Matthew 5
ButlerM. 1 AND seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his 2 disciples came unto him. And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples; and he opened his mouth and taught them, saying, 3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4 Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. 5 Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. 6 Blessed are they which now do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. 7 Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. 8 Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. 9 Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. 10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11 Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and revile you; and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall persecute you; and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, and cast out your name as evil, for my sake. 12 Rejoice ye in that day; be exceeding glad, and leap for joy: for great is your reward in heaven: for in like manner their fathers persecuted the prophets which were before you.
L. 24 But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation.
25. Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger.
Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep.
26. Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.
M. 13 Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under
14 foot of men. Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be
15 hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick;
16 and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.
BEFORE Christ came, the heathen had counted for divine the legislative wisdom of the man—manly strength, manly truth, manly justice, manly courage. The life and the cross of Christ shed a splendor from heaven upon a new and till then unheard-of order of heroism—that which may be called the feminine order—meekness, endurance, long-suffering, the passive strength of martyrdom. For Christianity does not say honor to the wise, but “Blessed are the meek.” F. W. R.
These beatitudes teach us wherein the only true, pure, lasting blessedness for man consists; not in anything outward, not in the gratification of our natural passions or desires, our covetousness, or pride, our ambition, or love of pleasure; not in what we have, but in what we are in God’s sight and in relation to his empire over our souls. H.
If we estimate character more by the standard of Christ’s beatitudes than by what we short-sightedly call “results,” we shall find some of the sublimest fruits of faith among what are commonly called passive virtues: in the silent endurance that hides under the shadow of great afflictions; in the quiet loveliness of that forbearance which “suffereth long and is kind;” in the charity which is “not easily provoked;” in the forgiveness which can be buffeted for doing well and “take it patiently;” in the smile on the face of diseased and suffering persons, a transfiguration of the tortured features of pain brightening sick-rooms more than the sun; in the unostentatious heroisms of the household, amid the daily dripping of small cares; in the noiseless conquests of a love too reverential to complain; in resting in the Lord, and waiting patiently for him. F. D. H.
1. The mountain. From the two prominences it presents, this hill is called the Horns of Hattin—Hattin being a village at its base. It overlooks the lake and the plain. You see Capernaum from its summit, lying about seven miles off. As seen again from Capernaum and the plain, it appears as the highest and loneliest elevation that rises upon that side of the lake. It would naturally be spoken of by the inhabitants of Capernaum and its neighborhood as the mountain. The ordination over, Jesus descended to a level spot, either between the two summits or lying at their base. The day had now advanced, and the great multitude that had followed him, apprised of his place of retreat, poured in upon him, bringing their diseased along with them. He stood for a time healing all who were brought to him. Retreating then again to the mountain-side, he sat down. His disciples seated themselves immediately around him, and the great multitude stood or sat upon the level ground below. H.
There were three great offices connected with the mediatorial work which the Son of God assumed. He was to be a Priest, to atone—a King, to reign—and a Prophet, to instruct. In this last capacity, he acted from the earliest period of the Church, but all along through her history was it promised, that in the end of the Jewish dispensation he should appear in our nature as a public Teacher. A. V.—When the time came that the Jewish nation should cease to have its old functions to discharge, and when all its types and ceremonies had their true meaning expressed and their ends accomplished, then out of this complicated law there would come to be extracted that which was absolutely perfect and universally obligatory. Jesus knew that at his advent that time had come, and assuming the very place and exercising the very prerogative of the divine legislator of the Jews, he begins in this Sermon on the Mount to execute this task. H.
The most careless reader has probably been struck with the contrast between the delivery of this sermon and the delivery of the law on Sinai. We think of that as a “fiery law,” whose promulgation is surrounded by the imagery of thunders and lightnings, and the voice of the trumpet sounding long and waxing louder and louder. We think of this as flowing forth in divinest music amid all the calm and loveliness of the clear and quiet dawn. That came dreadfully to the startled conscience from an Unseen Presence, shrouded by wreathing clouds, and destroying fire, and eddying smoke; this was uttered by a sweet human voice that moved the heart most gently in words of peace. F.—On Horeb, as the great Law-giver, he enunciated the naked law in terms of sternness, amid terrific symbols of his presence which made Israel quake. Here, he speaks as a teacher full of sympathy and love. He clothes his lesson with the colors of hope, overarches the path of life with the splendors of the heavenly bow, and sets duties, like gems, in the bosoms of bright benedictions; adding, over and above, the happy reward to which they point as a stimulus to their performance. A. V.
