But who is my neighbor, really?

All Christians agree we are to love our neighbors.

The command is written in Old Testament law, and Jesus made it the second most important commandment. Only love of God is a more important command. When Jesus had his confrontation with a lawyer about the laws of God, there is no hint in the passage about a conflict of opinion about the command to love neighbor. The conflict of opinion was about the definition of neighbor.

The roots of the command to love neighbor goes back to the Israelites during their years of wilderness wanderings after fleeing the hardships of slavery in Egypt. The Israelite population grew, but not by birthrate. Their numbers grew through absorbing. Any tribe that would join in the Israelite covenant to love and serve their God Yahweh became a part of the Israelite clan. Alien tribes that embraced Yahweh were no longer enemies to be conquered by the sword. They were neighbors, who were to be respected and loved. The earliest form of the love your neighbor command is believed to be “love your neighbor as a member of your own clan.”

David was Israel’s greatest king. He was a mighty warrior who did not hesitate to massively kill members of surrounding tribes who would not submit to Yahweh. They were not considered neighbors, and King David had no hesitancy to wipe them out. He could kill people by the thousands and return home praising his loving and compassionate God.

With this understanding of who is your neighbor and who is not, the perfect seedbed for endless war is created. The only peace that was ever experienced by Israel was a peace of a certain kind enforced by a powerful king and military might.

This particular understanding of who is my neighbor was not effectively challenged among Israelites until the early sixth century BCE. The Jerusalem Temple built by King Solomon had been destroyed and the last trace of Israel as a landed nation was gone. A remnant of the people had been carried off to Babylon as slaves. The Israelite remnant lived in a ghetto of Babylon. They had two choices — assimilation into the Babylonian population or completely rethink the meaning of being a chosen people of Yahweh.

It is believed that many chose the path of assimilation, but a remnant of the remnant chose the more difficult path. The slaves in their loyalty to Yahweh completely revised the Israelite tradition.

The evidence of the impact of this small remnant is scattered in the Old Testament, but is crystallized in chapters 40-55 of Isaiah, known also as II Isaiah. Most — or all — of the material was written by an unknown poet who attached his material to the prophet who lived about 200 years earlier. The tone of II Isaiah is shown in chapter 47 when the author writes, “Thus says Yahweh … remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing.”

In the passage, the author declares two changes. First, he changes the interest of Yahweh from the narrow interests of Israel to concern for the entire world. In II Isaiah, Yahweh takes a long step into universalism. Second, II Isaiah changes the role that Yahweh expects Israel to play as his chosen people. In the reimaging of Yahweh’s people, Israel is called upon to forsake the role of conquering ruler and take on the role of a servant/healer of the nations.

The II Isaiah material produced a competing tradition that challenged the King David/King Solomon tradition of military might and the pursuit of wealth and privilege. The argument between the two perspectives continues to this day in both Christianity and Judaism. Are the people of God called to be rulers of all with a very limited definition of neighbors to be loved, or are the people of God called to be servants of all with a definition of neighbor that includes the whole human race?

The heart of the argument about the role of God’s people is found in the definition of neighbor. From the beginning of the teaching ministry of Jesus, Jesus embraced the essence of II Isaiah. One of the aphorisms that Jesus left for us to ponder is found in Mark 9:35: “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all, and servant of all.”

It came straight out of the universalism of II Isaiah. Jesus was an itinerant teacher who moved around the small communities of Galilee in Northern Palestine. Words such as “servant of all” were no doubt repeated hundreds of times. The Jesus message was very plain. His definition of neighbor knew no boundaries. His neighbors included outcasts, foreigners, lepers and even enemies.

It is all too easy for us all to look first to our own interests and security and put limits on our understanding of neighbor. The lawyer who engaged Jesus asked, “and who is my neighbor?” He asked the right question, but did not like the answer Jesus gave him. I suspect few Christians like the answer either.

The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister who lives in Palmer. His email address is hdbss@mtaonline.net.

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