Article November 18, 1967 Issue

Who Is My Neighbor?

L. IVIMY GWALTER

This question demands a penetrating answer. It presents itself to everyone and lies at the root of human problems.

Just who is my neighbor? The Master was asked this very question. It is related in the tenth chapter of Luke that a lawyer came tempting him and asking what he should do to inherit eternal life. Jesus approved the lawyer's own answer that he must love God supremely and his neighbor as himself. In self-justification the lawyer asked who his neighbor was. Jesus' reply was the familiar and much loved parable of the good Samaritan. At the end he put the question, "Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbour unto him that fell among the thieves?"^{Luke 10:36;} Jesus approved the lawyer's reply that it was the Samaritan, he who had shown kindness, and Jesus admonished him to go and do likewise.

Superficially we may be satisfied to say that the neighbor we are to love is the man who has fallen among thieves, the individual whose path crosses ours and who so sorely needs our compassion and love. Under these circumstances it is not very difficult to love him, but what if he turns out to be ungrateful, antagonistic, dishonest, hypocritical, or hateful? What if he is secretly or openly trying to do us harm? Or perhaps he persists in following a course which is evil or wrong, and which we know will lead to his own destruction; yet he will not listen to correction. Does loving him mean to close our eyes and let the error go unrebuked and unpunished? Does it mean to condone evil or ignore it? Is this love? Does it really help him?

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

Article

The Importance of Persistence