Don Friesen
The Salvation Army, founded in the mid-nineteenth century (1865), has long had a deep commitment to the poor. Its founders, William and Catherine Booth (1829-1890), were committed to "loosing the chains of injustice, freeing the captive and oppressed, sharing food and home, clothing the naked, and carrying out family responsibilities," and they worked tirelessly on behalf of the poor. In a day when women's gifts were not appreciated by the Church, Catherine developed her gift as an outstanding preacher. She must have been a compelling speaker, for it is said that "wherever Catherine Booth went, humanity went to hear her. Princes and peeresses merged with paupers and prostitutes." (G. Campbell Morgan)
On one such occasion Catherine preached to what was described as a large crowd of "publicans and sinners," and after the meeting she was invited to a fine home for tea. The hostess began by saying, "My dear Mrs. Booth, that meeting was dreadful!"
"What do you mean?" asked Catherine.
"Oh, when you were speaking, I was looking at those people opposite to me. Their faces were so terrible.... I don't think I shall sleep tonight!"
"But don't you know them?" asked Catherine, to which the hostess replied, "Certainly not!"
"Well, that is interesting," said Catherine. "I didn't bring them with me from London; they must be your neighbours!"
G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936) wrote, "We make our friends; we make our enemies; but God makes our next door neighbour." That's a hard pill to swallow, particularly by those of us who have annoying neighbours next door. One couple who seemed to have more than their share of colourful neighbours, tells, for example, of the witty kitty lady, who talked incessantly to them about the fascinating antics of her nineteen cats! Another neighbour would get up at three o'clock in the morning to knock lurking evil spirits off their common wall with her broom! And then there was the thoughtful couple who hosted bi-monthly Christian karaoke hoe-downs next door. (Cara DiPaolo, "Simon and Sonia") Some neighbours are so annoying that they drive you to devise elaborate evasive manoeuvrers in order to avoid them.
If you asked anyone younger than me what name they associate with the word, "Christian," the person named would not necessarily be the Pope, or Mother Teresa, or Billy Graham. They would probably answer, "Ned Flanders." Ned Flanders is the goofy-looking next-door neighbour of Homer and Marge, on The Simpsons. Ned is an irrepressibly cheerful Christian whose commitment to neighbourliness is sorely tested by Homer. Ned can be a little annoying himself; his doorbell chimes, "A Mighty Fortress is Our God" and his air horn blares the "Hallelujah Chorus". Ned, however, is committed to Matthew 19:19 "Love your neighbour as yourself" and it is only by repeatedly turning to this admonition of Jesus that Ned is able to survive Homer's sustained scorn and abuse. (Mark I. Pinsky, "Saint Flanders," Christianity Today, February 5, 2001)
Negative Injunctions and Commandments Concerning the Neighbour
Today's biblical word is "neighbour," and the biblical notion of neighbourliness may well test our mettle, but I couldn't find another biblical N-word that was anywhere close in importance. Even the Bible's negative N-words, like "nausea," "neglect," and "nonsense" are rather bland. The only other interesting N-word is the word, "nose-ring," but it appears only twice, and both times in the book of Genesis. (Genesis 24:22 and 30) I guess it never really caught on!
