Matthew 5

Opening Summary (5:1-2).



‘Blessed ones, the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingly Rule of Heaven.’

‘Blessed ones, the poor in spirit.’ This certainly includes the thought that they are ‘happy’ and ‘enjoying spiritual fullness’ and blessed because of the future benefits that they will enjoy, but that is not at the heart of its meaning. Rather His emphasis is that they are that because of what God has done in them. Its central meaning is that they are ‘poor in spirit’ because they have been actively and positively blessed by God. They have been worked on by the Holy Spirit (see Psa 143:7with 1:0 ). They have been given a new heart and a new spirit (Eze 36:26 ). It means that they are like this because God has worked within them to make them humble within, and that that is why they are as they are.

The use of the passive verb without an obvious reference is regularly a way in Jesus’ teaching of indicating God as the subject. It is typical of Jesus’ teaching. It was a method used by the apocalyptists, and also later used by the Rabbis. And here Jesus is using the adjective makarios (with the verb assumed) in the same way. He is saying ‘blessed indeed by God are those whom He has made poor in spirit in the right way, so that as a result of that poverty of spirit they have come to listen to Me and to respond to My words in order that they might enjoy ultimate blessing. How glad they should be that they have not been hindered from it by wealth or arrogance or the cares of life, and all this is because God has blessed them and worked in their lives and made them poor in spirit’.

This word ‘poor’ basically indicates the destitute. But in the Old Testament it regularly refers to the godly who recognise their own desperate spiritual need. It became a synonym for the godly in Israel. And we therefore regularly have to determine from the context whether the literal poor or the ‘poor in spirit’ are in mind (see for example Psa 22:24 where ‘the poor’ refers to the Psalmist, and it is a Psalm of David).

Luke expresses similar words as being spoken by Jesus directly to His listeners. ‘Blessed are you poor’ (Luk 6:20 ) he depicts Jesus as saying, and he compares it with, ‘Alas for you rich’. At first this appears to be saying something different, as though He was saying that it was a blessing to be very poor, but in fact He is not. For the ‘you’ is what makes the difference. It is only those poor in front of Him, poor though they may be, who are said to be blessed, and they are seen to be blessed precisely because they are the responsive poor. They are here in Jesus’ presence because they recognise the poverty of their lives and are looking for something better. They have thus been chosen by God to be rich in faith and heirs of the Kingly Rule which He has promised to those who love Him (Jas 2:5 ). On the other hand the rich onlookers, who were probably observing Him either out of disdainful interest or in order to decide what to do about Him, came under His ‘Alas’ or ‘Woe’ (Luk 6:24-26 ). So the reason that the poor were blessed was not because they were poor, but because they were there with their hearts open for Him to speak to them, and were open to God’s working on their lives. Jesus is not saying that God had blessed the poor who were not there. They still struggled on in poverty without help. Thus it was only His listeners who in this case should look on themselves as favoured.

We should in this regard consider that among those whom He is addressing, are Peter and Andrew, James and John. While they have left all and followed Him, their background is not one of total poverty, and should they wish to they can go back to their boats, and their businesses (Joh 21:3 compare Mat 4:21 ; Mar 1:20 ). They are not thus the helplessly poor and destitute. They are the willing poor, the poor by choice. And they are that way because they have been blessed by God within, because they had not suffered the distraction of great riches.

In view of Luke’s use of ‘poor’, which can mean ‘actually physically poor’, at least to some degree, some have suggested that we should perhaps translate Mat 5:3 as ‘blessed in spirit are the poor’ with the emphasis on the fact that Jesus is speaking of the poor and that the poor are more likely to find blessing in spirit because their minds are not taken up with riches and ambition. But that is to miss the dynamic behind the phrase, which is indicating the positive blessing of God. It would in fact have been foolish to say that all the poor everywhere are blessed in spirit. They are not. But it was a very different matter to say it of those who, as a result of God’s blessing, were there to listen to Him.

So in neither Matthew nor Luke is there the idea that poverty itself is a blessing. Jesus’ idea is not that it is a blessing to be poor, except in so far as it is those who are less rich who tend to think more on spiritual things, and will therefore, if they respond to Him because of it, as these have who are before Him, come into blessedness. Nor is He speaking of those living in abject poverty, (although the word can mean the very poor), as though somehow that was a wonderful thing to be. Nothing was further from Jesus’ mind. His whole concentration is on the particular ones whom God has blessed, and what the result has been in their attitude towards life. Show me the person who is humbled and lowly and contrite and hungry after God and merciful and seeking to be pure in heart and desirous of making men’s peace with God and I will show you a person whom God has blessed. It will be a person who was dwelling in darkness but on whom the light has shone (Mat 4:16 ). He will have repented and come under the Kingly Rule of Heaven, and will have been drenched with the Holy Spirit.

The world, and the Pharisees, tended to think that it was the rich who were blessed by God, but Jesus did not see material ‘blessings’ as a blessing. He was only too aware of what wealth could do to a man’s soul. He knew that in such people ‘the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches and the desire for other things choked the word and it became unfruitful’ (Mar 4:19 ). For such people’s minds were fixed on other things than the things of God. They had too many distractions. That is why Jesus did not see the rich young man as blessed. He was indeed far from blessed. He went away sorrowful because he had great possessions. While he was rich, he was really ‘poor, and still in need of mercy, and wretched, and blind and naked’ (Rev 3:17 ). That is why even today Jesus has many lip-followers whose satisfaction with their affluent lifestyles prevents them from a true living commitment. They call Him ‘Lord, Lord’ but do not do what He says (Mat 7:21 ). They should take note of the fact that Jesus said that there is sadly no place for them in the Kingly Rule of Heaven (it was Jesus Who said it, not us). They have not been blessed, otherwise the thoughts of their hearts would be different. But they can be blessed. Let them but respond to Him truly and they will be blessed, and will become like those described here.

Thus we must interpret Matthew here as signifying mainly poverty ‘of spirit’ (see Pro 29:23 ). This does not mean poor-spirited (although some might be that for a while) but those of whom Jesus is speaking who have a sense of lowliness, who are not bumptious or overbearing, but who rather are aware of spiritual need, and of the fact of their total undeserving. They admit that without Him they can do nothing really worth while and lasting. And this change of heart is because of God’s work within them. It may be that being poor helped them to come to this position. But it is certainly not a position enjoyed by all who are poor.

A similar phrase, ‘poor in spirit’, was found at Qumran which supports this interpretation. There it signified a helplessness and lowliness of spirit which was looking for God to step in and help them, because they could do nothing of themselves (although in a different context). So the whole point in Luke is that their hearts (whether rich or poor) have not been prevented by riches from coming to Him, while in Matthew we may see it as similar to its meaning at Qumran. Indeed the Psalmists regularly spoke of ‘the poor’ when they were indicating the humble and lowly, possibly because most of such were to be found among the relatively poor in contrast with the godless rich (see Psa 34:6 ; Psa 37:14 ; Psa 40:17 ; Psa 69:28-29 ; Psa 69:32-33 ; Isa 61:1 ). Such people may in the end be seen as summed up in the words of Isa 57:15 ; Isa 66:2 ; Psa 51:17 . They are those who are of a contrite and humble spirit who tremble at His word.

The idea of the godly poor thus becomes synonymous with the righteous, while the ungodly rich become synonymous with the unrighteous. Compare Psa 37:14 where ‘the poor and needy’ are paralleled with ‘the upright in the way’. This is something later exemplified in the Dead Sea Scrolls (for example the War Scroll parallels ‘the poor in spirit’ with ‘the perfect of way’ (War Scroll 1:4 ), and says of them ‘you will kindle the downcast of spirit and they will be a flaming torch in the straw to consume ungodliness and never to cease until iniquity is destroyed’ (the War Scroll 1:1 )). But the final attitude of those mentioned in the Dead Sea Scrolls was not the same as the one that Jesus was encouraging, for they wanted nothing less than to destroy their enemies and put the ungodly to rout. However, the initial idea of poverty of spirit was similar, even though it had a very different outcome.

But with all this emphasis on ‘the poor’ it is quite clear in the end that not all the poor are actually righteous, nor are all the rich actually unrighteous. For as Jesus declared in the context of the failure of the rich young man, God can work miracles in all (Mat 19:26 ). God is merciful to all who call on Him from a true heart.

‘For theirs is the Kingly Rule of Heaven.’ To them (hoi ptowchoi) ‘belongs’ the Kingly Rule of Heaven. That is, they have entered under His Rule now, and they will also enjoy it now, and also in the everlasting future. We may here bear in mind Psa 22:28 where the Psalmist declares ‘of YHWH is the Kingly Rule (Psalm 21:29 LXX tou kuriou he basileia), and He reigns over the nations’, and this in a context where He has ‘not despised the affliction of the poor’ (Psa 22:24 , Psa 22:25 LXX ptowchou), where ‘the poor’ is the Psalmist, and it is a Psalm of David. Thus it is to the poor (ptowchoi) in spirit that the Kingly Rule of Heaven belongs.

Almost the whole of Judaism was waiting and longing for this ‘Kingly Rule of God’ to be manifested on earth (although in a totally distorted way) but it was these few who were poor in spirit who were to receive it and enjoy it. For God had purposed His Kingly Rule and eternal life for those whom He had purposed to bless, those whom He will draw to His Son (Joh 6:44 ). And the reason that the Kingly Rule of God is now seen to be theirs is because they are now responding to Jesus and following Him (see Joh 10:27-28 ). They have put themselves under His kingly rule. Their awareness of their spiritual need and their lack of concern for worldly goods (they were willing to leave all and follow Him) is the consequence of their having turned their thoughts towards Him, and they have submitted to His Reign over their lives. Notice the present tense, which contrasts with the future tenses that follow, thus stressing its ‘presentness’. ‘Theirs is the Kingly Rule of Heaven’. It is something that they enjoy even now. For the Kingly Rule of God is within them and among them (Luk 17:21 ). They are pressing into it and refusing to take no for an answer (Mat 11:12 ). But it is also a permanent present. It signifies that the Kingly Rule of God will also be theirs in the future, when they will enter into the everlasting Kingdom, for that is in the end simply a continuation of His Kingly Rule on earth (see Isa 11:4 ; Isa 42:4 ). Thus those who have been blessed by God, and are His, enjoy both present and future blessedness.



‘Blessed ones, those who mourn, for they will be comforted.’

This is not saying that it is good to be in mourning because the result will be that someone is sure to comfort us. It rather has in mind Isaiah 4:0 (‘comfort, comfort, my people’) where the people of God were mourning over their sin, and God promised that finally He would come to them and encourage and strengthen them, and lift them up. He would take them in His arms like a shepherd and would ‘comfort’ them (Isa 40:11 ). In the same way the Anointed Prophet will come ‘to comfort (encourage, strengthen, establish) all who mourn’ (Isa 61:2 ) and to give them ‘the oil of joy for mourning’ (Isa 61:3 ), words which Jesus must surely have in mind here. These mourners, then, are those who are looking for ‘the consolation’ at the hand of the Lord of what are at present a downtrodden remnant who represent the true Israel (Luk 2:25 ). They are discovering that ‘the Lord is near to those who are broken-hearted and who are contrite in spirit’ (Psa 34:18 ; compare Psa 51:17 ; Isa 57:1 ; Isa 66:2 ). And they have been brought into that blessed state by God so that through it they may be freed from their sins and brought through to enjoying the sustaining presence of God, which was a position that must now with God’s encouragement and strength (‘comfort’) be constantly maintained. And the result is that both now and in the future life they will continue to be ‘comforted’ and made strong (see Isa 49:15 ).

We may include here also the thought found in Psa 119:136 , ‘My eyes shed streams of tears because men do not keep your Law’. Here the mourning is of a godly sort caused by the fact that other men and women do not love God’s Law. Those who are His are always constrained in this way. Nothing grieves them more than the failure of men and women to respond to and love God’s word. It is the result of the Psalmist himself having become contrite in spirit. For further Old Testament examples of mourning over sin see Ezr 10:6 ; Psa 51:4 ; Eze 9:4 ; Dan 9:19-20 .

Thus the idea here is that those who are disturbed about their sinfulness, and about the sinfulness of others, to such an extent that it has caused them to mourn over it and seek Jesus, are like this because they have been truly blessed by God, and the result is that they will have found in Him the encouragement and strength that they need. They are thus seen to have truly repented. And they will therefore also enjoy His Great Comfort, both now and in the Last Day (Isa 40:1 ; Isa 49:13 ; Isa 51:3 ; Isa 51:12-13 etc.).

So we are here already seeing the kind of people who make up Jesus’ disciples. They are humble and lowly, and aware of sin. And they have recognised in Jesus the One Who has come to save His people from their sins (Mat 1:21 ). And that is why they are seen as being those who have been blessed by God.



‘Blessed ones, the meek (lowly of heart), for they will inherit the earth.’

The ‘meek’ are those who take the buffetings of life and do not rebel against them overmuch. They accept them from the hand of God. They do not get riled up at them. They are not always seeking revenge. They accept what life brings. They do not allow themselves to be upset over things that they can do nothing about. They do not throw their weight about. They concentrate on what does matter. They are ‘meek and lowly in heart’ like Jesus was (Mat 11:29 ). Thus the word could be used to describe an animal which responded to its reins.

And yet like Him ‘the meek’ are strong for what is right. For they are bold in testimony. When necessary they speak out against sin. But even in boldness of testimony they remember Whose they are (1Pe 3:15 ). They respond to His reins. That is why in 1Pe 3:4 Peter speaks of, ‘the hidden man of the heart in the envelope/clothing of a meek and quiet spirit which is in the sight of God of great price’.

In Psa 69:32 ‘the meek’ are paralleled with those ‘who seek after God’. Their ‘meekness’ (Godlike humility) does not mean that they let people walk all over them. But it does indicate they are not always thinking of themselves and their own rights. Rather they think more about others and about God. They are exemplified in Mat 5:44-48 .

The words here are actually cited from Psa 37:11 , where we are told that such people will ‘inherit the earth’, in contrast with those who ‘will be no more’ (Psa 37:10-11 ). In the context in the Psalm the idea behind this is of a wholesome and prosperous life, enjoying the earth’s benefits, in contrast with the sudden doom of ‘the wicked’ (the ungodly). The latter may not happen immediately but God sees that the day of the wicked is coming (Psa 37:13 ), while the righteous know that their heritage will abide for ever (Psa 37:18 ). So the meek, the godly, those who are responsive to God, will find that they prosper in their life on earth and that things on earth will be good to them, at least spiritually (Mat 19:28-29 ; Mar 10:29-30 ). And in the end they will finally inherit the new earth in which dwells righteousness (2Pe 3:13 ; Isa 65:17 ), the new earth in which is based the eternal Kingdom.

But this could not possibly have been said of all meek people. For it is totally untrue to say that all who are meek will ‘inherit the earth’. Many of them will in fact be ground into it, even though it may sometimes be true that very often the meek will survive when the strong have destroyed each other. But the Psalmist is rather speaking of those who are like this because of their response to God. God has blessed them and made them meek, and it is because they are the blessed ones of God that they will ‘inherit the earth’, both in terms of enjoyment in this earth, and, in the final consummation, in the new earth.

A very good example of true meekness was Moses. He was ‘meek above all men who were on the face of the earth’ (Num 12:3 ). But that did not mean that he was a soft option. What it meant was that he never fought his own cause or considered his own interests. He was wholly out for the Lord. When people attacked his own interests he left it in the Lord’s hands. But how different it was when people attacked the Lord’s interests. Then his stregth was supreme, but always in obedience to what the Lord told him to do. And indeed the one time when he did give way to his own urgings he forfeited the right to enter the promised land with his people, because he had disgraced the Lord in front of them (Num 20:12 ).



‘Blessed ones, those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they will be filled.’

We must here first consider what hunger and thirst in these terms signify. It must be remembered that these words were spoken to people, many of whom could only afford at the most one good meal containing meat a week, if that. And what they had then had to be shared with the whole family, while during the remainder of the week they subsisted on what they could afford, which was often very little. Hunger was what happened when even that failed. So they regularly knew what real hunger meant. For some it was a constant experience.

Furthermore many of them constantly knew what it was to be out working in the hot sun and be some distance away from water, meanwhile having to carry on until the opportunity came to struggle through the heat of the sun to find a well, which might well contain little water, which they would share between them. Thus for them being what we would call really thirsty and panting for water was a regular experience. And even in the good times they knew what it meant to have to depend on water from a distant spring and having to share any available water collected with their families and friends. But that was everyday experience. They would not think of it as thirst. Thirst came when they were caught in a sandstorm in the wilderness, having to wait, kneeling down with their faces covered and their backs to the wind, until the storm died down, sipping any water that they carried and then having to survive until they could find more, with their lips cracked and dried, their throats parched, and their thirst constantly growing worse and worse.

So they regularly knew what real hunger and thirst meant. To them it was not just a matter of feeling a little peckish and a bit parched, but of real hunger and thirst. And this was what they would think of here, a craving and desire which had to be satisfied.

‘After righteousness.’ Verbs of hungering and thirsting are usually followed by the Genitive indicating the desire for a part. The use of the accusative here signifies the whole rather than a part. Thus the idea here is of seeking total righteousness.

