Jesus was once asked what the most important law was in the Bible. His answer? “Love God with all your heart, soul, and mind and strength”; and “love your neighbor as much as you love yourself”. Then He said something amazing: “The whole of the Law and the Prophets is summed up in these two Commandments” (Matthew 22:36-40, Weymouth).
He didn’t say, as most people assume, that the law and the prophets – the whole of the Old Testament – was replaced by these commandments; but rather, that they were summed up by these two commandments!That within these two principles you could find ALL the commandments, statutes, and judgments in the Old Testament IN SPIRIT!
Another time, Jesus said something similar:
Matthew 7:12 Therefore whatever you desire for men to do to you, you shall also do to them; for this is the law and the prophets.
So the law and the prophets of the Old Testament – and all the examples, teachings, and rules within them – are the same as this saying:
Do to others what you would want them to do to you!
But remember before, Jesus said the Old Testament was summed up into two rules; love your neighbor, and love God. Here, Jesus summed the sum and gave a single principle within which EVEN THOSE rules were contained!
Thus, the highest law of God, old covenant or new, is to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. That law contains within it two great sub-laws;
- Do unto God as you would want done unto you (if you were the Creator of all); which is to say, love Him with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength;
- Do unto men as you would want them do unto you; which is to say, as you love yourself and care about your own good, love them equally and care about them as much as you care about yourself!
But these guiding principles are summaries, quick reference points, of the foundation of Biblical ethics and law. The whole POINT of summaries is that within them lie hundreds if not thousands of sub-principles which can be extracted from studying and meditating on these principles!
Which is why Jesus went on to put these principles under a microscope and expand these two great laws into their own sub-laws!
Romans 13:8 Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbour has fulfilled the law.
How can you fulfill the law merely by loving someone? By loving them as you love yourself!
Romans 13:9 For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not give false testimony,” “You shall not covet,” and whatever other commandments there are, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”
So here Paul lists commandments 7, 6, 8, 9, 10 and then concludes that all these and any other commandments are all summed up in Jesus’ words that you love your fellow man, as you would want him to love you!
In Matthew 19:16-19, Jesus gave a very similar list, only He included #5 and left out #10, but with the same conclusion; that anything that wasn’t mentioned here was covered under “And, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’”
Treat him as you would want to be treated; do you like to be stolen from? Lied to? Cheated on? Then don’t do that to any other person.
Romans 13:10 Love doesn’t harm a neighbour. Love therefore is the fulfilment of the law.
No matter what ethical question you may have, whether covered in the Bible or not, to find the right thing to do you have only to ask “would I want this done to me”? Your answer will be a good thing to do because it is what you want done to yourself, and you love you!
People today like to think of love as a vague feeling of goodness and benevolence, but this means there are concrete acts of love towards your fellow man, and therefore the breaking of these laws are acts of nonlove, or hate.
Said differently, you cannot love your neighbor as much as you love you, and steal from him to feed you. You cannot love your neighbor as much as you love yourself and sleep with his wife. A feeling of “love” does not trump an act of hate – which is any action you, yourself, would hate being done to you!
THE 1-2-10 LAW
When asked about the greatest commandment, Jesus answered that it was to “Love God”; but then proceeded to break that commandment down into four sub-commandments! (Mark 12:28-31). We were not merely told to love God, but to love God in FOUR different ways!
So the highest principle of all, the golden rule, says simply “do unto others”; but that law contains both “do unto God” and “do unto Men” within it. And now Jesus is adding another layer, a whole new subgroup of laws!
Thus, “do unto God” contains “do unto God with your heart”, “do unto God with your mind”, “do unto God with your soul” and “do unto God with your strength”! Four great principles that within them contain every way you can love, or hate, God!
Just as “do unto men”, contained “do unto your parents”, “do unto your enemy”, “do unto your wife”, and so on… the last six of the ten commandments! Six broad principles that cover all the ways you can do good or evil unto men!
Now if you’re counting along that makes ten great commandments – the last six are explicitly connected to the ones given at Sinai (albeit not cited in order in the NT), so it stands to reason that the first four would correspond to the first four commandments as well!
If you read the original Ten Commandments in Exodus 20:1-17, you’ll notice that they easily form two groups – #1-#4 are strictly about the way you treat God, and things God made holy. But #5-#10 are about how we treat our fellow man.