Neighbourliness is a strong theme throughout the Scriptures. The word, "neighbour," appears twice in the Ten Commandments:
You shall not covet your neighbour's house; ...or anything that belongs to your neighbour." (Exodus 20:17)
The book of Deuteronomy warns us not to be "hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward our needy neighbour." (Deuteronomy 15:7) Do not "view your needy neighbour with hostility and give nothing," it warns, for "your neighbour might cry to the Lord against you, and you would incur guilt." (15:9) Deuteronomy contains all sorts of specific instructions to facilitate smooth relationships with neighbours (23:24, 25; 24:10, 13), but it also encourages us to "open our hand to the poor and needy neighbour...." (15:11)
The psalms urge us not to "take up a reproach against our neighbours" (Psalm 15:13) and speak disparagingly about those "who speak peace with their neighbours, while mischief is in their hearts." (28:3) The book of Proverbs gives the several bits of helpful and memorable advice: "Let your foot be seldom in your neighbour's house, otherwise the neighbour will become weary of you and hate you." (Proverbs 25:17) And: "Whoever blesses a neighbour with a loud voice, rising early in the morning, will be counted as cursing." (27:14) And then, in a scenario that would do Homer Simpson proud, Proverbs suggests, "Like a maniac who shoots deadly firebrands and arrows, so is one who deceives a neighbour and says, I am only joking!'" (26:18-19)
Some of the Old Testament prophets also warn about those who "speak friendly words to their neighbours, but inwardly are planning to lay an ambush." (Jeremiah 9:8) or those who "make gain of (their) neighbours by extortion...." (Ezekiel 22:12) There are a number of books extant that were written after the prophets, in the time between the Old and New Testaments, and they too underscore the importance and delicate nature of neighbourly relations. The book of Ecclesiasticus (Sirach), for example, warns about the damage that gossip can do to our relationships with neighbours. (Ecclesiasticus 19:12) It advises us not to accept gossip as fact. "Confront your neighbour; he may not have said it; or if he did say it, he will know not to say it again." (19:14, NEB) Ecclesiasticus also identifies "three things (that) ...are beautiful in the sight of God and of mortals," one of which is "friendship among neighbours". (25:1)
Jesus Raises the Bar The God-Neighbour Commandment!
Love of neighbour and the spirit of neighbourliness are well-entrenched in the Old Testament, but I think that Jesus raised the bar, when in response to a question from a Pharisee concerning the most important commandment, he replied with the familiar "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 neighbour as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)
The Pharisee asking the question had a Ph.D. in religious law. He could rhyme off all of the commandments that constituted the law. He could rhyme off the 365 negative commandments as well as the 248 positive commandments 613 in all! Dr. Pharisee had devoted his academic career to codifying these commandments, dividing them into categories and rating their importance. There were commandments about what to eat; what to wear; what to wear when you eat; when to work and when to rest; how to raise children; how to raise animals; how to farm; how to weave; how to slaughter animals, and how to cook the slaughtered animals. The complex array of commandments would do any modern bureaucrat proud, and Dr. Pharisee knew his way through this maze, backwards and forwards. He thought he had Jesus stumped!
So, Jesus, what do you think about a question that has taxed my own great intellectual powers for years? It turned out the Nazarene was not as thick as the learned doctor had thought, for the answer he gave was correct at first! When Jesus answered, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind," Dr. Pharisee and his learned colleagues all nodded in agreement. Before they could interrupt, however, Jesus added, without a pause, "And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40)
Jesus' answer at least the first half was somewhat predictable from someone well-schooled in the Law, but he also raised to the same level of importance a law from Leviticus regarding love for one's neighbour. (Leviticus 19:18) In the fusion of these two commandments Jesus capsulized the entire tradition of Moses and the Prophets. In other words, Jesus was saying that the fundamental nature of the relationship of a person to God, one of devoted love, is also to be the nature of the relationship of one person to another. A person's commitment to another person is as profound and as deep as that person's relationship to God.
It's two-commandments-in-one! It's a hyphenated commandment. You shall love God-hyphen-neighbour! You cannot, in Christian tradition, say God without saying neighbour. Jesus set the shape of the Christian landscape when he combined God and neighbour in a Christian moral imperative. One cannot have one without the other. To love God and not neighbour is fraudulent, says the New Testament; it's a lie! (1 John 4:20) To love one's neighbour without rooting that love in love of God is morally thin, and any nasty and annoying neighbour will quickly test its depth. Love of God that does not include love of neighbour becomes a selfish spirituality, a spirituality that listens to Jesus say, "Love your neighbour as yourself," and concludes that the emphasis is upon learning to love yourself! And love of neighbour that does not include love of God is about as helpful as the airline pilot flying in rough weather who emerged from the cockpit wearing a parachute and tried to calm his passengers by telling them that he was going for help!
