NOTES for Rom 13:8-10

⁸Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.

⁹For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

¹⁰Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

This approach to life and relationships can seem maximalist and therefore not very realistic, but only at first glance. In fact, the apostle's words are deeper than they appear at first, and therefore they are entirely realistic, provided, of course, that one looks at love not as emotions, dividing everyone around by the principle "like - dislike," "appealing - unappealing," but as relationships that do not depend on emotions or sympathies. In that case it becomes clear that relationships are precisely what condition everything else, everything included in the concept of the inner Torah. Indeed, the inner Torah is above all the aspirations, desires, and intentions that determine a person's spiritual life. These can either correspond to God's commandments, experienced by the person as an inner spiritual and moral imperative, or fail to correspond to them.

It is customary to think that physically we are what we eat, and psychically we are what we think and feel. Spiritually, however, we are what we desire and what we strive for. Jesus Himself says this briefly and simply: where your treasure is, there your heart is also. But desires, aspirations, and the intentions connected with them can exist in our heart in different ways.

They can be something self-sufficient, governing us and determining our attitude toward those around us and toward the world in general, while submitting to no one and nothing, including ourselves. Or they can be part of relationships and work to support and build them. In the first case, one can speak of love only in a certain sense and only up to a certain point, because often it is precisely our desires that destroy our relationships with other people when they become self-sufficient.

At times relationships can collapse because of the most ordinary and not very deep negative emotions, which take our will captive and force us to desire, or more precisely in this case not to desire, what in fact is important and dear to us but does not look that way when emotions gain the upper hand over us. In the second case, however, when relationships themselves are experienced by a person as true value, no emotions or desires in themselves become self-valued for him anymore. And then he can be at peace about keeping the commandments: with such an attitude toward one's neighbor, it is hard for a person to think of violating them, at least those that define his relationships with that very neighbor.

If you love, you no longer need to train yourself in polite words and polite smiles; you no longer need to restrain negative emotions toward another person: they simply are not there, and words and smiles arise on the tongue and on the face by themselves. Then following the inner Torah becomes completely natural and organic for a person. All the more if we are speaking of the love that unites the inhabitants of the Kingdom: here there is the fullness presupposed by the ideal of the living Torah, toward which in Gospel times every Christian strove as the goal of spiritual life, as that which would make him like Christ.

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For Rom 13:8-10

⁸Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.

¹⁰Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

Speaking about the relationships that bind those living in the Kingdom, Paul returns to the Savior's words spoken at the Last Supper. The apostle is convinced that precisely... Read more

Speaking about the relationships that bind those living in the Kingdom, Paul returns to the Savior's words spoken at the Last Supper. The apostle is convinced that fullness is contained precisely in it. In fact, all the commandments are given, in the end, so that the one following them can make the right choice between good and evil; love presupposes that this choice has already been made. Therefore it is precisely the one who loves his neighbor who shows the fullness of the fulfillment of the Law. Here the apostle, as we can see, returns again to the theme of the "living Torah" which a person seeking the Kingdom must become. For Paul, the "living Torah" is possible only in the Kingdom, because for him the Torah is an entirely objective reality. In Paul's time the generally accepted idea was that the Torah existed in God's design even before the creation of the world, and in history it was only revealed to God's people, who had also been conceived before the creation of the world.

Such a view is not very far from the truth if we accept, and the Bible proceeds from just this premise, that the Torah describes the objectively existing dynamics of the relationship between God and man and its laws. In that case it must exist at least as long as man himself exists, and perhaps longer, if we accept that this dynamic was known to God in all its details even before He created man, a quite well-founded admission. In that case the Torah cannot be reduced to commandments or laws alone; it is, first of all, relationship, whether a person's relationship to God or his relationship to his neighbor.

But the fullness of relationships both with God and with one's neighbor is necessary and possible precisely in the Kingdom. The love of which Jesus speaks, the love that the world does not know but with which the Kingdom is permeated, constitutes the flesh, the spiritual substance of such relationships; and the Torah, that inner Torah about which so many argued in Paul's time, forms their structure. Only in the Torah does that spiritual substance of which the Kingdom consists find its form, and the Torah, in turn, only in the Kingdom finds the spiritual substance that allows it to be embodied. And this happens in a person and through a person, because in the Kingdom everyone becomes a "living Torah," just as the Savior Himself became one for those seeking the Kingdom. Apparently it is precisely this experience of the life of the Kingdom that Paul has in mind when he says that the day is already dawning and salvation is near. Abstaining from excesses here no longer looks even like an ascetic effort, but simply like a natural state. Natural to the extent that life in the Kingdom can be natural.

For Rom 13:8-14

⁸Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.

¹⁰Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

¹¹And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.

¹²The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.

¹³Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying.

¹⁴But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.

We are used to taking disorders in human relationships as a given, and if we are upset by them... Read more

We are used to taking disorders in human relationships as a given, and if we are upset by them, it is often simply because they throw us off balance. But for the apostle, our quarreling and dark feelings toward a neighbor who has done something a little better than we have are things of the same order as feasting, drunkenness, and sensuality. This is exactly because both drunkenness and quarrels are the result of self-will, the result of our concerns for ourselves, both bodily and emotional, subordinating our striving for the good.

It is not for nothing that Paul, a little earlier, repeats Christ's words about the greatest commandment, which embraces all the others: to love your neighbor as yourself. After all, quarrels and envy, that is, sins against our neighbor, have their source in our lack of love both for our neighbor (and this is more or less obvious) and for ourselves (and this is no less important). This second part of the commandment is often not fully understood by us. Love is acceptance, and its foundation is self-acceptance, an adequate understanding of our abilities and their limits. To accept ourselves, it is very important to understand that we are not superhumans and never will be, that our abilities are not unlimited, and that we often take on too much and from exhaustion begin hurting our neighbors. Many quarrels can be avoided simply by acknowledging our tiredness and realizing that a constructive conversation should be put off until later. And our flesh often experiences many needs that require satisfaction. But for food not to turn into gluttony, it is important to understand ourselves and our needs well; it is important to understand that simple food is in fact enough for us. This is what Paul is talking about: "make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires."

And if we love ourselves as we are, accepting and recognizing our sins without turning repentance into self-torment, it will become much easier to love our neighbor. Because others are exactly the same as we are, just as imperfect. And God gives us only one means to cope with our human limitation: love.

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