Matthew 22:39
And the second is similar: You will love your neighbor as yourself.
In answering an insidious question, Jesus is grafted into that great prophetic and rabbinical tradition that was in search of the unifying principle of the Torah, that is, of the teaching of God contained in the Bible. Rabbi Hillel, a contemporary of his, had said: "Do not do to your neighbor what is hateful to you, this is the whole law.
For the teachers of Judaism, love of neighbor derives from the love of God who created man in his image and likeness, so that one can not love God without loving his creature: this is the true motive of love of neighbor and «It is a big and general principle in the law.
Jesus claims this principle and adds that the commandment to love one's neighbor is similar to the first and greatest of the commandments, that is, to love God with all one's heart, mind, and soul. Affirming a relationship of similarity between the two commandments Jesus unites them definitively and so will the whole Christian tradition; as the apostle John will say emphatically: «How can he love God, whom he does not see, who does not love his brother, whom he sees?.
You will love your neighbor
Other - clearly the whole Gospel says - is every human being, man or woman, friend or enemy, to whom respect, consideration, esteem is due. Love of neighbor is universal and personal at the same time. It embraces all of humanity and is concretized in that-which-is-your-side.
But who can give us such a big heart, who can arouse in us so much kindness to make us feel close - close - to those who seem more distant from us and make us overcome the love for oneself, to see this self in the others? It is a gift from God. Moreover, it is the same love of God that "has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us".
It is not, therefore, a common love, a simple friendship, only philanthropy, but that love that has been poured into our hearts since baptism: that love that is the life of God himself, of the Trinity, from which we can take part.
Therefore, love is everything, but in order to be able to live well we have to know its qualities, which emerge from the Gospel and from Scripture in general, and which we seem to be able to synthesize in some fundamental aspects.
In the first place Jesus, who has died for all, loving everyone, teaches us that true love must be addressed to all. Not like the love that many times we live, simply human, that has a reduced radius: family, friends, neighbors ... True love, the one that Jesus wants, does not admit of discrimination; he does not differentiate between nice and unfriendly people, for him there is no cute and ugly, big or small; for this love there is no such thing as my country or the foreign, my Church or that of the other, my religion or the other. This love loves everyone. And that is what we have to do: love everyone.
True love, moreover, takes the initiative, does not wait to be loved, as happens in general with human love: that we love those who love us. No, true love is ahead of the other, as the Father did when, while we were still sinners, and therefore not lovers, he sent his Son to save us.
Therefore, love everyone and love taking the initiative
For Jesus it is clear that the neighbor is anyone who is not me, and from that perspective I help him, I feel compassion for him, I do not take into account his social condition, race, religion or sex (Luke 10, 25-37). I see in the neighbor the visible manifestation of God, his perfect work. Jesus begins to teach this to his disciples, to recreate in them the old alliance, where all were equal to each other and where the social pyramids did not exist. Among them, the prevailing, pyramidal social model must never be repeated. In fact, the greatest is not the one who serves him, but the one who serves; all a revolutionary message for his time. The teacher teaches by example. Remember the woman who was about to be stoned; a law sentenced his execution, but he puts forward the highest law, the greatest of all, love. So his words, "Love your neighbor as yourself," are not only an expression of a loving man, but of someone who understands that this principle goes against the whole social, economic and political order, order by the way tyrannical, excluding, because only think from the individuality and not from the collectivity.
For Jesus, this brief but profound message is an invitation to understand the Kingdom of God, that is, to understand that justice, equality, love, respect, tolerance, are principles of the kingdom, "I want you to have life and they have it in abundance (John 10,10). "
Jesus invites us to reflection to empower ourselves of our commitment as a Christian in this world. Jesus does not speak, he keeps shouting: "Love your neighbor as yourself.