CHRIST JESUS designated the second great commandment as, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself."
When endeavoring to obey this command, we should carefully examine the quality of the love that we are applying to ourselves, before we attempt to be obedient in regard to our neighbor. He would in no way benefit, should we extend to him the kind of love which most of us seem satisfied to lavish upon ourselves.
The words "love yourself" have for so long been misunderstood that loving oneself has been considered a mental habit to be shunned rather than cultivated. The error lies in a misconception of the self that the Scripture commands us to love. If we regard ourselves as an aggregation of human characteristics contained in a material body, we find that the material law of heredity or some such man-made decree controls the result, making it pleasing or otherwise. This concept shows how we still lack an understanding of man's real selfhood. Without this understanding we depend upon human personality. When our personality seems desirable, our physical appearance not unlovely, and our talents valuable in the world's eyes, then conceit, pride, and vanity try to masquerade as love of self. On the other hand, if the amount of good in our human makeup seems small to us, and we see ourselves undervalued by the world, we are likely to develop what is popularly called an "inferiority complex." Fear of another's censure often makes us assume an attitude of self-depreciation. This false sense of humility strives to disarm another's criticism by being the first to acknowledge the fault. Then our love of ourself resembles that defensive kind which a tigress manifests in protecting her helpless young. With these too prevalent counterfeits in thought it is plain why the individual aims to avoid even a semblance of loving himself, instead of seeking to fulfill the Scriptural command and thus benefit both his neighbor and himself.
