Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 1–7

“At that time, the Pharisees, hearing that Jesus had put the Sadducees to silence, gathered together, and one of them asked him, testing him: Teacher, which is the greater commandment in the law? And he said to them: You shall love the Lord your God with your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment.”

When the Lord, at the question of the Sadducees, who were unwilling to hear that there is a resurrection, had demonstrated it from the example of the law, then, as Matthew said, Jesus put the Sadducees to silence, wishing to show that the clarity of truth made the bitter and harmful voice of falsehood fall dumb. So, as the Saviour by the whole word of his teaching put the Sadducees to silence and confidently refuted the false doctrine that among them was taken for the truth, so also the imitators of Christ will do by the examples of the Scriptures, by which, according to sound doctrine, every voice of Pharaoh must be struck dumb, the voice in which he boasts and says, “The rivers are mine, and I made them,” as it is written in Ezekiel. The Sadducees, then, who say that there is no resurrection, questioned the Saviour about what is written, thinking to put him to silence. But neither Jesus nor his beloved disciples are ever stopped by the ungodly. For it is proper that the Sadducees be put to silence by Christ. The righteous man is indeed silent, knowing “a time to keep silence and a time to speak,” but he is not struck dumb. And as it is proper to the righteous to keep silence but not to be struck dumb, so it is proper to the Sadducees, or to all who are teachers of falsehood, to be struck dumb but not to keep silence. For even if they are struck dumb as far as the matter goes, they still do not keep silent. That is why the Lord said, not to a man but to the sea, “Be silent, be still,” rebuking it … Yet the Pharisees, who agree on the resurrection, hearing that he had put the Sadducees to silence, gathered together, clearly because the doctrine of the resurrection prevailed; and those were gathered who were not gathered so long as the Sadducees had not been put to silence. Nevertheless, even though they had gathered because the proof of the resurrection had held, one of them asked, not as one wishing to learn from him what he asked, but testing the Lord God. Every person, then, who questions any of the teachers on any point whatever, not for the sake of learning but in order to test, and not from a simple disposition, we must regard as a brother of that Pharisee who tested the Saviour with his question. For everything that is done to Christ's saints, whether by those who lie in wait for them or by those who love them, he receives entirely into himself; for by what is written we must treat also what is not written. It is written that on account of the hungry and the thirsty he said, “I was hungry” and “I was thirsty,” and on account of the naked, the strangers, the sick, and those in prison, “I was naked,” “I was a stranger,” “I was sick,” and “I was in prison.” Following the logic of the likeness, let us too add: I suffered insults, I was beaten, I was tested, and all the rest. And just as in what is written the Lord's word is true when he says, “As long as you did it to one of the least of these, you did it to me,” so when a righteous man has suffered insult, or blasphemy, or anything of the kind, picture Christ saying to those who did it: “When you insulted one of the least of these, you tested me, you blasphemed me.”

Let us now look at the tester's question: “Teacher,” he says, “which is the greater commandment in the law?” Testing him, he said “Teacher,” because he did not utter this word as a disciple of Christ. This will be clearer from an example. A father, for instance, is the father of his son, and no one can properly call him father except his son; and a mother is the mother of her daughter, and no one can call her mother except her daughter alone. So too a teacher is the teacher of his disciple, and the disciple is the disciple of his teacher. Therefore no one can rightly say “Teacher” except disciples. And see whether it was not for this reason, because not all who call him teacher say it rightly but only those who have the will to learn from him, that he said to his disciples: “You call me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am.” The disciples of Christ, then, rightly call him teacher, and those who serve his word rightly call him Lord. Hence the Apostle rightly said, “But for us there is one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him.” Consider also what he says: “It is enough for the disciple to become,” not simply like a teacher, but “like his teacher.” If anyone, then, does not learn from the Word and does not give himself with his whole soul to become his beloved planting, but says to him “Teacher,” he is a brother of the Pharisee who tested Christ and said to him “Teacher.” So also everyone who says, “Our Father who art in heaven,” ought not to have “the spirit of slavery in fear” but “the spirit of adoption as sons.” One who does not have the spirit of adoption as sons and says, “Our Father who art in heaven,” lies, calling God his Father when he is not a son of God.

