Posted by The WORD in other words (2009) by Fr. Emmanuel de Leon, SVD (SVD Retreat House, Baguio City)
Friday 20th Week in Ordinary Time
All forms of human organization, from the biggest to the smallest, from the past to the present, are defined by a set of laws, rules, and regulations. Laws are a must for the common good. And the highest good is the attainment of man’s ultimate end, which is eternal life in the kingdom of God. Too much laws however, could become a burden and a hindrance to man’s attainment of his ultimate end.
This must be the experience of the Jews, the chosen people of God up to the time of Jesus. Thus we read in today’s Gospel text, a scholar of the law asking Jesus this challenging question, “Which commandment in the law is the greatest?”
It is of help to note that, at the time of Jesus, the Jewish Rabbi’s counted 613 commandments, 365 of which were prohibitions and 248 were positive precepts. For practical reason, a unifying principle and a certain hierarchy among these laws/commandments have to be established.
The Prophets and the Rabbis of old searched for this unifying factor. For example, in the book of Leviticus 19,18, Rabbi Akiba said: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” is the great and general precept in the Law.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus, the prophet — in answer to the question of the scholar of the law –combines two texts of the Law from the Old Testament. The first text is the heart of the Shema (Listen, O Israel) taken from Deuteronomy 6,15, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind.” This is the Jewish profession of faith recited everyday. The second comes from the book of Leviticus 19,18 as quoted earlier. In the Jewish recital, these two texts were not combined. Now Jesus places the two on the same level. In effect Jesus is suggesting that the commandment to love holds together all the laws, rules, and regulations that one can think of.
As we can see, there are many kinds of love: sensual, filial, platonic, etc. But the kind of love that Jesus is talking about is the Agape love, that selfless concern for others, as shown by God’s way of loving in the person o His son Jesus, the Christ. Jesus who loved totally without leaving any for himself, giving everything in the process, in his ultimate sacrifice on the cross.
Jesus’s response to the question, “Which commandment in the Law is the greatest?” is a revelation and a challenge for us followers of Jesus. We ought to take to heart this great commandment to love, if we dream of possessing the ultimate good: God our loving Father.
But, what really is love? Frank Mihalic has this reflection to share: In a scene of the stageplay and movie “Fiddler on the Roof,” the hero Tevye on one occasion keeps nagging at his wife Golda, asking her whether she loves him or not. He keeps wanting her to say she does…but she is in no romantic mood and brushes him off, until finally she turns to him and says, “Look at this man…I am your wife, I cook your meals, wash your clothes, milk the cows, raise half dozen daughters for you, my bed is yours, my time is yours, everything I have and am, I share with you and after all that, you want to know whether I love you? Oh, well, I guess I do…”
Most grownup people the religious included do not go around telling people they love them…even if Jesus tells us we have to love one another. But they do tell this love by what they do to those people around them every day.
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