The Other & The Neighbor

"I do not share the common error of judging others by myself."

— Montaigne, Essays I, chapter XXXVII

"The Other," Everywhere and Nowhere

The inflation of the phrase "the other" has, for some, turned it into an unbearable slogan. They criticize it for its incantatory character and its slide into a political mantra, omnipresent in discourses on tolerance, diversity, interculturality, inclusion, and recognition.

For others, the expression has become completely detached from any narrative anchor. It no longer refers to a specific individual or group situated within a lived context but serves as a vague invocation of all forms of alterity. "The other" becomes an abstract category, a floating concept.
This generalization leads to an impoverishment: alterity is celebrated—but without difficulty, without confrontation, without the roughness that once marked real encounters with others.

Today, "the other" is no longer someone encountered but merely an idea of otherness. As a result, it is invoked in general slogans ("welcoming the other," "including the other") but almost never truly encountered in singularity.

Does the Notion of "Neighbor" Do Any Better?

At first glance, the notion of "neighbor" seems to escape the pitfall of abstraction that has engulfed "the other."
Where "the other" dissolves into an ethereal concept, celebrated in generalized slogans, "the neighbor" grounds alterity in tangible proximity: someone physically present, with a face, a history—sometimes with a disturbing roughness.

In the biblical tradition, the "neighbor" is not an idea but a concrete, unpredictable, often uncomfortable call to relationship.
The neighbor is not chosen; he happens—and therein lies his strength.

But does the notion truly fare better?
Does this proximity risk turning into a moralizing category, where we are obligated to "love" the person next to us without acknowledging tensions, rejections, or even potential violence?
Can the "neighbor" be made universal, or is it trapped within a specific religious or cultural framework?

If "the other" errs by abstraction, doesn't "the neighbor" sometimes come too close to allow for a broader ethical reflection?
In short: does replacing a floating concept with an embodied figure solve the problem—or simply shift the limits of how we relate to alterity?

The Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37)

The parable of the Good Samaritan addresses this tension.
The neighbor is not one we choose among our own; he appears where we least expect him, in the unexpectedness of encounter.
He is someone we see, touch, and lift up—not someone we celebrate from a distance.

Beautiful as this is, it is not quite what the parable says.
Jesus responds to the question "Who is my neighbor?" by telling the story of a wounded man, ignored by a priest and a Levite but aided by a Samaritan.
At the end, Jesus reframes the original question: "Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers?" (Luke 10:36).
The answer is clear: it is the Samaritan, the one who showed mercy, who became the neighbor.

Thus, the "neighbor" is not the other.
The "neighbor" is each one of us, every time we actively draw near to another.
The neighbor is an active posture—a choice to become close, even to a stranger or an enemy.
The Samaritan, a figure of the despised foreigner, becomes a model—but that is not the central point.

The issue is more radical:
it is not simply that "the other" and "the neighbor" evoke different imaginaries or implications;
it is that they do not overlap at all.

Serving the Other or Using the Other?

The other is not there to serve as a pretext for our goodness, nor to satisfy our need for self-justification.
Seeking the other as an opportunity to demonstrate our generosity still objectifies them—reducing them to a role serving our own image.

Paradoxically, focusing on ourselves—on our own relationship to the other—might be what truly allows the other to remain "other."
Not living oneself as the agent of a "good deed" may be a more just way of recognizing the presence of the other, without dissolving them into our own projections.

Back to the Starting Point? What Has "the Other" Gained?

Have we fallen back into the excessive use of the phrase "the other"?
Maybe—but something has shifted.
"The other" has regained a face: no longer an abstraction, but a person, identifiable and embodied.
And this face calls not primarily for a position or a moral stance, but for concrete action.
Not to talk about the other—but to act for them.

And this movement not only revives the figure of "the other" but also de-glosses the notion of "neighbor."
The command to "love your neighbor as yourself" has often been judged naive, unrealistic, even sugary.
Even within Christianity, many perform mental contortions to soften or reframe it—instead of trusting in the God who works in us more than we can imagine.
Otherwise, why constantly affirm that God is our strength?

The renewed notion of "the other" leads back to reality—to the recognition of the person.

In the Christian tradition, a person is not merely an individual, nor simply another to be welcomed;
they are a unique, irreducible being, carrying a dignity that does not depend on their actions or affiliations.
Recognizing a person means refusing—especially—to instrumentalize them for our own virtue or self-justification.

A Possible Convergence?

Perhaps a fruitful point of convergence is to be found here:
The dignity of the other is preserved not by treating them simply as "other," nor by assimilating them as "the same,"
but by recognizing their presence as a person.

And it is this very presence that grounds the call to act.

What About Difference?

It’s not so simple.
Another open question remains: What do we do with difference?
Should we erase it, exalt it, ignore it?

If we affirm that dignity rests solely on the presence of the person—independent of difference or resemblance—
we still face the reality that difference is never neutral.
The other resists.

Pretending difference does not exist would deny the real effort every true encounter demands.
Celebrating difference for its own sake would again separate it from the person, turning it into an abstract object of admiration.

Difference is neither essence nor obstacle:
It is the test of recognizing the person—what we are called to encounter through it, not against it.

But we must go further—or rather, return to the essential.

From Difference to Divine Image

From a Christian perspective, diversity itself is part of the imago Dei.
Humanity is created in the image of God—not in uniformity, but in the plurality of faces, languages, and stories.
The human person is upheld in their dignity not despite their difference, but through a diversity that reveals the richness of God's image.

Humanity as God's image is not the replication of two identical beings;
it is the summoning of multiple, singular existences—each called to manifest, in their own way, the presence of the Creator.

Thus, recognizing the other as a person means neither erasing their difference nor freezing it in place.
It is understanding that their very uniqueness participates in the greater mystery of the image of God.

It is through this unique, difference-marked presence that the call to act arises.

What Have We Missed?

Plenty, of course.
But in good Reformed theology, knowledge of humanity flows from knowledge of God—
and we must return to God.

And here again, it will discomfort those who bristle at the mantra of "otherness":
The true "Other" is first and foremost God—not just any other, but the wholly Other (ganz Andere), as Karl Barth names Him.

Not a distant abstraction, not an infinite difference, not a concept pushed to the extreme.
The wholly Other is also the God who comes near, who draws close, who reveals Himself in the person of Christ.

And perhaps that is where the heart of it all lies:
Not merely welcoming the other in their difference,
but allowing ourselves to be moved, unsettled, displaced—
by the One who is infinitely Other and yet becomes infinitely close