Let’s begin with Holy Writ: “ lawyer asked a question, to test Him. ‘Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?’ And He said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets’ ” (Matthew 22:35-40).
1 John 4:21 stressed this double precept: “This commandment we have from Him, that he who loves God should love his brother also.” The first part of the twofold law is about unconditional love of God. The second part follows as its consequence. St Thomas Aquinas (d 1274) glossed these verses in his Commentary on St Matthew: “When man is loved, God is loved, since man is the image of God.” We must cultivate our different loves in their proper order. God comes first, always.
