The discussion that prompts Jesus’ parable of the good Samaritan in Luke 10 was not unusual in 1st century Israel. The culture of the Jewish people was highly stratified, and most of the people of that time would define “neighbor” according to where they fell on a scale of social status. As a result, when Jesus tells the lawyer that he is correct in reading the law as loving God with all you are and loving your neighbor as yourself, the lawyer responds (not surprisingly), “Who is my neighbor?” (Luke 10:29, emphasis added).

Now it must be understood that, due to the stratification of society, it seems clear that the lawyer is not seeking instructions. He’s looking for boundaries. He wants to define the limits of his responsibility to love; Luke plainly says the lawyer asked Jesus to identify neighbor “wishing to justify himself” (v.29).

Instead of asking HOW to love his neighbor, he asks WHO he must love. First century Israel had its own ways of answering that question. They had twisted the words recorded by Moses in Leviticus 19:18, which reads:

“Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.”

While these instructions certainly seem clear, Israel’s religious leaders in the time of Jesus had gone in a different direction. Jesus referenced this mutation in Matthew 5:43 when He said:

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’”

The Bible Knowledge Commentary says:

The Pharisees taught that one should love those near and dear to him (Lev. 19:18), but that Israel’s enemies should be hated. The Pharisees thus implied that their hatred was God’s means of judging their enemies. But Jesus stated that Israel should demonstrate God’s love even to her enemies—a practice not even commanded in the Old Testament! God loves them; He causes His sun to rise on them and He sends rain to produce their crops.

As a result, they had to redefine “neighbor.” And that definition reflected the social strati of the day in Israel.

The common Jewish person viewed their neighbor as their fellow Israelite (however, gentiles were accursed).

The Pharisee viewed his neighbor as his fellow Pharisee (the rest of the Jewish rabble was accursed, as seen in John 7:49).

Those of Qumran limited their view of neighbor only to their fellow Qumranian (the rest of the world—including their fellow Jews—were darkness).

How different was the teaching of Jesus! Instead of limiting love, Jesus challenged them to go even further. Beyond simply loving their neighbor, Christ urged them:

“But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you…” (Luke 6:27).

And…

“But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.” (Luke 6:35)

So, Jesus had already taken the Law of Moses in Leviticus 19 and stretched it to higher relational ground, moving from loving neighbors to loving even enemies!

The lawyer’s question reflected the ideal of setting specific and strict boundaries in order to limit responsibility. This explains why Jesus took such extreme steps to expose this bigotry and bias, making a Samaritan the hero of the story in Luke 10:30–37.

While often presented as a story about showing kindness to others or helping the down-and-out (neither of which is a bad thing), the story of the good Samaritan is an attack on the bigotry and, in fact, racism that had crept into the thinking of the chosen people. Samaritans were the ethnic “less-thans” that the pure-bred Jews felt they had every right to despise. Love them? That wasn’t even on their radar. For a Samaritan to be positioned as a role model was unthinkable—precisely why Jesus did it.

Jesus’s definition of neighbor was necessarily broad—even global—in nature. Not content to simply set this challenging standard, Jesus practiced it himself in the worst and most painful moments of His earthly experience. Nailed on the cross by an alliance of self-righteous Jews and bloody, violent Gentiles, Jesus surveyed His true enemies from the cross and prayed:

“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).

There are no boundaries to his love or grace—we were also once his enemies (Romans 5:10), but we have been declared sons and daughters by his rescuing love and sacrifice. Our response to that love? The same that Jesus called for after telling the story of the good Samaritan:

“Go and do the same.” (Luke 10:37)

Bill Crowder