Commandment, the New
Jesus and the Old Commandment of Love
The command to love was not invented at the Last Supper. When asked to identify the greatest commandment, Jesus pointed to two Old Testament texts: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" (Deuteronomy 6:5; Matthew 22:37) and "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 22:39). Jesus affirmed that the entire Law and Prophets hung on these two commandments (Matthew 22:40). The Pharisees knew these texts well. What, then, was new about the New Commandment?
The New Commandment at the Last Supper
On the night before His crucifixion, after washing His disciples' feet, Jesus declared: "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another" (John 13:34). The critical phrase is "as I have loved you." The Old Testament commanded love measured by the standard of self-love ("as yourself"). Jesus raised the standard to His own self-giving love, a love that would be fully revealed on the cross the following day. The commandment was new not in requiring love but in defining its measure and source.
Jesus repeated and expanded this teaching later that evening: "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:12-13). The New Commandment is thus inseparable from the cross. It calls for a love that is willing to sacrifice everything for the good of others.
Love as the Mark of Discipleship
Jesus declared that this love would be the distinguishing mark of His followers: "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another" (John 13:35). This is a remarkable statement. Jesus did not point to doctrinal correctness, miraculous power, or organizational structure as the primary evidence of discipleship. He pointed to love. The Christian community was to be recognizable by the quality of its members' relationships with one another. This teaching has challenged the church in every generation to ask whether its internal life reflects the sacrificial love of Christ.
The Apostolic Development of the New Commandment
The apostles took the New Commandment and wove it into the fabric of early Christian teaching. Paul declared that "the one who loves another has fulfilled the law" (Romans 13:8) and that the entire law is summed up in love of neighbor (Galatians 5:14). He provided the most detailed portrait of what this love looks like in practice: "Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude" (1 Corinthians 13:4-5).
John, who recorded the New Commandment in his Gospel, returned to it repeatedly in his first epistle. "Beloved, I am writing you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning" (1 John 2:7), he writes, before adding, "At the same time, it is a new commandment that I am writing to you" (1 John 2:8). The paradox is deliberate: the command to love is ancient, yet it becomes perpetually new as it is lived out in the light of Christ. John goes further: "Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love" (1 John 4:8). Love is not merely an ethical requirement but flows from the very nature of God.
From Law to Principle
The New Commandment represents a fundamental shift in how God's people relate to His will. Under the old covenant, obedience was framed primarily as response to external law. Under the new covenant, which Jeremiah had prophesied would involve God writing His law on human hearts (Jeremiah 31:33), love becomes an internal principle that naturally produces obedience. Paul contrasts the letter that kills with the Spirit that gives life (2 Corinthians 3:6). When love becomes the governing principle of life, external commands are not abolished but fulfilled from within. As Augustine famously summarized: "Love, and do what you will," because genuine love inevitably produces right action.
The Enduring Challenge
The New Commandment remains the most searching test of Christian faithfulness. It demands not merely the absence of hostility but the active pursuit of others' good at personal cost. It requires loving not only those who are lovable but those who are difficult, as Jesus loved His betrayer at the very table where He issued the command. It is both the simplest and the most demanding of all Christian teachings, and it points to the ongoing need for the Holy Spirit's power to produce what human effort alone cannot sustain.
Biblical Context
The New Commandment is given by Jesus in John 13:34-35 and expanded in John 15:12-17. It builds on the Old Testament love commands in Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18 as cited by Jesus in Matthew 22:37-40. The apostolic development appears in Romans 13:8-10, Galatians 5:13-14, 1 Corinthians 13, 1 John 2:7-11, 3:11-18, and 4:7-21. Jeremiah 31:31-34 provides the prophetic background for the internalization of God's law under the new covenant.
Theological Significance
The New Commandment reveals that love is both the essence of Christian ethics and the evidence of genuine faith. By measuring love against His own sacrifice rather than self-interest, Jesus established a standard that is humanly impossible apart from divine grace. The command thus drives believers to dependence on the Holy Spirit and connects ethics inseparably to the gospel. Christian love is not self-generated virtue but the overflow of Christ's love received and lived out in community.
Historical Background
The early church took the New Commandment seriously as its distinguishing characteristic. The second-century apologist Tertullian reported that pagans remarked of Christians, 'See how they love one another.' The Didache, one of the earliest post-apostolic writings, emphasizes love as central to Christian life. Augustine's famous dictum 'Love, and do what you will' captures the principle that genuine love fulfills all other commands. Throughout church history, the New Commandment has served as both the inspiration for Christian service and the standard by which the church's faithfulness is measured.