Among all the commandments, one stands out as both simple and deeply perplexing:
the commandment to love.
Most mitzvot are concrete. They tell us to either perform a particular action or refrain from one. Love, however, is not an action. Love is emotional and personal.
The Torah explicitly commands love in three places( repeated in different forms elsewhere):
•“ You shall neither take revenge nor bear a grudge against members of your people; you shall love( v’ ahavta) your neighbor as yourself.”( Leviticus 19:18)
•“ The foreigner who resides with you shall be as a native among you, and you shall love( v’ ahavta) him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.”( Leviticus 19:34)
•“ You shall love the Lord( v’ ahavta) your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.”( Deuteronomy 6:5)
Nowhere are we commanded to love our parents or our children. Instead, we are commanded to love our neighbor, to love the stranger, and to love God.
What binds these three commandments together?
In Hebrew, the letter vav placed before a word can
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