without loving your neighbour – Whoever claims to love God, but hates a brother or sister is a liar (1 John 4:20).
31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
This is taken from Leviticus 19:18. First let’s consider what Jesus meant by ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ Let’s start with what it doesn’t mean. It doesn’t mean, as some have wrongly assumed, that Jesus is teaching us that we should love ourselves. I am aware that it’s often used this way to encourage people who, for one reason or another, have a low self-esteem, but neither in the original context of Leviticus 19:18, nor in the context of what Jesus was saying can this interpretation be justified. It’s a typical example of eisegesis, of reading into a text what you want it to mean. Christian counsellors must beware of using the methods of modern secular psychology. Using Scripture in this way can be dangerous, however much we may wish to encourage others. There are other ways to encourage such people without misusing Scripture – reminding them how much God loves them, for example.
But why am I so sure about this? Because, as we shall see in a moment, in Matthew’s account, immediately after saying, Love your neighbour as yourself, Jesus says that All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments (Matthew 22:39-40). But in Matthew 7:12 he says
So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
Putting these two passages together, we see that loving your neighbour as yourself means doing to others what you would have them do to you – and that presupposes that you love yourself.
So why does Jesus say as yourself? It seems to me that the obvious meaning is that we should love others as much as we love ourselves. Jesus knows that it’s human nature to love ourselves. The difficult thing can be loving others. Because of the tendency to sin we have inherited from our first parents, we are all basically selfish. This is very evident even in the behaviour of little children. They have to be taught to put others first, and that’s what Jesus is doing here.
But why does Jesus say, All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments? Because, if you really love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and if you love your neighbour as yourself, you will keep all the commandments. Notice what James says:
If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’, you are doing right (James 2:8).
Let me illustrate the point I’m making by referring to the Ten Commandments. The first four relate to God, the final six relate to our neighbours. If we really love God with every fibre of our being, we won’t need a written law to tell us not to worship other gods, not to make idols, and not to misuse God’s name. And we will remember to set aside time to rest and to worship him. And if we really love others as much as we love ourselves, we will honour our parents, and we won’t murder, commit adultery, steal, tell lies about them or covet their possessions. Perhaps you remember what St. Augustine of Hippo said: Love God, and do as you please. Because if you truly love God you will only do what pleases him.
Notice what Paul says in Galatians 5. After reminding them that the entire law regarding our relationships with others is summed up in the single command, Love your neighbour as yourself (v.14), he goes on to tell them to live by the Spirit (v16) and they will not gratify the desires of the flesh. And in verse 18 he says, If you are led by the Spirit you are not under the Law. Why? Because the fruit of the Spirit starts with love (v.22). But that brings us back to our passage and the reply the Pharisee gave to what Jesus had said.
32“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33 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.”
According to Matthew’s account, the man’s purpose in asking Jesus the question was to test him, presumably hoping to catch him out by getting Jesus to say something against the law of Moses. Remember, Jesus had more than once overridden the authority of the law – or at least the Pharisees’ interpretation of it. But now the Pharisee, having weighed up Jesus’ answer, is compelled to acknowledge that Jesus is right.
When people ask us questions about what we believe as Christians, their motive may not always be genuine. But if we give them an honest answer there is always the possibility that they may come to admit that we’re right. They may be nearer the kingdom of God than we think.
34 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.
In the previous verses we saw the man’s evaluation of what Jesus had said. In this verse we see Jesus’ evaluation of him. People have all kinds of different opinions about Jesus, but in the final analysis Jesus will have the last word. It’s his evaluation of us that determines our final destiny. Jesus said that the man was not far from the kingdom of God. But he did not say he was in it. We don’t know if this man ever entered it, was ever born again (John 3:3). It’s one thing to admit that something Jesus has said is right. It’s quite another to acknowledge who he is!
However, perhaps this man did finally come to a full realisation of the truth about Jesus. It’s clear from Acts 15:5 that some of the Pharisees had become believers in Jesus and were part of the church in Jerusalem, even if they were still struggling with the idea that Gentile believers did not need to be circumcised! It may still take some time after we become Christians to break away from the unbiblical traditions we have grown up with.
But let’s finish by asking why Jesus said that the man was not far from the kingdom of God. It was undoubtedly because the man had understood that the attitude of our heart is far more important than religious observance. There is no religious ceremony or ritual that can save us, whether it be the Old Testament sacrificial system, or Christian baptism or confirmation, or church attendance, or pilgrimage. When we understand that, we are not far from the kingdom of God, but we can only enter it by personal faith in Christ as our Saviour. And if we really believe that he loved us enough to die for us, we will love him with all our being, we will only do what we know is pleasing to him, and we will love others because we know he loves them too.