As Jesus teaches in the Gospels, the greatest commandment is "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets."
As Jesus teaches in the Gospels, the greatest commandment is "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets."
Indeed, God’s ultimate law is indeed love--love of God, love of people, and love of self. Moreover, we see throughout Jesus many teachings that all three modes of love are inextricably intertwined. We cannot love others without loving God, we cannot love ourselves without loving others, and we cannot love God without loving others and ourselves.
But when we remember these teachings, we must remember that these teachings have always been with us. The commandments Jesus cited are found in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. If we are honest with ourselves, we must admit that we have always had this teaching, we have always had this law, and so it is only the hardness of our own hearts that brings us to choose not to love in this all-encompassing way.
In Buddhist teaching, much is said about importance of bodhicitta, the essence of which a loving-kindness which is similarly all-encompassing. From this we may see that even people who have not Mosaic Law have received at least this much of God's Law, however it came to be transmitted. In Romans, the Apostle Paul teaches that even those not given the law yet still conform to the law are still justified.
And so we can see that, no matter how we apprehend God's Law, there is little rebuttal to the proposition that we have always known God's Law. We know what is Right and what is Wrong. It is this knowledge which invites consequence upon us if we ignore God's Law.
And it is God's Grace and God's Mercy that we have but to open our hearts and embrace God's Law--the all-encompassing loving-kindness which Jesus reminds us is God's Supreme Commandment--to receive God's Forgiveness.
Something I learned decades ago, which stayed with me, is the origin of the word ‘sin’. It’s from an ancient word (Ancient Greek, if I remember right) that means “missing the mark”, as in archery. We take aim, but we miss the mark. So our ‘sins’ aren’t necessarily evil or wrong, they can just be errors.
If a toddler is learning to walk, he ‘misses the mark’ repeatedly before he gets it right. His parents don’t consider him to be evil or even wrong, he just hasn’t mastered it yet, and they still love him. I believe God’s love is similar. Our life’s journey involves us making errors one after another, but we are just “missing the mark”, and God forgives us and loves us.
But you are right, we must acknowledge our errors, and strive to walk a better path, as that is the path to being more like God.
As Jesus teaches in the Gospels, the greatest commandment is "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets."
Indeed, God’s ultimate law is indeed love--love of God, love of people, and love of self. Moreover, we see throughout Jesus many teachings that all three modes of love are inextricably intertwined. We cannot love others without loving God, we cannot love ourselves without loving others, and we cannot love God without loving others and ourselves.
But when we remember these teachings, we must remember that these teachings have always been with us. The commandments Jesus cited are found in Leviticus and Deuteronomy. If we are honest with ourselves, we must admit that we have always had this teaching, we have always had this law, and so it is only the hardness of our own hearts that brings us to choose not to love in this all-encompassing way.
In Buddhist teaching, much is said about importance of bodhicitta, the essence of which a loving-kindness which is similarly all-encompassing. From this we may see that even people who have not Mosaic Law have received at least this much of God's Law, however it came to be transmitted. In Romans, the Apostle Paul teaches that even those not given the law yet still conform to the law are still justified.
And so we can see that, no matter how we apprehend God's Law, there is little rebuttal to the proposition that we have always known God's Law. We know what is Right and what is Wrong. It is this knowledge which invites consequence upon us if we ignore God's Law.
And it is God's Grace and God's Mercy that we have but to open our hearts and embrace God's Law--the all-encompassing loving-kindness which Jesus reminds us is God's Supreme Commandment--to receive God's Forgiveness.
And you give me more reasons to adore you, Peter!
Something I learned decades ago, which stayed with me, is the origin of the word ‘sin’. It’s from an ancient word (Ancient Greek, if I remember right) that means “missing the mark”, as in archery. We take aim, but we miss the mark. So our ‘sins’ aren’t necessarily evil or wrong, they can just be errors.
If a toddler is learning to walk, he ‘misses the mark’ repeatedly before he gets it right. His parents don’t consider him to be evil or even wrong, he just hasn’t mastered it yet, and they still love him. I believe God’s love is similar. Our life’s journey involves us making errors one after another, but we are just “missing the mark”, and God forgives us and loves us.
But you are right, we must acknowledge our errors, and strive to walk a better path, as that is the path to being more like God.