Likewise, if you look closely you’ll realize that from the very beginning there was a physical division of the Ten Commandments, which were placed on TWO separate tablets! (Exodus 31:18), one for each of the great principles; one to teach you how to love God, the other to teach you how to love man!
In this way all the laws in the Bible are summed up in do unto others – one law. Again, Jesus’ words not mine. That first law divides into two laws, which together sum up all laws in the Bible. Those laws, in turn, divide into 4 and 6 laws, which between them sum up all other laws in the Bible – every way you can show love or hate in the universe is contained within those principles.
BEYOND THE TEN
The ten, themselves, contain all other laws, advice, and examples in the Bible. For example, kidnapping is a crime; the Bible calls it “stealing a man” (Exodus 21:16), and thus kidnapping is a sub-law of “thou shalt not steal”, or “take care of your neighbor’s goods as you would take care of your own”.
If you have a vicious dog which kills someone, that’s considered manslaughter (Exodus 21:28-29). Thus, even though you yourself didn’t kill them, someone was killed by something you should have controlled better. Thus this is a sub-law of “thou shalt not kill”, or “love your neighbor’s life as you love your own”.
Plowing with an ox and a donkey yoked together was forbidden (Deuteronomy 22:10). Where did that law come from? Well, first the easy way; if you were a donkey, would you want to be yoked to a much more powerful animal you constantly struggled to keep up with? Then consider yourself #goldenruled.
God also forbade Israel from intermarrying with Canaanites (Deuteronomy 7:1-3). Because He knew they would teach Israel to worship other Gods! (Exodus 34:14-16). Which means this law was simply a sub-commandment of “Thou shalt have no other gods before me”!
Now Paul, in the NT, builds on this same principle to say that Christians shouldn’t marry unbelievers, for the same reason. That they, children of the light, should not be yoked together with children of darkness! (2 Corinthians 6:14-17).
Notice that word Paul used, yoked together… for it allows us to unite these laws with the laws about donkeys and oxen being yoked together! For God considered Israel “clean”, like oxen, and the Canaanites and unbelievers in the world “unclean”… like donkeys! (Deuteronomy 14:4-7).
Cows and donkeys have different strengths and different desires, and do not pull well together! And if one pulls stronger than the other, they will inevitably be pulled aside off the straight and narrow way that leads to life! (Matthew 7:14).
For this reason God made a law that they should not be unequally yoked, not just because He was thinking of the oxen, but “altogether for OUR sakes”! (1 Corinthians 9:9-10). So all of these laws are in fact ONE law, the same principle applied to different specific situations!
All of these apparently dissimilar laws were clearly derived from “thou shalt have no other gods before me”, itself derived from “do unto God” and ultimately from do unto all beings as you would have them do unto you!
What if we could do this with EVERY law, every example, and every word in the Bible? And what if, when we found the idea behind every commandment, we found a simple principle that could be summed up in a single phrase? What phrase would that be? We already know:
Galatians 5:14 (NLT) For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
YOU CAN’T BREAK JUST ONE
James 2:8, 10 However, if you fulfil the royal law, according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself,” you do well … For whoever keeps the whole law, and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.
Now that we understand how the laws were arranged, this makes sense. There is really only ONE law; the “royal law”, or “king of laws”. Do unto others what you want them to do unto you; we have that from Jesus’ own lips!
All of these other sub-laws are extracted from that great law, so if you lie to your neighbor, even if you don’t steal from him… you have broken the whole law, the ONLY law! For you failed to love him as yourself!
Or suppose you honored God with your strength – that your work went to honor God – but you did not honor God in your heart and served other gods. Whether you failed to love God with your strength or with your heart, either way you failed to love God and broke the greater commandment!
Because both of these laws are simply an outgrowth of THE law, the King of Laws – you did to someone else something you wouldn’t want done to you. No matter how great or how small, you have broken the one law that gives all others their meaning!
The law is a single idea that you should do to all creatures as you would want them to do to you. Think of it like a tree; whether you break a branch, or merely break off a leaf, you have harmed the tree! One way certainly hurts more than the other, but either way you have harmed it.
And whether you steal a penny from your neighbor or kill him, you have failed to love him as you love yourself!
RIGHTLY DIVIDING
Since all existing laws can be merged into the 1-2-10, then every conceivable sin should be able to be derivedfrom that same law by “rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15). Because the division doesn’t stop at 1-2-10.
Each of the ten laws contains infinite sub laws, which can be adapted to any situation imaginable. For example, there is no commandment that says “thou shalt not use pirated software, music, and videos”.
