The question is: love is not something a person can just decide about something.
Certain things are given in an object or person, and based on them one will love it or not. He can’t decide whether he loves or not.
Therefore a person cannot decide that he loves God.

So the question he asked was: why did God command us to love Him?
Either you love Him or you don’t.

I’ve seen this kind of misunderstanding several times already, and in my opinion the Rabbi doesn’t see the titles of the questions. It’s worth writing the full question in the body of the question.

It seems to me that he saw it perfectly well, but expected a more orderly presentation of the point of difficulty. Is it because love is an emotion (as distinct from belief), or because love is a state and not an instruction to perform an act (in which case one could also ask about the commandment to believe)? And after all, Maimonides’ words are well known: what is the path to loving and fearing Him? When a person contemplates His deeds and His wondrous creations, etc. (and similarly some explain regarding faith / belief that the commandment is to exert oneself to find supports for belief). You can command an action, and you can command a state, and then you understand that you need to do actions in order to reach it. Only with opinions is there really a problem in commanding.

Go to a couples counselor and say, “I’ve stopped loving my wife.” He’ll give you a few simple tips on how to reawaken love.

And besides, for Rabbi Michi’s view, see Column 22, 142, 259. And here: https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%A9%D7%9E%D7%A2%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%90%D7%A4%D7%9C%D7%98%D7%95%D7%A0%D7%99%D7%AA-%D7%9C%D7%A8%D7%92%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%AA-%D7%91%D7%94%D7%9C%D7%9B%D7%94#_ftnref2

Please be precise. The Torah says: “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.”

And immediately afterward comes the explanation:
“And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart” = “And these words that I command you today shall be upon your heart.”
“And with all your soul” = “And you shall teach them diligently to your children, and you shall speak of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk on the way, and when you lie down and when you rise.”
“And with all your might” = “And you shall bind them as a sign upon your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. And you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

Posek, in the section “And it shall come to pass, if you surely listen,” it says “with all your heart and with all your soul” without “with all your might,” and it still says there to bind them as a sign on the hand and to write them on the doorposts of the house.

In the section “And it shall come to pass, if you surely listen,” the matter of “and to serve Him” is mentioned.
A commandment to serve God with all your might would lead to idolatry.

Later on the meaning of love of God is again explained explicitly: “to love the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, and to cleave to Him.”

What? You’re saying that binding on the hand is an elaboration of loving with all your might. In the section “And it shall come to pass, if you surely listen,” there is binding on the hand and “love” (or “service”) with all your might is not mentioned. If because it says “to serve Him,” the Torah didn’t want to say “with all your might” because maybe that would lead to idolatry (not that I understood this made-up idea, yes, but let’s grant it) — then the Torah is welcome to say, “and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul, and to love Him with all your might.” It’s obvious that binding on the hand is not an elaboration of loving with all your might. There is no commandment to pull interpretations out of your sleeve.

But later it does say: “And you shall place these My words upon your heart and upon your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign upon your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes.”

That is the elaboration and the parallel to “your might,” written in different words.

“Your heart” means in the inner things within you, “your soul” means in your souls (family), “your might” means in your possessions. And from here comes the concern about idolatry.

Maimonides wrote in chapter 2 of the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah:

“This honored and awe-inspiring God, it is a commandment to love and fear Him, as it says, ‘And you shall love the Lord your God,’ and it says, ‘The Lord your God shall you fear.’

And what is the path to loving and fearing Him? When a person contemplates His deeds and His great and wondrous creations, and sees from them His great wisdom, which has no comparison and no end, immediately he loves and praises and glorifies, and longs with a great longing to know the great Name, as David said: ‘My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.’

And when he reflects on these very matters, he immediately recoils and is afraid and trembles, and knows that he is a small, lowly, dark creature, standing with slight and meager understanding before the Perfect Knower, as David said: ‘When I behold Your heavens… what is man that You are mindful of him?’”

You’re squeezing yourself into rock crevices for no reason at all. The reasonable approach is that if the detail appears (“and you shall bind them”) without the general term (“your might”), then apparently it is not actually an elaboration of that general term and there is no connection between them, and therefore in the “And you shall love” section too there is no connection.
As for the concern about idolatry, you know perfectly well that this is not the Torah’s only commandment to serve God with physical objects. We bring the Holy One, blessed be He, offerings and meal-offerings and first-fruits, and we build Him a Temple with a menorah of pure gold inside it, and we separate tithes — so the Torah is afraid to add a vague sentence about serving the Holy One, blessed be He, with all your might because it might cause a slide into idolatry, against explicit verses that explain not to worship idols? And the fact that right afterward it would explain it and say, “I only meant binding something on the hand” — that wouldn’t remove the concern? That is an especially over-creviced crevice.
Besides, the interpretation that “with all your might” means “with all your wealth” (possessions) is really not the plain meaning of the verse at all. “With all your might” is a literary intensifier like “with all your heart” and like “with all your soul” — serve as much as possible, very very much, with all the “muchness” you can muster. And from the standpoint of plain-sense interpretation there is no reason to think there are three separate expressions here (heart, soul, might) that are elaborated into three separate commandments; rather, it is one general expression of intensification that generates various details. Personally, I think the attempt by later commentators (since Malbim) to pour special meaning into every word and look for patterns under the floor tiles is forced and artificial, and its main purpose in the world is to provide material for lazy preachers at wedding celebrations.