The question itself is this: “Which is the great commandment in the law?” Here it is fitting that we set out something about the difference between the commandments. For some commandments are great, others come after them, and so in order one must inquire down to the least commandments. If he had not answered the Pharisee who tested him and said, “Which is the greater commandment in the law?”, we would consequently suppose that no commandment is greater than another. But now, since in answer he says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind; this is the great and first commandment,” we learn a necessary teaching about the commandments: that there are great ones and lesser ones, down to the least. Note further that the Pharisee asked, “Which is the great commandment in the law?”, but the Lord in answering teaches us that to love the Lord is not only the great commandment but also the first: first not in the order of Scripture but in the dignity of its excellence. And this must be noted as fitting this passage: that, as though many commandments had been laid down, he now called this the great and first commandment, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind,” and the second like the first, and great because of the likeness, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself,” so that we may understand accordingly that there is another which is third in greatness and in order, and another fourth; and so, counting the commandments of the law in order, one who receives wisdom from God may arrange them down to the least. This is the work of no one else but of Christ alone, who is “the power of God and the wisdom of God.” From the times of Moses until the Saviour's coming, then, when the law was read, perhaps it was asked which was the great commandment in it. For the Pharisee would not have asked this unless it had been inquired into among them and not found, until Jesus found it and taught not only which was great but also which was first, and which was second, like the first. It is his work, therefore, to find the third, the fourth, and the rest. You will ask whether there is any commandment that does not have both, that is, being both first and great, but only one of them. I think the Apostle says something of this kind to the Ephesians: “Honour your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise, that it may be well with you and you may live long on the earth.” So “Honour your father and mother” is first, but not also great; and if there is one that is great but not also first, you will inquire into the differences in greatness among the commandments. And since, when the commandments are compared, others are least, it is useful to bring forward as an example what the Lord himself says: “If anyone breaks one of these least commandments and teaches men so, he will be called least in the kingdom of God.” And the Saviour, having handed on which was the great and first commandment in answer to the testing Pharisee, and having added also the second, like the first, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself,” goes on to say: “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” But the Apostle says to the Romans: “You shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall not steal, and any other commandment there may be is summed up in this word: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” Let us see, then, whether it is one thing for all the law and the prophets to hang on these two commandments about the love of God and of neighbour, and another for every commandment to be summed up in this commandment, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself”; or whether all the commandments both hang on and are summed up in both commandments. Someone, then, says that commandments hang from commandments: from the first and great hangs the second, like the first; from the second, the third; and so in turn all those after the second hang from the ones before; and that the Apostle, considering the matter, said that every commandment hangs from the commandment “You shall love your neighbour as yourself,” while the Saviour taught that these two commandments rule over all the commandments. But another, examining it, will ask how it was said: “You shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall not steal, and any other commandment in the law is summed up in this word: You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” He will say, then: that commandment too, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind,” is summed up in the commandment “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” For how would it be true when he says, “and any other commandment there is, is summed up in this word,” unless the commandment laid down about the love of God is also summed up in the second, which is like the first? And if the first commandment is summed up in the second, the second must be greater than the first. Every commandment, then, and even that first and great one, is summed up in this second, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself”; because when we love ourselves, if we do anything, we also love God himself, who is the author of our love, so that we love one another and are loved by one another. For when we give thanks that we are rational, and have been called to the knowledge of God, and obtain his benefits and grace, we sum up the love of God in the second commandment, which is like the first. The great and first commandment in the law, then, is this: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” But one who takes away anything from that whole commandment, that is, either from “with all the heart,” or from “with all the soul,” or from “with all the mind,” takes away from its greatness and its primacy. And perhaps all who love God and their Lord keep the commandment only in part unless they fulfil the parts that follow and love with all the heart, all the soul, and all the mind; and only those receive its greatness and primacy into themselves who not only love the Lord their God but have also taken on those three things: that with all their heart they store the whole of it up within themselves, both its works and its thoughts; and with all their soul, that is, that they are ready to lay the soul down for devotion to God, who created all things, when the need of the Word requires, since one who loves God with all his soul lets no part of the soul be torn away to anything foreign to the faith; and in all our mind, thinking or uttering nothing but the things of God. And see whether you can take “heart” for the understanding, which contemplates intelligible things and shows their source and principle, which is God, and “mind” for bringing things forth in speech. For with the mind we bring forth particular things, and through each thing signified we walk about, as it were, in our mind, and bring it forth. And if someone understands acutely the commandment about love laid down in all three of the things named, and considers the love of God in each of the faithful, he will perhaps find the whole commandment in one, perhaps in a second, or a third, and that if it has been given in all of them; or he will find the love of God falling short, by little or by more, either in respect of “with all the heart,” or “with all the soul,” or “with all the mind.”

