What does John 15:12 Mean?
Written by Tyler S. Fulcher | New Testament
The Four Doctors of the Western Church, Saint Augustine of Hippo (354–430) - Gerard Seghers (1591-1651)
When Jesus issues a command, we should listen. In John 15:12, Jesus told his disciples, “This is my command, that you love one another just as I loved you.”
We know that John considered this command extremely important. He records Jesus issuing it on two separate occasions: here and in John 13:34. We also find a variation of it in 1 John 3:16-17.
In John 13:34, Jesus illustrated his love for his disciples by washing their feet, even the feet of Judas who would betray him. Though the disciples did not know he would die for them (and us), Jesus knew the wheels were already in motion and the hour of his death was drawing closer.
About the author
Tyler S. Fulcher writes about the Bible, Theology, and Church History. He is a biblical scholar based in Springfield, MO. Click here to contact.
When he repeats the command in John 15:12, he explains what it means by stating “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13 NRSV).
For love to be truly Christian, it must imitate Christ. It must be self-sacrificial.
Writing in the late 4th or early 5th century, Saint Augustine observed a curious difference between John 13:34 and John 15:12.
See if you can notice it:
John 13:34 (NRSV) “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you. . .”
John 15:12 (NRSV) “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.”
In John 13:34, Jesus describes it as “a new” commandment. In John 15:12, he simply describes it as “my commandment.”
It’s easy to brush past tiny differences like this in the Bible and assume they are stylistic variations. But Christian interpretation (and Jewish as well) has always seen significance in these slight changes.
Augustine understands Jesus in John 15:12 to mean that the command to love one another as Christ has loved us is the singular command of Christianity.
He asks, “But when He said in this way here, ‘This is my commandment,’ as if there were none else, what are we to think, my brethren? Is, then, the commandment about that love, wherewith we love one another, His only one?”1
Augustine suggests that obeying this one command from Jesus will necessarily mean that we obey every other command. If we love one another in the self-sacrificial way that Christ has loved us, we need not worry about all the other commandments because we will naturally find ourselves keeping them.
Perhaps this is why Jesus said, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35 NRSV).
1 Augustine of Hippo, “Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel according to St. John,” in St. Augustin: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. John Gibb and James Innes, vol. 7 of A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1888), 349.
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