Jesus Christ · On One Another
Love One Another
Judas has just walked out into the night. In the few hours left before His arrest, Jesus gives the eleven what He Himself calls a newcommandment — though its words had stood in Leviticus for fifteen centuries. What is new is the measure: not “as thyself” but “as I have loved you,” spoken by a man on His way to a cross. And He attaches to it a job no other commandment carries: this love, visible between His people, is the one mark by which the watching world is meant to recognize them at all.
The Night It Was Given
— John 13:31-35 — after Judas went outThe setting is the upper room, the last night. Jesus has washed the disciples’ feet; Judas has taken the morsel and gone out; and John marks the moment with four words — “and it was night.” It is here, with betrayal already in motion and hours to live, that Jesus turns to the eleven with a word of tenderness the Gospels record nowhere else on His lips — “little children” — and gives them the commandment He names as His own.
A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you also must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another.”One Clause Changed
— Leviticus 19:18 beside John 13:34THE OLD COMMANDMENT
“Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself”
Leviticus 19:18 →already fifteen centuries old when Jesus spoke — the measure is the man’s own self-love
THE NEW COMMANDMENT
“That ye love one another; as I have loved you”
John 13:34 →spoken the night He is betrayed — the measure is now His love, on its way to a cross
WHAT THE BADGE IS FOR
“By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another”
John 13:35 →not a rite, a dress, or a creed recited — the one identifying mark Jesus appointed is visible only between His people, and legible to everyone outside them
What Is New About It
— the church's own answers, from the second century onEvery careful reader eventually asks the same question: how is this commandment new, when “thou shalt love thy neighbour” is a direct quotation of the Law? The answer the church has given, generation after generation, is that the newness sits in the second clause. Leviticus measured love by a man’s love for himself. Jesus measures it by His own — a love that had “its beginning on My side,” owed nothing, and was about to be spent to the last drop.
Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against any of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the LORD.the old commandment — already Scripture for fifteen centuries.
A new commandment - Not new in itself; but new in the school of Christ: for he had never before taught it them expressly. Likewise new, as to the degree of it, as I have loved you.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament (1755), on John 13:34
A new commandment I give unto you - In what sense are we to understand that this was a new commandment? Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, was a positive precept of the law, Lev 19:18, and it is the very same that Christ repeats here; how then was it new? Our Lord answers this question, Even As I have loved you. Now Christ more than fulfilled the Mosaic precept; he not only loved his neighbor As himself, but he loved him More than himself, for he laid down his life for men.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1832), on John 13:34
He plainly indicates the novelty involved in his command here—and the extent to which the love he enjoins here surpasses the old idea of mutual love—by adding the words "Even as I have loved you, you also should love one another." … The law of Moses mandated the necessity of loving our brothers as ourselves, yet our Lord Jesus the Christ loved us far more than he loved himself.
Cyril of Alexandria· Commentary on the Gospel of John, Book 9 (444), on John 13:34
(Hom. lxxii. 3) Or, as I have loved you: for My love has not been the payment of something owing to you, but had its beginning on My side. And ye ought in like manner to do one another good, though ye may not owe it.
John Chrysostom· Catena Aurea by Aquinas (407), on John 13:34
The Badge
— John 13:35 — how the world was meant to recognize themJesus appointed exactly one identifying mark for His people — not a symbol, a garment, a diet, or a form of words, all of which other schools and sects already used, but a quality of relationship that cannot be counterfeited for long and cannot be hidden either. The earliest reports we have from outside the church confirm the badge worked: the pagans of Tertullian’s North Africa had a stock saying about Christians, and Clarke’s note below preserves it in their own words.
By this shall all men ... - That is, your love for each other shall be so decisive evidence that you are like the Saviour, that all people shall see and know it. It shall be the thing by which you shall be known among all men. You shall not be known by special rites or habits; not by a special form of dress or manner of speech; not by special austerities and unusual customs, like the Pharisees, the Essenes, or the scribes, but by deep, genuine, and tender affection.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869), on John 13:35
(Hom. lxxii. 4) Passing over the miracles, which they were to perform, He makes love the distinguishing mark of His followers; By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another. This it is that evidences the saint or the disciple, as He calls him.