The second commandment is like the first, since it is love of man, who was made according to the image of God, and perhaps also according to his likeness. In expounding the commandment laid down about love of neighbour, these things too must be learned. According to what is said in the tenth psalm, “He who loves iniquity hates his own soul,” and according to what is said in Proverbs, “He who rejects discipline hates himself,” it is clear that no one who loves iniquity loves his neighbour as himself, since he does not even love himself; and no one who rejects discipline loves his neighbour as himself, since he does not love even himself. And so it comes about that one who loves iniquity, and hates his own soul, cannot keep the second commandment. Likewise one who rejects discipline loves sin; and so one who rejects any word of God's discipline hates his own soul.

After this you will ask how all the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments. For the text seems to show that everything written, whether in Exodus, or in Leviticus, or in Numbers, or in Deuteronomy, hangs on these two commandments. But how do the law laid down about lepers, or about those suffering a flow of blood, or about menstruating women, hang on these commandments? And further, how do the prophecy given about the capture of Jerusalem, or the vision of Egypt in Isaiah and the other prophets, and the vision of Tyre, or whatever is prophesied about Tyre or about the prince of Tyre, and the vision of the four-footed beasts in the desert in Isaiah, hang on these two commandments? What seems right to me on this point is as follows. One who has fulfilled everything written about the love of God and of neighbour is worthy to receive the greatest gifts from God, at the head of which is wisdom: the word through the Spirit, and through him the word of knowledge which is according to the Spirit. Having been made worthy of all these gifts, he exults in the wisdom of God, having a heart full of the love of God, his whole soul enlightened with the light of knowledge, and his whole mind with the word of God. Having obtained such gifts from God, he surely understands that all the law and the prophets are some part of the whole wisdom and knowledge of God, and he understands that all the law and the prophets hang on and cling to the principle of love for the Lord God and for one's neighbour, and that the perfection of godliness consists in love.

What we have said is indeed sufficient; yet to show its greatness it is fitting to add these words too: “Love is patient, love is kind. Love is not puffed up, does not act wrongly, is not ambitious, is not provoked, does not think evil, does not rejoice over iniquity but rejoices with the truth; it bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things; love never fails.” For no one who is faint-hearted has love, nor one who does anything contrary to kindness, nor one who is jealous with the jealousy that the patriarchs had against Joseph, or Aaron and Miriam against Moses. No one who is puffed up has love, nor one who does anything wrongly, nor one who is roused to anger. Again, no one who thinks evil, defiled in heart, has love. One who has love never rejoices over anything unjust but always rejoices with the truth. One who has love bears all the evils that befall him; he believes, not in part, but all things; he hopes, not in part, but all things; and there is nothing that love does not bear, but it bears all things. And since love never fails, the Apostle, confident that he had taken it up whole, said: “Who will separate us from the love of God? Will tribulation, or distress, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or the sword? As it is written: For your sake we are put to death all the day long; we are regarded as sheep for the slaughter.” For it was because of love that he said, “But in all these things we prevail because of him who loved us.” From the love that never fails came those words of his: “For I am confident that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any creature will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” And since the Apostle had the two commandments of love, of God and of neighbour, he therefore had within himself the mysteries of the whole Law and the Prophets made plain, so that, understanding them, he could say that all the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.

“Now when the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying: What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he? They said to him: David's. Jesus said to them: How then does David in the Spirit call him Lord, saying: The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet? If then David calls him Lord, how is he his son? And no one could answer him a word, nor did anyone dare from that hour to ask him anything.”

The words themselves are found in the hundred and ninth psalm: “The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet.” Since the Pharisees acknowledged, as it were, that the one who spoke is the Lord God, and the one to whom he spoke a second Lord, the Christ, the Saviour asks them, saying: “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?” And to the answer of those who said “David's,” he adds: “If David calls him Lord, how is he his son?” It is worth seeing what the Saviour intended in putting to the Pharisees a question about the Christ, so that they might answer what they thought, and what was the reason they could not give him an answer. A simpler one among those examining it will say that the Saviour's intention was this: to check the boldness of the Pharisees, who put many questions to him, and likewise of the Sadducees, who had put to him the question about the seven brothers and their one wife. Since, then, the Pharisees and Sadducees, by putting many questions, seemed to be saying something, and in doing so did not desire to learn as disciples but were testing Christ, and in this way seemed to be teachers of the law when they were not, it was necessary for the Lord too to put a question to them, since they professed to have knowledge of the law, so as to convict them before the people when they gave no answer to what was asked, while he himself answered everything: because he was fit, as befits the profession of teachers, to make plain and hand on divine teaching, while they did not know even the Prophet himself, who was the summit of the prophets. One who is pleased with this explanation adds further: That is why the Scripture of the Gospel adds this too, saying, “And no one could answer him a word, nor did anyone dare from that hour to ask him a word.” The reason they did not dare afterwards to ask him a word was this: being questioned, they could not answer him. For if their questioning had come from a will to learn, he would never have put such questions to them that afterwards they would not dare to ask. But since they asked in order to test him, he wished to stop their mouths with his own question, so that they would be ashamed and cease from their boldness and ask him nothing afterwards. This much we have said according to the understanding of a simple interpreter.

