Matthew 22:39

The context

The scene is Jerusalem in Jesus' last week. Test questions have come at him in sequence: the Herodians on tribute to Caesar (22:15–22), the Sadducees on the resurrection (22:23–33), then a Pharisee who is a lawyer, asking which commandment is greatest in the law (22:36), a live question in contemporary Jewish debate.

Jesus answers with two texts, Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18, and adds a claim about the whole law: on these two hang all the law and the prophets (22:40). He then puts his own question about David's son (22:41–46), and the questioning stops.

The words

Both commands use agapao, "to love" — the ordinary verb of committed regard and action, not a word for affection or attraction. The Septuagint uses it for the Hebrew ahav in both Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18, so the Greek carries covenant loyalty and concrete treatment of others.

Plesion, "neighbor," renders Hebrew rea, which in Leviticus 19 covers the fellow Israelite, the poor, the deaf, the blind, and the resident alien (19:34). That chapter's context is conduct, not sentiment: honest scales, prompt wages, impartial judgment. The measure is hos seauton, "as yourself," which assumes an ordinary self-regard as the standard rather than the goal. The law and prophets kremannytai — "hang" — on the pair.

What this passage establishes

Jesus endorses Leviticus 19:18 as the summary of the second table of the law and joins it inseparably to love of God. The claim is about the law's internal coherence: the commandments are not a list to be ranked but a body with a center. The neighbor's claim is a command, not an option weighed against convenience.

What it does not establish

It does not define the neighbor. The scope of the command is exactly the question left open here. Luke records a follow-up — "who is my neighbor?" — answered by the parable of the Samaritan (Luke 10:29–37). Matthew supplies no such definition.

It does not reduce the law to a feeling. Love here summarizes concrete commands; Leviticus 19 continues with weights, wages, and courts. Reading the summary as abolition of the particulars inverts the relation Jesus states: the commandments hang on love, not the reverse.

It does not adjudicate hard cases. A summary does not decide between competing claims — when truth-telling and harm collide, or when two neighbors' interests conflict. That work is done by the particulars, and the verse gives no method for it.

How the church has read it

Augustine made the double command the hermeneutical key to Scripture, with love of neighbor ordered to love of God (On Christian Doctrine). Aquinas placed the two commandments at the substance of the moral law (Summa, I–II), and Luther used them to structure the two tables of the Decalogue. Interpreters differ on scope: patristic and medieval reading universalized the neighbor, while modern scholarship notes that Leviticus 19:18 addresses a fellow member of the community, with 19:34 extending it to the resident alien.

First pass, written October 2026. Corrections welcome.

Cited in these answers

• I am homosexual and I was born homosexual – don't homosexuals have the right NOT to be hated and persecuted by the church?
• I tried Christianity but failed when the church bouncer told me to check my intelligence in at the door. Christians are stupid – ignorant, dumb, money-grubbing gay-bashing idiot bigots.
• So you believe in a book full of contradictions, one that endorses slavery, incest, murder, drowning babies, genocide and stoning homosexuals?

Part of Scripture, Opened — the exegetical layer behind every citation on this site. Scripture quotations are from the ESV.