“Which is the first of all the commandments?”
There were plenty of commandments from which to choose when answering this question. It was a legitimate question to put to a teacher, to ask what was their unique priority or emphasis. The answer Jesus gave ought not to have been a surprise to anyone. His emphasis was consistent with the tradition of Israel. He did not come to point away from love of God is the primary thing, nor just to point toward it, but to finally live out that love perfectly.
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 unexpected part of the answer of Jesus was perhaps that he did not end his answer there. After all, that was the Shema, the famous prayer of the Jewish people. Yet for Jesus, leaving it at that would miss something important.
The second is this:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
It might not be immediately evident that there would be any parallel or analogy between love of God and love of neighbor. When Jesus says the second commandment is like unto the first (as Matthew records) it might not be immediately evident how. Was not God served by ritual, by burnt offerings and sacrifices, and neighbor by concrete works of mercy and charity? If we are honest we still often suffer from this duality. We serve God at mass and praying or daily prayers and our neighbors when we donate to suitable charities and the connection between these often seems vague or insubstantial at best.
Our neighbors, and we ourselves, are made in the image and likeness of God. We are in fact meant to be dwelling places of God, temples of his Holy Spirit. We can't claim to love God at all if we spurn his image in our brothers and sisters, or, for that matter, in ourselves.
If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen (see First John 4:20).
We do have a duty to honor God above all else, and not bow to any idols which our age presents to us as deserving of worship. We have a duty to praise God alone, to worship him alone, and to offer our lives as living sacrifices to him (see Romans 12:1)
and to love your neighbor as yourself
is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.
There is a difference between this religious duty of ours and the burnt offerings and sacrifices of the Old Covenant. By the one sacrifice of the New Covenant offered by Jesus himself we are invited to enter into the love by which the Son perfectly loves and offers himself to the Father. It could be said that the sacrifice of the cross is the Shema lived out perfectly and completely. All aspects of Jesus's being, heart, soul, mind and all his strength were fully engaged in it. When we see his sacrifice as the perfect exemplar or the greatest commandment we see how the love of neighbor cannot be separated out into a distinct duty, for the cross was also the perfect fulfillment of the commandment to love one's neighbors.
God ultimately has no need for our offerings, no need for our worship. He is perfectly content in his blessed life as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in a way that cannot be increased or diminished by anything we do. Even the commandments add nothing to him, but are given for us. But we have much that we can offer our neighbors, gifts both corporeal and spiritual. When we choose to offer these gifts, to feed the poor, clothe the naked, and instruct those ignorant of God in his ways, God receives such service as done unto him.
The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ (see Matthew 25:40).
Tobiah and Sarah demonstrated a life properly ordered, a life where God himself was first even before the consummation of their marriage.
Tobiah arose from bed and said to his wife,
“My love, get up.
Let us pray and beg our Lord to have mercy on us
and to grant us deliverance.”
By putting God first they also loved one another in a way that was greater than they could have done any other way. They loved with a love that was victorious in the spiritual warfare against the demon that had afflicted Sarah until that point. It is the same for us. We place God first not at the expense of others, but because by doing so we entrust both them and ourselves into God's hands.
They said together, “Amen, amen,” and went to bed for the night.
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