Hear and Do, O People Matthew 22:34-40 October 29,2017 If you have attended a service in Hebrew, you would hear this prayer, known by its first word Sh’ma., “Sh'ma Yisrael Adonai Eloheinu Adonai Eḥad - "Hear, O Israel: the LORD is our God, the LORD is One." It is a practice to say this in the morning … Continue reading What Makes You Great Again
Whenever I am lost in an intellectual tangle and wondering what I really believe, I always come back to this great commandment from Jesus, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” I don’t need any great exegetical theories, I don’t have to understand the hermeneutics of Heidegger or ponder the great teleological talents of Tillich to make sense of this. As an editor, I prefer how Luke presents this passage, since he follows with the parable of the Good Samaritan. This way we are even left without a great intellectual debate about “Who is my neighbor?” Everyone who suffers beside the road to Jericho is our neighbor.
