Daily Manna, Year Two · Day 104 · April 14
Heart, Soul, Mind
“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.”
Which of the three did you quietly leave out?
The question that produced the list was not asked in good faith. 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? The invitation was to say something narrow enough to be attacked. 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. He is quoting Deuteronomy, the sentence Israel said morning and evening.
Heart, first. In Hebrew that is a good deal wider than feeling. The heart is where a person decides, weighs, plans and intends. Loving God with all your heart is a matter of what you have settled on, in the place where you settle things.
Soul, second. The word covers the whole living self, the appetite and the breath and the life you would lose if you lost it.
Mind, third, and here it repays reading slowly. Deuteronomy says heart, soul and might. Matthew has heart, soul and mind. Mark prints four: heart, soul, mind and strength. The lists do not match each other, and that is the point of them. It is a way of saying the whole of you, closing every exit one at a time. Nobody was drawing a diagram of the human parts.
Then he answers a question nobody asked. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
Give the third one its turn this week, since it is the one most of us skip. Spend twenty unhurried minutes learning something true about God you did not know on Monday. Count it as obedience. The verse has already told you which part of you it belongs to.
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 104 is The Protection of Habitation (Psalm 91:9-10).