In its central place in the chiasmus, this beatitude sums up all the others. And it is the speaking of the ones who are genuinely ‘hungry and thirsty for full righteousness’. They long for it and they crave it. And because of this, and because it is what God has worked within them, they will all be filled. For they had been made aware of their lack of righteousness, and they have repented, and they are aware that Jesus has brought them forgiveness, and so now they are hungry and thirsty have more of it and to be more like Him (Psa 42:2 ; Psa 63:1 ; Isa 41:17-20 ; Isa 55:1-2 ), and the promise is made that they will finally be ‘satisfied’, their hunger and thirst will be satiated, and they will have all that they need.

Basically they had been made aware of their sin and spiritual need, and in their hunger and thirst they had turned to look to the source of their salvation, to Jesus Christ (compare Mat 1:21 ; Joh 4:10-14 ), Who had saved them from their sins. They had been made righteous in Him (2Co 5:21 ). And this had now given them an even greater hunger for righteousness. They ‘seek first the Kingly Rule of God and His righteousness’ (Mat 6:33 ). That is their great desire. And so they now look for that work which God has begun in them to continue until they are themselves fully righteous in practise in the sight of God, until God wholly approves of them, until they are unblameable before Him. They want His Kingly Rule to be made real in their lives. So nothing is more important to them than to seek His righteousness, and to be like Him (1Jn 3:2 ). And they do this because God has blessed them, and given them this hunger and thirst, and because they are confident that He will continue to bless them. How different these people are from modern man’s picture of the ideal man, confident, overbearing, selfish, and spiritually bankrupt, or even the self-righteous. But these latter are hardly likely to be blessed.

We should note here that in Isaiah, ‘righteousness’ regularly equates with vindication and deliverance. It is active righteousness, God’s righteousness in action. Through the work of the Anointed Prophet His new people are to be given a garland of rejoicing ,the oil of joy and the garment of praise and this in order that they might be called ‘trees of righteousness’, (as a result of) the planting of the Lord, so that He might be glorified (Isa 61:3 ). Thus they will be able to say, ‘He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness’ (Isa 61:10 ), indicating by this that He has not only accepted them as righteous, but has been acting on them to make them righteous. The idea in both cases is that God has acted in righteous deliverance, so that, by His action, His righteousness, will not only revealed but will also surround them and be imparted to them, with the result that their own resultant righteousness, will be revealed. For when the skies open He will pour down righteousness as the rain (compare the drenching in the Holy Spirit - Mat 3:11 ) and the earth will produce deliverance (Isa 45:8 ). And Isa 44:1-5 demonstrates that this very much has in mind spiritual blessing.

And again He says, ‘I bring near My righteousness --- and My salvation will not delay, and I will place salvation in Zion for Israel My glory’ (Isa 46:13 ; see also Isa 51:5 ; Isa 51:8 ; Isa 56:1 ). Here again God’s work within them is in mind. So when God brings near His righteousness to those who are hungry and thirsty after righteousness, they will enjoy His deliverance and salvation, while the Mighty Warrior, ‘the Redeemer Who will come to Zion and to those who turn from transgression (repent) in Jacob’, will also be upheld by salvation and righteousness, and He will wear righteousness as a breastplate and the helmet of salvation on His head (Isa 59:16-17 ; Isa 59:20 ). The idea in all this is that the Righteous One, through His Redeemer, will act in righteous power producing righteousness and salvation in His people. This is the righteousness for which those blessed by God will be hungering and thirsting.

And along with a personal desire for righteousness we may see here the thought of their longing for the deliverance and vindication of all God’s true people, something which is to be revealed as a result of His powerful activity. They long for God’s salvation to come about in themselves and in all His people, as they long for the Messianic deliverance. They look for the establishment of righteousness under God’s King (Isa 11:1-4 ) and Servant (Isa 42:1-4 ). This combination of personal aspiration and corporate hope is a full part of the Gospel. The individual is important, but the individual is also part of a larger body of which he or she is a member. Each is the Temple of the Holy Spirit (1Co 6:19 ), and yet so are the whole body (2Co 6:16 ). And it is the presence of the Holy Spirit that will produce righteousness.

‘They will be filled.’ The word indicates that their hunger and thirst will be fully satisfied. They will enjoy something of His righteousness even now in all its aspects as He moves in saving power among them, but in the end they will be even more fully vindicated, being made fully righteous, and enjoying righteousness to the full when they are presented holy, and unblameable and unreproveable before Him. They will in the end gorge on true righteousness, enjoying to the uttermost extent the righteousness of God in Jesus, both imputed and imparted, and sovereignly exercised on them as in Isaiah. And they will not just enjoy it as individuals, they will enjoy it as part of God’s true people. They will see God’s purposes come to their full consummation with themselves being a full part of it. God’s King (Isa 11:1-4 ) and Servant (Isa 42:1-4 ) will have been finally established in righteousness and justice, and His people will all be one in it together with Him.

So while the emphasis in the first three beatitudes is on men’s attitude towards God because God has blessed them, and on God’s resulting response to them, although it would certainly be an attitude that made them responsive to their neighbour, now in this fourth beatitude the full significance of His righteousness and salvation on behalf of His people has been made known. And then finally in the last three beatitudes Jesus will turn His thoughts more specifically towards their attitude towards others. For they must love both God and their neighbour. In these beatitudes they reveal something of what is in the heart of God.



‘Blessed ones, the merciful, for they will obtain mercy.’

Not only does God make men lowly of heart and contrite, but He also blesses them by making them merciful, so that in return they can find mercy from Him. Such people as have been described will inevitably be merciful because God has been at work in them. They will thus forgive others because they have been forgiven (Mat 6:12 ; Mat 6:14-15 ; Mat 18:33 ). That is why Jesus could point out that those who would not forgive could not be forgiven. For it was evidence that they had not been made merciful. The merciful will have compassion on the weak, and give strength to the needy, because they are aware of their own need (Mat 9:13 ; Mat 12:7 ). They will not be over-judgmental and yet will always be ready to humbly help their brothers and sisters (Mat 7:1-6 ; Mat 12:7 ). They are meek at heart, so they will not exert their rights to the detriment of others (Mat 5:38-39 ). And the result is that they will obtain mercy from God and will have God’s forgiveness now, and mercy in the Last Day (Psa 100:5 ; Psa 103:17 ; Isa 54:8 ). ‘They will obtain mercy’. That is, God will be merciful to them. They will bask in His abundant mercy. For God is the abundantly merciful (Exo 20:6 ; Exo 34:7 ; Num 14:18 ; Deu 4:31 ; Psa 18:25 ; Psa 103:8 ; Psa 103:17 ; Psalms 13:6 all; Isa 49:10 ; Isa 49:13 ; Isa 54:8 ; Isa 54:10 ; Isa 60:10 ; Zec 10:6 )

The idea of mercy is seen as important in both wisdom literature (Pro 3:3 ; Pro 11:17 ; Pro 14:21-22 ; Pro 14:31 ; Pro 17:5 ; Pro 20:28 ; Pro 21:21 ) and the prophets (Isa 57:1 ; Hos 4:1 ; Hos 6:6 ; Hos 12:6 ; Mic 6:8 ; Zec 7:9 ). Mercy and truth are not to forsake men (Pro 3:3 ) and the merciful man does himself good (Pro 11:17 ), so that those who are glad at calamity will not go unpunished (Pro 17:5 ). Mercy, along with truth, even preserves the king, for his throne is upheld by mercy (Pro 20:28 ). And men must especially show mercy to the poor (Pro 14:21 ; Pro 14:31 ). In Isa 57:1 the righteous are paralleled with the merciful. And when there is no mercy in the land (along with truth and the knowledge of God) God has a controversy with His people (Hos 4:1 ), for God desires mercy and a knowledge of God rather than offerings and sacrifices (Hos 6:6 ). Indeed to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with God is God’s prime requirement for man (Mic 6:8 ), while in the exercising of justice, mercy and compassion must always be present (Zec 7:9 ). Thus mercy is at the very centre of God’s requirements for His people, and it was partly the lack of this that angered Jesus about the Scribes and Pharisees (Mat 9:13 ; Mat 12:7 ; Mat 23:23 ). It was the sin that finally showed them up for what they were.



‘Blessed ones, the pure in heart, for they will see God.’

Those whom God has blessed will also be pure in heart. Central to the thought here is Psalms 2:4 . The ones who would ascend the hill of the Lord and stand in His holy place must have ‘clean hands and a pure heart’ (Psa 24:4 ). Then they will not ascend in vain. And this involves among other things not having one’s thoughts fixed on vain and useless things, nor on dishonesty and deceit (Psa 24:5 ). The pure of heart have their hearts fixed on God and are open and honest. None can therefore say that they have been truly blessed by God if there has not come into them a yearning for such purity of heart, for without it they cannot approach God. It is the upright and righteous who can behold His face (Psa 11:7 ; Psa 17:15 ). If men and women have no desire for purity of heart it is thus clear that God has withheld His blessing.

And this purity of heart results in a singleness of mind and purpose, and a rejection of all that is impure and false. The ones whom God has so blessed may still be sorely troubled by impurity of thought, but their greater desire will now be to be freed from it. They will hate impurity. For the pure in heart are those whose eyes are fixed on God and on what is good. Their eye is single (see Mat 6:22 ; Jas 4:8 ) and their heart is pure, and this purity of heart will result in equanimity of spirit. They set their hearts on whatever is true, honourable, right, pure, lovely or gracious (Php 4:8 ). They do not lift up their souls to what is false, or engage in lies (Psa 24:4 ). They are not envious of others (Psa 73:1 ). They do not allow their eyes to stray (Mat 5:28 ). They rather turn their eyes and their hearts away from anything that displeases God. And thus their vision will be clear and they will see God in their hearts, ‘seeing Him Who is invisible’ (Heb 11:27 ), and one day will see Him as He really is (1Jn 3:2 ; Rev 22:4 ; Psa 17:15 ).

Moses speaks of it as resulting from ‘the circumcision of the heart’ which removes men’s stubbornness and enables them to love the Lord with their whole being (Deu 10:16 ; Deu 30:6 ). The hardness is cut away from their hearts leaving ‘a heart of flesh’ (Eze 36:26 , compare Isa 44:1-5 ; Jer 31:33-34 ). They have thus become new creations (2Co 5:17 ). And that is what has been the experience of those disciples who have responded to God in repentance (Mat 4:17 ) and are here with the genuine intention of listening to Jesus. They have been blessed by God with purity of heart, and thus with a singleness of mind that is also pure. And it provides them with a spiritual check up before the final application in the remainder of the Sermon. If they fail here they need go no further.



‘Blessed ones, the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.’

The final description in the list is of those who seek to make peace, because they have been blessed by God. God has worked within them and given them peace, contentment and wellbeing (shalom) and so they seek in the right way to reconcile people with each other and to calm troubled waters. They are peacemakers. Their great desire is that of establishing harmony among men and women by dealing with the problems that lie between them. They are to ‘seek peace and pursue it’ (Psa 34:14 ; 1Pe 3:11 ). They are to seek to fulfil Paul’s dictum, ‘If it be possible, as much as lies in you, be at peace with all men’ (Rom 12:18 ). Such a suggestion would not have been seen as good news by many Galileans. They had a reputation as turbulent rebels. They hated the Romans and took every opportunity to hit back at them. For it to be suggested that they should be peacemakers would thus have riled them beyond bearing. But it was an essential part of Jesus’ message. He was here as the Prince of Peace.

And He wanted to remove from His disciples any idea that He might be here to make war. He wanted them to see that He had come to reconcile men to God, not to set them at each other’s throats. Although having said that He was a realist. And so He also later warned them that His coming would spark off dissension and hatred (Mat 10:34-36 ), it would set people at the throats of Christians. But that was not to be the result of the activity of the blessed, and was not in mind here. That would come about through the unblessed. At this point He was laying a foundation of peacemaking.

But even greater than the desire to make peace between men should be the desire of those whom God has blessed to bring harmony between men and God. They should love their enemies (Mat 5:44 ). They should long that all men and women might find peace with God. For this is in the end what making peace and producing wellbeing is all about. In Old Testament terms to proclaim peace is to declare the Good News of salvation (Isa 52:7 ). It is to seek to bring men to God. It is therefore to proclaim the coming of the Servant of the Lord (Isa 52:13 to Isa 53:12 ) and Prophet (Isa 61:1-2 ). For there can be no real permanent peace without reconciliation to God. Thus they do not try to suggest that such peace is available without repentance, saying ‘peace, peace, where there is no peace’ (Jer 6:14 ; Jer 8:11 ), because they know that that would be foolish. For above all they want to bring men and women into a peace with God that is true and genuine. So they proclaim only what is true, even when that does not satisfy others. It is not peace at any price.

Such people then walk in peace and at peace, while proclaiming the whole truth. Their feet are shod with the shoes of the Good News of peace (Eph 6:15 ). And they follow the Prince of Peace and His ways (Isa 9:6 ), and require that others do also. They seek to bring men and women into the Kingly Rule of God, so making peace. They seek to break down the walls of partition between men by bringing them to Christ (Eph 2:14 ). And by this they thus reveal themselves as true sons of God, in that they are behaving like God, and like His Son, the Prince of Peace (Isa 9:6 ). Thus here the term ‘sons of God’ would seem largely to indicate those who are declared as sharing the same aims and purposes as God, and as behaving as He does (compare Mat 5:45 ).

We thus see here an attitude completely contrary to that at Qumran. There all hope was for the war that would drive out their enemies and establish God’s people (themselves). They exulted in the idea. Their idea was peace for themselves and destruction for their enemy. But Jesus’ attitude is revealed as the very opposite of that. His people were to seek to make peace, both between God and man, and between man and man, applying it in the end to all men who would respond. And in general it would not be a very popular idea.

But where do we find the idea of ‘sons of God’ in the Old Testament, other, that is, than the bene elohim (the ‘sons of the elohim (God’) who are angels? And why should the term be specifically connected with peacemakers?

One place in the Old Testament where Israel are seen as the son of God is found in Exo 4:22 , where Israel is depicted as His firstborn son, something which is in mind in Hos 11:1 , which is in turn cited in Mat 2:15 . But there the thought is of the singular ‘son’. Israel was there God’s corporate son. So if Jesus had had Exodus 4 in mind He could have used the singular ‘son’. On the other hand there are other places where Israel are described in terms of being His sons. The idea is, for example, found in Deu 14:1 , ‘you are the children (LXX - ‘sons) of YHWH your God’, where it is an argument used for showing why they should not do undesirable things. A similar use is found in Hos 1:10 (compare 2Co 6:18 ) where the restored of Israel will be called ‘sons of the living God’ because they have been restored and are to be abundantly blessed in numbers as a result of their restoration to God, a verse which, in 2 Corinthians, is connected with their being set apart as pure and separated to God. All these examples demonstrate that the term ‘sons of God’ denotes a people of especial holiness and purity, and this might well be seen as going along with being peacemakers.

But the place where ‘a son’ is connected with peace making is in Isa 9:6 . There the Son who is to be born will be the Prince of Peace. So Jesus’ point here may well be that those who are like the Son in being peacemakers will themselves be seen to be true ‘sons of God’, enjoying their sonship through Him (see Gal 4:4-7 ; Rom 8:9-17 ). And they will thus be identified as God’s sons in the everlasting Kingdom. (Compare Hos 1:10 which is spoken of the restoration of those who had previously gone astray).

We may thus summarise the seven beatitudes as indicating the attitude wrought in men by God as a result of His work in their hearts, an attitude required by Jesus to be continued in His disciples (and us). And this work that God has brought about in them is so that they will continue to be like this, and enjoy the present blessedness and future rewards that will certainly be theirs. They describe what His disciples have become through repentance and entry into the Kingly Rule of Heaven, and give them something by which they can measure the genuineness of their own salvation. And the result will be that as they keep their minds fixed on things above they will become more and more like this, with God more and more working in their hearts to will and to do of His good pleasure (Php 2:13 ), and as a result they will be truly blessed, both in the present and in the eternal Kingdom. And all this is in the light of what God has done within them through the Holy Spirit at work through Jesus (Mat 3:11 ) and because Jesus is saving them from their sins (Mat 1:21 ).



“Blessed ones, those who have been persecuted for righteousness’ sake,

For theirs is the Kingly Rule of Heaven.”

Here those who are blessed by God ‘have been persecuted for righteousness’ sake’. This can hardly refer to His current disciples, for they are hardly yet in a position to have faced any real level of persecution. And if it had been meant to refer to them, why the change of tense? Thus the blessed ones spoken of are in the past, which is confirmed by the introduction of the present listeners in Mat 5:11 . For John, who is specifically said to have ‘come in the way of righteousness’ (Mat 21:32 ), had certainly been persecuted ‘for righteousness’ sake’, and we may see it as very probable that some of his faithful disciples had suffered with him in one way or another. They would not have sat idly by while he was hauled off to prison, and they may well have been roughly handled when they visited him, as very bravely they continued to do (Mat 11:2 ). And they may also have come in for mistreatment in the synagogues as well, in the same way as Jesus’ disciples would later. So Jesus may here be pointing His disciples in that direction as an example.

