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JOHN 15:13 — KING JAMES VERSION 0
John 15:12John 15:14
“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”
No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends — this is the supreme expression of love: the willingness to die for those one cherishes. Jesus speaks prophetically of his own imminent death but also establishes the paradigm for all Christian love. To lay down one's life does not require literal martyrdom but does require the orientation of one's whole existence toward the welfare of others, the persistent willingness to sacrifice for the beloved.

Church Fathers on John 15:13

Having said, If you keep My commandments, you shall abide in My love, He shows what commandments they are to keep: This is My commandment, That you love one another.

Theophylact · 11th century

But when all our Lord’s sacred discourses are full of His commandments, why does He give this special commandment respecting love, if it is not that every commandment teaches love, and all precepts are one? Love and love only is the fulfillment of every thing that is enjoined. As all the boughs of a tree proceed from one root, so all the virtues are produced form one love: nor has the branch, i.e. the good work, any life, except it abide in the root of love.

Gregory the Great · 6th century

Where then love is, what can be wanting? Where it is not, what can profit? But this love is distinguished from men’s love to each other as men, by adding, As I have loved you. To what end did Christ love us, but that we should reign with Him? Let us therefore so love one another, as that our love be different from that of other men; who do not love one another, to the end that God may be loved, because they do not really love at all. They who love one another for the sake of…

Augustine · 4th century
Read all 19 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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John 15:13 — Community Reflections | HolyStudy