Charles Ellicott Commentary Matthew 22:37

"And he said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind." — Matthew 22:37 (ASV)

You shall love the Lord your God — In Mark's report (Mark 12:29), our Lord's answer begins with the Creed of Israel (“Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord”), and so the truth is rightly positioned as the foundation of this duty.

It is significant that:

1. The answer comes from the same chapter (Deuteronomy 6:4–5) that supplied our Lord with two of his three answers to the Tempter (see notes on Matthew 4:4; Matthew 4:7).
2. He simply repeats the answer that had been given before by the “certain lawyer” who stood up to tempt him (Luke 10:25).

In their ethical teaching, the Pharisees had grasped this truth intellectually, though they did not realize it in their lives. Our Lord, therefore, did not shrink from identifying his teaching with theirs on this point. Truth was truth, even though it was held by the Pharisees and coupled with hypocrisy.