The Parable of the Good Samaritan

"Love your neighbor as yourself" was part of the Old Testament law (Leviticus 19:18). But the Jewish teachers had often interpreted "neighbor" to include only people of their own nationality and religion. The expert in the law was looking to Jesus for justification for that interpretation, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" In response, Jesus told His famous Parable of the Good Samaritan.

Samaria was a region of central Palestine that was once the capital of Israel. The Assyrians captured Samaria in 721 B.C. They deported many of the inhabitants and replaced them with foreign colonists (2 Kings 17:24-33). The colonists were pagans who eventually intermarried with the remaining Jews. They adopted the religion of Israel, but they also continued to worship their pagan idols. The Jews considered the Samaritans to be religious heretics of a foreign nationality and inferior race. The Samaritans offered to help rebuild the Jewish temple, but their offer was rudely rebuffed (Ezra 4:1-3). Finally the Samaritans built a rival temple on Mt. Gerizim and proclaimed it, rather than the Jewish temple, to be the true house of God. By the time of Jesus, the Jews and Samaritans had hated each other for hundreds of years.

With that background, it is easy to understand that there was no one that the Jewish expert in the law would have considered to be less of a "neighbor" than a Samaritan. If a Samaritan man could be a "neighbor" to the Jewish man who was robbed and beaten, then the definition of "neighbor" would have to include all people of the world.

In this parable, Jesus tells us that anyone in need is our neighbor, regardless of race, religion, nationality or any other artificial distinction.