Jewish views on love

Judaism offers a variety of views regarding the love of God, love among human beings, and love for non-human animals. Love is a central value in Jewish ethics and Jewish theology.

One of the core commandments of Judaism is "Love your neighbor as yourself" (Leviticus 19:18), sometimes called the Great Commandment. This commandment stands at the center of the central book in the Torah. The Talmudic sages Hillel and Rabbi Akiva indicated that this is the central commandment of the Torah. The commandment emboldens individuals to treat each other as equals which requires first valuing oneself in order to be able to mirror that love onto others. Similarly, another significant commandment is to “not stand idly by your neighbor” (Leviticus 19:16), which can be exhibited in many forms. Some Jewish sources have emphasized the importance of self-sacrifice in regards to putting our needs second to another's, but Rabbi Akiva's teaching of "Your own life takes precedence to that of another," contradicts his own principle of loving thy neighbor as thyself.

This commandment of love, with the preceding sentence, "Thou shalt not avenge nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people," may originally have referred, and has by some scholars (Stade, "Gesch. des Volkes Israel," i. 510a) been exclusively referred, to the Israelitish neighbor; but in verse 34 of the same chapter it is extended to "the stranger that dwelleth with you . . . and thou shalt love him as thyself." In Job xxxi. 13–15 it is declared unjust to wrong the servant in his cause: "Did not he that made me in the womb make him? and did not one fashion us in the womb?"

Romantic love is included in the command to love one's neighbor, but romantic love per se is not a central topic in classical Jewish literature. Some medieval rabbinic authorities such as Judah Halevi wrote romantic poetry in Arabic, though some say that Halevi regretted his romantic poetry, which he wrote in his younger years.

Commenting upon the command to love the neighbor (Lev. l.c.) is a discussion recorded (Sifra, Ḳedoshim, iv.; compare Gen. R. xxiv. 5) between Rabbi Akiva, who declared this verse in Leviticus to contain the great principle of the Law ("Kelal gadol ba-Torah"), and Ben Azzai, who pointed to Gen. v. 1 ("This is the book of the generations of Adam; in the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him"), as the verse expressing the leading principle of the Law, obviously because the first verse gives to the term "neighbor" its unmistakable meaning as including all men as being sons of Adam, made in the image of God. Tanḥuma, in Genesis Rabbah l.c., explains it thus: "If thou despisest any man, thou despisest God who made man in His image."

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