When explaining what it meant to be faithful, Jesus said, “Love God with everything you have and love your neighbor as yourself.”
“Who is my neighbor?” Jesus answers by telling the story of the so-called “Good Samaritan.” There is a man on the road to Jericho who is robbed, beaten, left for dead. A priest sees the man, crosses the street, and leaves him there. A Levite — a man who works in the temple — also sees the man, crosses the street, and leaves him there. It’s a Samaritan — a mixed-race person from Samaria, between Judea and Galilee, a person with Jewish and Pagan ancestry who doesn’t believe in the whole Jewish Bible and worships differently from the Jews — who stops.
He sees the man, picks him up, takes him to a hostel, pays the bill, asks the folks to care for him, and then drops back by to make sure there is no more money due.
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Who is the neighbor? Jesus says it is the one who did this radical act of love and justice. The one hated by the Jews; the one considered despicable — he was the one who did the love thing. Jesus — the outsider — made an example of the outsider. This is what matters most. Love God, love neighbor, love self.
The question of what it means to follow God’s law comes in a time of conflict and testing. The conflict is in the context of the so-called Pax Romana — the Roman Peace. It’s empire occupying Palestine and Judea. It’s stress and tension about belonging and identity and place. It’s tension about religiosity and theology and ethics. What does it mean for us to be Jewish in this context?
Remember that Jesus is not a Christian, so this is an intra-faith question. This itinerant rabbi in an argument with the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Scribes — Jewish religious authorities who are questioning the authority of Jesus to interpret the law, to break the law: healing on the Sabbath, talking to women, centering children, claiming ultimately to be the Son of God. They are threatened by these new teachings. These religious leaders are living in a tense time, and Jesus ups the tension with his theology. He ups the tension with his teachings, his behavior.
He ups the tension by focusing not on religiosity, rules, and rituals but on love. Jesus is not making new rules; he is OG, taking them back to the Shema — God is one, Love God with everything (Deut. 6.5-6), and to Leviticus — Love your neighbor as yourself (Lev. 19.18) More important than anything else — rituals, sacrifice, burnt offerings. More important than rules and regulations that you think matter. This is what matters. Love is what matters.
Let me remind us that Jesus wasn’t a Christian, family, he was a Jew. And confronted with his reminder to love, his Jewish folk — religious experts if you will — were resisting, testing that. Love your neighbor? Which neighbor? Love them for real? And with what kind of love?
We who are Christian are confronted with this question now. Who is our neighbor and what does it mean to love them? Some parts of our Christian family — the so-called white Christian Nationalists — are asking these questions, too. Who is our neighbor? Just the Christians? Just the Americans? Just the white people? Just the rich white people? Just the straight people? Just the ones who share our politics? And what does it mean to love?
How much hatred can we do, and still say we love? Which people can we violate and demean; from whom can we withhold justice and still say we are Christian?
We who are Christian, just like those religious leaders, are looking for loopholes. We can say we are Christian and hate immigrants. We can say we are Christian and hate women, hate non-English speakers, hate Queer and Trans-people. If we disagree on issues like guns, or abortion, or the environment, we can hate the people with whom we disagree with such a violent hatred, in the name of being Christian. In the name of Jesus, lynchings, cross burnings, withholding resources, trashing Puerto Rico and “s-hole nations.” In the name of Christian threats of violence to our so-called enemies. In the name of Christian, lies — so many lies. It is shocking, right?
We who are Christian who follow a Palestinian Jew are called to love. Love that is not tepid. Love that is not cheap talk. Love that smells violence and bigotry and speaks the truth about it, that demands the demolition of oppressive systems. We can’t in the name of Christianity stand by while hatred hijacks Jesus, while empire corrupts Christianity. We are not powerless; in fact, we have the Holy Spirit Power to take back Christianity, to reclaim and reframe the religion of Jesus as Fierce Love. Period.
Dr. King said, “Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”
Don’t you want some of this Fierce Love? I do!
Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis is senior minister and public theologian at Middle Church in New York. She champions racial, economic, and gender/sexuality justice and is the author of several books, including “Fierce Love” and the “Just Love Story Bible.” Her work has been featured on NBC, CBS, PBS, MSNBC, and NPR and in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Ebony and Essence magazines.
Jesus was not Palestinian. He was from judea