Matthew 22: The Two Commandments Hanging on the Cross

Introduction

"There are questions we ask in order to understand, but there are also questions we ask to bring out contradictions." This is how Italo Benedetti, pastor of Chiesa Battista Napoli (via Foria), opens his sermon on Matthew 22:34-46.

The passage begins with a question from an expert in the law, asked to test Jesus: which is the great commandment? It ends with a question from Jesus to the Pharisees: "What do you think of the Christ? Whose son is he?" The roles are reversed, and in the end no one can answer him a word. Between the first question and the last, says the pastor, "there is the whole Gospel."

You probably know the two great commandments. This message asks a different question: are you able to live them? And if you are not, who lived them for you?

Message Outline

1. A Debate Within Israel

The scene takes place in Jerusalem, in the last days of Jesus' life.
Yet Matthew wrote his Gospel after the Romans destroyed the temple in AD 70, about forty years after the events. He was writing to a Christian community made up largely of believers of Jewish origin, in open conflict with the synagogue. This explains some of the harsher language.
Mark, who wrote before Matthew, tells the same scene and presents this scribe as a sincere man, to whom Jesus says: "You are not far from the Kingdom of God."
For the pastor, then, this is not "Christians against Jews." It is an open discussion within Israel, "between people who all love the same Scripture."

2. Two Commandments, Like the Two Hinges of a Door

Jesus answers with the words of the Shema, the prayer that every believing Jew still recites morning and evening today: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind."
He adds a sentence from Leviticus, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself," and places it on the same level: one is the first, the other the second.
Other teachers of Israel taught very similar things. Jesus "invents nothing": he speaks as a faithful Jew.
Yet he adds: "The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments," that is, the Torah and the rest of the Old Testament. The whole Bible rests on these two commandments.
Translated literally, the verb "depend" means "to hang." Just as a door hangs on its two hinges so that it can open: if the hinges fall, the door no longer opens. "If you take away these two commandments, you take away the whole law."

3. God Frees First, Then He Commands

The pastor points out something we often forget: in the law, the commandments are never given alone.
The Shema begins with "Hear, Israel." The Ten Commandments begin with "I am Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt."
In Leviticus, love of neighbor is also applied to the foreigner: "you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt." You were slaves, and you are slaves no longer.
God does not give commandments by saying: "Now you are on your own." Israel's law is not a burden placed on the shoulders of slaves. It is a word given to a people who have already been set free, so that they may go on being free.
"I set you free, and then I give you the commandments, so that you can keep on being free."

4. "Whose Son Is He?"

Jesus in turn asks the Pharisees a question. The answer is easy, and they know it: the Christ is the son of David.
Jesus then creates a problem by quoting Psalm 110, where David speaks and calls the Messiah "my Lord": "The Lord said to my Lord, 'Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.'" How can the Messiah be both his son and his Lord?
Jesus does not deny being the son of David. Matthew calls him that from the very first line of his Gospel.
But Jesus says he is more than that: he is the Lord seated at the right hand of God.

5. The Problem Is Not the Commandment, It Is Us

Why does Matthew place these two seemingly different scenes side by side? Because the problem is never knowing the commandments.
The Pharisees and the teachers of the law knew them very well. So do we: we know what they are and that they are good.
"No one loves God with all their heart. That is the problem." No one loves their neighbor as themselves. A reasonably honest examination of conscience is enough to see it. We know we should do it, but we do not, or not all the way, or not every time.
So if we live with this inability to truly love God and our neighbor, how can we be saved?
The decisive question is no longer "what must I do to be saved?" The one Jesus suggests is: who is the Christ, who is Jesus? "You have to answer that question."

6. The Two Commandments Hanging on the Cross

A few chapters later, Matthew shows that Jesus does reach the right hand of God, but only after first passing through the narrow gate of the cross: being rejected, persecuted, and finally put to death.
"What is the cross, if not Jesus loving God with all his heart, to the very end, and doing his will?" He said it in his prayer: "not what I desire, but what you desire."
And what is the cross, if not Jesus loving his neighbor more than himself? The disciples who will leave him alone, Peter who denies him, Pilate who washes his hands of him, the Sanhedrin that hounds him, the soldiers who crucify him: he loves them to the end, even to the point of giving his life.
"The two great commandments on which the law hangs are in fact both hanging on the cross of Jesus." They stand because of it. "That is the good news, that is the Gospel."
Just as God freed Israel before giving it a law, in Christ God loved us first, before we were able to love him.
The great commandment is not first of all a task to accomplish alone with our own abilities. It is "a love that comes before you, that anticipates you, that stands behind you" and that, from there, holds you up and pushes you toward faithfulness.

7. Love God, Love Your Neighbor, and Never Separate the Two

Love God as someone already loved by God, not to win his love. Love him also "with all your mind," because "faith does not ask you to switch off your brain": study, read Scripture, ask yourself the real questions, listen to what God truly wants to tell you.
Love your neighbor as yourself, that is, not against yourself. Someone who despises themselves and does not know how to love themselves will struggle to truly love their neighbor.
Your neighbor is not an idea or a concept. Your neighbor is a flesh-and-blood person, to be loved as they are: the one who sits next to you on Sunday, the one who lives with you at home, and even the one who has hurt you. The foreigner who lives near you too: remember that you were once a foreigner yourself. Love them as someone God loves.
Never separate these two loves: they are two sides of the same coin. Love for God that does not see the brother or sister becomes empty devotion. Love for neighbor with no roots in God becomes fragile, grows tired, and eventually dies out, "because our loves are born and then end, but God's love does not."
"From that day forth, no one dared ask him any more questions." That day becomes a day of silence, which echoes the Shema: "Hear, Israel." Before God, you do not have the last word. So above all, listen, and after listening, love. "Do not be content with talking; it is of no use."

Key Takeaways

The whole law and the prophets hang on two commandments, like a door on its two hinges: love God and love your neighbor.
In the Bible, God frees first and gives his commandments afterward, so that his people remain free.
The problem is not knowing the commandments but living them: no one loves God and their neighbor as they should.
The real question is not "what must I do?" but "who is Jesus?" On the cross, he fulfilled for us the love of God and the love of neighbor.
We love God and our neighbor as people who are already loved, never separating these two loves.

Personal Application

Do you live the commandments as a burden to carry alone, or as the word of a God who has already set you free?
If someone asked you today, "What do you think of the Christ?", what would you answer?
How are you loving God "with all your mind" right now: are you taking time to study Scripture and ask yourself the real questions?
Who, concretely, is your flesh-and-blood neighbor this week: at church, at home, or someone who has hurt you?
In your life, have the love of God and the love of neighbor come apart? Which of the two has grown tired?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

What does "the whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments" mean?

Italo Benedetti explains that the verb literally means "are hung." The whole law and the prophets rest on these two commandments the way a door rests on its two hinges: if the hinges fall, the door no longer opens. To take away these two commandments is to take away the whole law.

Why does Jesus ask whose son the Christ is?

The Pharisees know the answer: the Christ is the son of David. Jesus then quotes Psalm 110, where David calls the Messiah "my Lord." Jesus does not deny being the son of David, but he shows that he is more than that: he is the Lord seated at the right hand of God.

Why does Matthew place these two scenes side by side?

Because the problem is never knowing the commandments. No one loves God with all their heart or their neighbor as themselves. So the decisive question is not "what must I do to be saved?" but "who is Jesus?" On the cross, Jesus fulfilled both commandments for us.