This is a pointless argument. You do not understand the Torah.
All the commandments of the sacrifices and all the rituals of putting on tefillin, and how one ties them and from what leather and what the order of the passages is — all of these contain an element of the idolatry that human beings need. The Torah aims at the essence of things, and human beings busy themselves with the rituals of things. Golden calf.

Keep enjoying your literary intensifications and golden calves.

It is explained by one of the commentators: “Hear, O Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord is one — and you shall love.”

That is, when you understand that God is one and cannot be compared to anyone, then you will arrive at love of God.

With God’s help, 23 Tevet 5781

The consciousness that “the Lord is one,” which internalizes the Creator’s infinite greatness, leads more to a feeling of human insignificance, to fear and self-nullification.

Love comes more from the paradoxical feeling that in the very place of God’s greatness, where everything is as nothing before Him, “there is His humility” — that He is “the Lord our God,” guiding us in the ways of truth and goodness of His Torah and watching over us in order to benefit us in all our ways.

Our gratitude to God, who shepherds us and cares for us, is what internalizes and strengthens our love for Him.

With blessings, Simcha Fish"l Halevi Plankton

With God’s help, 23 Tevet 5781

“Me’od” denotes great abundance. According to this, one could say that “with all your might” means with all the abundance and plenty that the Lord your God has granted you. “Your heart and your soul” — a person has only one heart and one soul; for his very existence he must acknowledge the good of his God.

But beyond his very life and intellect, a person receives from his God abundance and blessing in various areas. Some are blessed with talents and abilities, some with material success, some with spiritual success, some with a loving family, and some with a supportive society.

Therefore, beyond your very existence — “your soul” — and beyond your very being a rational person — “your heart” — you must acknowledge the good of your God for all the abundance He has granted you, for your material, spiritual, familial, and social acquisitions.

This may be the depth of the Sages’ exposition that “with all your might” means “with all your wealth,” since the term “your might” can be broadened to include all kinds of your possessions.

With blessings, Yaron Tzemach Fish"l-Plankton

Even the events that pass over a person, his pleasurable experiences and his “challenging” experiences — they are part of a person’s “acquisitions of spirit,” and therefore they too can be considered his “might.”

With God’s help, 24 Tevet 5781 (the anniversary of the passing of the Rabbi, author of the Tanya)

The author of the Tanya writes in chapter 43:
“Now in love too there are two levels: great love and everlasting love. ‘Great love’ is love in delights, and it is a flame that rises of itself and comes from above to one who is complete in fear… But ‘everlasting love’ is love that comes from understanding and knowledge of the greatness of God…”

Another direction can be learned from the fact that the blessing “Everlasting Love” / “Great Love” precedes the recitation of the Shema, in which we were commanded regarding love of God — another path thus emerges for cultivating love of God. The understanding that God chose us from all the nations and “adopted” us to be “My firstborn son,” and gave us His precious instrument, His Torah, which sanctifies and elevates us and guides us to cling to goodness and truth, and even to influence the whole world with that goodness — reflecting on this great privilege with which our Creator has privileged us brings us to return love to Him.

With blessings, Yaron Fish"l Ordner

Similar to what I suggested (in paragraph 2), that love of the Torah brings a person to love of the Giver of the Torah, Maimonides writes in the Book of Commandments, positive commandment 4:

“That we should contemplate and reflect on His commandments, His charges, and His actions, in order that we may apprehend Him; and that apprehension of Him is the ultimate delight. This is the love that was commanded. And the language of the Sifre is: ‘Since it says: “And you shall love the Lord your God,” do I know how one is to love the Omnipresent? Therefore Scripture says: “And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart,” for through this you come to recognize the One who spoke and the world came into being.’”

A common denominator can be found between the path outlined by Maimonides in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah — to arrive at love of God through contemplation of the wonders of creation — and the path Maimonides suggests in the Book of Commandments, to contemplate God’s commandments and the ways of His governance as explained in the Torah. In both paths, a person encounters the goodness and wisdom of his God, and this recognition brings him to love the source of goodness, truth, and wisdom.

With blessings, Yafa"or

Paragraph 1, line 2
… in the Book of Commandments (positive commandment 4)

Paragraph 3, line 3
… in God’s commandments and in the ways of His governance