But the Pharisees, having heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, were gathered together.
The Pharisees had just watched their rivals lose an argument. They did not learn from it. They closed ranks and sent one more questioner, with a polite question about the law. Behind it lies the real issue of the chapter: what happens when religious men meet divine wisdom and refuse to bow.
This verse does not stand alone. It comes in the middle of a long line of questions put to Jesus in the temple. One writer sets out the whole sequence:
The Sadducees asked about marriage and the resurrection, only to be shown ignorant of both "the Scriptures and the power of God." So the Pharisees, "having heard that He had put the Sadducees to silence," gathered together... The Lord had met every one of their questions perfectly: first, about divine authority; second, about political authority and tribute; third, about marriage and the resurrection; fourth, about the great commandment in the Law. And now Jesus Himself raises the question of all questions.
The gathering could have been an act of respect. It was not. The word Matthew uses for what follows names the motive:
So the Pharisees hear that He has put the Sadducees to silence, and they gather together. Sadly, it is not to acknowledge His divine wisdom, but to "tempt" Him once more. Still, as Mark tells us, there was an effect on the questioner, and something better lies hidden under the test question he asks. Matthew says nothing of this, because his concern is where the nation as a whole stands toward the Lord, and the state of one individual does not show that.
Their motive was not only hostile. One writer points to a rivalry underneath it:
The Lord had done what the Pharisees, the opponents of the Sadducees, could not do. This stirred the curiosity of the Pharisees, and they gathered together.
These groups had little in common. Yet the defeat of one only stirs the others to try, and one writer says the same pattern holds today:
The three great parties — Pharisees, Herodians and Sadducees — join together in this. Ritualists, worldly men and rationalists make common cause to defeat the Lord. Though they are so different at heart, they unite in this one thing: rejecting the Lord. It is no better in our own day.
By the end of the chapter, class after class had taken its turn and stood exposed:
Men from every class — priests, rulers, Pharisees, Herodians, Sadducees and lawyers — had come with their questions to test the Lord, only to find themselves exposed and silenced. The Pharisee, who claimed to uphold religion, had not given God the things that are God's... The Sadducee, who boasted in his intellect, stood out for his ignorance. And the scribe, who taught the law, had not kept the law.
Their scheming did not throw Him off. He used the moment to give the sum of the law. One writer marks carefully what that summary is — and what it is not:
The Lord takes the opportunity, given in the ways of God, to set out the basic principles of the divine law... It is the summary of what man ought to be, the root and the measure of human righteousness. It is in no way a revelation of divine love. It is not a matter of grace, nor of an open way for the sinner to come to God. It is the perfect rule of what a man should be.
He met their attack without weakening the standard they claimed to defend:
But He who came full of grace and truth never lowered the law, and at once gives its sum and substance in both its parts — Godward and manward.
Mark's account shows that the man sent to test Him was himself touched — yet he missed who was standing in front of him:
Once more His answer shows perfect wisdom. Mark's record tells us the lawyer was deeply moved by it. The Lord told him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God" (Mark 12:34). Yet the questioner did not realize who stood before him at that hour: Jehovah Himself, the giver of the law.
The Sadducees fell silent. In the end, so did the Pharisees. But silence settles nothing in a heart that has already decided:
They are silenced, but not won. The human heart is a fortress that can dig itself in against the clearest evidence. The conscience can harden itself by rejecting the truth again and again, until light becomes darkness.
- Silenced. The Sadducees lost on their own chosen ground, and the news travelled straight to their rivals.
- Regrouped. The Pharisees came together not to acknowledge His wisdom but to test Him once more.
- United. Ritualists, worldly men and rationalists agreed on nothing except one thing — rejecting the Lord.
- Exposed. Every class that questioned Him failed at the very thing it claimed to represent.
- Unwon. A heart can lose the argument and still refuse the Lord; being unable to answer Him is not the same as belonging to Him.
And one of them, a lawyer, demanded, tempting him, and saying,
Jesus had just silenced the Sadducees, so the Pharisees closed ranks and sent their best-trained man to test Him with a question. Two words carry the verse — "lawyer" and "to test him" — and both describe the questioner.
The word describes a profession, not a courtroom role. These men were the accepted experts on the law of Moses. Jesus had already spoken about them:
A teacher of the law, someone who explained the law. Nicodemus was probably one, for the Lord called him a "teacher of Israel." The Lord said of the lawyers that they put heavy burdens on others, but would not touch those burdens themselves. In their teaching they took away the key of knowledge. They did not go in themselves, and they blocked those who were going in — a solemn description that sadly may apply to some today.