The past tense may, however, also be seen as including the prophets (who are specifically referred to in Mat 5:12 ) and others who in the past have suffered ‘for righteousness’ sake’. There were in fact no lack of heroes of the faith in the past (Heb 11:35-38 ). And that such would enjoy the Kingly Rule of Heaven is implicit in Mat 8:11 where Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are also seen as enjoying it. If this is so then this reference to the persecution of others in the past is a timely warning to His disciples of what they too can expect (see Mat 10:17-23 ), and an assurance that the saints of the past will not lose out, any more than they will. (It also confirms the exclusion of this beatitude from the original list of beatitudes). And the whole point is that these things happened to God’s blessed ones in the past, with the consequence being their enjoyment of His Kingly Rule. This is then ample confirmation that His present blessed ones will experience the same.

The persecution of the prophets is a clear theme in 2Ch 36:16 , see also 1Ki 19:10 ; 1Ki 19:14 ; Neh 9:26 ; Jer 2:30 , so that Jesus was by no means the first to draw attention to it (Mat 21:34-36 ; Mat 23:29-31 ; Mat 23:35 ). Indeed, as He points out, the persecutors drew attention to it themselves (Mat 23:30 ). Jesus is thus aligning His present disciples with the past, as part together of all God’s purposes through history.



‘Blessed ones are you when men shall reproach you, and persecute you,

And say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.’

The switch here to the second person confirms that the previous verse is referring back to the past. His God-blessed disciples are now to recognise that they too will be reproached, persecuted and calumniated in the same way as the saints of the past. In the end people will have little good to say about them also. And in their case it will not just be for righteousness’ sake, it will be for His sake. Theirs is the greater privilege. Furthermore the use of ‘for My sake’ confirms that the listeners are genuine disciples. Only genuine disciples could suffer ‘for His sake’. They will be fine while they are not treading on people’s toes, but once what they say becomes personal to the people in question, or begins to touch on sensitive ideas, antagonism will soon arise. Godly persons very often do find it difficult to understand how anyone can treat them in this way when all they are doing is taking to men and women the most wonderful message known to men, but it will in fact not be long, if their testimony is true, before they find that it is so. For they will be disturbing the consciences of men and women, and the almost automatic result will be retaliation and persecution and insults. People do not like their consciences being disturbed.

But when disciples are so treated ‘for His sake’ they can take comfort in the fact that it indicates that they are those who have been blessed by God, and that they are truly His.

‘Reproach you, and persecute you, and say all manner of evil against you falsely.’ Note the small chiasmus. Persecution is central as being the most virulent, but is surrounded on each side by their being the subject of virulent words. It does, however, also follow a pattern, first the reproaches, then the persecution, and finally the calumniation of their names to the world as their reputations are destroyed.

‘Falsely’ is omitted in some manuscripts, such as D, most Old Latin witnesses and the Sinaitic Syriac version, and also in Tertullian. But the weight of the evidence is for inclusion. It was probably omitted because the copyist could not accept that the disciples might behave falsely. It does bring out to us that it is important that we ensure that we do not deserve any calumniations. It is not blessed to be persecuted for merely being awkward.



‘Rejoice, and be extremely glad,

For great is your reward in Heaven,

For so persecuted they the prophets who were before you.’

And when persecution happens they should rejoice. Indeed they should be deliriously happy. For it will indicate that they are deserving people, and it will mean that their reward in Heaven will be great. To them will belong the Kingly Rule of Heaven which has been given to the persecuted ones of Mat 5:10 . Eternal blessedness will be theirs. For such treatment will put them into the same category as the great prophets of the past. For the prophets too were persecuted by the fathers of these people in the same way as they will shortly be. This last statement parallels that in Mat 5:10 . Those prophets were ‘blessed ones’ as well.

Here then Jesus’ current disciples are paralleled with the prophets. They are presumably indeed to see themselves as prophetic men. Theirs is to be the privilege of carrying on in the train of the prophets, and indeed, because of their present position in the Kingly Rule of God, to be at present of an even higher status than they (Mat 11:11 ).

And here He stops, on a high note with no jarring thought of false prophets. But later He will add a warning. He will introduce the thought that they must take heed to themselves. For towards the end of Jesus’ message the contrast will be brought out of false prophets. Sadly they too will arise. And they will be known by their fruits (Mat 7:15-23 ). It will then be brought out that it was important therefore that His disciples recognise the danger of becoming false prophets. They were to ensure that if they were persecuted and insulted it was for the right reason. They must look to the fruit that will be borne in their lives in the doing of the will of Jesus’ Father in Heaven (Mat 7:21 ). By ensuring that they do His will, they will then ensure that they remain as true prophets. However, this is not part of Jesus’ message yet. At present He is speaking with positive confidence in His disciples, and showing them what kind of people they are and must be. For their present status demonstrates that they have been truly blessed by God.

‘Your reward in Heaven.’ That is, ‘your reward stored up for you by God’. This is another example of the desire to avoid using God’s name more than necessary. The point is that no one will lose out, however much they are called on to suffer.



“You are the salt of the earth,

But if the salt have lost its savour,

With what will it be salted?

It is from then on good for nothing,

But to be cast out and trodden under foot of men.”

‘You are the salt of the earth.’ While these salts were sometimes used as fertiliser they were not very effective as such, and that idea is probably not intended here. The meaning rather is that the disciples are like salt among the people of the world, and the thought of its uniqueness is in mind. There is no replacement for salt. In the same way His disciples were to recognise that they too were unique in the world (as Christians also ought to be, but for the right reasons, not because of peculiarities of behaviour). Salt was famed for its preservative qualities, and for making things palatable. It prevented corruption advancing so quickly, and brought out what was good in food. And it thus both kept things edible and made them enjoyable. It could also be used as a cleansing agent (Exo 30:35 ; 2Ki 2:19-22 ; Eze 16:4 ). In the same way the disciples, behaving in the way described in Mat 5:3-9 , will slow down the corruption in the world, and make the world itself a better place by the effects of their example and their teaching, slowing down the spread of corruption, making the world a more tasty place by transforming many of those who are within it, and having a continuing purifying effect.

Note the ‘YOU are’ (the ‘you’ is emphatic). This was spoken to His disciples, not the general run of people. It refers to the same ones as were to be persecuted and reviled for Jesus’ sake (Mat 5:11 ). The emphasis may be as a contrast to those who would revile them, or it may simply be a positive assessment of them in contrast to the rest of the world. We should note in passing that they are not told to ‘become salt’. That has already been done for them by God. They are rather to reveal the saltiness that God has put within them.

Salt was also used by the Rabbis as a symbol of wisdom (see Col 4:6 ). This may explain the use above of the Greek verb ‘become foolish’ which probably translates the Aramaic ‘tapel’. This was closely associated with ‘tabel’ which indicates to lose taste and may disguise a typical play on words of a type that Jesus loved. This then reveals the disciples as also being the source of the true wisdom in the world. They are being trained up by Jesus in order to be the world’s source of true wisdom. How sad then if they cease to do His will and become foolish.

But what if through neglect the salt lose its savour? Then it will be useless. It will cease to have any effect and will become fit only to be thrown out onto the streets, to be treated with the contempt that it deserves. This is looking back to His previous indication that the disciples are replacing the prophets, and is introducing the warning of the danger of becoming false prophets, which will be developed in more detail towards the end (Mat 7:15-23 ). It is therefore at this stage a warning to be careful how they behave, and how they learn and teach.

‘With what will it be salted?’ There is no way of restoring saltiness to the mass of chemicals that the dissolving of the sodium chloride (salt) has left behind. In the same way once His disciples have lost their way they will find it very difficult to get back to what they were (but thank God not impossible, for at that point there is a difference. We are dealing with God’s ability to restore. God can ‘make it again’ (Jer 18:4 ). But this must not be presumed upon). All they can then hope for is to be tossed out for the rubbish collector to collect, meanwhile being trodden over by heedless men and women.

‘It is from then on good for nothing.’ Once men have lost the salt of a truly godly life they may witness all they like, but they will achieve nothing lasting.

‘Trodden under the foot of men.’ The phrase indicates disdain and contempt, or, even worse, being totally ignored. Once the church is ignored it is a sign that it has lost its savour. The picture is probably that of being tossed out as rubbish into the streets, to be later collected by the rubbish collectors, but meanwhile walked over by all. It has. however, been pointed out that such salts were used in strengthening the flat roofs of houses, with the result that people would then trample it under foot. But this is probably becoming too sophisticated.

Jesus regularly uses the illustration of salt, and it would simply be being pedantic to suggest that they must all have been said at the same time just because of the mention of salt. Consider Mar 9:50 ; Luk 14:34-35 ; see also Mar 4:21 ; Luk 8:16 ; Luk 11:33 . But there is little real parallel and no reason for therefore suggesting that they are the same saying taken up and used in a different context. The picture was such a useful one that He must literally have used it scores of times in different ways. The unfortunate impression given by some scholars, in their eagerness to discern what Jesus might actually have said, which results in their trying to find a core in a number of sayings, is that Jesus simply went around making inane comments, and all the interesting expansions came from the later interpreters, who were all moral geniuses.



“You are the light of the world.

A city set on a hill cannot be hid.

Nor do men light a lamp, and put it under the bushel measure, but on the stand,

And it shines to all who are in the house.

Even so let your light shine before men,

That they may see your good works,

And glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

“You are the light of the world.” As we have seen the idea comes from the fact that Jesus Himself has come as a light into the world (Mat 4:16 ; compare Joh 8:12 ). And the purpose of that light is to reveal God, and what He is like, to men on earth. God is in Heaven and they are on the earth. Thus if men who are on the earth are to see God, it must be in Christ and in His people as they live out their lives on earth. ‘The world’ may not here have the same wide significance as in Mat 28:19 . But it contains the seeds of that idea. There may have indeed already have been in Jesus’ and Matthew’s minds the thought of the Servant as the light of the nations (Isa 42:6 ; Isa 49:6 ; compare Mat 12:18-21 ).

But the words that probably lie at the root of Jesus’ idea here are those of Isa 60:3 where Israel’s light is to shine out because the glory of God has come upon them (they have been ‘blessed’ as in Mat 5:3-9 ) in order that they might shine out of darkness and be a light to the nations. This would link in with the idea of glorifying God in the last phrase of the verse, and with the recognition that they are now the new congregation of Israel (Mat 16:18 ; Mat 21:43 ).

Note how this first assumes that the world is in darkness. That is constantly the theme of Scripture (Psa 82:5 ; Psa 107:14 ; Pro 4:19 ; Isa 9:2 ; Isa 42:16 ; Isa 49:9 ; Luk 1:79 ; Joh 1:5 ; Joh 3:19 ; Joh 8:12 ; Joh 12:46 ; Act 26:18 ; Eph 4:18 ; Eph 5:8 ). And it then declares that in His true people God has brought light out of darkness because they have come in contact with the Light of the world (Mat 4:16 ; Joh 8:12 ; compare also Act 13:47 ; Act 26:18 ; Eph 5:8 ).

“A city set on a hill cannot be hid.” Jesus’ idea is that the city has been set there by God, just as He has now set the disciples in the world as His witnesses. But that does not exclude the idea that men do set their cities on hills so that they can be admired. With its white houses any city set on a hill would glisten in the sun by day, and at night the lamps shining in the houses would draw attention to its presence. It thus could not be hid either by day or by night. And because His disciples have been given a prominent position, they also cannot be hid. This is bringing home the inevitability of their position. It is the inevitable position for all true Christians, a privilege given to them by God. And cities set on hills and made visible are vulnerable to attack. They will be ‘persecuted’.

This likening of the true people of God to a city is later taken up in Revelation where the heavenly people of God are seen in terms of the new Jerusalem, with its foundation laid on the Apostles. A city as one entity with large numbers of inhabitants is a good picture of the one body with its many members. There may have been a hint here in Jesus’ words of how this tiny group of disciples will grow in numbers until they become like a populous city.

“Nor do men light a lamp, and put it under the bushel measure, but on the stand.” Furthermore when men light a terracotta oil lamp in their homes it is in order that it may shine out. They do not put a corn measure over it. (Note that as with an attempt to hide the city, the idea would be ridiculous). Rather they put it on a stand or table where it can give light to all. So would it be foolish for the disciples (and us) not to let their lights shine out before men by what they are, how they behave, and what they say. For that is now their very purpose for being in the world. This general idea was used often by Jesus with interesting variations on the theme (see Mar 4:21 ; Luk 8:16 ; Luk 11:33 ).

“And it shines to all who are in the house.” The aim must be that everyone will benefit (compare Php 2:15 ).

“Even so let your light shine before men.” The illustration is now made specific. They are the light whose light is to shine out into the world before men. If they are faithful as the lamp of God they cannot help but shine, and through their lives, as well as with their lips, they will thus give testimony to Jesus.

“That they may see your good (kalos) works.” Compare here Mat 11:4-5 ; Act 2:22 . Jesus would do great works. And the disciples would do similar works of power. But the people of God in general are to be zealous of more ordinary ‘good works’ because they are God’s own possession (Tit 2:14 ), and good works are regularly urged on God’s people throughout the New Testament. ‘Kalos’ means good in the sense of being attractive. They are not to be works that are thrust on people who do not want them. The Sermon will later amplify on these good works which in the end signify the doing of the will of His Father Who is in Heaven (Mat 7:21 ).

Note that what they are and how they behave is pre-eminent. If the people of God, and especially the preacher, are not behaving well the preacher preaches in vain. Their good living and positive actions for the good of others must be visible to all, not because they thrust them in front of their noses like the Pharisees and Gentiles do (Mat 6:2 ; Mat 6:5 ; Mat 6:7 ; Mat 6:16 ), but because their good works so abound that they cannot help but be seen. They should not want to be seen of men, they should want God to be seen of men. It is these good works above all else, discreetly and lovingly carried out, that convince the world of the truth about Jesus.

“And glorify your Father who is in Heaven.” And their sole aim in all this is to be in order that men may glorify the Father of the disciples Who is in Heaven. This is the first mention of God as being their Father, but it will occur regularly through the Sermon. Note, however, that the first mention speaks of their responsibility to their Father. It is because they acknowledge their responsibility to bring glory to Him that they can later be seen as relying on His provision for them. Note also that He is the Father of the disciples, not of those who see their good works. The pronoun is specific. There is a general sense in which God is the Father of all men by creation, but in the sense used in the Sermon on the Mount He is the Father only of disciples of Jesus, those who are seeking to be true sons of their Father (Mat 5:9 ; Mat 5:45 ) because of the blessing that He has worked on their lives.

Note how ‘your Father in Heaven’ contrasts with the ‘light of the world’. Their Father is in Heaven. The only way that men will see Him is if they see Him in us. For we are in the world. If our light shines brightly in what we are and how we behave (without any ostentation), men will become aware of Him and will glorify Him.

And now, the basis of discipleship having been sorted out, we can move on to the detail. For as we now come to the main body of the Sermon it is on the basis of the fact that we recognise that the working of God in His disciples in Mat 5:3-9 has resulted in the effectiveness of their ministry to the world in Mat 5:13-16 . Had they simply perfected personal holiness in secret they might not have been persecuted, it was when they began to affect the world around them (Mat 5:13-16 ), and make the world feel guilty, that the world began to react and hit back (Mat 5:10-12 ). The world did not want to be shaken out of its apathy, and would resent it. What follows will now bring out more fully what their ‘good works’ are to be, and will reveal the way in which they are to be truly a light in the world.



“Do not think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets,

I came not to destroy, but to fulfil.

This dramatic statement can be viewed in a number of ways (although the list is by no means exhaustive).

As an emphatic statement, stressed by a denying of the negative, that His coming into the world was in order in Himself to totally fulfil all that was pointed to by both the Law and the Prophets (Mat 1:23 ; Mat 2:15 ; Mat 2:23 ; Mat 4:15 ; Mat 8:17 ; Mat 12:17-21 ). Thus by it Jesus is seen as saying precisely what Matthew is declaring in his Gospel, that He has come as the fulfilment of all that the Scriptures have looked forward to (see Mat 10:34-36 ; Mat 11:3-5 ; Mat 12:40 ; Mat 16:21 ; Mat 20:28 ; Mat 21:42 ; Mat 22:42-45 ; Mat 26:24 ; Mat 26:54 ; Mat 26:56 ; and for example Luk 10:23-24 ; Luk 22:37 ; Luk 24:27 ; Joh 5:45-46 ). His is a building up not a pulling down.

As a statement that He has come to fulfil all that was demanded by the Law and the Prophets in order to prepare Himself to be the perfect sacrifice without blemish (1Pe 1:19 ), and/or in order that He might be the fully ‘innocent’ One Who was fit to die on behalf of the guilty (Mat 20:28 ; Mat 26:28 ; see Isa 53:9 and compare 1Pe 2:22 .)

As a general statement of His attitude to the Law and the Prophets, prior to considering it in some detail in what follows, so that no one might be in any doubt of His support for and commitment to, the Law and the Prophets. The first part of His statement being thus seen as a negative which is intended to underline the second part. (‘Far from coming to destroy the Law, He is saying, I have come to fulfil it’).

