Love is greatest: In reply to the scribe’s question, Jesus recites the heart of all the commandments—the Shema (Dt 6:4-5). The greatest commandment centers on love of God with all one’s heart (the center of knowing, willing, and feeling), with all one’s soul (life), and with all one’s mind (energy). In other words, love engages the total person.
And because love involves the whole person, it extends to one’s neighbor. God comes first, but one cannot love God without loving the neighbor.
Throughout the Gospel, this has been one of Matthew’s favorite themes. God’s will is found in love, according to Matthew. Authentic discipleship is measured against love and not against a series of 613 commandments.
Matthew refuses to give a new set of commandments: to do so would be to fall into the very trap he has been trying to spring. Authentic discipleship involves love of God and neighbor. Any other commandment or law must be measured against love, which at the same time binds people to the heart of God’s will and frees them from the law when it degenerates into the mere keeping of the law for the sake of keeping it. For Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew it is not a matter of merely keeping the Law; it is a matter of why one keeps it.