John Chrysostom· Catena Aurea by Aquinas (407), on John 13:35
By this shall all men know, etc. - From this time forward, this mutual and disinterested love shall become the essential and distinctive mark of all my disciples. When they love one another with pure hearts, fervently, even unto death, then shall it fully appear that they are disciples of that person who laid down his life for his sheep, and who became, by dying, a ransom for all. The disciples of different teachers were known by their habits, or some particular creed or rite, or point of austerity, which they had adopted; but the disciples of Christ were known by this love which they bore to each other. The primitive Christians were particularly known by this among the Gentiles. Tertullian, in his Apology, gives us their very words: Vide, inquiunt, ut se diligunt; et pro alterutro mori parati sunt. See, said they, how they love one another, and are ready to lay down their lives for each other.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1832), on John 13:35
By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples--the disciples of Him who laid down His life for those He loved. if ye have love one to another--for My sake, and as one in Me; for to such love men outside the circle of believers know right well they are entire strangers. Alas, how little of it there is even within this circle!
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871), on John 13:35
Restated, With Its Full Measure
— John 15:12-13 — greater love hath no manLater the same night, walking from the upper room toward Gethsemane, Jesus returns to the commandment — no longer calling it new, but calling it His: “this is my commandment.” And He states the measure at its full height. The standard is not sentiment; it is a life laid down, and within a day He will have met His own standard literally.
This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.By this we know what love is: Jesus laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.John's own restatement, decades on — the measure applied to us.
While all of sacred Scripture is full of the Lord's commandments, why does the Lord speak of love as if it were a singular commandment, saying: "This is my commandment, that you love one another," unless it is because every commandment concerns love alone, and all commandments are one, since whatever is commanded is grounded in charity alone? For just as many branches of a tree proceed from one root, so many virtues are generated from one charity. Nor does the branch of a good work have any greenness if it does not remain in the root of charity.
Gregory the Dialogist· Forty Gospel Homilies, Homily 27 (604), on John 15:12
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends--The emphasis lies not on "friends," but on "laying down his life" for them; that is, "One can show no greater regard for those dear to him than to give his life for them, and this is the love ye shall find in Me."
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871), on John 15:13
That ye love one another - See on Joh 13:34 (note). So deeply was thus commandment engraved on the heart of this evangelist that St. Jerome says, lib. iii. c. 6, Com. ad Galat., that in his extreme old age, when he used to be carried to the public assemblies of the believers, his constant saying was, Little children, love one another.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1832), on John 15:12
Friends, Not Servants
— John 15:15-16 — the standing the commandment assumesThe commandment does not hang in the air; it comes wrapped in a change of standing. A servant obeys orders he is not let in on. Jesus says He has told the disciples everything He heard from the Father — the mark of a friend — and then closes the door on any thought that the friendship was their idea: “ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you.” The love commanded of them is a love they were first given.
No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not understand what his master is doing. But I have called you friends, because everything I have learned from My Father I have made known to you.You did not choose Me, but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will remain—so that whatever you ask the Father in My name, He will give you.The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and, so to say, its first swathing band. But, when wisdom bursts the bonds of fear and rises up to love, it makes us friends of God and children instead of slaves.
Gregory of Nazianzus· On the Great Athanasius, Oration 21.6 (390), on John 15:15
(Tract. lxxxvi. 3) Ineffable grace! For what were we before Christ had chosen us, but wicked, and lost? We did not believe in Him, so as to be chosen by Him: for had He chosen us believing, He would have chosen us choosing.
Augustine of Hippo· Catena Aurea by Aquinas (430), on John 15:16
We love because He first loved us.the whole teaching in seven words.
Where It Points
— the commandment's whole family“Love one another” is the inside face of a love that faces every direction on this site: upward in the greatest commandment, outward toward enemies, downward in the foot-washing — and its enabling condition is not effort but abiding, the branch drawing the vine’s own life.
Where the aged apostle landedJerome's report, inside Clarke's note above
Jerome records (Commentary on Galatians, book 3) that John, too old to walk to the assemblies at Ephesus and carried in by his disciples, said the same sentence every time: “Little children, love one another.” Asked why he always said only this, he answered that it was the Lord’s commandment, and if it alone were kept, it was enough. The man who wrote “God is love” spent his last strength repeating the commandment of this page.
Closing
One clause changed, and everything changed with it. The commandment was old; the measure was new; the badge still works the same way it did when pagans in Carthage pointed and said, “See how they love one another.”