As an introductory statement to what is to follow, as He moves on to explain what being a light to the world will involve, the contrast not suggesting that anyone has said otherwise, but simply being in order to doubly emphasise that His purpose in coming was for the purpose of bringing about the fulfilment of the Law and the Prophets in the way in which He will now speak of them, and not to set them aside, even though at first glance it might seem that He is doing otherwise.

As a general warning, which was not specifically connected with what has gone before, that they were not to take what He was about to say in Mat 5:21 onwards as an attempt to destroy the Law, but rather as a means of seeking to achieve its fulfilment

As indicating that by describing His disciples as the light of the world He is not suggesting for one moment that the Law and the Prophets are not also be seen as the light of the world as believed by many Jews (consider Psa 19:8 ; Psa 43:3 ; Psa 119:105 ; Psa 119:130 ; Pro 6:23 ; Isa 8:20 ), and assuring them and others that it is actually by following the light of the Law in the light of their new experience of God that they will themselves be the light of the world. Thus Jesus may be seen as assuring them that He is not by His previous description of His disciples annulling the Law. Indeed, as He will go on to point out, He wants all to know that He requires them to treat the Law so seriously that they embrace every last bit of it.

As combating suggestions that had arisen, or might arise, that He was seeking to destroy the Law of Moses and the prophetic interpretations of it. For in attacking the oral Law built up by the Scribes around the Law of Moses He would certainly be seen by some as doing precisely that very thing, because of the sacredness in which they held their traditions (Mat 15:2-3 ). Thus Jesus may here be seen as wanting His disciples, and all who heard Him, to recognise that in spite of His attitude towards ‘the tradition of the elders’, which He considered did actually make void the Law (Mar 7:13 ), He was not Himself here seeking to destroy the Law of Moses itself but to honour it. Indeed that He had come to ‘fill it full’ by bringing out its full meaning.

We do not necessarily have to select just one of the above. Jesus might well have been embracing a number of them in His mind in an overall, majestic statement that He was here to fulfil the Scriptures in every detail and from every angle (as He then emphasises), so as to make them flower in every aspect of what they declare, both instruction-wise, and prophetically. For we must not let the term ‘Law’ deceive us. It covered the whole of the Pentateuch, not just the regulations but its whole future expectations. The Pentateuch depicts the establishment of the Kingly Rule of God over His people (Exo 19:6 ; Exo 20:1-18 ) and is also written with the expectancy that the Kingly Rule of God will be permanently established in the promised land. That was the whole purpose of the deliverance from Egypt, and why Moses climbed the mountain so that he could survey the land of His Kingly Rule before he died (Deuteronomy 3:4 ). The Law was expecting the seed of the woman to bruise the Serpent’s head (Gen 3:15 compare Rom 16:20 ). It was expecting Shiloh to come to Whom would be the gathering of the people (Gen 49:10 ). It was expecting a star out of Jacob (Num 24:17 ). It was anticipating a King Who ruled according to God’s Law (Deu 17:18-20 ). It was anticipating another prophet like Moses (Deu 18:15 ). All that is why Matthew has pointed out in Mat 2:15 that The Exodus deliverance will go forward in Jesus.

For as we have seen and are to see, there is no doubt that Jesus did see the Law and the Prophets as being fulfilled in Himself, that He did see Himself as coming to give His life a ransom for many (Mat 20:28 ) and as a sacrifice for sin (Mat 26:28 ), that He certainly never suggested that the Law and the Prophets were not binding on Himself and His disciples (Mat 23:2 ), even though at times He did reinterpret them in order to give them a greater impact, and that He did exhort men to keep God’s Law and rebuked those who treated it lightly.

Furthermore as He was in this very sermon about to lay the fullest emphasis on the need to observe God’s Law, not only in letter, but in spirit, it would seem very capricious not to include this in what He was intending to indicate. But it should then be noted that His sermon did not stop at that. The expounding of the Law was in order to lead on to the need to seek for the spiritual wellbeing which would enable them to fulfil it (Mat 7:7-13 ) and to the recognition of Jesus’ Lordship, in the light of which they should live (Mat 7:22-23 ). It thus covers both instruction and prophetic attitude, as well as revealing Him as the Coming One above and beyond that. For the second part of His sermon, and even parts of the first, are very reminiscent of the prophetic attitude, and indeed few would deny that in fact He goes even beyond the prophets in His requirements, while His reference to His status as ‘Lord’, in such a way as to indicate that their attitude towards Him, and His attitude towards them, would determine their eternal destiny (Mat 7:21-23 ), is not only the fulfilment of what the prophets had spoken, but a clear indication that He is present as the Sovereign Lord and Judge in a way beyond what even they expected. He is the Shiloh Who is to come to Whom the people will gather (Gen 49:10 ). He is Himself the Judge of all the world (Gen 18:25 ). And this is especially so as He then closes off the Sermon by stressing His own sayings, rather than the sayings of Moses (Mat 7:24 ; Mat 7:26 ). Thus we will not go too far wrong if we are inclusive rather than exclusive when we consider His meaning here in the light of the whole sermon.

Note on The Oral Law.

After the Exile there had been great concern among the faithful concerning the keeping of the Law of God, and as time went by a group of Scribes gradually built up who sought to analyse and interpret the Law in detail in order to help the people to know what they should do in order to keep it. These interpretations then grew and grew in number, and were passed on by the Scribes to their students, who in turn became Scribes. And as will happen with human beings the detail took over and the spirit behind them was excluded (the same would also happen with the church). They analysed the Law into over six hundred stipulations, and sought to comment authoritatively in some detail on all. These authoritative pronouncements were a part of ‘The Traditions of the Elders’. But they had become a burden too grievous to be borne. The idea had originally been good, but of course not all the interpretations were of the same quality, and the multiplicity of them was simply confusing, not to say overpowering. Furthermore some of them were simply ways of avoiding the original intention of the Law, even though sometimes with sympathetic intent. Jesus put them to one side and refused to accept their authority. He felt that too much stress was being laid on them, and that they often actually evaded the Law, or interpreted them in a way that was more profitable for the Scribes and their supporters than for the people (Mar 7:9-13 ). And in fact He would now set about reinterpreting the Law in another way, in a way that took people away from trying to keep a list of rules and emphasised rather the taking up of a right attitude towards each other, towards material things, and towards God. Get the attitude right, He was saying, and the Law would then, as it were, look after itself.

End of note.

‘Do not think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets.’ Any thought of the destruction of the Law would have been abhorrent to every Jew (and indeed to Jesus Himself). The people might empathise with His partial rejection of the traditions upheld by the Scribes and Pharisees (for the fact that it was only partial see Mat 23:3 ), but they would not have accepted the idea of the destruction of the Law itself. It lay at the very heart of their beliefs, as in fact it did His, and they loved it and trusted in it. They did not want it removed or destroyed. He was seen as acceptable precisely because they did actually believe that in Him and in His teaching the Law was being given its full weight and authority, as supported by His own prophetic authority. He was a full upholder of God’s word (unlike the Scribes and Pharisees, although they would have claimed to be - Mar 7:9 ; Mar 7:13 ).

This then does raise the question asked by some as to whether Jesus was speaking about the whole Law or just the moral law. It is doubtful whether such a thought would have crossed anyone’s mind in those days. Such distinctions were not then made. All was seen as God’s Law. He was thus speaking about the whole Torah. But certainly Jesus did gradually introduce the idea that He was replacing the old ordinances of the Law, not by them ceasing to be a part of God’s revelation, but by His own fulfilment of them (Mat 20:28 ; Mat 26:28 ), so that once the ultimate sacrifice had taken place there was no requirement for any further sacrifices. The revelation with regard to this was thus not abrogated, it still stood firm but was fulfilled through a greater and better sacrifice (which is the message of the letter to the Hebrews). All the ritual obligations were fulfilled in Jesus Christ for those who believed in Him.

And He elsewhere also drew attention to the fact that the lessons behind the old rituals having been learned, they no longer needed to be given such emphasis (Mar 7:15-23 ). What needed rather to be learned was the lessons that they contained. Thus while He Himself observed them, the old laws of cleanness and uncleanness were to be seen rather as pointing to the need for God’s people to keep themselves from all that could be seen as coming short of the ideal, all that connected with sin and the dust of death. And now that same purpose was to be fulfilled by God’s people separating themselves from the impurity of sin, the thing that really spoiled man within (Mat 15:17-20 ; Mar 8:18-23 ). By separating themselves from what was really unclean they would become sons of God (2Co 6:16-18 , compare Mat 5:9 ), so that the rituals that had once been the evidences of a people separated to God as His holy people, were no longer required , having been replaced by something new, deliverance from all the sins of the inner heart (Mar 8:18-23 ), a process already begun in the disciples (Mat 5:3-9 ). In the end therefore it is true that it is the moral aspect of the Law that is seen as still retaining its full usefulness, but not because the law was seen as needing to be replaced or was rejected as such, but because having achieved its ends parts of it were to be seen as having been filled to the full, with the lessons of the old Law made redundant and replaced by the new.

‘I came.’ Compare Mat 11:18 ; Mat 21:32 , where ‘John came’. The thought in both cases is that both John and Jesus came from God, but it clearly does not indicate pre-existence in the case of John. It rather in both cases emphasises that they have a mission from God. However, in John’s Gospel Jesus would certainly be seen as emphasising His pre-existence (Joh 3:13 ; Joh 8:58 ), and Matthew has earlier given an indication of something similar in that He is seen by him as ‘God with us’ (Mat 1:23 ).

‘The Law or the Prophets.’ The Law was technically the first five books of the Bible (‘the Torah’ - God’s ‘Instruction’), but the term was soon used loosely by some to describe the whole of the Scriptures (Joh 12:34 ; Rom 3:19 ; 1Co 14:21 ), including the Psalms (Joh 10:34 ). As far as they were concerned God spoke through it all. This may therefore be why Jesus did not feel any need to continually mention the prophets separately once He had made the position clear. The expression ‘The Law’ could then be seen as covering both. The ‘Prophets’ included the former prophets (many of what we call the historical books, from Joshua to Kings), as well as the great prophets themselves. But notice the ‘or’ which indicates that here the two ideas, while close, are also to be seen separately.

The Law unquestionably had a special importance for the Jews. It was always read first in Synagogue services, and at this stage all who claimed to be Jews (including also the Samaritans, although they would not have seen themselves as Jews, nor have been seen as Jews) would without exception have seen the Law as central to their religion, and pivotal (the whole Law not just the regulations), while the prophets were variously assessed, with some leaning towards putting great weight on them, while others gave them less of an emphasis, although apart from the Samaritans all probably gave them some weight. Thus the mention of the Prophets as well as the Law in what was the opening verse of the central part of the sermon (see above) may well be seen as indicating that, in spite of the emphasis He would now lay on the Law, in viewing Him it was necessary to look wider than just to the Law. He was not to be seen as just another expounder of the Law. He was also the fulfilment of the flowering of both the Old Testament Law and the Old Testament prophecy.

‘Not to destroy, but to fulfil.’ The negative emphasises the positive, a device often used in Scripture. It brings out that His aim was the exact opposite of destruction. For His aim was to confirm, to build up and to cause to flower, and His purpose was to establish all that the Scriptures spoke of. It was to build it up and fulfil it in order to make both Law and Prophets come to completion. That is the purpose of His coming. It is to ‘fill both to the full’. And this includes the fulfilling of all the expectations and promises of both, for the Law also contained prophecies of the future, both typologically (Mat 2:15 ; Mat 2:23 ) and prophetically (Gen 12:3 ; Gen 49:10 ; Num 24:17 ; Deu 18:15 , all of which were also interpreted prophetically at Qumran), while the Prophets were full of them. So His aim was to bring both to their fully determined end.

It may be asked, why did Jesus speak of the possible destruction of the Torah, even if it was only as a negative? At least three answers are possible:

1). His purpose may have been to emphasise the positive by contrasting it with the negative. Thus He may be seen as saying, ‘Rather than coming to destroy the Torah and the Prophets, I have come to bring them to their ultimate completion.’ Thus His purpose may have been in order to underline their indestructibility, something He then brings out in Mat 5:18 .

2). He may have been hinting at a comparison between His own positive attitude towards them, and the negative attitude of the Scribes and Pharisees whom He saw as by their teachings slowly strangling the Law, and making it void through their traditions (Mat 15:6 ; Mar 7:9 ; Mar 7:13 ).

3). He may have been combating rumours that were already in circulation that He was a destroyer of the Law.

That the confirming of the Torah is at least a part of His purpose comes out in His continual emphasis on the fact that it must be observed; that the building up of the Torah is a part of His purpose comes out in that He does go on to ‘build it up’ in the following verses; and that the final fulfilment of the Torah is part of His purpose comes out in that His Sermon ends with Him being revealed as ‘Lord’, where He is clearly to be seen as both Arbiter and Judge (Mat 7:22 ). And as the first two suggestions certainly concentrate on the Law needing to be lived out, the inclusive reference to ‘the prophets’ as an alternative in Mat 5:17 emphasises that the third is very much included in His thinking, and that His words therefore also unquestionably signify bringing the Law and the Prophets to their full fruition in Himself, so that not one part of them will be lacking in accomplishment, something which is His own constant theme (see Mat 10:34-36 ; Mat 11:3-5 ; Mat 12:40 ; Mat 16:21 ; Mat 20:28 ; Mat 21:42 ; Mat 22:42-45 ; Mat 26:24 ; Mat 26:54 ; Mat 26:56 ; and for example Luk 10:23-24 ; Luk 22:37 ; Luk 24:27 ; Joh 5:45-46 ), as well as being the theme of Matthew as we have already seen.



For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,

One jot or one tittle shall in no way pass away from the law,

Until all things be accomplished.”

Jesus then makes the strongest possible assertion of the permanence and almost divine status of ‘the Law’ and all that it promised. He emphatically declares (‘truly I say to you’) that rather than being destroyed it will certainly continue as authoritative until the destroying of the present Heaven and earth (2Pe 3:7 ; 2Pe 3:10 ; Rev 20:11 ) and its replacement with the new Heaven and the new earth (2Pe 3:13 ; Rev 21:1 to Rev 22:5 , an extension of the idea in Isa 65:17-25 ), and will last to such an extent that not even the smallest part of it will ‘pass away’, that is be removed from having authority. And in the end all of it will be accomplished, that is brought to its full realisation, to the last jot and tittle (to the smallest letter and the smallest symbol).

‘One jot’ is, in the Greek, ‘one iota’, the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet. This therefore represents the equivalent of either the yod or the waw in Hebrew, the one the smallest letter, the other looking very similar to an iota, either of which can often be removed from a Hebrew word without changing the sense. The point being made therefore is that even these semi-redundant letters are to be seen as a necessary part of the whole. God has caused them to be there and therefore they were permanent. A ‘tittle’ is literally ‘a horn’. It is referring to either the small stroke added to some Hebrew letters in order to differentiate them from others, or even to some kind of mark placed in the text for added, but relatively unimportant, significance. Thus Jesus is affirming the infallibility of the written Law, as originally given, as it stood. He is declaring that it must be accomplished because it is part of God’s word to man.

One distinction, however, that Jesus does make about the Law and the Prophets elsewhere, is that they continued to prophesy until John, that is until the coming of the Kingly Rule of Heaven began to bring about their fulfilment (Mat 11:13-14 ; Luk 16:16 ). The assumption is that they then ceased because something better had come. But that does not mean that their fulfilment ceased, or that they ceased to have effect, only that more prophecy would be unnecessary because the fulfilment of what had been given had already commenced. He thus sees the Law and the Prophets as complete, and His own coming as beginning the fulfilment of the Law and the Prophets rather than as part of the build up towards it. The build up had ended with John. The ‘last days’ were to be seen as here. What happens from that time on is therefore to be seen as the outworking of all that has been promised, the beginning of its fulfilment.

‘The Law.’ This possibly indicates ‘the Law of Moses’ as found in the Pentateuch, although it is more probablye that it covers both that and the prophets, on the basis of the recognised and stereotyped phrase ‘the Law and the Prophets’ (Mat 7:12 ; Mat 22:40 , compare Mat 11:13 ). Indeed ‘the Law’ in Jesus’ eyes can also include the Psalms (Joh 10:34 , compare Luk 24:44 ), thus having in mind the whole of the Old Testament Scriptures.

It is true that ‘until heaven and earth pass away’ might theoretically be seen as simply indicating what was seen as impossible, and thus as emphasising that the Law is everlasting, (and its intrinsic significance can hardly be anything other than everlasting, for eternity will be the fullest revelation of the perfection for which the Law was striving). But there are clear enough indications that that is not so, for Jesus could say that at the resurrection men and women are to be as the angels (Mat 22:30 ) so that the reproductive activity of creation will be no more, while He makes clear references to the fact that the future, and therefore the eternal future, will be ‘not of this world’ (Mat 7:21 ; Mat 8:11-12 ; Luk 16:19-31 ; Joh 14:2-3 ). This therefore confirms that Jesus did in fact believe that Heaven (the material heavens) and earth would themselves one day pass away, as Peter confirms (2Pe 3:10-13 ).

‘Truly (Amen) I say to you.’ The use of the Hebrew/Aramaic ‘Amen’, transliterated into Greek, and signifying a firm assurance, occurs over thirty times in Matthew, while ‘I say to you’, signifying a unique authority, occurs over fifty times. His is thus the voice of certainty and authority. By this Jesus was declaring that He spoke with an authority shared by no other, that guaranteed what was spoken.

