Love Is At the Center
I started this study genuinely curious to see how Jesus used his familiarity with his Scriptures, what authors/books he quoted, when he quoted them, and what the contexts of the quotations revealed about his passions in his ministry. I leaned entirely on the NASB’s cross references in the gospel of Mark, and I used present-day Jewish commentators on the quoted scriptures to get at least a flavor of what Jesus’s community might have understood them to mean. It has been so much fun to do this work.
Jesus quoted from the Law (the first five “books of Moses”) on nine occasions. What he emphasized from the Law were the following themes:
God is present to us at all times
What we do with our own and with others’ bodies matters to God and has profound effects on us; we are eternally present to God
We need to love God wholeheartedly
We need to love our neighbor, showing generosity and compassion to all other human beings
We need to put human need above the letter of the law
He also took his hearers to task for their failure to read the Law with open hearts that saw the love at the heart of all things. “What does the Law say?” he asked; “Have you not read…”; “What did Moses command you?” “Why do you put your tradition above what God has said?” In his claim to be Lord of the Sabbath, Jesus implicitly took precedence over the letter of the Law, even while paying tribute to its heart of love for God and neighbor.
Jesus quoted from the Prophets on ten occasions. He clearly associated himself with Isaiah and Ezekiel in being a prophet, particularly one who preached to willfully deaf and blind audiences. He expected to be misunderstood and dismissed. His association with Ezekiel, who famously acted parables of his prophecies, teaches us to see Jesus’s actions as acted-out parables. Specifically, what he emphasized by quoting from the Prophets were the following themes:
God does not want ritual obedience when the heart has strayed
God does not want ritual obedience from those who go on to do whatever they want
God wants repentance because the present actions will lead to violence, exile, and ruin
God judges the nation for continually missing the mark and rejecting God’s messengers
God wants the place of worship to be inclusive and free from commerce
God will do what is necessary to cleanse the people in order to effect reconciliation with them
Jesus clearly identified himself with the prophets, calling his people to repent, to be contrite, humble, and reverent before God, so that God might comfort them and care for them like a mother. People are judged by their lack of repentance, their refusal to admit need, their stubbornness in wanting their own way rather than God’s way.
Jesus quoted from the Writings, specifically the Psalms and Daniel on five occasions. As he neared the end of his life and ministry, his mind turned to the apocalyptic visions of Daniel, This turn to apocalypse coincides with the intensity of his experience of moving toward death. At his trial, he quoted Daniel and Psalm 110 to assert his messiahship. As he was dying on his cross, he Identified himself with David, poignantly quoting the opening of Psalm 22; he invoked thereby the whole of that psalm which moves from his sense of abandonment to his assertion of confidence in God.
Jesus took from his familiarity with his scriptures the understanding that love was and is at the heart of the Law and the Prophets and the Writings. Violations of love toward God and neighbor must be recognized and repented of; if people insist on putting other things ahead of this one, they are moving toward judgment and misery. God will do all God can to bring people into reconciliation with God and with each other. Let those who have ears, hear.