Verse 34 says the Pharisees gathered when they heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees. That silence showed His wisdom, yet they would not admit it:
So the Pharisees hear that He has silenced the Sadducees, and they gather together — sadly, not to acknowledge His divine wisdom, but to test Him yet again.
Asking which commandment ranks highest was not innocent curiosity. It was a well-worn argument among the teachers, and the way they argued it exposed their whole idea of God:
Which, asks the lawyer, is the great commandment in the law? This was a question the Jews argued about a great deal. Each commandment had its own special value for them. Keeping each one earned so many good marks from God, as in an exam. The Lord takes the opportunity, provided in God's ways, to set out the basic principles of the divine law.
A trap invites an escape. Jesus took none. He answered with the law at full strength, in both its directions:
The Pharisees were not sorry to see the Sadducees, the ruling party of that day, put to silence. Still, one of them, a lawyer, tested the Lord with a question that touched them closely. "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" But He who came full of grace and truth never lowered the law. At once He gives its sum and substance in both its parts — toward God and toward man.
Mark records the same encounter but tells us what was stirring inside the questioner. Commentators account for the difference by the purpose of each Gospel:
Mark takes special notice of the scribe who questions the Lord about the first commandment. He lets us see what was going on in that man's soul. Matthew tells us only that he came to test the Lord, as one of the representatives of the fallen-away nation. But Mark shows him to us as a person, and lets us see what was stirring inside him. Mark then shows us how the Lord met him on that same personal ground, saying to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God."
The lawyer asked about the greatest commandment. The commandment he received back asks for love — and that is exactly where a command runs out of power:
The law makes man the main agent and the responsible one. It is man who is to do this and, still more, man who must not do that. The law commands him to love God with all his heart, with all his soul, with all his strength, and with all his mind. But the commandment, just as it stands, is completely useless, because in this case man is a sinner with no love in him. No law ever produced or called out love. It may demand but cannot create love; it is not within the nature or power of law to do so. God knew this perfectly; and in the gospel He becomes Himself the Great Agent. It is He who loves, and who gives according to the strength of that love in sending His only Son.
- Tested. The Pharisees regrouped after Jesus silenced the Sadducees. They came to test Him again, not to admit His wisdom.
- Tester. A "lawyer" was an expert on the law of Moses. Jesus said such men loaded burdens on others and took away the key of knowledge.
- Testing ground. They chose a question the teachers had long argued. They treated each command as marks earned from God.
- Test answered. Jesus never lowered the law to escape the trap. He gave its full substance in both directions: toward God and toward man.
- Test failed. The law can demand love but cannot create it — so God became the Agent Himself, loving first and sending His Son.
Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?
The scene is the temple courts. One group after another has come to test Jesus with questions, and each has failed. Now a Pharisee trained in the law steps forward. His question sounds honest. Matthew tells us he asked it to test Him.
Jesus had just silenced the Sadducees over the resurrection, and the Pharisees regrouped.
So the Pharisees hear that He has silenced the Sadducees, and they gather together. They come not to acknowledge His divine wisdom, sadly, but to tempt Him yet again. Still the questioner has been affected, as Mark tells us, and something better lies hidden under the test question he puts. Matthew says nothing of this. He is taken up with where the nation as a whole stands toward the Lord, and the state of one man does not show that.
The word "which" assumes some commandments outrank others. Israel's teachers argued over exactly that.
The scribes counted 613 commandments in all in the Old Testament. They sorted them into laws they thought important and laws they thought less important. The Lord also points out a difference. He calls the commandment to love God the great and first commandment. Yet at once He puts the commandment to love your neighbour on the same level (Matt. 22:36-40).
Behind the counting lay a way of thinking about God. Obedience worked like score-keeping.
It was a question much debated among the Jews. Each commandment had a special value for them, and keeping each one earned so many good marks from God, as in an examination. The Lord takes the occasion, given to Him in the ways of God, to establish the basic principles of the divine law.
A trap question invites a small answer. Jesus gives the opposite.
He who came full of grace and truth never lowered the law. At once He gives its sum and substance in both its parts — Godward and manward.
The questioner had the ten commandments of Exodus 20 in view.
He was thinking of the ten Commandments in Exodus 20, but the Lord turned him to Deuteronomy 6:5, and added Leviticus 19:18. The demand of the law is summed up in one word — love. First, love to God; second, love to one's neighbour. When Paul tells us, "Love is the fulfilling of the law" (Rom. 13:10), he is only stating in other words what Jesus said here (verse 40).
