NOTES for Mar 12:28-34

In spiritual life, reason often does not occupy the most honored place. We take care to act well, to follow the commandments, and not to harm either our neighbor or ourselves - and that is wonderful, for this is exactly what the parable of the Judgment speaks about (Matt 25:31-46).

We are attentive to the movements of the heart, to feelings: we strive to have compassion, to rejoice with others, to love God and neighbor. Most often we turn to our reason when we read Scripture: here too, of course, it is important to measure our life against the Word of God, important to listen and hear it, as Mary listened by the manger, 'keeping all these words and pondering them in her heart' (Luke 2:19), but it is no less important still to strive to understand, to read deeply into the meaning.

And we really do this. But how often do we pay attention to how exactly we think? Do we consider this important? Yes, of course, at every service we proclaim our faith, listing the dogmas on which it is built. But how often at that moment do we ponder every word, trying to understand why the fathers of this or that Ecumenical Council established exactly these words as the foundation of our Church?

Sometimes we say: all this can be left to theologians, while I believe as my heart tells me, for the foundation of faith is prayer, the Encounter with God, the reading of the Word of God. Of course, all this is true. But from Jesus' conversation with the scribe it is clear that our Lord values reason no less than feelings, the will directed toward good, or deeds performed out of love.

The scribe says to Him: 'You have spoken the truth.' Truth belongs to reason, to how we think and what we agree with. These words already bring the scribe nearer to God, for he and God have one common truth. The scribe pronounces words that affirm his faith. We know nothing about his deeds, about how he prayed, or how sincerely he conversed with God. We do not even know how attentive he was in studying Scripture, although his membership among the scribes shows that he devoted much time to interpretation. We know exactly one thing: he understood the essence of Scripture in the same way as Jesus and agreed with His words in his mind. And Jesus, 'seeing that he answered wisely, said to him: You are not far from the Kingdom of God.' It follows that not only prayer, not only good deeds, but also precision of thought brings us nearer to the Kingdom.

Jesus does not break the familiar world, but He radically changes it from within, filling established ideas with the right understanding. Out of the many commandments, so familiar, He singles out two, and the meaning of a person's relationship with God and with the world immediately comes into clear focus. True, the scribe is interested in only one commandment, since from a human point of view only one thing can be most important. Yet Christ unexpectedly places two commandments side by side.

That the commandment to love God is named first is natural and could not be otherwise. But that the commandment to love a human being is placed beside it, and that no other commandment can compare with these two, was a breakthrough in grasping the highest Reality. The high dignity of the human person, the calling to deification, is something absent from non-biblical religions and is the reason God became man. Understanding this is one of those golden talents given to us by the Savior that we ought not bury in the ground, but put to use more often.

The scribe who understands this (a very modern figure, by the way) is not far from the Kingdom of God. Someone who is near is not yet inside; he still has to take a step toward Christ, and that step can be so hard to take. People like this scribe often find it hard to decide on such a step, but because they have drawn near, it would also be easier for them to enter.

The dialogue between Jesus and an unnamed teacher of the Torah, a "scribe," is remarkable because, at least outwardly, the participants say nothing especially unusual. The teacher of the Torah asks Jesus an elementary school question about the meaning of the Torah, the answer to which was known to any yeshiva student: the meaning of the Torah comes down to two commandments, the commandment to love God ("with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength," if we recall the corresponding line from Deuteronomy) and to love one's neighbor as oneself (as is said in Leviticus). This understanding of the meaning of the Torah was already quite traditional in Gospel times, and the teacher asks Jesus his question with the clear intention of testing His knowledge of the tradition.

Jesus gives the correct answer, the teacher approves His answer - "well said" - and in turn receives the Savior's assessment: you are not far from the Kingdom of God. What did the Savior like so much in the teacher of the Torah's reaction to His words? Perhaps that he says directly that love for God and neighbor is greater than all sacrifices? Evidently yes, for Jesus constantly reminds people that in the Kingdom and for the Kingdom the main thing is relationships, and that the question of abiding in the Kingdom is connected with a person's spiritual state, not with his activity, even if that activity is religious.

For the spiritual state, what matters is precisely that God be at the center of a person's whole life, in his heart, in his soul, that He be the center of all the efforts a person makes in his life. This, of course, is not about some abstract ideal, nor even about faith as a system of convictions around which religious people often build their lives, but precisely about God's real presence in the deepest part of the human person, in that center which in biblical language is called the heart.

