Deuteronomy 6:4

The point then for the Jew was the one true God… He was the only God. To what were they always inclined? Setting up other gods in the wilderness. So this is the solemn and central truth brought in here… God revealed it as the great truth that works in practice, pressed on Israel again and again — their one true God.

"Jehovah, our Elohim is one Jehovah" — that is how the name of God is used in this verse. The verse states that the name Jehovah (the Self-existing One) belongs to Him alone. He is the one who is God in the full sense. It stands as the testimony against the polytheism (many and different gods) of the nations that surrounded Israel on every side. And so, because He is the one God, and there is no other beside Him, He must be loved with all the heart, with all the soul, with all the might. Spirit, soul and body must be devoted to Him. And we know this Jehovah as our Redeemer, who came and died in our place.

Here we are given that great, basic truth which the nation of Israel had a special duty to hold fast and confess: the unity of the Godhead… As long as they kept it, they were a happy, prosperous, fruitful people. But when they let it go, all was gone. It was their great national defence, and the thing that marked them off from all the nations of the east.

This was the great central truth that Moses, the lawgiver, pressed on Israel. Every other truth circled around it. There could be only one object of love, this one Jehovah, to whom every affection should flow (v. 5). And there could be only one object of worship and service (v. 13) — the words our Lord used when He answered Satan.

Orthodox Jews have made much of this verse, and they hold it in deep reverence. They call it the "Shema" after the first word, "Hear." Jews and Unitarians often use it to deny the three persons of the Godhead. But the Hebrew word "echod" (one) rules out that denial forever, because it means a compound unity. Hebrew has another word for what those who reject the three persons in the Godhead believe. It is the word "yochid", and it means a single one.

With this in mind, the verse reads like this: "Hear O Israel: The LORD [Jehovah, singular] our God [Elohim, plural] is one LORD [Jehovah, singular]." Here is a striking statement of the Oneness of God. Yet along with it, equal care is taken to point clearly and unmistakably to the truth of the Holy Trinity.

When he asks which is the first commandment, he clearly means the one that is first in importance. The Lord's answer comes from Deuteronomy 6:5. But notice how vital the first words here are: "Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God is one Lord." This is the basis of all obedience on man's part. If people do not confess the unity of the Godhead, the very spirit of obedience is missing. This agrees with the words of the Lord Jesus, "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30).

Did Israel not fail completely to keep, confess and live out the truth of the unity of the Godhead? And did their failure touch that glorious truth in the smallest degree? There were as many idol altars as there were streets in Jerusalem. Was it not still just as true that there is one God… as on the day Moses proclaimed to the whole assembly those majestic words, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord"? Blessed be God, His truth does not depend on the faithless, foolish ways of men.