The word ‘amen’ used in this way is found elsewhere only in a Jewish work of the late 1st century AD called the Testament of Abraham. There it is found in Mat 8:7 (where God sends a message to Abraham saying ‘Amen I say to you that blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your seed, and I will give you all that you ask from me, for I am the Lord your God, and besides me there is no other’) and in Mat 20:2 , (where Death says in response to a question from Abraham, ‘Amen, amen, I tell you in the truth of God that there are seventy-two deaths’). It will be noted that both are seen as affirmations from ‘another world’. The Testament of Abraham is a Jewish writing written probably in the late 1st century AD, but it may reflect previous usage. On the other hand the author may have picked up the idea from Christian usage, and thus ultimately from the teaching of Jesus. So the evidence either suggests that Jesus is using a term which would be seen by all as indicating His own ‘other-worldly’ uniqueness, or has actually being introduced for the first time by Him for a similar reason. Either way it represents unique authority.

‘Amen.’ This transliteration of the Hebrew occurs four times in LXX (1Ch 16:36 ; Neh 5:13 ; Neh 8:6 (twice)) and also in the Apocrypha, but never as used here except as mentioned above.

Short Note on the Authority of the Bible.

Jesus’ emphasis here was, of course, on the permanence and completeness of the whole Law (at least of the whole Pentateuch) as such, as something concerning which every word was valid and indisputable. But while that is so it also has wider implications. For if what Jesus says here is true it indicates that He put His authority behind every word in the original text of the Pentateuch as originally given (and saw the current text as giving a reasonable representation of it), declaring it to be indisputable and permanently valid. Those therefore who on the basis of this statement speak of the Pentateuch as ‘verbally inspired so that every word is seen as God-given’, rate Jesus among their number. This is really indisputable.

The question of the full verbal authority of Scripture then boils down to the question of how we view Jesus. If we consider that Jesus brought us the whole truth from God without error, and that we enjoy the benefit of that truth in His words in Scripture (a value judgment we can make by considering and weighing up His words for ourselves) then we have no alternative but to believe that at least the Pentateuch as originally given is inerrant (every jot and tittle). If we do not believe that then we have to say ‘Goodbye’ to an inerrant Jesus, and the Jesus of the Bible. We are simply left with a Jesus formed according to our own imaginations. Our faith ceases to be in Jesus but in ourselves, and in what we decide to accept. That is why belief in the inerrancy of Scripture finally comes, not from examining Scripture, although we have to do that, but from examining Jesus Christ, and making up our minds about Him, whether He really is the Son of God or not. Once we are sure of that everything else falls into place, for He constantly asserted the absolute reliability of Scripture. And we then recognise that any problems we have with inerrancy are due not to the Bible but to our own lack of knowledge, or our own lack of faith in Him. We can then be confident that if only we had full knowledge we would have the answer to every problem. Meanwhile we can trust Him and look to the Bible in confidence, even if we cannot ourselves find an answer to every difficulty that it raises. The ‘only’ problem then is the interpretation of it. But that is another question.

End of note.



a “Whoever therefore shall loose (relax, treat lightly, render ineffective) one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so,

b Will be called least in the Kingly Rule of Heaven,

a But whoever shall do and teach them,

b He will be called great in the Kingly Rule of Heaven.

a For I say to you, that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees,

b You will in no way enter into the Kingly Rule of Heaven.”

Note that the first ‘a b’ and the last ‘a b’ both indicate an undesirable situation, while the central ‘a b’ indicates the desirable state of affairs. (A few important manuscripts such as Aleph, D, W, omit the central ‘a b’ but it is included by the majority of manuscripts. The omission was probably due to a scribal lapse in picking up his copying from the wrong ‘ouranown’ (Heaven).

Here we are given three alternative positions of people over against the Law. There are those who are lax towards what they see as the less important commands, and will thus be called ‘the less important ones’; those who treat all the commands without exception (because they honour the fact that every jot and tittle is from God) with the seriousness that they deserve, and will thus be called ‘great’; and those who actually misrepresent the whole by following the teaching of the Scribes and Pharisees, who will simply be excluded. The first will lose out in that they will be seen as ‘least important’ in the Kingly Rule of God, the last will lose out because they will not even enter the Kingly Rule of God (they prefer rather to obey the Scribes), and those who honour all God’s words without exception will be called great in the Kingly Rule of God (compare Mat 18:4 ). Attitude to God’s word and all His requirements is thus seen as vital for our future. The seriousness of what is involved in not entering the Kingly Rule of God is brought out in Mat 8:11 .

It should be noted that Jesus’ purpose in these words is in order to stress the need to observe every last detail of the word of God. Nothing may be cast aside. A lax attitude towards the word of God is seen as making someone of little account in the sight of God. On the other hand to take a totally wrong approach to it as the Scribes and Pharisees did, and thus to misuse it, will be to be cut off from God completely. This was very much preparing for what Jesus would now go on to say. It was a serious warning to take heed to His words, and not to let one of them be lost or disregarded.

‘Shall loose.’ The Rabbis were said to ‘loose’ a law when they relaxed it and made it less demanding because it was felt to be too severe in practise. But Jesus is here rather thinking of those who set aside a law because it is thought to be unimportant. His aim in saying it is certainly not in order to allow His disciples to choose what their level of dedication should be, but to make clear that what their attitude should be is to see all His requirements as equally important. He thus makes clear His severe disapproval of those who are lax with God’s word.

Yet at the same time He does not want to exclude absolutely those who did not have quite that total dedication. He rather makes clear that, while He does not reject them outright, He has a low esteem of them. Elsewhere Jesus certainly does allow that there will be different levels of devotion (Mat 11:11 ; Mat 18:4 ), and different levels of ‘reward’ (1Co 3:15 ), yet we should also remember that He let the rich young man walk away sorrowfully and did not suggest that he was nevertheless acceptable as a minor disciple and had received eternal life, which was what his question had been all about (Mat 19:16-26 ). The impression given is in fact that he went away without eternal life. We do well not to treat lightly the loss of Jesus’ esteem.

Note that it is those who teach laxity as well as those who are lax, who are ‘least’. Jesus clearly saw any laxity towards the word of God as being heinous.

‘One of these least commandments.’ ‘These commandments’ loosely connects with the overall commandments of the Old Testament of which not one jot would fail until all was accomplished. Note that the idea is not of general laxity. (Jesus does not expect that). The person in question has only been lax on one. But in the event is one too much! Jesus is really concerned to ensure fully disciplined lives and a total commitment to all His commandments.

‘Great.’ That is, of the highest standard. In other words they pass out ‘A1’.

‘The Kingly Rule of Heaven.’ Whether this refers to the Kingly Rule of Heaven while on earth or the eternal Kingly Rule is not a question we have to answer. Both are in fact the same Kingly Rule and those within it are simply either on earthly or heavenly service. Thus this signifies that whether on earth or in Heaven, those who have treated lightly any part of the Law of God lose out in His eyes. The only difference is that for those on earth there is still time to do something about it.

‘The righteousness of the Scribes and the Pharisees.’ That is, their way of keeping the Law criticised by Jesus in chapter 2:3 , involving detailed observation of ritual, and the interpretation of it to their own advantage, while ignoring the principles of mercy and compassion. The Scribes and Pharisees that Jesus was speaking about (the majority) analysed the Scriptures minutely so as to exactly follow the letter of the Law, rather than considering its implications and the wider implications of such commandments as which required love for their neighbour and for the stranger among them (Lev 19:18 ; Lev 19:34 ), and yet they made a great show of how religious they were (compare Luk 18:9-14 ). Tithing the smallest thing was more important to them than going out of their way to help others, and they judged all men on that basis. They were condemned both for behaving like this (Mat 23:3 ), and teaching the same attitude to others (Mat 23:15 ). We can compare here Isa 1:11-18 .

‘Your righteousness.’ Jesus was not simply comparing their dedication with that of the Pharisees, nor saying that somehow they needed to outdo them. He was talking about a different form of righteousness. It was the righteousness worked within men who had repented and come under the Kingly Rule of Heaven, a God-implanted and God-imputed righteousness (see on Mat 5:6 . Compare Isa 61:3 ). They were illuminated, empowered and forgiven by God, and transformed into those who obeyed God’s Law as revealed by Jesus. His righteousness and deliverance had been revealed (Isa 46:13 ). This was the righteousness that saved, and produced the kind of people who will fulfil the injunctions He is about to give. We may again compare this with the idea of righteousness found in Isaiah where righteousness is paralleled with deliverance (Isa 46:13 ; Isa 51:5 ; Isa 51:8 ; Isa 56:1 ). Isaiah declared that Israel would enjoy ‘righteousness and deliverance’ when God broke in to save. The righteousness was God’s as, in His righteousness, He acted to bring about the ‘righteousness’ and ‘salvation’, the setting free and restoration of His people, with the result that they too became righteous. Something of that is reflected in the use of the term ‘righteousness’ here. What was required was a God-inworked righteousness. His idea is that God will have acted on them in righteousness in order to make them righteous, firstly in His sight, and then in their lives. When used in Matthew of believers, righteousness always has this significance of the delivering power of God (see Mat 3:15 ; Mat 5:6 ; Mat 5:10 ; Mat 6:33 ; Mat 21:32 ).

‘In no way.’ An emphatic negative.

‘Enter into the Kingly Rule of Heaven.’ Compare ‘enter into life ‘(Mat 18:8-9 ; Mat 19:17 ). We enter the Kingly Rule of Heaven now when we yield our lives to Him and submit to His rule, and will one day enter it in its fullness after the resurrection.

Note on the Scribes and Pharisees.

The Scribes were looked on as the Biblical scholars of the day. The majority were Pharisees, but there were also Scribes of the Sadducees and probably also more general Scribes. Their aim was to enable the people to understand the Torah and the Prophets, with especial emphasis on the former, and the Pharisaic Scribes isolated from the Torah over six hundred laws, making pronouncements on many of them as to how they should be observed. The interpretations were sometimes thought-provoking, sometimes rigid, and all too often facile. Their dicta were united with other traditions brought down from the past known as ‘the traditions of the elders’. When people had a problem about how they should behave in particular circumstances they would seek out the Scribes who would have memorised all the traditions of the elders and would call on them in order to provide a solution to their problem. But the problem with many of the Scribes was that they had become tied down to their own traditions rather than looking afresh at the Scriptures, and their interpretations were regularly rigidly determined by their traditions. Their interpretations therefore followed set patterns. There had been, and were, godly Scribes who were full of compassion according to their lights, and wise in their teaching, but the truly great ones were few, and the false copies many, and it was these last who mainly continued to pester Jesus. There can often be no one more narrow-minded than those who cling to and expound and try to carry forward the words of great Teachers, interpreting them by their own narrow ways of thinking, and that was true of these. For Jesus’ overall criticism of them see chapter 2:3 .

The Pharisees only numbered about six to seven thousand but their influence was huge because of what was seen as their piety. Initially they had probably been mainly godly men who reacted against the Hellenisation programmes carried out against the Jews by the Syrian overlords, with the result that they had therefore developed a concern for special Jewish practises, aiming thereby to preserve distinctive Jewishness. They thus begun to lay great emphasis on ritual washing, avoiding ritual ‘uncleanness’, tithing even the smallest thing, and strict observance of the Sabbath in accordance with their rules. And these had gradually taken a place in their thinking above what they should have had. They hoped thereby to attain merit. This had initially been alongside a living faith in God, but as can happen all too easily, the living faith tended to diminish over time, and the ritual took over and thereby became all-important. (The same process occurred later in the Christian church, resulting in all the distortions of the mediaeval church. It is always to be guarded against. This was true legalism). Their main strength was in Judaea, although there were also Pharisees in Galilee. They would meet in groups, often around the meal table, for discussion and mutual encouragement. They did not run the synagogues, but undoubtedly had influence in them. Jesus was sometimes invited to join in with such groups (see for example Luk 14:1-24 , also Luk 7:36-50 ). So not all Pharisees were in total disagreement with Him, or totally antagonistic towards Him. We tend to hear about the ones who were and overlook the ones who were not.

Both the Scribes and the Pharisees were highly respected by the people, the former for their knowledge and the latter for their ‘piety’. The suggestion therefore that their righteousness was lacking, and was insufficient to allow entry into the Kingly Rule of God would have been startling to the common people, for they were seen as portraying Scriptural standards and Scriptural truth, (we can compare the later monks and friars, some of whom were godly men, but many of whom became rogues and self-seekers benefiting from the reputation of the few) something about which Jesus was now about to undeceive them. For Jesus was only too well aware that they had become bogged down in an overemphasis on ritual which had begun to count for them more than morals, and that much of their piety was at the worst hypocritical and self-publicising, or at the best simply self-striving. He wanted the people to recognise that they must look away from ritual and self-striving to experiencing the power of God working on them in righteousness and deliverance.

We must beware of thinking that Jesus was at odds with all Scribes and Pharisees. Many came to Him with genuine questions (Mat 22:34-40 ; Luk 10:25-37 ; Joh 3:1-6 ), and others invited Him to partake in meals with them. They were willing to listen to what He had to say, even if critically. A number of them later became believers. The danger is that we tend to see them all in the light of the more bitterly critical ones who dogged His steps. But that many of the Scribes and Pharisees undoubtedly did end up opposed to Him the Gospels make clear. They felt that He was undermining their credibility among the people (which in some ways He was) and grew more bitter as time went on, until in the end they undoubtedly consented to His crucifixion, with some even taking part in brining it about.

End of note.

Having laid down the importance of the Law of Moses and the Prophets, and having stressed that both were of God and to be treated with the greatest of respect and honour, and that both should be obeyed, Jesus now set about showing what that obedience should consist of. It was not to be on the basis of listing certain commandments, and then ticking them off and saying smugly, ‘All these things have I observed from my youth up’. It was to be by seeing these commandments against their whole background, and recognising the approach to life that they demanded. As the Law itself had said, by recognising this and living by it they would find what it meant to live a genuine spiritual life (Lev 18:5 ). This was the full-orbed spiritual life to which God had delivered them by His active righteousness at work upon them.



“You have heard that it was said to those of old time,”

This is the first ‘you have heard that it was said’ of the five occurring in the chapter. These deal with violence (Mat 5:21 ), marital relationships (Mat 5:27 ), honesty (Mat 5:33 ), desire for vengeance (Mat 5:38 ) and partiality (Mat 5:43 ), things which go to the very root of people’s lives. This statement will in each case then be compared with what should be. Together they cover all the basic relationships which lay between human beings. The Rabbis also used comparative techniques, raising theoretical possibilities based on words from Scripture, only to reject them, but none had done it in quite the same authoritative way as this. They postulated solutions, but they did not declare them to have divine authority. So Jesus was not speaking as a Rabbi putting forward guidance. He was speaking as the Messiah.

‘Those of old time.’ In this case this refers to the verdict of the elders of the past on murder, based on the Law of Moses, possibly even going back to the wilderness community itself. He is not criticising them for that as such. But His point is that their religious Leaders and Teachers should not have been satisfied with simply dealing with murder, and satisfying themselves by solemnly declaring a judgment on it. They should have taken much more trouble over dealing with the root causes of murder, including dealing with ‘lesser’ methods of ‘doing violence’ to people which could lead to murder.



“But I say to you, that every one who is angry with his brother will be in danger of the judgment.”

“I say to you.” This will be repeated on each proposed extension of men’s understanding of the commandments. Jesus speaks with a unique authority. He does not need to appeal to the fathers, or to the wisdom of the past. He can speak on His own authority. This is basically at the minimum a Messianic claim. And He does it as One Who expects that His authority will be accepted.

Jesus now looks at three examples of people’s attitudes towards each other, each of which God is concerned about, and each of which, (and even more so when they were combined), could lead up to murder. And He describes three punishments for them which get severer as they go along. These are first the ordinary law court (compare Deu 16:18 ), then the Supreme Court (the Sanhedrin, or the court of twenty three members set up to deal with criminal matters), and finally the tribunal of God. His point is that as we become more involved in sin so the judgment gets steeper, and that while no one would, of course, be taken to court, or before the Supreme Court for such behaviour as He describes, they should certainly recognise that it might eventually lead on to that if the anger gets out of control, and that meanwhile they can be certain of the fact that they will have to face the judgment of the Messiah and of the Supreme Court of God, where they can be sure that they will receive the full punishment for their behaviour. For let them be in no doubt about it, for such things they will be cast into the destructive fire of Gehenna.

The fact that there is a build up in the level of the punishment, (compare also the building up of the situation in Mat 5:25-26 ) suggests that we are to see a build up in the level of sin. What He may thus be saying is that men commence with anger, then they move on to ridicule and contempt, and then they move on to more serious accusations, and as their crime grows (with the seething anger still there) so does their being deserving of condemnation. All of us know what it means to allow anger to build up into resentment, and resentment to build up into more violent reaction It was as a result of this that the people had persecuted the prophets. And this would eventually be why His disciples would be persecuted, because this was how people regularly behaved. And yet no one in authority had as a whole really stopped and considered these matters. As long as the number who were murdered had been kept to a reasonable level they had been satisfied with passing judgment on the murderers, and had left the world to seethe on by itself.