Judging by Jesus' answer, He saw that for the teacher of the Torah who had turned to Him, this was not just theory, that the meaning of the Torah had become reality for him, that he lived as he taught, as far as this was possible for him as a human being. A person is limited here by his fallen nature, but if he does everything possible and lives to the maximum, fully realizing his spiritual potential, then he really is not far from the Kingdom. Only the last step remains, and the One who brought the Kingdom into the world can help him take it.

Christ's answer to the scribe's question about the greatest commandment in the law has fundamental importance for the New Covenant. The question itself reflects the heated debates taking place among the Jews during the Savior's earthly life. Some of them believed that in the law every commandment without exception has decisive importance, and that among them there are none more or less important. From this point of view, the one who sins against one commandment becomes a violator of the whole law. This view found expression, in particular, in the apostle Paul's letter to the Romans. Those who held this position believed that the law as such was given by God and therefore is holy. Yet it is hard to consider equally important, on the one hand, the commandments "I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods" and "you shall not kill," and on the other hand, the commandments "do not spoil the edges of your beard" and the commandment about the need to relieve oneself outside the camp.

Other Jews, on the contrary, considered the commandments of the Sinai covenant far from equal. The answer of Rabbi Hillel to a Gentile who wished to know the essence of Judaism briefly, "while standing on one foot," is well known. Hillel told him: "What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor; this is the whole law, the rest is only its explanation." The Lord Jesus' answer evidently supports this latter point of view. Yet there is a significant difference between the positions of Christ and His older contemporary Hillel.

Unlike the learned rabbi, the Son of God formulates two chief commandments, placing first the commandment to love God. Moreover, the Lord expresses both chief commandments in an active, positive form: instead of "do not do," He says, "love," that is, His understanding of the law is directed not toward what must not be done, but toward what should be done. Further, it is crucial that the Lord joins these two commandments. In essence, the New Covenant gives us one commandment, calling us to love God and neighbor with the love with which the Son of God loved us on the Cross. Finally, Christ resolutely refuses to compare other commandments with these two, emphasizing their uniqueness and exhaustive character.

The scribe who asked the question pays attention precisely to this last aspect: "You have truly said... and to love Him... and to love one's neighbor... is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices." The Lord approved this understanding, telling the scribe that he was not far from the Kingdom of God.

The connection of the two commandments given at the time of Moses shows here, that they are the same thing. It is impossible to love God and the same time don’t love those whom He loves (1Jn 4:20); it is impossible to love a person if we are not dwell in love with God who is Himself love (1Jn 4:16). And Jesus who showed to people what is love by giving " His life for His friends ", shows as well what is love to God, accomplishing all that the Father ordered Him (Jn 14:31). To love as Jesus loves is the fulfillment of this double command.

Speaking about the two commandments the Lord gave us in today's reading, one wants to pay attention to Christ's words about their likeness. At first they seem understandable: indeed, in both cases the matter is love. But let us think about this again. Love for God and love for a human being - how different these things are! We express love for God in prayer. We express love for a human being in labor. Every layperson (in the sense of someone who is not a monastic) who lives a life of prayer knows well that prayer takes time away from labor, and labor takes time away from prayer (especially if the labor is intellectual). That means these are two different principles standing in opposition to each other. Why, then, does the Lord speak of likeness? What does He put into these words?

Looked at from this side, these words cease to be a simple statement that in both cases the matter is love. In general, we must always be extremely careful when something in the word of God seems simple to us. Most often this is an apparent simplicity connected with the fact that we have not penetrated the text deeply enough. After all, the Lord had little time, and He understood this, so He could not waste it on obvious things. What, then, is the meaning here?

Perhaps what is being affirmed here is the ideal of likeness reaching the point of indistinguishability between labor and prayer. This is precisely what we must strive for: that prayer would be labor for us, hard labor, and that labor would be prayer for us. But of course this in no way means (as one often has to hear from secular, unchurched people who are accustomed to working much and intensely) that labor is prayer, a word by which they try to justify themselves before the Most High, dimly perceived by a soul that has not learned to love God.

It is precisely when we live in the tension between these two poles, labor and prayer, unconfused yet inseparable, so inseparable that they manifest a unity, that we fulfill God's commandment.

In His conversation with the scribe, Christ asks him about what he knows by the nature of his work. Answering Christ, the scribe speaks of love for God and neighbor, saying that these are more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices. And Christ says to him: you are not far from the Kingdom of God. In the Apostle Peter (1 Pet 4:1-11) we find a call to serve, that is, to fulfill one's duty and responsibilities according to the strength God gives. In his work, in his studies, the scribe still saw what mattered most. He saw the essence and meaning of faith. Christ constantly calls us to seek the meaning of every step we take and every thought we have: the meaning of what, here and today, we can do for the glory of God and out of love for Him. Serving one another is the most important thing that should become the meaning of our life after love for God. There are different ways to serve. One can work in a factory or raise children. A scholar and a cleaner glorify God equally by their labor if, in that labor, they find time and place for God. The apostle calls us to serve one another with the gift each has received. The gift we have received is the possibility of meeting God at every moment of life; it is the gift of His love. By our life we can confirm His presence in this world, His love for people. And every day we must ask God to give us strength to serve one another. Through constant prayer and communion with Him we will gain the joy of His presence and of recognizing Him in every manifestation of life.

