It is mandatory upon every man to love each and every one of Israel even as he loves his own self, for it is said: "But thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself" (Lev. 19.19.). One is therefore, obliged to speak in praise of his neighbor, and to be considerate of his money, even as he is considerate of his own money, or desires to preserve his own honor. "But whosoever glorifies himself in disgracing his neighbor has no share in the world to come" (Yerushalmi, Hegigah. 2.1). The love for the proselyte, who came and embraced the protection beneath the wings of the Shekinah, rests upon two mandatory commandments, one because he is included in the commandment concerning a neighbor, and the other because he is a stranger, and the Torah charged us, saying: "Love ye therefore the stranger" (Deut. 10.19.). He commanded on the love for the stranger as He commanded concerning the love for Himself, saying: "And thou shalt love the Lord thy God" (Ibid. 6.5.). The Holy One, blessed is He! loves the strangers Himself, even as it is said: "And (He) loveth the stranger" (Ibid. 10.18).

(1) The commandment of loving the strangers (converts): That we were commanded to love the converts, meaning to say that we be careful not to cause them pain in any thing, but [rather to] do them good and grant them kindness according to what is proper and is possible. And converts are anyone who connects with us from the other nations, that leaves his religion and enters into our religion. And about them is it stated (Deuteronomy 10:19), "And you shall love the stranger, etc." And even though the commandment (Sefer HaChinukh 243) about the Israelite includes him, as it is stated about him (Leviticus 19:18), "and you shall love your neighbor as yourself" - since behold, a righteous convert is included in "your neighbor" - God added for us a specific commandment about his love. And so too is the thing in the prevention against cheating him. As even though he was included in "A man shall not wrong his countryman" (Leviticus 25:17, Sefer HaChinukh 338), Scripture added a specific prevention about him in its stating, "You shall not wrong a stranger" (Exodus 22:20, Sefer HaChinukh 23). And they said in the Gemara (Bava Metzia 59b) that one who wrongs the convert transgresses because of "[A man] shall not wrong" and because of "You shall not wrong a stranger." And so too [with this], he nullifies the commandment of "and you shall love your neighbor" and the commandment of "And you shall love the stranger."

(2) It is from the roots of the commandment that God chose Israel to be a holy nation and wanted to give them merit. And therefore He guided them and commanded them about the ways of grace and compassion and warned them to crown themselves with every beautiful and precious trait to find grace in the eyes of all who see them, [such] that they will say, "These are the people of the Lord" (Ezekiel 36:20). And it is so much the way of pleasantnesses and beauty to show kindness and to grant good to one who leaves his people and all the family of the house of his father and mother and comes to take shelter under the wings of a different nation in his love for it, and in his choosing of truth and his hatred for falsehood. And in our meriting these good traits, the goodness of God will rest upon us and cling to us, and nothing will prevent us from it; as the good will extend to the good ones and the opposite to the bad ones.

(3) From the laws of the commandment - that which they, may their memory be blessed, said (Bava Metzia 58b) that a person not say to a convert, "Remember your early deeds"; that which they said (Sanhedrin 94a), that a person not disgrace an 'Aramean' in the presence of a convert until the tenth generation, and all of this is not to cause him pain in any regard; the intensification of love that they focused upon them to the point that they said that Scripture equated their love with the love of the Omnipresent, as with them it states, "And you shall love," and with the love of the Omnipresent, "And you shall love, etc.," and that is as I have written in the Order of Mishpatim about the commandment to not oppress the convert, even with words (Sefer HaChinukh 63); and the rest of its details - are in the Midrash and in [various] places in the Gemara (see Mishneh Torah, Laws of Human Dispositions 6).

(4) And this commandment is practiced in every place and at all times by males and females. And one who transgresses it and causes them pain or is negligent in saving them or saving their money, or treats their honor lightly due to their being converts and not having a helper in the nation, has violated this positive commandment; and his punishment is very great, as behold, the Torah has warned about them in several places. And we should learn from this precious commandment to have mercy on a man who is in a city that is not the land of his birth and the place of the family of his fathers. And we should not pass him by on the road when we find him alone and that his helpers are far from him, since we find that the Torah warns us to have mercy on anyone who needs help. And with these traits, we will merit to receive mercy from God, may He be blessed, and the blessings of Heaven will rest upon our heads. And Scripture hints to the reason of the command when it states, "since you were strangers in the Land of Egypt": It mentions to us that we were previously burnt by this great pain that there is to every man who sees himself among foreign people and in a foreign land. And upon our remembering the great worry of the heart that there is in the matter, and that it already passed over us and that God, in His kindnesses, took us out of there, our mercies for any person like this will overwhelm [us].