The first example He speaks of is anger. Jesus here goes beneath murder, and other acts of violence, and asks what it is that causes them. And His reply is that it is people’s ‘anger’. Control people’s anger and there will be far less murder. So He points out that as far as God is concerned, not only murder, but to show unreasonable or undeserved anger towards others also puts men and women in danger either of men’s judgment or of God’s judgment. It is in a sense equally deserving of the same kind of punishment as murder (‘the judgment’), for it is murder in waiting. Anger may well even in this life lead to activities which result in a chargeable offence before a court, or it may not, but however that might be, they can be sure that it will certainly be a chargeable offence in the judgment to come. In God’s eyes, if not in man’s, it is seen as ‘judgment-worthy’.



“If therefore you are offering your gift at the altar,”

And there remember that your brother has anything against you,

Leave there your gift before the altar,

And go your way, first be reconciled to your brother,

And then come and offer your gift.”

Jesus then comes down to practicalities. Of course such ‘crimes’ will probably not end up in court. But let them still be aware that the great Judge of all knows all about them. And He will not treat lightly those who behave in this way and are unrepentant. For they have caused disharmony among God’s people, and have been involved in false accusation. The Law had always stressed the importance of removing causes of anger by face to face contact with the other party (Lev 19:17 ), but it was not something that was commonly practised. It was, however, to be practised by His disciples.

So if they are considering coming before Him with gifts while still being unreconciled to someone against whom they have sinned, (or who alternately may have sinned against them), let them pause and think. They are coming before the Judge of all Who knows their hearts. Let them remember, ‘Blessed are the meek, blessed are the peacemakers. Blessed are those who seek righteousness.’ So if as they approach the priests with their offering they recall that they know of someone who holds something against them, they should leave aside their gift before the altar, (that is, unoffered), and first go and seek reconciliation with their brother or sister. Then when that is achieved they may come and offer their gift, confident that it will be accepted.

The first point that we gather here is that in their unreconciled state there is no point in them offering their gift (compare Jer 7:9-10 ). It can only bring judgment on them (compare here 1Co 11:27-32 ). It may seem perfectly acceptable to men, and to the priests, but it will not be acceptable to God. He will not give regard their gift, but will rather regard their undealt with sin, and the disharmony among His people, and He will thus have no regard for their prayers (see Isa 1:12-15 ; 1Sa 15:22 ; Psa 66:18 ). The second is the need for positive action in seeking reconciliation. We may feel that it was all the brother’s fault, (just as he probably thinks it was all our fault), but that must not stop us from seeking to be reconciled to our brother. What is wrong between us must first be put right, and we have a responsibility to see to it in humility and love. If we would be right before God, we must be right with the world. And such reconciliation always involves compromise and a willingness to come to terms. The third point is that once we are reconciled, or at least have made a real and genuine attempt to be so, then God will accept our gift. It will then be noted before God to Whom all hearts are open and from Whom no secrets are hidden.

This does, however, raise the question as to who is our ‘brother or sister’ in these terms. While Jesus would undoubtedly have felt that it was most important for this to happen among His disciples in their relationships with each other (the Qumran community were strong on the idea of harmony within the community) it is probable that He was not restricting it to that. For as He would point out later even Gentiles can behave like that with those whom they love (Mat 5:44-48 ). Nor is He limiting it to fellow-Jews, as His parable of the Good Samaritan brings out (Luk 10:29-37 ). Indeed these examples may confirm that He in fact means by ‘brother and sister’ all men and women of reasonable goodwill (compare Mat 25:40 , where all nations are gathered, and ‘these’ are not differentiated from the nations apart from their having been in need).

(We say those of reasonable goodwill because to approach those who have no goodwill would be useless, and might even heighten animosity and bring reprisals. There is a time to speak and a time to be silent. But even some of these may be won over by a genuine revealing of love and sorrow over failure ).

Imagine what an impression it would make if one Sunday in our churches the minister were to say, ‘Our next hymn (or song) is number 6:4 , but before we dare to try to sing it let us first be reconciled with all in church who have anything against us’, and this was followed by a period in which there was a genuine attempt to fulfil what he asked. Revival might well break out. And yet the truth is that for us to sing a hymn without being reconciled to others is to make us like these who brought their gifts to the altar and took no notice of what Jesus had said. We need therefore to heed the warning that followed.

It will be noted that the assumption behind these words is that the people in question (His disciples) are in the habit of going to the Temple and bringing their gifts to the altar (note the ‘continual’ tense). It is spoken of as the natural thing for them to do. Thus it demonstrates that these words were spoken well before 7:0 AD. The description is far too descriptive and detailed to be simply metaphorical. Thus it fits perfectly into the time of the teaching of Jesus, while it fits not at all into a late first century or a Gentile environment, except in a very secondary way.



Agree with your adversary quickly, while you are with him in the way,

Lest it happen that the adversary deliver you to the judge,

And the judge deliver you to the officer, and you be cast into prison.

Truly I say to you, you will by no means come out from there,

Until you have paid the last penny.”

Finally Jesus brings out a further point and that is that being unreconciled might lead to repercussions. It may not only bring us problems before God, it may also bring us problems with men. For not only might our attitude prevent us from being able to approach God and have fellowship with Him, it might even result in reprisals against us. Thus even from a worldly point of view we are advised to be reconciled with people who have something against us.

For if we are slow in seeking reconciliation we may find that the pace builds up, and we may suddenly find ourselves being called to account. And then we may be found guilty, with the court handing us over into the custody of the police, with the result that we might find ourselves in prison. The background for the idea of prison for such offences is Greek and Roman rather than Jewish and fits perfectly into the environment of Galilee of the Gentiles. All in Galilee knew the ways of the Gentiles among them in which they could so easily be involved. (This would also serve to confirm that ‘brother’ includes Gentiles). But again Jesus is not just mainly thinking of the practicalities as His last comment makes clear. While they may escape an earthly court let them recognise that they will not escape the heavenly court. For these illustrations are but a picture of the final tribunal before the great Judge of all, when every penny that we have will be exacted from us because we have failed to obey God.

The word for ‘adversary’ is a legal term and basically here means ‘the plaintiff’. The ‘officer’ is the one appointed to carry out the judge’s instructions. The ‘penny’ is strictly the lowest level of coinage.

Similar words to these are found in Luk 12:57-59 in a different context and with a different emphasis. But that need not mean that Jesus only ever said them once and each Gospel writer used them as they thought fit. This was precisely the kind of illustration that was good for repetition and useable in a number of ways. And if He saw His regular listeners repeating them as He spoke Jesus would have been only too delighted that His hearers had so learned His words by heart that they could repeat them along with Him. For the expectation that His words would be remembered was a main consideration when He worked out what He would say, and was the main purpose of continual repetition. And the words fit aptly, both here and in Luke.

(The fact that Jesus constantly repeated His teaching, with variations, helps to explain why we seemingly have so little of it when He seemingly taught so much. John indicates that there is much that we do not have, but he clearly felt that what the church did have covered the main ground of what He had said over a number of years, otherwise he would no doubt have arranged for them to have more. And none knew what Jesus had said better than him - see Joh 21:25 ).



“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ ”

Jesus commences by citing the seventh commandment, and the first thing that will be noted is that He makes no reference to ‘those of old’. These words accompanied reference to the commandment about murder (Mat 5:21 ), and will accompany the one about the swearing of oaths (Mat 5:33 ). They do not, however, occur in Mat 5:38 ; Mat 5:42 which are similar to here. It may therefore simply be stylistic, or it may be that this commandment was not seen as having been added to by those of old. ‘It was said’ is neutral. It simply refers back to the past without necessarily passing a verdict on it. But once again He brings out that the commandment is speaking about more than might at first appear on the surface. He is bringing out that its concern is in the end for the purity of a man and a woman in a lifelong, indissoluble marriage, undisturbed by the effects of man’s sinfulness.

Thus He now speaks of anything that might result in adultery, whether through the wife’s unfaithfulness, a man’s wandering thoughts, or through divorce and remarriage, and warns against them all. To Jesus, anything that might interfere with a lifelong marriage, whether it be by attitude, by invasion by men’s thoughts or by the breakdown of the marriage, was to be abhorred, for it was attacking the God-ordained oneness between a husband and wife. For as He will say later, ‘from the beginning it was not so’ (Mat 19:8 ).



“But I say to you, that every one who looks on a woman to lust after her, has committed adultery with her already in his heart.”

Once again Jesus declares authoritatively, “I say to you.” Once He has spoken that settles the matter. The principle here is very clear. Even the desire for adultery in the heart, a desire which is encouraged in himself by a man, is the equivalent of adultery. The man who looks on a woman with the desire to break in on her purity, thus considering breaking the oneness between her and her husband, is actually to be seen as guilty of committing adultery. He is invading her purity, and in his mind appropriating her for himself, without having the intention of forming a permanent relationship with her as his one and only wife (which of course he could not have in the nature of the case). He is intending to cause a breakdown of the original purpose of God in creating man and woman. For it had been God’s purpose from the beginning that each man and each woman should have one partner to whom they would be insolubly bound until death broke the bond, looking only to them. The lustful look with intent at an unmarried woman, (unless with the genuine aim of marriage), or at a woman who was already bound to another, thus hit at the very purpose of God in creation. It indicated rebellion against God’s will. In God’s eyes it was therefore as much adultery on the person’s part as if he had actually had sexual relations with her. And he has thus by it broken God’s law.

Alternately we may translate this as, ‘every one who looks on a woman to cause her to lust’. (The wording is literally ‘for the lusting of/by her’). The idea then is that he has persuaded her to return his desires and there is therefore a very real case of adultery in their thoughts, brought about by his actions, but the final result is the same.

Here then Jesus is stressing that the thought is father of the deed (as with hatred and murder), and it is therefore something that His disciples must equally avoid because it attacks both the purity of the woman, and marriage itself, at their very heart. It is contrary to the sanctity of marriage. The idea that lustful thoughts were sinful was not new. In the Book of Jubilees Mat 20:3-4 , written by a Pharisee in 2nd century BC the writer says, that we should keep ourselves from all fornication and uncleanness --- let them not fornicate with her after their eyes and hearts.’ In the Testament of Isa 7:2 we read, ‘except for my wife I have not known any woman. I did not act in a sexually immoral way by lifting up my eyes.’ While in the Psalms of Solomon Mat 4:4 it was said of someone with disapproval, ‘his eyes are on every woman without distinction’. In Qumran also we read of the ‘fornication of the eyes’, while later the Rabbis would stress that a woman’s little finger, or her leg, or her voice, or her eye, could all lead on to impure thoughts in a man (such women would in general be well covered up and thus even a hint of sexuality would be enough). But while they were aware of the impropriety of such behaviour, none of them suggested on their own authority that this is precisely what God’s commandment was against. They disapproved, but they did not condemn. And yet this is what Jesus was saying.

“And if your right eye causes you to stumble,

Pluck it out, and cast it from you,

For it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish,

And not your whole body be cast into hell.”

And lest this be dismissed as just another example of theological hairsplitting Jesus rams home the seriousness of the matter. This is so important that if a man’s right eye cause his thought to roam in this direction, he should, as it were, pluck out his eye and hurl it from him, so concerned should he be not to sin in this way. For it would be better to lose an eye and be half blind, than for his whole body to perish in Gehenna. The eye is in fact regularly connected with sin (see Num 15:39 ; Pro 21:4 ; Eze 6:9 ; Eze 18:12 ; Eze 20:8 ) and clearly has a connection with a sin such as this.

There is no thought here that this mutilation should become a part of Jewish Law, or that this dismemberment should be carried out by others as a sentence on what he had done. For who would know of it? (Indeed were it so the vast majority of men would be half blind). It is a private and personal matter, and the choice is the man’s. It is a moral choice. Nor does Jesus intend it to be carried out literally. He is using exaggeration to enforce His argument, as He regularly does. What He is really saying is that a man should go to any extreme in order to prevent himself from sinning in this way. He should be prepared to take drastic action. And today we can add the rider that if a woman dresses in such a way as to attract the roving eye she too is equally guilty. She is persuading men to commit adultery with her in their hearts.

The mention of the ‘right’ eye suggests the most important eye. To have said both eyes would have resulted in total blindness. It was not the thought that the man make himself wholly blind. The thought was rather of getting rid of the offending member and paying any price to be rid of the sin. The picture is of the man recognising his sin, and immediately and violently responding by taking out his eye and throwing it from him because it had sinned. Mar 9:42-47 , in another context, simply says ‘your eye’. This simply confirms that Jesus used similar illustrations and varied them. In fact, of course, this would not solve the problem, for it was not really the eye that had sinned, it was the whole person. Seeming to deal with the offending member would not really get to the root of the problem. Both eyes would need to be put out for it to be effective, and even then it would still not prevent evil thoughts. So to take it literally would be foolish. Nor would it be consistent with His rejection of mutilation in Mar 9:38-42 . It is rather a stress on the need to take decisive action emphasised by exaggeration.

“And if your right hand causes you to stumble,

Cut it off, and cast it from you,

For it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish,

And not your whole body go into hell.”

Jesus now takes it one step further, moving from the initial eyeing of the woman to actual bodily contact. If a man allow his hand, (or any of his body parts), to stray in the woman’s direction, even if it be his vital right hand, then he must cut if off and hurl it from him. For that would be better for him than having his whole body perish in Gehenna. Again the severity of the proposed remedy stresses the seriousness of the sin, and the greatness of the effort that should be taken in order to avoid it. Jesus is clearly very much concerned about this type of sin.

We can compare for this violent action the words of Paul in Col 3:5 , ‘Put to death, therefore, your members which are on the earth, fornication, uncleanness, passion --’. His words are just as violent as the words of Jesus but we do not see it as a suggestion that we commit suicide, for we relate it to the cross.

There is, however, a possibility that the ‘right hand’ here is a euphemism for the private parts. Such were often referred to euphemistically in the Old Testament by such means in order to avoid mentioning them directly (e.g. Isa 57:8 ).

“And it was said, Whoever shall put away his wife,

Let him give her a certificate of divorce,

But I say to you, that every one who puts away his wife,

Except for the cause of fornication,

Makes her an adulteress,

And whoever shall marry her when she is put away,

Commits adultery.”

But the matter does not just stop there, for man in his ingenuity can find a way around this. He divorces his wife. And then he argues that he can be free to cast lustful eyes on another. Jesus declares that that is not so. Unless the wife has committed adultery the marriage is permanently binding and the man cannot free himself to marry another. Adultery is allowed as an exception because it will, of course, have broken the unity between the married couple because by her act of adultery the woman has bound herself to another man. The husband will therefore no longer be bound. Indeed if he followed Jewish custom he would feel himself bound to arrange a divorce (compare Mat 1:19 ). The woman will thus be living in sin but he will not. But apart from this exception he is bound to his wife as long as she lives, just as she is bound to him (Rom 7:1-3 ).

The case that ‘was said’ here was built on Deu 24:1-4 . But that law was intended rather in order to prevent a woman who has been divorced for ‘uncleanness’ and has been married to another, from then returning to her first husband. That is forbidden. It is an abomination to God. The husband has rightly divorced her because she has united herself in some way to another man. Therefore he must never receive her back. Otherwise he too would be condoning sexual uncleanness. But this was not intended to encourage, or even indicate approval of divorce. It was catering for a situation where adultery, or similar, had already taken place.

It is difficult to see how Jesus could have laid a stronger emphasis on the sacredness and indissolubility of marriage. It is clear that in His view nothing was to be allowed to break the marriage bond. And the extremeness of His suggested remedies about plucking out and hurling away the eye and cutting off and throwing away the hand, together with His whole emphasis, brings out that God sees this matter as of vital importance. Woe betide, therefore, those who treat divorce lightly. That there is forgiveness even for the sin of adultery Joh 8:4 ; Joh 8:11 makes clear (and so does Psalms 5:1 ). But it was with the stern injunction that it must never happen again, while the divorced person goes on in adultery, as David did, and for him, although he was forgiven, the consequences of his sin also continued. We must not underestimate the mercy of God, but we must also beware of presumption. It should be noted, however, that Jesus did not suggest that those who had been divorced should get together again. Indeed that would be to go against Deu 24:1-4 , and would be equally sinful if they had then married another.

‘And it was said.’ This falls short of the full ‘you have heard that it was said’ (Mat 5:21 ; Mat 5:27 ; Mat 5:33 ; Mat 5:38 ; Mat 5:43 ). It is therefore clearly an addendum to what has gone before and not the indication of the beginning of a new section.

