The Greatest Commandment

Mark 12:28b-34

One of the scribes, when he came forward and heard them disputing and saw how well he had answered them, asked him, “Which is the first of all the commandments?” Jesus replied, “The first is this: ‘Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” The scribe said to him, “Well said, teacher. You are right in saying, ‘He is One and there is no other than he.’ And ‘to love him with all your heart, with all your understanding, with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself’ is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” And when Jesus saw that [he] answered with understanding, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And no one dared to ask him any more questions.

Discussion Questions:

1. In your experience, how is loving God with your “whole heart” different than obedience to, or thoughts about God?
2. How would you describe your relationship with “the laws” of your faith? Are you overly rule-bound, or can you move within and beyond the law when a situation and your conscience dictate?
3. Can you describe a situation where doing the “the loving” thing collided with doing the traditionally observant, or “law-abiding” thing? How did you resolve it?
4. How would you describe loving your neighbor as yourself? Can you give an example of this consciousness and action from your personal experience?
5. Why do you think Mark ends this passage with: “And no one dared to ask him any more questions.”?

Biblical Context

Mark 12: 28b-34
Mary M. McGlone CSJ

The story of the scribe who came to Jesus is one of the most inconclusive incidents of Mark’s Gospel. It’s almost as if Mark set us up for confusion. As soon as we hear that a scribe came to ask Jesus a question, we are ready for a clash of intellects and religious outlooks. In language that sounds very much like the tests others put to Jesus, this man asks Jesus’ opinion about which of God’s commands is the most important. Surely, this is a trap!

The scribe’s question was a topic of popular debate. It is said that in those days a questioner challenged Hillel and Shammai, the two great rabbis of the early first century, to teach him the entire Torah while he stood on one leg. Hillel replied, “Do not do, to your neighbor what is hateful to you; this is the whole Torah, the rest is commentary.” (See R. T. France, The Gospel of Mark, A Commentary on the Greek Text.)

Jesus did not quote Hillel but went to Scripture. He quoted Deuteronomy 6:4-5, a prayer/teaching that serves as something like a hinge between the commandments and all the regulations intended to flesh them out. It is also the oldest prayer formula in the scriptural tradition. As such, Jews were supposed to recite it every morning and evening. Deuteronomy 6:7-9 tells people to teach it to their children, to bind the prayer as a symbol on their hand and forehead, and to inscribe it on their doorposts. This prayer/creed would be etched deep in every faithful person’s consciousness and have a subconscious effect stronger than any 21st century advertising. It is no wonder that Jesus could respond so quickly and unequivocally to the scribe’s question.

But then, Jesus added another citation, revising Hillel, he quoted Leviticus 19:18, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Although Mark doesn’t finish the quotation, almost everyone who heard it would have known that the last words of that command were, “I am the Lord.”

In response to the scribe, Jesus combined two of the popular schools of thought of his day, implicitly connecting heaven and earth, love of God and love of neighbor as two inseparable dimensions of a life of faith. The Lord in whom the people believed, who gave them their identity as a people, demanded that they treat one another with the same attitude of love that they were to show the God who gave them life.

In what is a unique situation in the Gospel, the man who had questioned Jesus went on to affirm Jesus’ response and to add a bit of his own commentary. It may have still been a battle of wits as the scribe showed his command of Jesus’ response by adding that “to love your neighbor … is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” Nevertheless, Jesus had the last word when he told the man, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

Why only “not far”? The answer might be in Jesus’ assessment of the scribe’s response. Mark tells us that Jesus saw that he answered, “with understanding.” The word “understanding” here has to do with the head more than the heart, an exercise of the intellect that need not imply commitment. Judged on the first quote from Deuteronomy, the scribe had mastered the “soul” or mind, but he had yet to demonstrate how his knowledge would issue forth into action.

We don’t know the end of the story. Did the scribe go away content with his doctrinal correctness or did he take the next step? All we know is that if we ask Christ what we should do, the answer will call forth our whole heart and soul and strength. That is probably why Mark concluded by saying, “And no one dared to ask him any more questions.”

 Love Above All

Reflection
Barbara E. Reid

“There is a famous scene in the play Fiddler on the Roof, where Tevye, the protagonist, tells his wife Golde that he has decided to give his permission for their daughter Hodel to marry Perchik, a student and Bolshevik revolutionary. Golde protests that he has absolutely nothing, but Tevye replies that it’s a new world, that now people marry for love, and what can they do? Tevye then turns to Golde and asks her if she loves him. She doesn’t know how to respond; she skirts the question and when Tevye keeps pressing her for an answer, she recites all that she has been doing for him for twenty-five years: washing his clothes, cooking his meals, cleaning his house, giving him children, milking the cow. Still not satisfied, Tevye asks her again if she loves him. She observes, “For twenty-five years I’ve lived with him, fought with him, starved with him, twenty-five years my bed is his; if that’s not love, what is?”

In the play, Golde gives all the evidence of love in action and then concludes that these constitute love. In today’s gospel, a scribe asks a question that comes at the issue of love in action and then concludes that these constitute love. In today’s gospel, a scribe asks a question that comes at the issue of love from another direction. He wants to know which is the first of all the commandments, that is, what actions must take priority if one wants to respond correctly to God’s love. Jesus doesn’t help him out with the particulars. He simply advises him to love God back with his entire being: heart, soul, mind, and strength. And then a bit more concretely, he adds that loving one’s neighbor as oneself puts flesh and bones on this loving response to divine love.”

“The dialogue between the scribe and Jesus, like that of Tevye and Golde, emphasizes that love does not consist so much in feelings, as in concrete loving deeds toward the other. This is how Jesus can speak about love as something that is commanded. One cannot be commanded to feel warmly toward another, but one can be mandated to treat another with loving kindness. Knowing oneself as the recipient of gratuitous divine acts of loving kindness enables one to respond in kind. A concrete way by which human beings can express love toward God is by extending that love toward fellow human beings.”

“The two-pronged formulation of the love command does not give hard-and-fast answers about how to make difficult choices for prioritizing loving deeds in daily circumstances. Jesus, for example, was faced with hard choices several times when the command to love seemed to clash with the command to observe the Sabbath. Which took priority? In a number of instances, he healed people on the Sabbath, choosing to raise up a woman bent double (Luke 13:10-17), to restore a man’s withered hand (Mark 3:1-6), and a blind man’s sight (John 9:16). When challenged, he interprets these actions as giving proper expression to the intent of Sabbath, fulfilling the prime commands to love God and neighbor. When one’s whole self is centered on love, that’s all that’s needed to know how to make the day-to-day choices.”

Reflection Excerpt from Abiding Word: Sunday Reflections for Year B.  By Barbara E. Reid