The two commandments sound like the gospel in miniature. Darby marks the difference.
Everything in man hung on these two commandments. This is the summary of what man ought to be, the root and the measure of human righteousness. It is in no way a revelation of divine love. It is not a question of grace, nor of an open way for the sinner to come to God. It is the perfect rule of what a man should be.
The commandment names love as the requirement. Naming it and producing it are two different things.
The law does not give life, and it does not give strength. Man's great need is power to do right. I may know well enough what is right. I may even want to do right. Yet something else has power over my heart, so that I do wrong. Neither does the law give a motive to love. It tells me to love God with all my heart (and my conscience admits I should), but why? Because I shall be cursed if I do not. But that will not produce love.
God Himself has supplied what the commandment demanded. The order of the two matters.
Love to God and love to our neighbour is what the law required! The Lord Jesus said the second was like to the first (Matt. 22:39); but note, it is the second and not the first! Response to God's love comes before love rightly flows out to others. Attempted reversal of this order has produced dire iniquity. Above all, the law demanded love to God; it could not produce it, but God's own love has brought this about in those who are now His children.
The deepest irony of the scene is one the questioner never saw.
The Jewish scribes, the lawyers, argued in many ways about the greatest commandment. The Lord does not enter into these disputes at all. Once more His answer shows perfect wisdom... However, the questioner did not realise who stood before him in that hour. It was Jehovah Himself, the giver of the law.
- Tested. The question was a trap, not a search for truth. Yet Mark records that something better was stirring in the man who asked it.
- Ranked. The scribes sorted 613 commandments into greater and lesser, as if obedience earned marks in an examination. Jesus answers on completely different ground.
- Summed. He passes over Exodus 20 and goes to Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18. He sums up the whole law in one word: love — first Godward, then manward.
- Exposed. The summary is the perfect measure of what a person ought to be, not a revelation of grace. The law demands love, but it gives neither motive nor strength.
- Supplied. God's own love has produced in His children what the commandment could only demand. The order never changes: loved first, then loving.
And he said to him, Thou shalt love [the] Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy understanding.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
This is [the] great and first commandment.
The lawyer's question came from a long dispute among Jewish teachers about which rule in the law outranked the rest. The Lord's answer goes to the root of the law, and it shows what man owes God — and whether man has ever paid it.
The Lord did not argue over rankings. One writer explains how the Jews treated the commandments, and what the Lord did with the question instead.
Which, asks the lawyer, is the great commandment in the law? The Jews debated this question a great deal. For them each commandment had its own value, and keeping each one earned so many good marks from God, as in an examination. The Lord uses the moment to set out the basic principles of God's law. To love God with all the heart — that is the first commandment. It is the summary of what man ought to be, the root and the measure of human righteousness. It is in no way a revelation of divine love. It is not at all a question of grace, nor of an open way for the sinner to come to God. It is the perfect rule of what a man should be.
Some read the words as placing this commandment above all the others. Darby looks at the Greek and reads it differently. He says the words describe what kind of commandment it is, not where it ranks.
The Jews measured the commandments to work out righteousness. The Lord answers, not by formally comparing this one with the others, but by so characterising it. I do not think He means a first and great one, though the grammar would allow it, but an absolute characteristic.
The commandment asks for love. That tells us something about God, and it shows how much of a person the demand covers.
The law's demand was love. That very fact shows it was God's own nature which desired this, and that nature is love — "God is love." And the law does not simply demand love from the whole heart, as is sometimes said. It demands love from the whole being!
The commandment asks for what a sinner does not have. A command cannot create it.
Man is here commanded to love God with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his strength, and with all his mind. The commandment is right. But it achieves nothing here, because man is a sinner and loveless. No law ever produced or drew out love. It may demand but cannot create love; it is not within the nature or power of law to do so. God knew this perfectly; and in the gospel He becomes Himself the great Agent. He is the One who loves. He gives according to the strength of that love: He sent His only begotten Son, with eternal life in Him — yes, and sent Him to die in expiation for sin.
The commandment did not stay unmet. The very One they were questioning answered it, and what is true of Him passes to those who belong to Him.