‘Let him give her a writing of divorce.’ The Greek word for ‘of divorce’ means ‘of relinquishing rights to a property’. That was mainly how a Jew would see his wife. It was very different with Jesus. To Him she shared equality with the man, for they had both been made one. The certificate of divorce stated that the woman was free to marry again and had to be signed and verified in the presence of witnesses. It was based on Deu 24:1 and provided the woman with the means of proving that she was no longer bound to a husband. But Deu 24:1-4 was never intended to provide general grounds for divorce. It was to be used in cases where a woman was found guilty of ‘an indecent thing’. This might have included adultery which her husband did not wish to charge her with publicly (otherwise she would suffer the death penalty), suspected adultery which could not be sufficiently proved but of which the husband had little doubt, potential adultery, and so on. Often the woman’s family might come to some agreement about it in order to prevent the worst happening to their daughter. Rabbi Shammai saw ‘an indecent thing’ as indicating adultery, and Jesus basically agrees with him, but Rabbi Hillel argued that it could apply to any failure, such as burning the dinner. Not surprisingly, knowing the hearts of men, Hillel’s decision tended to be the most popular among the men, for they felt that it gave them divine authority to divorce their wives if they wished to. Divorce had thus become fairly commonplace. We can compare the Samaritan woman who had had five husbands under the same laws (Joh 4:18 ). We can also compare the attitude towards women in Sir 25:23-26 , ‘A woman who will not make her husband happy is as hands which hang down and as palsied knees --- if she does not go as you would wish, cut her off from your flesh’. Jesus, however, makes clear that marriage was permanent in the eyes of God and that the only possible grounds for divorce was ‘fornication’, for that meant that the sin of adultery had already been committed, and the oneness with her husband had already been destroyed.

‘Except for the cause of fornication.’ The word for ‘fornication’ can signify premarital sex, but it can also indicate general sexual misdemeanours, and adultery (compare also Mat 19:9 ). Thus here it refers to adultery. But it might have included other sexual misdemeanours. In other contexts Jesus does not add this reservation (Mar 10:12 ; Luk 16:18 ), but it was clearly necessary when speaking to Jews, for now that an adulterous woman was no longer necessarily stoned to death there had to be some means by which the husband could be set free from the wrecked marriage. And Jewish thinking required a man to divorce such a wife.

The differing verses are as follows: ‘Everyone who divorces his wife, except on the grounds of fornication, makes her an adulteress’ (Mat 5:32 ); ‘Whoever divorces his wife, except for fornication, commits adultery (Mat 19:9 ); ‘Whoever divorces his wife and marries another, commits adultery’ (Mar 10:12 ); ‘Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery’ (Luk 16:18 ). It has therefore been suggested by some that Matthew is expanding Jesus’ words in order to reflect the position in his own day. But the more probable reason is that Mark and Luke are stating the accepted position held generally by Christian Gentiles, who did not consider it essential to divorce an adulteress, and were therefore simply abbreviating Jesus’ statement to agree with it, without introducing the added complication about fornication which applied more to a Jewish situation, while Matthew is providing the detail about the exception, because he is well aware, as Jesus also had been, that the Jews who read his words would insist that a man must divorce a wife caught in the act of adultery in accordance with Jewish tradition, in order to maintain the purity of Israel, and was confirming that Jesus was in agreement with that. Note that both Mark and Luke have ‘and marries another’ as an additional statement, stressing the fact that the man is choosing to commit adultery. They are more concerned with that than the exception. Thus all are indicating the aspects of what Jesus said which they wish to bring out.

Note on The Idea of Marriage and Adultery.

Scripture from beginning to end lays great stress on purity within marriage. It is stressed in Gen 2:24 . It is stressed in the fact that the major reason for the physical destruction of the Canaanites was to be because of their defiling sexual practises when their ‘iniquity was full’. It is stressed in the various provisions in the Law where it is made clear that the actual physical act of sexual union is seen as binding a man and woman together as one. (Thus a man who has sexual union with an unmarried woman must marry her. If she is betrothed or married he must be put to death, and she also if she consented). It is stressed in the teaching of Jesus, as here (see also Mat 19:3-12 ). It is seen to lie at the very heart of creation. Scripture does not therefore treat the sexual act lightly. For even if a man has sexual relations with a prostitute, it makes him one with her and if he is a believer, defiles the Temple of the Holy Spirit (1Co 6:15-19 ). To have had sexual relations with someone who is not the sole living partner with whom those relations have first been enjoyed is therefore seen as a major sin. Such people bear the permanent stain of being ‘adulterers’ although the consequence for the forgiven adulterer is never spelled out. It is made clear, however, that they can never be restored to their original purity. They are for ever stained. We in the west tend to treat it lightly. Only eternity will reveal at what cost.

However, that there can be forgiveness for one who has committed adultery as long as there is genuine repentance comes out in Lev 19:20-22 , in the only example where adulterers were not to be put to death (but see also Deu 21:14 which presumably allows the man and woman to marry again). The point in both these cases, however, is that they were not fully fledged members of the community. See also Joh 8:1-11 . This must not, however, be seen as removing the seriousness of the sin. Murder too could be forgiven, but we do not therefore sympathise with murder.

End of note.



‘Again, you have heard that it was said to those of old time,

“You shall not swear falsely (or ‘break your oath’), but shall perform to the Lord your oaths.”

As described above this was probably a citation that someone had thrown at Him, possibly as a Tradition of the Elders, or He may have put it together Himself from the Scriptures mentioned above as an indication of what people were quoting ‘from the past’. The gist of it was that when men swore an oath they were not to do so falsely, but were to perform them to the Lord. Jesus does not deny the truth in it, but He goes on to declare that as His disciples they should not resort to oaths which the Scriptures did not require. Rather because they were under the Kingly Rule of Heaven they should be so honest that oaths were not required. After all a man under the Kingly Rule of Heaven was speaking as one who was a servant of God. He could not therefore lie.



“But I say to you, do not swear oaths at all.”

Once again we have Jesus’ authoritative “I say to you.” He again claims to speak with unique authority. Jesus is here probably referring to general oaths which had become a common feature in a society which was lax with the truth (as the need for a multitude of oaths proved). He probably did not have in mind specific oaths made in court, especially those required in the fulfilment of legal ritual as prescribed by the Old Testament (e.g. Exo 22:11 ; Num 5:19 ; 1Ki 8:31 ). Nor was He forbidding them to make oaths of loyalty to their rulers. He was not inviting persecution for them. (It would be different once idolatry became involved in such oaths). In fact the disciples would be in no position not to respond to such oaths. Jesus Himself responded to a court oath before the High Priest (Mat 26:63-64 ), and all were called on at times to swear fealty to king and emperor, in the case of Jews accompanied by the offering a sacrifice for him in the Temple. This distinction is further demonstrated by the type of oaths that He now describes.

Thus Jesus is lifting His disciples above both the general Old Testament environment, and the environment in which they were then living, into a higher sphere of truthfulness. His basic point is that God had not required oaths in the general course of life, which was therefore a demonstration of what His will really was (Deu 23:22 ), so that under the Kingly Rule of Heaven they were unnecessary, for that was a sphere where truth was all.



“But let your speech be, Yes, yes; No, no,

And whatever is more than these is of the evil one.”

So they are to restrict their replies to specific assertions. They are to say, ‘yes, yes’ or ‘no, no’. The point here is either that people will be listening for the oath, ‘yes, I swear by --’ but will rather hear another ‘yes’, or that it represents the firmness with which the disciple of Christ says ‘yes’ and ‘no’ because they speak only the truth (compare Jas 5:12 ). It is not intended to indicate a special form of oath. The assumption is that under the Kingly Rule of God nothing but the truth will be spoken.

Indeed anything more than such a firm assertion must be seen as being the product of the Evil One (or of an evil heart). The use of tou ponerou is regularly ambiguous, compare Matt 3:39 ; Mat 6:13 ; Mat 13:38 ; 1Jn 5:19 . But see Mat 13:19 where it must be translated ‘the Evil One’. Evil and the Evil One are closely connected, and the Devil is specifically linked by Jesus with falsehood. He is the ‘father of lies’ and abounds in falsehood (Joh 8:44 ). Therefore here we should probably see it as signifying the Evil One. On the other hand in Mat 5:39 it means either ‘the evil person’ in the sense of one who wishes to impose himself on you, or evil itself. But here in Mat 5:37 the Evil One has to be resisted whereas in Mat 5:39 , because it is a different kind of ‘evil’, it does not have to be resisted but has to be responded to with a loving response. This brings out the wide ranges of meaning of the term.



“You have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth”

Known as the lex talionis, in ancient days this law was common in many cultures in times far preceding Moses. It is found in the Code of Hammurabi from the 1:8 th century BC, and it was probably old then (and was incorporated within Israel’s Law Code, see for it Exo 21:24 ; Lev 24:20 ; Deu 19:21 ). Its purpose was to prevent blood revenge and to limit the penalty that could be exacted, by making it fit the offence. There was, however, also in it the thought that justice must be satisfied and that sufficient satisfaction should be obtained. However, man being what he is, it became the standard by which many lived. In the way that they interpreted it, it was the exact reverse of ‘do to others as you would that they would do to you’. It said, ‘I will demand of others what they have done to me’ (something forbidden by Pro 24:29 ). But at least it was a restraint on crime and prevented worse crimes by satisfying people’s sense of justice. On the other hand, as Jesus will point out, it is not the kind of standard that should be followed under the Kingly Rule of a wise and beneficent God Who Himself shows mercy to the undeserving. Nor is in line with the Law of God which said, ‘You shall not take vengeance or bear any grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love you neighbour (and the foreigner who is among you - Lev 19:34 ) as yourself’ (Lev 19:18 ).



But I say to you, do not resist him who is evil,

But whoever smites you on your right cheek,

Turn to him the other as well.

And if any man would go to law with you, and take away your coat,

Let him have your cloak as well.

And whoever shall compel you to go one mile,

Go with him two.

Jesus now again sets His own authority up against the wisdom of the ages. “I say to you --.” All that man has seen as wisdom in the past is now subjected to the King of the ages. And He wants His disciples to show compassion and mercy, rather than demanding their ultimate rights.

“Do not resist (or ‘stand up against’) him who is evil.” This is not a general overall statement that evil is never to be resisted. Taken out of context it would clearly not in fact even be right, for one of the main aims of the disciples of Jesus was to be to resist evil when it was wrought on others, and especially to resist the Evil One in every way (Jas 4:7 ). Furthermore they had already basically been told to resist evil in Mat 5:37 . Certainly in the light of the Old Testament they would be expected to protect the rights of the poor and the needy, the widow and the orphan. In the words of the Psalmist we are to, ‘Do justice to the afflicted and destitute, rescue the poor and needy, deliver them out of the hand of the wicked’ (Psa 82:3-4 ). As we consider this therefore it is a reminder that we must always be careful to interpret terms within their context and not put a stress on them that they do not have.

Here the ‘evil’ or the ‘evil person’ is not represented as grossly evil, (compare ‘if you then being evil --’ in Mat 7:11 which is spoken of the disciples in order to remind them of their own sinful hearts). The ones spoken of here are not murderers or those engaged in illegal activities, or violent actions, rather they are people who are acting quite legally but are behaving arrogantly and unpleasantly and are seeking to demonstrate their superiority and claim their ‘rights’ over others in one way or another. They are representatives of an ‘evil’ world, behaving as the world does. And in process of this they are making demands on the personal life of the disciple himself, not on the helpless poor. If he puts up a defence therefore he is not defending others, but simply defending himself, and revealing himself as on a par with the other. He is thus not being ‘meek’ (see on Mat 5:5 ), nor is he being righteous (Mat 5:6 ), nor is he being a peace-maker (Mat 5:9 ). He is not demonstrating that those who are under the Kingly Rule of God are not like other men and women. To such behaviour then the disciples are not to retaliate with like for like, but are to respond generously and compassionately, returning good for evil, gentleness for arrogance, generosity for meanness, and helpfulness for hardness of spirit.

The man who smites another on the right cheek is clearly doing it with his right hand, and will therefore be smiting with the back of his right hand, and the Mishnah demonstrates that to the Jew to be smitten with the back of the hand was thought of as a double insult. The person who does it is trying to demonstrate his own superiority, and to humiliate the other. He is trying to hurt their deepest feelings and put them in their place. He may even to some extent have the right to do it. Certainly no one would accuse him of a crime. But he is nevertheless misusing his position or betraying his arrogance and behaving contemptibly. His purpose is not to do the one he strikes any real physical damage. Assuming that it was not deserved as a result of some uncalled for remark, he is seeking to remind the person whom he strikes of his place and to show his contempt for him (compare Act 23:2 ). But instead of producing resentment and a desire for retaliation in the disciple of Christ, which would be the natural reaction to such treatment, it is to do the opposite. It is to arouse a loving response. The disciple is to do the exact opposite of what is expected of him. Instead of glaring and being filled with hatred in return he is to turn the other cheek. He is to openly demonstrate that he is not offended and that he has only thoughts of love and compassion towards his tormentor. He is to show that he is perfectly ready to receive more of the same. He is by his action contrasting the Kingly Rule of God, a sphere of love and gentleness, with the tyranny of darkness, a sphere of arrogance and violence. He is contrasting God with the world, to the world’s disadvantage. He is openly witnessing to the difference between the two. Note that he does not just stand silent and say nothing. It is not passivity. He positively acts to bring out the wrongness of the situation.

Why then did Jesus, when He was smitten, rather than do what He Himself had taught Jesus, quietly ask for justification of the act (Joh 18:23 )? We must in that case remember what the situation was. Jesus was in some kind of court, and all that went on would be recorded. Furthermore He was defending Himself at the High Priest’s request and therefore the action of the soldier was reprehensible. If it went down in the record that He had had to be smitten it would have suggested that He had been guilty of some crime. Thus it was necessary for Him to set the record straight and demonstrate before the hearing that He was innocent, and had done or said nothing wrong. He did not want the record to suggest that He had been discourteous in any way, or had been deserving of being smitten. But He was not retaliating with evil for evil. He was quietly seeking to show the High Priest and the court that they were in the wrong. It is a reminder that we must not simply act mechanically with regard to things like this. We too have to think about the consequences of our actions even in these circumstances. For in the end Jesus is not just talking about an insulting blow to the cheek. He has in mind any way in which someone demonstrates a wrong and antagonistic attitude towards a disciple, an attitude that has to be responded to with compassion and love.

The one who sues another for his tunic (or shirt) presumably has a right to do so, but is showing no compassion. He is being remorseless. For the one being sued in such a way is clearly in poverty, otherwise the shirt off his back would not be in question. The plaintiff is clearly determined to have the shirt off the poor man’s back and to leave him unclothed. He is demonstrating a determination to squeeze the last penny out of him and to humiliate him. He is showing extreme meanness of spirit. While strictly legal, what he is doing is in fact to go against the higher law. For the Law commanded that he show concern and generosity towards the poor (Lev 25:35 ; Deu 15:7-8 ; Pro 14:21 ; Pro 21:13 ).

However, if this is done to the disciple, instead of showing resentment he is to respond with generosity. He is to hand over his outer cloak as well, the cloak over which the one who is suing has no rights (see Exo 22:26-27 ; Deu 24:12-13 ). There was no way in law that the plaintiff could obtain the outer cloak. Thereby the disciple reveals his willingness to meet all his obligations over and above what is required on him, and to put the attitude of the other to shame. And he also demonstrates that to be humiliated by being rendered clotheless is of no concern to him. To him life is more than clothing. (Although there is no thought that he would strip there and then. He would have to borrow clothes). And besides he is confident that his Father will supply him with clothing (Mat 6:30 ; Mat 6:32 ). And at the same time he is demonstrating what the Kingly Rule of God accomplishes in men, and is contrasting it with the tyranny of darkness. All will be able to judge between the actions of the two. The disciple is acting as true salt and as a light in the world.

The one who compels another to go a mile with him is a Roman soldier, who had a perfect right in law to demand that someone carry his equipment for one mile (strictly 8 stades or one thousand paces). This was the law under which Simon of Cyrene was compelled to carry Jesus’ crosspiece (Mat 27:32 ). Most Jews resented this law bitterly. To them it was the ultimate in humiliation. But the soldier had the right to expect it. Most Jews would make clear to the soldier their resentment. But it was not to be so for those under the Kingly Rule of God. As servants of the King they were to be only too glad to lend a hand to someone who wanted assistance, even to a soldier of Rome. Unlike the zealots they were not to look on him as an enemy, but as someone to be loved, as God loved him and sent him sunshine and rain.

All three illustrations reveal that the people in question, while they may well have been within their rights, were nevertheless behaving unpleasantly, and humiliating the objects of their unpleasantness. That is what is being indicated by the word ‘evil’ here. And the reply to such behaviour is to reveal pleasantness, and love, and peace, and a total lack of concern at being humiliated, all of which is revealed by their positive response, rather than to demonstrate resentment and retaliation. It is also to reveal the attitude and behaviour prevalent in the Kingly Rule of God. Note that in each case the disciple does not just submit, he acts positively in order to bring out his different view on the world from others. He will be revealing that as a disciple of Christ he is the servant of all (Mat 20:26 ). And all will say, ‘God is with him of a truth’.

