“And Who is My Neighbour?”
25th Sunday after Pentecost
Ephesians 4:1-6; Luke 10:25-37
(The Parable of the Good Samaritan)
Nowadays, so-called interviews are very common: through TV, radio, various press conferences, panels, public polls (“Gallup polls”), questions are asked, and people answer them. In this way, we not only find out how other people feel about certain problems and issues, but we also acquire information and knowledge from various fields of science; we learn about facts from life that were unknown or little known to us before. At the same time, these questions and answers make us think about our position on many issues and problems.
All sorts of plebiscites are also questions and answers from a large number of people. Not so long ago, the province of Quebec held a plebiscite to decide whether people there wanted to have an independent state of Quebec or to continue to belong to Canada as before.
When we study at school, whether in the elementary grades or at university, there are always tests or exams to check the knowledge of students.
When we apply for a job somewhere, they ask us questions again, and we have to answer them if we want to get the position.
Before being awarded a title, before receiving a document to practise a profession, people are asked questions, and they are also given practical tasks to complete, for it is important not only whether a person has certain knowledge and understanding, but also whether he or she can apply it in life.
That is why, for example, after written and oral questions and answers to and from a candidate for a driving licence, he or she is asked to show how they can apply the knowledge they have acquired in practice.
In the teaching of the Christian faith, in particular in the Orthodox Church, the Catechism, a textbook of the Orthodox faith written in the form of questions and answers, has been published for a long time. (Although I am not personally in favour of the Catechism in the form of questions and answers, it is better when it is delivered in the form of a systematic narrative.)
The Gospel passage read out today presents a question that was asked of Jesus Christ:
“Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?”
If such a question had been asked by a person who did not know the Scriptures, Christ would obviously have given an answer immediately, but the question was asked by a legalist, a person who had to have detailed knowledge of the Scriptures. Thus, it was clear that the man was just testing Jesus Christ, so He answered him with a question:
“What is written in the Law, as you read it?”
And he answered:
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and love your neighbour as yourself.” (Luke 10:25-27)
The lawyer responded on the basis of this instruction from God: Leviticus 19:18; and even more so, in Deuteronomy 6:5. And Christ did not contradict the lawyer, for he spoke correctly, according to the instruction in The Holy Scriptures, but only affirmed and obliged:
“You have answered rightly; do this and you will live.” (Luke 10:28)
Thus, Christ confirmed the teachings of The Old Testament; He did not reject them, for those teachings were given by God through the prophet Moses. In another place, Christ affirmed that He did not come to destroy the Law, but to fulfill it. (Matthew 5:17)
Up to this point, it seems that Jesus Christ, the Teacher of the New Testament, is in agreement with The Old Testament. But the difference was revealed in the definition-answer to the question:
“And who is my neighbour?”, which was asked by the lawyer.
The confessors of The Old Testament, the Jews, believed that a neighbour could only be a person from their own people, from among their fellow believers. Therefore, a Jew should be honest and show love only to people from his own people, to his fellow believers.
Christ, in telling the parable of the merciful Samaritan (Luke 10:29-37), brought us to the understanding that every person with whom we have a relationship in life should be our neighbour. When a Samaritan showed mercy to a Jew, even though the Jews considered the Samaritan to be racially and religiously “unclean”, they became neighbours. This is what we should do.
Love for one's neighbour, as Christ showed in the parable, should be shown not only with words, verbally, but also by one's deeds and actions. People generally make judgments about our faith not on the basis of our verbal definitions, but on the basis of our actions in life.
For example:
a) One of the Orthodox people in Dauphin, Manitoba, said that although he rarely goes to church, to a service, when he drinks beer with his neighbour, he tries to prove to him that the Orthodox faith is more true.
b) My Italian neighbour in Toronto would go to a half-hour Mass on Sunday mornings, and then come home and mow the grass, fix the car, and so on.
I didn't hear the sermon of their priest, but I gained an understanding of the Roman Catholic faith by observing the life and behaviour of Roman Catholics. People of other faiths judge us, Orthodox Christians, in the same way.
In The New Testament there are no rules for a double standard-etiquette: to be indifferent to strangers, to treat them with hostility, deceit, and without mercy, and to treat your fellow believers with love, understanding, and mercy--as the adherents of The Old Testament did and still do.
In Christianity, in Orthodoxy in particular, there is one standard of virtue for all people. In relation to non-Christians, one must manifest the virtues of our faith even more diligently, for, based on that manifestation, people will make judgments and conclusions about our faith.
We should all be aware that news, for example, in the press, about criminal acts by people of our faith, our people, are negative testimonies about our faith among people of other faiths. These cases are never personal matters, whether we like it or not.
Likewise, when our fellow believers, people of our nation, do not show the love for their neighbour commanded by Christ in their relations with other people, they testify negatively about our faith by their actions, and harm our Orthodox Church. For when a person does not reveal works of faith in his life, his faith is very weak.
The Apostle James, the Lord's brother, poses a question to us:
“What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works?”
And he goes on to answer:
“...faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” (The Epistle of the Apostle James 2:14,17).
And the Orthodox faith is true when it is alive, when it is professed by spiritually alive people who recognize the one and living God. (Matthew 12:32)
Amen.
Very Rev. Fr. Taras Slavchenko
Taras Slavchenko was born on March 8, 1918 in Nikopol, Dnipropetrovsk region in Ukraine. After graduating from school and the Pedagogical College, he entered the language and literature faculty of the Scientific Pedagogical Institute. Having successfully completed it in 1938, he served as a teacher in a secondary school.