The Lord Jesus showed perfect love to God and to men. He was the only Man who ever loved the Lord His God with all His heart, soul and strength, and His neighbour as Himself. His holy life showed that God had a Man in reserve who could meet every demand of the law. The holy nature found in God's Son is given to all His children, who have been born of Him. They have God's nature and the Spirit of God living in them. So the righteous requirements of the law are fulfilled in them, "who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit" (Rom. 8:4).
There is another way to hear this demand. It means God wants our love.
Is it not a happy thing to know that our Lord claims our hearts and their affections? Have any of us ever read "the first and great commandment" and not rejoiced, at least sometimes, at the grace behind such a demand? Is it nothing to us that God Himself values our love, that He says to us, "My son, give Me your heart"?
- Demand. This is the root and measure of what man ought to be. It is not a revelation of God's love, but the perfect rule of what a man should be.
- Depth. It asks for love, and not from the heart only. The demand covers the whole being.
- Deadlock. Law can demand love but cannot produce it. To a loveless sinner, the commandment achieves nothing.
- Deliverance. One Man loved God with all His heart. God gives that same nature to those born of Him, so the law's righteous requirements are fulfilled in them.
- Delight. The same demand, seen from the side of grace, is God asking us for our hearts — and valuing what we give.
And [the] second is like it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
On these two commandments the whole law and the prophets hang.
A lawyer has just asked Jesus which commandment in the law is the greatest. Jesus names two, and then says something larger: these two carry the whole of the law and the prophets.
This was a well-worn debate among the Jews of the day. Jesus used the question to lay down the root of God's law.
The lawyer asks which is the great commandment in the law. The Jews debated this question a great deal. For them each commandment had its own value, and keeping each one earned so many good marks from God, as in an exam. The Lord takes the opportunity, given to Him in the ways of God, to set out the basic principles of God's law.
The two commandments Jesus quotes match the two halves of the Ten Commandments. The lawyer asked for one; Jesus gave both.
Look at the commandments together and you will see that the first four relate to God, and the last six to man. That is, they define our responsibility towards God and towards man. So our blessed Lord summed them up in answer to the question, Which is the great commandment in the law?
Kelly adds that this answer keeps the law at its full height:
He who came full of grace and truth never lowered the law, and at once gives its sum and substance in both its parts — Godward and manward.
The verb matters. Jesus does not call these two the biggest of many. He says the rest depends on them — the law, and everything the prophets wrote.
But He adds no word of blame. He only expands on the central place these two commandments held — not in the law only, but in the prophets as well, wherever God had made His mind known. Everything there depended on them. They were the moral unity shown in all of it.
The same writer ties the second command to the first through God's image in man:
The answer shows what is at the heart of it, the life-pulse beating through it all... God claims heart and soul and mind. And for that very reason man, as the image of God, must come in under it too. So the second commandment is like the first — and that was the commandment they were so obviously breaking.
Strip away the detail and the demand is a single thing. Paul later said the same in different words.
The demand of the law is summed up in one word — love. First, love to God; second, love to one's neighbour. When Paul tells us, "Love is the fulfilling of the law" (Rom. 13:10), he is only stating in other words what Jesus said here.
But the command runs into a problem in the person receiving it.
The law commands man to love God with all his heart, with all his soul, with all his strength, and with all his mind. But the commandment on its own achieves nothing, because the man it addresses is a sinner and has no love in him. No law ever produced love or drew it out. Law may demand love, but it cannot create it. That is not in the nature or the power of law.
Darby agrees this sums up all moral obligation, but warns that it does not cover Christian living:
I admit that this covers it all as far as legal obligation goes, and all the Law and the Prophets depend on these two — but Christianity is not covered. If a man walks in the Spirit, he will do it. That is what Christianity says, but he does it because he is not under law.
One Man kept both commands in full. Hole shows what that meant for the men standing in front of Him.
In the light of this it is also plain that the Lord Jesus was the best and truest Neighbour that man ever had — the perfect Neighbour, in fact. He was also God, perfectly revealed and known. In Him God and the Neighbour were united, and in hating and rejecting Him, men broke at once and hopelessly both counts of the law.
- Depend — the two commands are not the top of a list. The law and the prophets rest on them, the "moral unity" running through everything God has said.
- Two halves — the first four commandments face God, the last six face man. Asked for one, Jesus gave both, and lowered neither.
- One word — the whole demand reduces to love, which is what Paul means by "love is the fulfilling of the law."
- Cannot create — law can demand love but never produce it. It meets a loveless heart and leaves it loveless.
- One Man — Christ alone loved God and neighbour in full. In rejecting Him, the men questioning Him broke both commands at once.