Jesus' God-neighbour commandment left an indelible imprint on the New Testament landscape, for the book of Romans tells us that "love does no wrong to a neighbour...." (Romans 13:10) Galatians tells us that "the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, "You shall love your neighbour as yourself." (Galatians 5:14) And James calls the love of neighbour a "royal law". (James 2:8)
On this Commandment Hinge the Law and the Prophets
Jesus said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind," and "You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40) Or as another translation renders it, "On these two commandments hinge ...the Law and the Prophets." (Marquart)
Last fall one of the hinges on the door to the shed outside broke, and door was left hanging by only one hinge. A door does not work well with only one hinge; it cannot perform its door-like duties well. If you tour your home, you will find that most of your cupboard doors have two hinges; one on the top and one on the bottom. The doors to the rooms in your home as well as the outside doors have at least two hinges. Perhaps it's just semantic fancy on my part, but the two most important commandments Jesus identified are like the two hinges that make a door function properly. That is, the door to life as God ordained it turns on these two hinges: love of God, and love of neighbour.
A Compelling Story about a Compassionate Neighbour
Dr. Pharisee's sparring with Jesus didn't go too well, at least for the learned doctor, but others followed in his wake, determined to trap Jesus. Jesus' two-in-one God-neighbour commandment-combination shaped the New Testament landscape, and imprinted itself on Christian thought, but Jesus also told a story that imprinted itself on public consciousness and vocabulary. It is the story of the Good Samaritan, and even in a time of increasing biblical illiteracy, the term and the story continue to inform our notion of neighbourliness.
Jesus told the story in response to a rabbinical lawyer who asked him, not without ulterior motive, "Teacher, ...what must I do to inherit eternal life?" (Luke 10:25)
"What is written in the law?" asked Jesus. "What do you read there?" (10:26)
And the lawyer replied with Jesus' own answer, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself." (10:27) And Jesus said, in what sounds like a summary dismissal, "You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live." (10:28) End of story or it should have been, except that the lawyer, a survivor of many a courtroom battle, was not about to quit easily. "And who is my neighbour?" he asked Jesus. (10:29) To which Jesus replied with the timeless story of a traveller who fell upon hard times.
We know the story well, so we don't have to flog the storyline unnecessarily. The road between Jerusalem and Jericho was a dangerous stretch of road favoured by thieves, and the man in Jesus' story was held up, stripped, beaten, and left half dead. Fortunately, for the wounded traveller, several people passed by. Unfortunately, some of them were of no help whatsoever! One of the passers by was a priest, but when he saw the wounded man "...he passed by on the other side". Another passerby was a Levite, but he too, said Jesus, "...passed by on the other side". The third passerby was a Samaritan, and the wounded man had little reason to expect any help from him but the Gospel tells us, when he saw the wounded man, "he had compassion, went to him and bound up his wounds, ...set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn, and took care of him." (Luke 10:33-34, RSV)
The biblical teaching on neighbourliness is fairly clear, but the lawyer astutely questioned Jesus on the scope of biblical neighbourliness. Come on, Jesus. How large would you draw the circle of neighbourliness'? Always the crafty story-teller, Jesus hooked the lawyer by portraying the negligence of the lawyer's own neighbours; no doubt the lawyer, like most of us, had endured his share of nasty neighbours and he always kept a bundle of legal loopholes close at hand in order to "justify" (Luke 10:29) withdrawing or withholding his neighbourliness.
Frederick Buechner suggests that perhaps the lawyer wanted a legal definition he could refer to in case the question of loving a neighbour ever happened to come up something on the order of: "a neighbour (hereinafter referred to as the party of the first part) to be construed as meaning a person of Jewish descent whose legal residence is within a radius of no more than three statute miles from one's own legal residence unless there is another person of Jewish descent (hereinafter to be referred to as the party of the second part) living closer to the party of the first part than one is oneself, in which case the party of the second part is to be construed as neighbour to the party of the first part and one is oneself relieved of all responsibility of any sort or kind whatsoever." (Beyond Words: Daily Readings in the ABC's of Faith)
The second passerby in Jesus' story may have simply reinforced the lawyer's reluctance to be neighbourly, but I doubt that he was prepared for the third passerby a Samaritan! It was one thing to insinuate that his own people were negligent of their neighbourly duties, it was quite another to suggest that a foreigner could put them to shame! And Jesus, sensing the lawyer's unease, laid it on a little thicker, adding that the next day this generous Samaritan "took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.'" (10:35)
Go on, Neighbour, Go and Do Likewise!
