false and unreasonable. 3. When the young man insisted that he was blameless
in regard to his duty to his fellow men, our Lord applied a test to him which
undeceived him at once. 4. When Christ said, "If thou wilt enter into life, keep the
commandments," he spoke in harmony with his own words in Matt.5:17-19.
There he had declared that not even the minutest particle should pass from the
commandments till the heavens and the earth
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should flee away, and that whosoever should violate one of the least of them,
should be of no esteem in the reign of heaven. Then, our Lord being allowed to
explain his own words, it follows that to keep the commandments, is to observe
every one of them; and that the willful violator of the least one, shall have no part
in the kingdom of God. And the apostle James, as we shall thereafter see,
establishes in the clearest manner the fact that whoever understandingly violates
one of the ten commandments is guilty of breaking them all. What will those say
to this who affirm that the young man could keep the commandments, and yet
violate every one that defines our duty to God the great Law-giver?
"Then one of them which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him,
and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law? 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. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like
unto it: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments
hang all the law and the prophets." Matt.22:35-40.
Many mistake the question here proposed to Jesus, and read this text as
though the lawyer had said, Master what is the great commandment which you
will give to take the place of the ten commandments? The question was not
asked on that wise;
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and those who present this scripture as evidence that Christ gave a new code to
take the place of his Father's law, labor under a serious mistake. The question
related to the original law of God; what is the great commandment in that?
Christ answered this question by pointing out the two great immutable first
principles on which hang all the law and the prophets: "Thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." This is the
sum of our duty to God: on this hang all those precepts which define our duty to
him. "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." On this precept hang all those
commandments which contain our duty to our fellow men. This is the sum of
them, and out of this they all grow.
The Saviour did not abolish the law of his Father by these two precepts; for
they were as ancient as any part of the law of God. Deut.6:5; Lev.19:18. He did
not then hang the law and the prophets upon them; for they had ever hung there;
nor did Christ teach that on these two precepts all the law and the prophets were
abolished. Nay, he showed by this the immutable basis on which the law of
Jehovah rests. These two great precepts are, as all admit, unabolished. And the
law of God which hangs upon them is like them, immutable, and, must abide as
long as they endure.
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"And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass