Big Idea: There are no limits to the disciple’s duty to love other people, even the most unlikely.

Understanding the Text

On Jesus’s journey to Jerusalem, which began in 9:51, much attention is focused on the nature and demands of discipleship. Here a question from someone outside the disciple group prompts Jesus to illustrate the central demand of discipleship by telling one of his best-loved parables. The famous “summary of the law” in the twofold demand to love God and to love one’s neighbor occurs in all three Synoptic Gospels, but Luke’s presentation of it is distinctive in two ways: first, it is the questioner, not Jesus, who first offers the summary; second, Jesus provides extensive comment on it in the form of the parable of the good Samaritan. The recent hostile reception of Jes…