What Does The Lord Demand Of Us?
Deuteronomy 10:1-11:10
1 Thereupon the Lord said to me, “Carve out two tablets
of stone like the first, and come up to Me on the mountain; and make an ark of
wood. 2 I will inscribe on the tablets the commandments that were on the first
tablets that you smashed, and you shall deposit them in the ark.”
3 I made an ark of acacia wood and
carved out two tablets of stone like the first; I took the two tablets with me
and went up the mountain. 4 The Lord
inscribed on the tablets the same text as on the first, the Ten Commandments
that He addressed to you on the mountain out of the fire on the day of the
Assembly; and the Lord gave them
to me. 5 Then I left and went down from the mountain, and I deposited the
tablets in the ark that I had made, where they still are, as the Lord had commanded me.
6 From Beeroth-bene-jaakan the
Israelites marched to Moserah. Aaron died there and was buried there; and his
son Eleazar became priest in his stead. 7 From there they marched to Gudgod,
and from Gudgod to Jotbath, a region of running brooks.
8 At that time the Lord set apart the tribe of Levi to
carry the Ark of the Lord‘s
Covenant, to stand in attendance upon the Lord,
and to bless in His name, as is still the case. 9 That is why the Levites have
received no hereditary portion along with their kinsmen: the Lord is their portion, as the Lord your God spoke concerning them.
10 I had stayed on the mountain, as I
did the first time, forty days and forty nights; and the Lord heeded me once again: the Lord agreed not to destroy you. 11 And
the Lord said to me, “Up, resume
the march at the head of the people, that they may go in and possess the land
that I swore to their fathers to give them.”
12 And now, O Israel, what does the Lord your God demand of you? Only this:
to revere the Lord your God, to
walk only in His paths, to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and soul, 13 keeping the Lord‘s commandments and laws, which I
enjoin upon you today, for your good. 14 Mark,
the heavens to their uttermost reaches belong to the Lord your God, the earth and all that is on it! 15 Yet it was
to your fathers that the Lord was
drawn in His love for them, so that He chose you, their lineal descendants,
from among all peoples—as is now the case. 16 Cut away, therefore, the
thickening about your hearts and stiffen your necks no more. 17 For the Lord your God is God supreme and Lord
supreme, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who shows no favor and
takes no bribe, 18 but upholds the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and
befriends the stranger, providing him with food and clothing.—19 You too must
befriend the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.
20 You must revere the Lord your God: only Him shall you
worship, to Him shall you hold fast, and by His name shall you swear. 21 He is
your glory and He is your God, who wrought for you those marvelous, awesome
deeds that you saw with your own eyes. 22 Your ancestors went down to Egypt
seventy persons in all; and now the Lord
your God has made you as numerous as the stars of heaven.
1 Love, therefore, the Lord your God, and always keep His
charge, His laws, His rules, and His commandments.
2
Take thought this day that it was not your children, who neither
experienced nor witnessed the lesson of the Lord
your God—
His majesty, His mighty hand, His
outstretched arm; 3 the signs and the deeds that He performed in Egypt against
Pharaoh king of Egypt and all his land; 4 what He did to Egypt’s army, its
horses and chariots; how the Lord
rolled back upon them the waters of the Sea of Reeds when they were pursuing
you, thus destroying them once and for all; 5 what He did for you in the
wilderness before you arrived in this place; 6 and what He did to Dathan and
Abiram, sons of Eliab son of Reuben, when the earth opened her mouth and
swallowed them, along with their households, their tents, and every living
thing in their train, from amidst all Israel—
7 but that it was you who saw with
your own eyes all the marvelous deeds that the Lord performed.
8 Keep, therefore, all the
Instruction that I enjoin upon you today, so that you may have the strength to
enter and take possession of the land that you are about to cross into and
possess, 9 and that you may long endure upon the soil that the Lord swore to your fathers to assign to
them and to their heirs, a land flowing with milk and honey.
10 For the land that you are about to
enter and possess is not like the land of Egypt from which you have come. There
the grain you sowed had to be watered by your own labors, like a vegetable
garden;
Deuteronomy 6:4-5
4 Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and
with all your soul and with all your might. [1]
Mark 12:28-34
28 And one of the scribes came, and
having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them
well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? 29 And Jesus answered
him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O
Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: 30 And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all
thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the
first commandment. 31 And the
second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
There is none other commandment greater than these. 32 And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast said the
truth: for there is one God; and there is none other but he: 33 And to love him
with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and
with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more
than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. 34 And when Jesus saw that he
answered discreetly, he said unto him, Thou art not far
from the kingdom of God. And no man after that durst
ask him any question.
Matthew 22:34-40
34 But when the Pharisees had heard
that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together. 35 Then
one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting
him, and saying, 36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy
soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as
thyself. 40 On these
two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. [2]