Love Your Neighbor as Yourself

The Command in the Torah

The phrase "love your neighbor as yourself" originates in the Torah:

Leviticus 19:18 — "Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I [am] the LORD."

The command is embedded in the Holiness Code of Leviticus 17–26 — a cluster of chapters detailing how Israel is to live as a people set apart. Leviticus 19 begins: "Ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God [am] holy" (v. 2). The "love your neighbor" command sits in the middle of practical specifications of what that holiness looks like in social life.

The Hebrew

The command is v'ahavta l'reyakha kamokha (וְאָהַבְתָּ לְרֵעֲךָ כָּמוֹךָ).

• V'ahavta — "and you shall love." From ahav (אָהַב, Strong's H157). The same verb used in Deuteronomy 6:5: "thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart."
• L'reyakha — "to your neighbor / fellow." The noun rea (רֵעַ, H7453) means "companion, friend, fellow, associate" — broader than "the person next door."
• Kamokha — "as yourself." The Hebrew preposition k' ("like, as") + pronoun.

The construction with the preposition l'- before rea is unusual. Literally it reads "you shall love to your neighbor." Some scholars read this as meaning "do love for your neighbor" — the love expressed as action toward, not merely sentiment about. The grammatical peculiarity has fed centuries of rabbinic discussion.

Who Is "Neighbor"?

The immediate context of Leviticus 19:18 is "the children of thy people" — fellow Israelites. But the chapter does not stop there. Sixteen verses later:

Leviticus 19:34 — "the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I [am] the LORD your God."

The parallel formula — "love him as thyself" — is applied to the ger (גֵּר, H1616), the resident foreigner. Any reading of "neighbor" restricted to fellow Israelites is contradicted by the same chapter's expansion.

Jesus's Citation

Jesus cites Leviticus 19:18 in several Gospel passages:

• Matthew 22:39 — "the second [commandment] is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Jesus pairs it with the Shema (Deut 6:5) as the two commandments "on which hang all the law and the prophets."
• Mark 12:31 — "there is none other commandment greater than these."
• Luke 10:27 — a lawyer quotes the two together and Jesus affirms the answer.
• Matthew 19:19 — to the rich young ruler.

Paul treats it as summarizing the second tablet of the Decalogue (Romans 13:9): "Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal... and if [there be] any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself."

James calls it "the royal law" (James 2:8).

The Good Samaritan: Who Is My Neighbor?

In Luke 10:25–37, a lawyer quotes Leviticus 19:18 and asks Jesus, "Who is my neighbour?" Jesus answers with the parable of the Good Samaritan. A man is robbed and left half-dead. A priest and a Levite pass by. A Samaritan — a member of a group despised by first-century Jews — stops, bandages his wounds, pays for his care at an inn.

Jesus closes by reversing the lawyer's question:

Luke 10:36 — "Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves?"

The lawyer asked who qualifies as neighbor (a filter-defining question). Jesus asks who acts as neighbor (a behavior-defining question). The command to love neighbor is reframed as "be a neighbor to whoever is in front of you."

"As Thyself"

The measuring phrase kamokha has two common readings:

• Quantitative — love your neighbor to the same degree as you love yourself.
• Qualitative — love your neighbor as someone who is like yourself. Recognize shared humanity.

Both readings have ancient support. The rabbinic teacher Hillel (c. 60 BC – AD 10) summarized the Torah with a version: "That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is commentary" (Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 31a). Jesus articulates it positively in Matthew 7:12: "all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them" — the Golden Rule.

Love of Enemies

Jesus extends the command in the Sermon on the Mount:

Matthew 5:43–44 — "Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you."

The "hate thine enemy" addition is not in Leviticus 19:18 — it was a popular gloss, not biblical text. Jesus removes the gloss and extends the command's scope: the category of neighbor is enlarged until it includes those who would not choose to be loved.