Who is My Neighbor?

This week’s Gospel reading teases out the first two Commandments about loving God and neighbor. The section of scripture we are to study is when a law scholar stood up and asked Jesus a simple question: “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” In response, Jesus reiterated the mandate to love God with one’s whole being and love your neighbor as yourself. 

As they are fond of doing, the lawyer parsed the answer and questioned Jesus about the meaning of “neighbor.” Instead of answering directly, Jesus used the method of a parable to have the lawyer answer the question by himself.

 The story starts by stipulating that a man was robbed, beaten, and left on the road to die. The incident occurred on the road from Jericho to Jerusalem, a route which led to the Temple. Both priests and their Temple assistants, the Levites, would often make the journey.

Those who performed priestly duties were strictly bound by rules that were considered God-given and safeguarded against defilement. They could not serve others in their Temple duties if they broke the rules. Among these rules, laid down in the book of Leviticus, is one forbidding any contact with a dead person. The lawyer knew all this: he worked with regulations and would expect the priest to behave as he did. A priest and a Levite passed the injured man, and neither stopped to offer assistance. 

But now Christ brings a Samaritan into the equation, a man from a despised people, one who himself would cause defilement if even a drinking vessel of his were to be used. It is this man whose compassion leads him to save the traveler who was left for dead. The man he saved could have been a Jew; in fact, he could have been a journeying priest, for Jesus merely says “a man was going down” and gives him no identity. The untouchable touches with love, and a man’s life is saved.

The story ends with Jesus asking the lawyer this question. “Which of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the robbers’ victim?”  “The one who treated him with mercy,” the lawyer replied. The teaching had come full circle; the lawyer admitted that loving one’s neighbor is the key to eternal life.

So often in life, we make countless decisions about who our friend or foe is. Due to the power of social media, even family members seem not to be exempt. Disturbing stories about grown children accusing their parents of how outrageously they were treated growing up have left estrangements everywhere. Who would qualify if a parent or sibling is not seen as a neighbor? Or is the second Commandment regularly disobeyed?

There is a tendency to split the two Commandments. Christians would never say they do not love God, but there appears to be much room to wiggle when it comes to their neighbor.  There are many reasons, but one stands out amongst the crowd. Whether we acknowledge it or not, we all have a strict plan for how we want to live. When our apple cart is disturbed by another or perceived as such, the love of neighbor is the first casualty.

Perception is often the greater reason we choose not to love our neighbor. When our lives are disrupted, we search for a reason, and usually, we project the cause of our discomfort on another person. This is why children blame their parents instead of addressing their inadequacies.

But the dynamic holds in most situations. We fail to love our enemies because they threaten our way of life. For example, we might become envious of our neighbors for having more than we do. It is also hard to love a person who is evil and lives contrary to what we have come to know as righteous. We surely have missed Jesus’ teaching if we think along these lines. We do not have to condone our neighbor’s actions or even like him. The man on the road to Jerusalem could have been a vile individual, but that should not keep us from loving him. Why?

Because the question concerns eternal life, there is no room in heaven for those who cannot or will not love their neighbor. Consider this perspective.  God loves the most abhorrent of his creation, and if we want to live with God in eternity, the prerequisite is that we love those God loves. Otherwise, the lack of love is incompatible with eternal life.

We must remind ourselves that the worst of the worst is also created in God’s image. If we seek to love God with our whole hearts and souls, then it is incumbent upon us to love those God loves. The reiteration is necessary; we do not have to like or agree with how they live.  We have to get much better at separating the sinner from the sin. Doing that answers our question of what I must do to have eternal life.