What Does Matthew 22:39 Mean?
And the second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
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
And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.THE KEY
The word translated “neighbour” means “the one near,” placing love in the relationship before you, not in an abstract idea.
THE MEANING
The person near you matters by the same measure you already know from within: care for yourself. The verse holds both people in view, joining love for another with love for yourself.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that loving another requires treating yourself as disposable: the measure named here is love of your neighbour as yourself.
THE ROOT
πλησίον
plēsion
GROWS FROM
πέλας
pelas
Near, close at hand.
“your neighbor” in this verse is plēsion. The Greek names a neighbour through nearness: the person who is near. English can make “neighbour” sound like a fixed category, while the word itself keeps the relationship immediate and alive.
ALSO GROWS
pelas: Near, nearby.
πέλας
This base word makes nearness the seed of the word for neighbour.
plēsiazō: To draw near, approach.
πλησιάζω
This related word turns nearness into movement, echoing how a neighbour is someone encountered in relationship.
THE PATTERN
Love takes shape in how the person near you is treated, measured against the care you know for yourself.
You shall not avenge, nor hold a grudge against the children of your people; but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.Love does not work evil on the neighbor. So love is the fullness of the instruction.If you complete the royal instruction according to the writing, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. You do well.THE THREAD
You shall not avenge, nor hold a grudge against the children of your people; but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.Leviticus places this same command beside refusing vengeance and bearing a grudge. That makes love concrete in the relationship: resentment does not get to define the person near you.
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