Luke 10:27
What does Luke 10:27 mean?
He answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”
The short answer
In Luke 10:27, a legal expert answers Jesus's question about what the law of Israel requires, and he answers well. He joins two commands from the Hebrew scriptures into one: love God with everything you have — heart, soul, strength, and mind — and love "your neighbor as yourself." Jesus affirms the answer. This is the whole shape of a faithful life, compressed into a single sentence.
The first half is about totality. Heart, soul, strength, and mind are not four separate compartments; together they mean the entire person. Nothing is held back. Loving God is not one activity among many but the orientation of everything else — how you think, what you want, where your energy goes.
The second half is where most of us stumble, and where the phrase "as yourself" matters. As N. T. Wright points out, this does not mean loving others instead of yourself. It means extending to every person the same instinctive respect and care you already show yourself — the way you notice your own hunger, defend your own dignity, and want your own good. Wright adds that Jesus is not setting an impossible standard for show. He expects his followers to actually live this way, because he believes God is keeping an ancient promise to renew human hearts from the inside.
But the verse doesn't stay theoretical for long. In the very next scene, the lawyer asks who counts as a neighbor, and Jesus answers with the parable of the Good Samaritan. James Limburg presses the uncomfortable edge of that story: most of us are not the robbers. The sharper question is whether we are the ones who see someone hurting and pass by on the other side. Luke 10:27 is easy to recite and costly to practice — which is exactly the move Jesus makes with it.
What scholars say
N. T. Wright explains what "as yourself" does and doesn't mean — and why Jesus expects his followers to actually live this command, trusting that God is renewing people's hearts. James Limburg then turns the question of the parable that follows back on the church: even if we are not the robbers, have we too often been the bystanders who pass by on the other side?
“The lawyer hasn’t asked him about his second choice, but it’s so important to his whole mission that he adds it anyway. ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’; this doesn’t mean loving others instead of ourselves, but showing to all people the same respect and care that we show to ourselves. Elsewhere in the gospel stories (e.g. Luke 10) this is developed and applied in more detail. Again, if people lived by this rule, most of the world’s greatest problems would be solved overnight. Once more, Jesus implies that his kingdom-work will bring this commandment within reach. He really expects his followers to live it out, because he believes that God is now fulfilling his ancient promise to renew people’s hearts. That’s where writers like Paul take up the story.”
“Jesus spoke of a final accounting, and of those who had failed to stand with the hungry and thirsty, the stranger and naked, the sick, and the imprisoned (Matt. 25:31–46). The prophet raises the question for the church: If the church has not often found itself in the role of the oppressor, has it too often played the role of the innocent bystander? If it has not often been guilty of robbing and plundering, has it too often chosen to avoid getting involved in the lives of those who are hurting, choosing rather to pass by on the other side (Luke 10:25–37)?”
What it means for you
The temptation with this verse is to treat it as a correct answer — something to know rather than something to do. But the standard it sets is startlingly concrete. You already know how to love yourself: you feed yourself, forgive yourself, plan for your own future. The command is to let that same practical attention flow toward other people, including the ones it would be easier not to see.
A useful question to carry into an ordinary week: whose trouble am I currently walking past? Not causing — just avoiding. That is where this verse stops being a memory-verse and starts being a life.
Luke 10 in context
Luke 10 opens with Jesus sending out seventy followers to announce God's kingdom in the surrounding towns. When they return, a legal expert stands up to test Jesus, asking what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus turns the question back to him, and verse 27 is the lawyer's answer — which Jesus approves: do this and you will live. Wanting to justify himself, the lawyer asks who qualifies as a neighbor, prompting the parable of the Good Samaritan. The chapter closes in the home of Mary and Martha, where love for God takes the form of simply listening.