Yet that is obviously covered under thou shalt not steal – and if that wasn’t clear enough, simply take a step back, look at the greatest law, and ask yourself “would I want my music or videos appreciated without any compensation?”
It is impossible to write down every conceivable sin – literally impossible! So God gave us principles, guidelines, which we can divide and apply to any conceivable situation as it happens! Every way you can imagine harming your neighbor is forbidden by the principle behind one of the great 10 laws!
We could make a million, a trillion specific laws, and never plug all the loopholes. That is precisely what the Pharisees had tried to do. Yet with one simple statement “do unto others, as you would want them to do unto you”, all loopholes are plugged instantly!
We don’t need God to give us a law saying “thou shalt not torrent music”. Indeed, can’t you just imagine Moses’ confusion if God had given him such a law!
No, we simply need to divide “do unto others”, into “love thy neighbor”, and then into “thou shalt not steal”, and then into “the laborer is worthy of his hire” (1 Timothy 5:18).
Then we can easily see that those who labored for your music are not receiving their hire – and thus a new law is born exactly when it is needed, tailored to the exact situation in which you find yourself!
A SIMPLE LAW
This is simple stuff! Stuff ANYONE can easily understand! Even animals! How does your dog react when another dog eats out of its food dish? How does a cat feel when another cat comes sniffing around its mate? How does your child feel if you break your promise?
So you see, EVERYTHING understands the law of God! The entire Bible is ALREADY contained in the hearts of every creature ever born! It’s why Moses, then Paul, said “the word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (Deuteronomy 30:11-14, Romans 10:6-8).
Remember: do you like to be stolen from? Lied to? Murdered? Do you like it when your children disobey you? Then the law is not hidden or far off from you! And these are the words Jesus told us lead to eternal life! (Matthew 19:16-20).
… But there is one major problem. The same child that is furious when you lie to it, will glibly lie to you! The same dog that hates it when another animal steals its food will eat from his neighbor’s dish at the first opportunity!
They, like you, fully understand the law of God BUT ONLY AS IT APPLIES TO OTHER CREATURES! No creature likes to be stolen from, but ALL will steal from others! All creatures will kill others, even as they themselves struggle desperately to stay alive!
All covet, all deceive, all commit adultery, and all are disobedient to parents! Yet ALL are angry if another creature does the same thing to them! They ALL want other creatures to obey the laws of God, but refuse to be bound by them themselves!
And if even a DOG understands the law of God, how obvious should it be to us! How easy is it for US to know the right thing to do! We KNOW people should not steal from us! So God commands us to rule ourselves by the same rule that we would place on others!
“On these words rest all the Law and the Prophets”!
SUMMARY
Jesus came to nail the law to the cross, as every Christian rejoices to know. And yet… how can a Christian rejoice that love has been abolished? How can anyone want God to abolish the principles that define good and evil?
There probably isn’t a Christian in the world who doesn’t believe in the Golden Rule. Yet most reject the Old Testament; if not in principle, at least in practice. But you cannot reject one without rejecting the other, for every law is derived from the Golden Rule! We have that from Jesus’ own lips!
Where can you draw the line between a good law, and a bad law? Can you honestly argue that “don’t plow with oxen and donkeys together” is a meaningless, ritualistic law, but “don’t marry a non-Christian” is a good idea? They’re literally the same principle!
Since all of these laws, on the authority of Jesus Christ Himself, come from the same great axiom “do unto others”, which are good and which are bad? Where can you separate “love your enemies” from “if you see your enemy’s ox is lost, you must take him home”? (paraphrased from Exodus 23:4).
All these things are part of the same law; where can you separate one from another? To abolish a single one of those principles is to abolish them all, for they are ALL based upon “love God and your neighbor as yourself”.
Do you really want to abolish “love your neighbor”? What sort of a Christian wants to abolish love? And now you can understand what Paul meant when he told Gentiles “…the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good” (Romans 7:12).
You have seen a glimpse of the Truth that the law is not a jumbled mess of arbitrary laws from a capricious God. Instead, you’ve seen that all laws are harmonious pieces of a beautiful, perfect, holy principle that requires all men to treat others as they treat themselves.
And yet… Jesus came to nail something to the cross that was against us. Something was abolished in the New Covenant, and if it wasn’t do unto others, love your neighbors, treat all beings as you would want to be treated, and all the laws that derive from these Royal Laws…
Then what? The answer will stun you!