Matthew 22:40 Meaning and Explanation
“On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
King James Version (KJV)
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Read Full Chapter →Anyone who has read through the law and the prophets knows how much material there is: sacrifices, festivals, courts, boundaries, oracles, laments. A reader can easily lose the thread. Jesus hands us the thread here. He gives one short sentence that tells us how the whole library holds together and what any given command is finally serving.
Jesus says the whole of Israel's Scripture depends on love for God and love for neighbour. Every command and every prophetic word hangs from those two, drawing its meaning and weight from them.
The Context of Matthew 22:40
Jesus is teaching in the temple during the final week before his crucifixion. Matthew 22 gathers a sequence of test questions: the Pharisees and Herodians on tribute money in verses 15 to 22, the Sadducees on resurrection in verses 23 to 33, and then a lawyer among the Pharisees in verse 35, who asks which commandment in the law is great. Jesus answers from Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18 in verses 37 through 39. Verse 40 is his closing comment on that pair. He then turns questioner himself in verses 41 to 46, asking whose son the Christ is.
What Does Matthew 22:40 Mean?
The picture inside the word 'hang' is a door on its hinges or a weight suspended from a peg. Everything else in the law and the prophets is held up by these two commands. Dependence of that kind is a form of holding fast, since whatever hangs from a peg stays attached to it. Notice also that Jesus names two commandments and lets them remain two. The first, love for the Lord with all the heart and soul and mind, he has just called first and great. The second he calls 'like unto it', which binds them tightly together while leaving each its own force. Notice finally the scope of what hangs: all the law and all the prophets, the whole written revelation Israel had received.
The chapter has been a series of traps. Opponents came with tribute money and with a riddle about seven brothers, hoping to catch Jesus between rival loyalties or reduce resurrection to absurdity. The lawyer's question about the great commandment fits that pattern, since ranking commands was a live debate and any answer could be attacked. Jesus answers by going to the heart of Israel's own confession. Deuteronomy 6 was recited daily, and Leviticus 19 governed dealings with neighbours in ordinary village life. By joining them and saying the rest hangs there, he supplies an interpretive key: any reading of a command that produces contempt for God or cruelty toward a neighbour has read it wrongly.
Immediately after this answer Jesus asks the Pharisees what they think of the Christ, and presses them with David calling his son Lord. The two questions belong together. The one who states what the whole law hangs upon is the one whom that law and those prophets were pointing toward, and within days he will love the Father to the point of Gethsemane and love his neighbours to the point of the cross. Paul later writes that love is the fulfilling of the law, and John writes that we love because he first loved us. The command sits inside a story where God moves first and invites a real answering love from us.
Matthew 22:40 in the Original Language
krematai (κρέμαται), 'hang' -- present passive of a verb meaning to be suspended or hung up. The picture is of weight resting on a support, so all the law and the prophets are shown as held in place by these two commands.
Bible Verses Related to Matthew 22:40
“And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”
- Deuteronomy 6:5
“Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.”
- Leviticus 19:18
“Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.”
- Matthew 7:12
“Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.”
- Romans 13:10
Where Matthew 22:40 Echoes in Scripture
Romans 13:8-10 reads like an unpacking of this sentence. Paul lists commandments about adultery, killing, stealing, and coveting, and says they are all summed up in loving one's neighbour as oneself, concluding that love is the fulfilling of the law. James 2:8 calls the same command the royal law. Both writers keep the commandments in view while showing that love is what they were always asking for, which is exactly the relationship Jesus describes with the word hang.
How to Apply Matthew 22:40 Today
Most of our moral decisions are not exotic. We choose how to speak to a tired spouse, whether to answer an email honestly, how to spend an unexpected hour. A useful practice is to hold a decision up against the two commands and ask which way each one leans. Bible reading changes too. When a passage feels strange or severe, we can ask what love for God and love for neighbour it was protecting, and often the strangeness turns into sense. Where the two seem to pull apart, the order Jesus gave helps: love for God is first, and it never licenses contempt for the person in front of us.
Reflection & Prayer
Which commandment of God have we been keeping carefully while quietly letting love for God or for a neighbour drop out of it? Sit with that one for a moment before answering. A prayer: Lord, you have shown us what everything hangs upon. Teach us to love you with heart and soul and mind, and to love the people you have placed beside us, so that our obedience is the shape of that love. Amen.