So the response of the disciple is to turn the other cheek, thereby disquieting the striker and revealing a totally different attitude of heart and mind. It is saying, ‘if that helps you, do it again. I do not mind. I serve the One Who was so smitten and I am proud to share His humiliation’. It reveals the non-violence of the Kingly Rule of God. The one who sues you for your tunic is forbidden by law to take your cloak from you, for you need it to sleep in (see Exo 22:26-27 ; Deu 24:12-13 ). So by offering him your cloak you are going beyond the law in order to satisfy him, and doing something totally unexpected. And hopefully he will recognise his own meanness of spirit and be brought to consider his ways. You are returning good for evil, and demonstrating sacrificial generosity, and making him see what he ought to have done in the first place. Furthermore you are manifesting to him the effect of being under the Kingly Rule of God. The Roman soldier who has exerted his legal right over you will be taken totally by surprise by your offer to carry his equipment a further mile. He will never have experienced anything like it before. It will open up the opportunity of testimony to Christ (he will want to know why you have done it) and he will never forget you or your testimony. He will tell all his comrades about it. By this means you will be the light of the world (Mat 5:14 ), and in each case what you have done you will have done for Christ, and Christ will reward you with His blessing. And by your act you will have demonstrated to the one who sought to get one over on you the depth of the love of Christ Who when He was reviled did not revile in return, but instead submitted the reviling to God and was content with whatever His verdict was (1Pe 2:23 ). It would be the attitude of the Servant of the Lord in Isa 50:6 ; Isa 53:3-4 ; Isa 53:7 (compare Mat 26:27 ). It would reveal to all that here were men who had a new heart and a new spirit within them (Jer 31:33 ; Eze 36:2-27 ), and who were thus involved in the eschatological renewal. They were under the Kingly Rule of Heaven and experiencing the eschatological work of the Spirit (Isa 43:1-5 ; Eze 36:26 ). The Kingly Rule of Heaven had drawn near.

It should be noted that these positive actions in response to the evil prevent the submission from being just a negative act. It is not a matter of meekly submitting and doing nothing. If we see someone else being treated in this way we might step in. But here the person involved will hopefully be brought up sharply by what is done, and will be made to think. It is not a question of doing nothing in the face of evil. It is a matter of witnessing to the Messianic peace and love.



Give to him who asks you,

And from him who would borrow of you turn not yourself away.”

These commands are rooted in the Old Testament. They are not spoken in a capitalist environment, but in an agricultural environment. The idea is that when someone who is in poverty or in dire straits comes seeking your help you are to be more than ready to offer it (compare Psa 112:9 ). The background to it is found in Deu 14:28 to Deu 15:11 . There Moses described the giving of the third year tithe for the poor, from which the poor could always seek help, followed by the command to lend money to those in dire straits even if the seventh year, when all loans had to be cancelled, was approaching. The poor who came seeking help from the tithe should receive what they asked for. (But if no tithe was available then the disciple of Jesus should in the same way help to meet their need). The borrower should not be refused a loan, even though part of it would even be subject to cancellation. And of these things God said, “You shall give to him freely and your heart will not be grudging when you give to him, because for all this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake. --- You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor in the land” (Deu 15:10-11 ).

Jesus was here aware that this generosity of spirit required by that law was often being overlooked, or begrudged. But it was not to be so under the Kingly Rule of God. His disciples were to demonstrate the generosity that God had spoken of in Deuteronomy, and by doing so, would reveal that the Kingly Rule of Heaven was therefore present.

‘Give to him who asks of you.’ This is more generous even than Deuteronomy. Jesus is expanding the idea by also saying, ‘whatever you have, be willing to share it with those in genuine need, whatever the circumstances’. But he is certainly not saying that if mischievous people try to get all your money from you, you should let them have it. That would not be wise stewardship of what belonged to the Lord. Nor would it be doing them good in the long run.

Nor is he advising giving money to people who will spend it on drink or drugs. Often, if they claim to be hungry, we should in those cases ‘go the extra mile’ and take them to a food store. On the other hand we must not use these factors as an excuse for being mean-spirited. The whole idea is that as a result of our open-handedness, declared to be in the Name of the Lord and participated in generously, the world will glorify God, and will see a demonstration of the Kingly Rule of Heaven at work among them. They will see what kind of people God has made into. But lest this give the impression that they only behave in this way with an ulterior motive Jesus will now stress the importance of true love as being the right motive for it all.



“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour, and hate your enemy,

The passage once again commences with a statement made by others. ‘It has been said.’ This represents the popular attitude. And what has been said is that ‘love your neighbour’ necessarily excludes one’s enemy. The statement had thus clearly become somewhat commonplace that ‘you shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy’. Here a central feature of the Law appears seemingly to have been taken up, ‘you shall love your neighbour as yourself’ (Lev 19:18 ), but then limited by the addition of what seems a commonsense rider, ‘you shall hate your enemy.’ But in fact it will be noted that the whole emphasis of the first statement has by this been altered. The idea of the demanding depth of the love revealed in Lev 19:18 is dropped (‘as yourself’) so that the cutting edge is removed, while the contrast with the enemy takes away even more force from the idea of love. It has simply become a statement seen as speaking of friendship as against enmity. In this form it is very similar to ideas expressed at Qumran, ‘love the sons of light -- and hate all the sons of darkness’. It has become a parochial representation of national solidarity, and a softening up even of the requirement to a neighbour. And we can also parallel the idea in Rabbinic teaching, where commenting on Lev 19:18 we find the comment, ‘against others (who are not your neighbours) you may be revengeful and bear a grudge’. Although that must not necessarily be seen as typical of all Rabbinic teaching.



“But I say to you, love your enemies,

And pray for those who persecute you,

That you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven,

For he makes his sun to rise on the evil and the good,

And sends rain on the just and the unjust.”

Jesus then deals with this misrepresentation and dilution of the Law by disposing of the statement ‘hate your enemies’. This removes all doubt on the matter. He is saying that His disciples must rather positively love their enemies, and must pray for those who persecute them. This fact that they must pray for those who persecute them demonstrates that it therefore includes their personal ‘enemies’. But that ‘enemies’ here is intended to cover a wider range, and does not just indicate personal enemies (although it does also include them), comes out in the statements that follow. It is to cover all men everywhere, in the same way as God makes His sun rise on all men everywhere, and it is to be towards those whom men would not expect to be loved, for it is to be different from the way in which civil servants and Gentiles were wont to behave.

The love is then given a practical edge. They are also to pray for their persecutors, the idea being that the prayers will be positive and for blessing on those who persecute them. This adds to the conception of love. Their love is to be towards those who are actually at the time using them badly. The love is to be both personal and universal, and also practical. For to the Jew nothing was more practical than praying for God’s blessing on another. With that prayer would go all his goodwill and practical support. The prayer is to be a positive attempt to bring good down on their persecutors. The mention of persecution takes up Mat 5:11 , and therefore includes all who treat them badly and seek ill of them. These too are to be loved.

Defining this love is not as easy as saying it. Certainly it includes the thought of doing good to all men (compare Luk 6:27-28 ; Luk 6:32-33 ; Gal 6:9-10 ; 1Th 5:15 ) but it must also include the thought of a beneficent attitude towards them. We should not be satisfied just with behaving well, our attitude must be right as well. While we cannot feel affectionate towards all, we can certainly have a feeling of beneficence towards all. We can ensure that we see them as God sees them. We can ensure that we do not hate or despise them, even while we hate what they do and despise their behaviour, because God despises it. But we are to recognise that they are fellow human beings like ourselves and are themselves therefore loved by God (Who in fact loves us and yet despises and hates the sins of us all).

This is an advancement on the Psalmist in Psa 139:20-22 , although we should note that there he was probably dealing with assailants who were seeking his blood, and were openly rebelling against God’s authority. And besides, it was really their sins that he hated. But that in the Old Testament period His people were to treat their enemies rightly comes out in such verses as Exo 23:4-5 ; Pro 24:17-18 ; Pro 25:21 .

While many examples can be cited, taken from writers of many nations, which recommend a show of love towards enemies, none is as open, and without an intention to benefit by it, as this by Jesus. Such an attitude is indeed only possible to one who is under the Kingly Rule of Heaven and therefore recognises that nothing earthly can overthrow it or prevent its progress, so that he knows that he will triumph in the end, because God will triumph. It is altruistic love from a position of security and strength, with no strings attached.

The Babylonian ‘Counsels of Wisdom’ said, ‘Do not return evil to the man who disputes with you, requite with kindness your evildoer’ but the aim was so that the person might come out of the court case that he was facing unscathed. Cicero recommended love and mercy as the best way of being able to rule men, but again he had an ulterior motive in view. How to control the masses. Epictetus declared that the true Cynic ‘while he was being flogged must love the men who flogged him, as though he were father and brother of them all’, but this is because he himself delighted in whatever came from the hand of Providence and therefore saw all as good. Seneca even said, ‘if you wish to imitate the gods, do good deeds also to the ungrateful, for the sun also goes up on the evil, and the sea stands open even to pirates’. But note that it is an ‘if’, not a command. It is merely a general comment, to be observed or not as they wished. All this is good, but it falls short of Jesus’ demand for absolute love under all circumstances and for no other motive than to be like God, Who expects nothing in return.

‘That you may be sons of your Father Who is in heaven, for He makes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.’ Just as being a peacemaker would result in His disciples being called ‘the sons of God’ (Mat 5:9 ), so here those who love their enemies will reveal themselves to be true sons of their Father, and are to become so more and more. They are to seek to earn the approving epitaph, ‘they are their Father’s sons’. For His mercy is in general unrestricted. He sends equal benefits on all. And they must do the same. This does not mean, of course, that the whole of the rest of the Bible is being cancelled out. God’s antipathy to sin (His wrath) is still fully true, judgment still awaits all. Nor does it deny His special love for His own (nor the special love that Christians have for one another). But the point here is that meanwhile God in a general way treats all the same, and is beneficent towards all, and that therefore those who are under His Rule must do the same. This demonstrates the remarkable universality of the love that is required of us. We too are to love all.



“For if you love those who love you, what reward have you?

Do not even the civil servants the same?

And if you salute your brethren only, what do you more than others?

Do not even the Gentiles the same?”

Jesus then draws attention to the difference between what He is describing and what is more common among men. He points to two types of people who would not be looked on with favour, and who would not be expected to have any love for most Jews. The first are the civil servants’ or ‘tax collectors’. They were out to screw what they could out of people, (or certainly that was the way in which they were seen), and yet they could still love their family and friends. They loved those who loved them. And the same was true even of the Gentiles. Even they greeted warmly those who were their friends or comrades. So both national outcasts and an outcast world were capable of love. And with the salutation went hospitality. Thus loving others was not in itself a sign of anything remarkable. But His disciples were to reveal how different they were from both by loving those who did not love them, and by greeting warmly and giving hospitality to those who did not greet them. Implicit within these references is that they were also to love the tax collectors and the Gentiles. Otherwise how would they be different from them? Thus none are to be excluded from their love. And they are to do it in order to be like God, in order to reveal that they are true sons of the Kingly Rule of Heaven.



You therefore shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

The first thing to note here is that ‘you’ is both plural (in contrast with much of what has gone before) and emphatic. It means ‘you band of disciples’ (you new congregation of Israel), in contrast with all others. This idea of the completeness and ‘perfection’ of the whole body particularly comes out in Eph 4:12-13 . Those separated to God (His ‘saints’ or ‘holy ones’), who are being taught by those appointed by God, are to be ‘perfected’ for His service. And that will go on until ‘we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a ‘perfect’ man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ’. This is the aim set before God’s people as a whole. By this the Kingly Rule of Heaven will be manifested and they will be the light of the world. So while it applies to each, it also applies to all, and when one comes short he mars the whole body. In view of this it can therefore only indicate potential perfection rather than present perfection, the hope of what is to be striven for and finally achieved.

Here in the context of Matthew we may see this command statement as either closing off these few verses (Mat 5:43-48 ) or as closing off this whole section (Mat 5:17-48 ). If the former it has in mind the universal and all-embracing love of God described in Mat 5:43-48 . Their ‘perfection’ or ‘completeness’ will be revealed by their being ‘all embracing’ in their love like God is. Those who fail to love all will not be ‘perfect’ as their heavenly Father is, for He does love all, and they will thereby mar the whole body. Alternately it may be emphasising the need to fulfil all that is contained in the Law and the Prophets concerning God’s Instruction, as in Mat 5:17 . In this case it has in mind the need to observe every last detail of God’s Instruction (Mat 5:19 ), thus being ‘like God Himself’ by seeking to achieve the total fulfilment of His revealed will. That is why those who break one of the least of the commandments and teach men so will be called ‘least’ in the Kingly Rule of Heaven (Mat 5:19 ). They are a blot on the whole. For, as we will see below, being ‘perfect’ is often linked with conforming to the whole will of God.

We may also see ‘you shall be’ as indicating firstly what their aim must be, they are to be ‘perfect’ in their loving and in their living as God is, and secondly as indicating what will in the end be the result of their being His disciples and totally committed to His will. They will become ‘perfect’ in the fullest possible sense, for they will one day be like Christ, and will see Him as He is, which is why they are now to seek to purify themselves even as He is pure (1Jn 3:2-3 ).

These two aspects of perfection come out if we consider other verses where the word is found. For the word translated ‘perfect’ here is ‘teleios’, which means ‘attainment of an end or aim, completeness, being all-embracing, being of full measure, being fully grown, mature, and up to standard, being perfect’. Thus in Mat 19:21 the rich young man would be ‘perfect’ if he sold all and followed Jesus. He would be rounding off his present high standard and ‘making it complete’. He would be filling up what was lacking in his attitude by getting rid from his make-up of the love of wealth and becoming someone totally dedicated to Jesus, seeking first the Kingly Rule of God and His righteousness (Mat 6:33 ). It was the one thing lacking in him. Once he had done that his dedication to God would be complete. In Rom 12:2 Paul speaks of the need for us to offer ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God, for that is what will constitute our true spiritual worship and priestly service. And this will be achieved by our not being conformed to this world, but by our being transformed by the renewal of our minds, that we may prove what is the good, acceptable and perfect will of God. Both Mat 19:21 and Rom 12:2 are indicating that in order for us to be ‘perfect’ and be matched with the perfect will of God there must be total dedication and separation from the world and its aims and follies, and total commitment to following Jesus, with minds and wills that are open to the working of God. And here in Matthew Jesus expected that of the whole band of disciples. They were to be team players in the game of love.

In 1Co 2:6 Paul writes of ‘speaking wisdom among those who are perfect’, that is among those who are so dedicated and in tune with God that their minds are spiritually attuned to receive spiritual truth (1Co 2:12-15 ). In 1Co 14:20 being ‘perfect’ is contrasted with being like a child, ‘in malice be children, but in how you think (in mind) be perfect’. They are not to be developed in malice, but they are to be developed and fully grown in how they think. It therefore means fully grown spiritually, spiritually adult and mature. In Eph 4:13 Paul says, ‘until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ’. Here what we should aim to be is described and ‘perfection’ indicates becoming like Christ in all His fullness through believing in Him and knowing Him more and more, something to be eventually achieved by the whole church, even though it has not yet been achieved. In Php 3:12 ; Php 3:15 Paul recognises that he is not already perfect (cognate verb), that is fully fitted for resurrection, and that is because he does not as yet sufficiently know Christ and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death. And yet he does class himself among those who are ‘perfect’, that is, are morally and spiritually mature, who should therefore be pressing on towards the goal, towards the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus (when full perfection will be theirs). In Col 1:28 it is Paul’s aim, by admonishment and teaching in all wisdom, to present every man perfect in Christ Jesus. In Col 4:12 Epaphras is depicted as striving in his prayers for the Colossians, praying that they might stand perfect and fully assured in all the will of God. He longs for them to be people of full faith. In Heb 5:14 milk is for babes but solid food is for perfect, that is, full grown men, but full grown men who have, by reason of use, had their senses exercised to discern between good and evil. In Jas 3:2 the man who can control his tongue demonstrates that he is a perfectman, able to control his whole body. He is fully mature and in total control. Thus ‘perfection’ firstly has in mind full growth and maturity in spiritual and moral experience, and secondly becoming like God Himself in the fullness of spiritual and moral experience.

Coming back to Matthew then Jesus is not speaking of the attainment of individual disciples, but of the attainment of the whole. He sets before the whole band what their goal together must be, although, of course, in the fulfilment of that goal each individual must play his part. Thus perfection is the goal and the end, not achievable (except theoretically) immediately, but to be attained in the end. It is what his band of disciples, and later His newly founded ‘congregation’ (Mat 16:18 ; Mat 18:17 ), are to be aiming for. And it must be achieved in terms of what He has been saying, and especially in their revealing of universal love, that is, of love to all, in the same way as God’s beneficence is revealed towards all.

By this they are to reveal the all round perfection of their Father. And they will do so by the complete fulfilling of His perfect Law (Instruction), because in that Law is revealed His very nature. In Lev 11:44-45 ; Lev 19:2 ; Lev 20:26 God had required His whole people to be holy as He was holy, separated from sin and set apart so as to reveal His all round goodness, and therefore as having to keep themselves from all that was defiling. And that had included love for their neighbour and for the foreigners among them (Lev 19:18 ; Lev 19:34 ). That still remained true. They were to be in the world but not of the world. But now they were above all to reveal this by the heavenly love that they showed for all the world, in the same way as their Father in Heaven did. While separated from the world as citizens of Heaven (Php 3:20 ) under the Kingly Rule of Heaven, they were to embrace all who were in the world within the embrace of their love. And by this they would as a whole become complete men and women, developing into full Christlikeness, ‘to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ’ (Eph 4:13 ), with each one being an essential part of the whole.