But we say that our Saviour and Lord knew himself to have been made from the seed of David according to the flesh, but “predestined Son of God in power”; and that he was all those things which he said in teaching about himself: “I am the way, the truth, and the life”; “I am the door”; “I am the resurrection”; “I am the living bread which came down from heaven”; and knowing that he existed before the birth even of Abraham himself, for which reason he said, “Before Abraham was, I am”; and knowing that he was Wisdom and the living Word: Wisdom, which God created as the beginning of his ways for his works, and the Word, which was in the beginning with God, God the Word; knowing all this of himself, and seeing that the Pharisees knew from the divine Scriptures what belonged to the human dispensation and was for men's sake, so that they could grasp it, namely that he was from the seed of David according to the flesh, and perhaps even supposed that he was altogether David's son; but seeing that they were far from understanding his divinity, according to which he was the beginning of the universe, being of no one but of God who is over all; wishing to expose their wavering opinion of him and to challenge them by his words, so that they might be willing to ascend to the Word and see him according as he was God the Word, who was in the beginning with God, he said first: “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?” When they answered thus and said, “David's,” he answered them again, making plain the height of his divinity, which was shown at the very beginning of the psalm, saying: “The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet”; so that, even if they could not answer him then, they might still take occasion from his words to consider the whole psalm and think something greater about the Christ, who surpassed not only human nature but also the other things that came into being, according to what it says: “In the splendours of the holy ones, from the womb before the morning star I begot you.” For he did not specify “in the splendours” of some particular holy ones, but spoke generally of all the holy ones, that is, not only of men but also of angels, saying: “In the splendours of the holy ones, from the womb before the morning star I begot you.” And if they had considered wisely that other verse too, “The Lord has sworn and will not repent: you are a priest for ever according to the order of Melchizedek,” they would surely have submitted themselves as disciples to our Saviour, who had been sent by God as teacher and priest. But the reason the Pharisees could not answer the words of Christ was this: they perceived nothing great about the Christ set down in the holy Scriptures, but only about his human dispensation, and not even that in a manner worthy of a divine dispensation. For I think they did not know even the saying, “Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb, and his name shall be called Emmanuel,” nor this, “Behold, a star shall rise out of Jacob,” about the birth of Christ.

This very saying in the psalm, “The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet,” someone will expound more fittingly when he has undertaken to expound the psalm itself. For now, however, let us lightly taste its sense. Do not picture to yourself sessions perceptible to the senses, and two thrones, and the Father and the Son sitting on them in human form; but understand that these things are said figuratively of the kingdom of God and of the kingdom of the Son, which is established by the Father and is always at the Father's right hand. But if someone does not want these things understood figuratively, let him explain how this too is true where it says, “The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand,” and what he says elsewhere: “But to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to give you, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” One who will not understand these things worthily, according to the greatness of the mind of Christ, must then be forced to say that at one time he sits at the Father's right hand, and at another, leaving this dignity of sitting at the Father's right hand, he sits privately with those for whom the Father has prepared that they should sit at his right hand or his left. Again, he must be forced to say that while sitting at the Father's right hand he still has enemies; for he sits beside him only until they are made by the Father the footstool of Christ's feet. But when he ceases to sit at the Father's right hand, then he will no longer have enemies, when those who were formerly the footstool of his feet begin to sit at his right hand or his left according to the Father's ordering. And so it would come about that some of those seated sit in the Father's former place. What could be more ridiculous than this? Further, if you wish to understand a bodily sitting, you will find in the same psalm both that the Son sits at the Father's right hand, according to what it says, “The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand,” and that the Father sits at the Son's right hand, according to what is declared in what follows, where it says: “The Lord at your right hand will shatter kings in the day of his wrath.” But we say that there is no need to bring a bodily consideration into things that are to be understood spiritually. For, figuratively, the Son is at the Father's right hand and the Father is always at the Son's right hand.