What Does Matthew 22:38 Mean?
This is the first and great commandment.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
This is the first and great commandment.THE KEY
“First” names love for God as the commandment that gives the others their order.
THE MEANING
Love for God stands first in your life with God now, carrying the greatest place among the commandments. The others gather around this governing center.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This verse undoes the idea that God’s commands are a flat list of disconnected demands: one is named first and great, with a governing place among them.
THE ROOT
πρώτη
prōtē
GROWS FROM
πρῶτος
prōtos
first, foremost; preceding in order or rank
“First” can sound like an item that merely comes earlier in a sequence, but this Greek word also marks precedence. Here it places love for God in the position that orders the commandments around it.
ALSO GROWS
prōton: first; in the first place
πρῶτον
This form shows the root’s use for ordering what follows, which helps reveal the commandment’s priority here.
prōteuō: to be first or hold first place
πρωτεύω
This related verb makes the sense of precedence explicit: the commandment has primacy, not just an earlier position in a list.
THE PATTERN
Love for God stands first, and the rest of instruction gathers around that governing center.
And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your living soul, and with all your might.Love does not work evil on the neighbor. So love is the fullness of the instruction.On these two commandments hang all the instruction and the prophets.THE THREAD
And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your living soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first command.Mark uses the same Greek root for “first” and gives the commandment’s full scope: love for God with heart, soul, mind, and strength. That makes Matthew’s ranking tangible: first place belongs to love involving the whole person.
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