It may seem strange: why does Jesus, knowing that His death is near, enter into apparently unnecessary arguments and disputes, and allow Himself to be provoked? After all, the Pharisees and Herodians were not driven by a thirst to find the truth. Likewise, when the Sadducees asked how the law of levirate marriage, which they had so cleverly interpreted (Deut. 25:5-6), would be reflected in the life to come, they only wanted to laugh at Jesus, since they did not believe in the resurrection. We do not know whether Jesus' answers satisfied the Pharisees and Sadducees, but they undoubtedly made an impression on a scribe standing nearby. The question of the greatest commandment in the law certainly troubled this man, and Jesus' answer drew from him a sympathetic response. Jesus reduces all the commandments of the law (not only the Ten Commandments, but all the rest as well, which the scribes counted as 613 in the Old Testament) to the two most important ones: love for God and love for neighbor. This is also the answer to the previous questions and to every later question throughout Christian history: how should one act rightly in this or that case? Christ answers us with precisely these words. And when, reading the Gospel, we see that here we are on Jesus' side, when we answer with the scribe's words, "Well said, Teacher; You have spoken the truth," that means that Jesus' words apply to us as well: "You are not far from the Kingdom of God."

Today's passage is devoted, as we will soon see, to the theme of Tradition and to how differently different people can make use of it depending on their intentions. This passage consists of three dialogues that the Savior conducts with different interlocutors.

The first of them (vv. 13-17) is plainly provocative in character. The question of whether it was permissible to pay taxes to the Roman authorities, under whose rule Palestine then was, was usually raised by representatives of the most radical part of the Synagogue of that time, whom the Gospel calls "Zealots," that is, "the zealous." These people held views of the Kingdom of God not very different from those that were generally accepted in the times of Joshua and the Judges. For them, the Kingdom of God and Roman power in Palestine were incompatible things. They considered armed struggle against Roman rule a religious duty for every believing Jew, and the payment of taxes to Roman authority a violation of the Law. To all that has been said, one need only add that all who looked at things less radically, even if they were their fellow believers, were considered by the Zealots to be apostates and enemies of the faith, deserving death. The question about taxes, asked of Jesus publicly, in a crowd where both Zealots and secret agents of Roman power were certainly present, placed the One answering in an obviously losing position: to answer "yes" meant bringing upon Himself the wrath of the Zealots; to answer "no" was equivalent to a state crime in the eyes of the Romans, for under Roman laws public calls to refuse payment of taxes to the lawful authority were treated as rebellion.

The second question (vv. 18-27) most of all resembles a problem from a theology textbook, or one of the traditional "hard questions" of its time that opponents of faith in the resurrection used against believers. Of course, to this question, as to all similar questions in all times, there existed an answer, and perhaps more than one, well known to everyone who had received the corresponding education. But what was known about Jesus was precisely that He had not studied theology, and it was all the more interesting to those asking the question what this, as it appeared to them, ignorant man from Galilee would answer.

The third dialogue (vv. 28-34) was caused, evidently, not by a desire to catch the Teacher in His words, but by a real desire to understand what He thought about the Law. Apparently the questioner understood that this astonishing Man truly had to understand something important and central in the Law, and he wanted to learn what it was. And Jesus, in reply, refers him to those traditional answers that were perfectly well known to the questioner himself. It is interesting that in this answer only the first part, speaking of love for God, has a direct correspondence in the text of the Law (Deut. 6:4-5). The second part of the commandment is a formula of rabbinic tradition that in Gospel times had already become generally accepted. And in this case Jesus confirms Tradition by His own authority.

In neither the first nor the second dialogue does He do this. Of course, in these cases too the questioners appeal to Tradition, but here the matter evidently has more to do with abuse of Tradition than with relying on it. This is no surprise: authentic Tradition always reflects the experience of real, living communion with God preserved in the memory of the community. But if the goal turns out not to be communion with God but something else, for example the desire to catch an opponent in his words or to assert oneself at the expense of one's interlocutor, the spirit of Tradition disappears, and only its empty, dead form remains, giving nothing except support for equally empty, dead religiosity and human pride.