The lawyer might have managed a graceful exit at this point, but I think Jesus was enjoying himself too much not to toy with him a little more. Fixing his eyes on the lawyer, he asked, "Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?" (Luke 10:36) There's just a hint of condescension in Jesus' question, as if to say, Now who's asking the questions? You want to take a pedantic tone with me, let's see how you answer an obvious question. Which of these three, do you think, Mr. Lawyer, Sir, was a neighbour to the wounded man? To which the lawyer was forced to give the obvious answer, "The one who showed him mercy." (Luke 10:37) And if the lawyer wasn't already sufficiently embarrassed at being hoisted by his own petards, Jesus as much as gave him a verbal pat on the head, saying to him, "Go and do likewise." (Luke 10:37)
Jesus' concept of neighbourliness is an encompassing one, and one firmly based on biblical principles. We often refer to this story as The Parable of the Good Samaritan, and the Good Samaritan designation has gained a solid foothold in our vocabulary, but Jesus' story may be less about the priest, the Levite, and the Samaritan and more about the lawyer who asked his question because he wanted to "justify himself".
Like the priest and the Levite and the lawyer we also may tend to limit our caring and compassion. It may be that some of us remain at a very limited level of compassion, a little like the comedian, Flip Wilson, who used to call himself a "Jehovah's Bystander!" He said he was asked to be a "Jehovah's Witness," but he didn't really want to get involved. Some of us want others to do something about human need. Why doesn't "the church" do something about such and such? we ask, as if "the church" is anyone other than ourselves.
Most of us are not cavalier about human need, but we have only so much time and energy. There is a difference, however, between apportioning our time wisely, and limiting the circumference of our love arbitrarily. Jesus leaves no room for the "charity begins at home" rationalization. Your neighbour, Jesus said, is the one who needs you. And that may be your next-door neighbour; it may be a family member; it may be your child, your mother, your father, your spouse, or it may be a friend. It may be our homeless neighbours; it may be our global neighbours. It may be a neighbour-formerly-known-as-an-enemy!
Leaving Footprints in one's Neighbourhood
Some time ago a neighbour with a dog moved next door to our home. It was winter and the dog left his footprints or paw-prints all over our yard that winter. The dog, a large one, intimidated our small children and also left a lot more than footprints on our yard.
Someone has said that we leave our footprints wherever we go, particularly in our neighbourhoods. We are always leaving footprints, of one kind or another, be they tender words of kindness, or gestures of indifference. There are certainly some neighbours on whom we'd prefer to leave our boot-prints, but that is not the manner in which we were taught. God may have given us these neighbours to test our spiritual maturity.
Aristides, a second-century Greek philosopher, described Christians to his emperor in this way: "Christians love one another. They never fail to help widows; they save orphans from those who would hurt them. If one of them has something, they give freely to those who have nothing. If they see a stranger, Christians take him home and are happy, as though he were a real brother. ... This is really a new kind of person. There is something divine in them."
May our neighbours say the same about us.
"You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour." (Exodus 20:16)
There are a number of similar injunctions in Exodus and Leviticus, about cheating, exploiting or pilfering from your neighbour and the consequences thereof. (Exodus 22:7-8; 22:26-27; Leviticus 6:2; 25:14) Our reading from Leviticus tells us that we are "not (to) defraud our neighbour" (Leviticus 19:13) or "profit by the blood of our neighbour" (19:16). And then, with a more positive spin, Leviticus says, "with justice you shall judge your neighbour" (19:15), and in the words that Jesus echoes in the New Testament, "you shall love your neighbour as yourself...." (19:18)
All quotations of Scripture, unless otherwise noted, are from the New Revised Standard Version.