Mark 12:28-34

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 neighbor 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 neighbor 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.

Here we have another trick question but a questioner who does not seem hostile. In fact, rabbis at the time frequently debated what was the most important commandment. The first one that Jesus quotes comes from Deuteronomy 6:4-5 and was recited daily by devout Jews. More original is the fact that Jesus links it to another, lesser known, commandment from Leviticus 19:18 (“Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself.”) The implication from the Leviticus passage is that your neighbor is one of your kin or, at least, a fellow countryman but we know from the “Good Samaritan” parable that Jesus has a much wider definition of neighbor. For him it includes everyone, even people we hate.

By doing this, Jesus covers all Ten Commandments since the first four concern love of God and the last six how we should treat our neighbor. Most of Old Testament law comes under one heading or the other. Of course, you may protest that Jesus cheated: that he was asked for one commandment and gave two but they share the same key word: love. The Law tells people how to behave but love must be the background or, as the prophets so frequently complain, religion is empty hearted. For Jesus, following the Law is not enough – what is most important is the attitude and the motive for doing so.

Unlike in the previous encounters, the scribe here admires Jesus’ answer: it has brilliantly summed up the essence of the Law but also offered a new perspective. Since scribes focused on the practical consequences of implementing the Law, they could find themselves preoccupied with tiny details and lose track of its basis in love. Here Jesus pushes ritual into the background and makes love the center of all our actions.

Finding himself in agreement with Jesus, the scribe takes what he has said to its logical conclusion – that love is “more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices”. Jesus then sees that this scribe is not far from the kingdom. Mark does not tell us if the scribe became a disciple but it seems unlikely that he could ever have seen the Law in the same way again. However, at the end of this passage we do learn that since Jesus has defeated all attempts to trap him, no one dares to ask him any more questions.