If there was one sentiment spread more widely than another throughout this crowd, it was the vague yet ardent expectation of some great national deliverance—of the near approach of a new kingdom—the kingdom of God. Of this kingdom they had no higher conception than that it would be a free and independent outward and visible Jewish monarchy. And when it came, then should come the days of liberty and peace, of honor and triumph, and all kinds of blessedness for poor oppressed Judea. With what a delicate hand was this deep national prejudice now treated by our Lord! What could have run more directly counter to the earthly ambitious hopes, swelling up within the hearts of those around him? what could have served more effectually to check them, than the very first words which Jesus uttered? H.—The people were expecting a Messiah who should break the yoke off their necks—a king clothed in earthly splendor, and manifested in the pomp of victory and vengeance. Their minds were haunted with legendary prophecies, as to how he should clothe them with jewels and scarlet, and feed them with even a sweeter manna than the wilderness had known. But Christ reveals to them another King, another happiness—the riches of poverty, the royalty of meekness, the high beatitude of sorrow and persecution. F.
1,2. The connected system of truths unfolded in the discourse was intended to exhibit to the people the kingdom of God as the aim of the old dispensation; as the consummation for which that dispensation prepared the way. The Sermon on the Mount, therefore, forms the point of transition from the law to the gospel; Christianity is exhibited in it as Judaism spiritualized and transfigured. The idea of the kingdom of God is the prominent one. N.—In this great declaration of the principles and laws of the Christian republic—a republic, in the relations of its citizens to each other; a kingdom, in their relations to Jesus—the omissions are no less striking than the demands. There is no reference to the priests or rabbis—till then the undisputed authorities in religion—nor is the rite of circumcision even mentioned, though it made a Jew a member of the old covenant. It is not condemned, but it is ignored. Nor are any other outward forms more in favor. The new kingdom is to be founded only on righteousness and love, and contrasts with the old by its spiritual freedom, untrammelled by outward rules. For the first time in the history of religion, a communion is founded without a priesthood, or offerings, or a temple, or ceremonial services; without symbolical worship, or a visible sanctuary. The kingdom thus founded is manifested only by the witness of the Spirit in the heart, and by the power going forth from it in the life. G.—Never was morality revealed so humbling, so ennobling, so spiritual. It makes the character of God our model, and the grace of God our encouragement. It brings us at once into contact with him, and the blessed result is a nobleness and reality of holiness, as far removed from bitterness and hypocrisy as it is from selfishness and pride. J. A.
3-12. The key-note of all the utterances of Christ reveals itself in these few sentences. His kingdom is at once present and future: present by undoubting faith in his assurances; future in the realization of its joys. As Christ’s disciples, the future will be the contrast to the present; riches for poverty; joy for mourning; plenty for hunger; a heavenly crown for earthly suffering for the Master’s sake. The contrast of sin and pardon; the lowly sense of needed salvation, which already has in itself the assurance that salvation is granted, are implied in all the states of heart recounted. Through all there runs the deepest sense of the sinfulness and troubles of the present; and springing from this, the loftiest aspirations, rising far above the earth to eternal realities. They thus disclose the inmost and central principle of the new kingdom; the willing and even joyful surrender of the present, in lowly hope of the future—and that from no lower motive than loving obedience and fidelity to Christ. Immediate self-interest is to be disregarded. The one passion of the heart is to be for greater righteousness—that is, for an evermore complete self-surrender to the will of God, and active fulfilment of its demands. G.—As these immortal promises fall on the outward sense—mercy for the merciful, comfort for them that mourn, the kingdom of heaven for the poor in spirit, filial places for the peacemakers, celestial fellowship with the prophets for those persecuted for righteousness’ sake, and for the pure in heart the beatific vision of God—what does all this boundless Beatus, “blessed,” signify, except there be some spiritual discernment to catch an image of the joy? To the sensual, to the profane, to the soul that is shut upward and open only toward the earth, cold in devotion and eager only with its appetites, or cased in that intellectual selfishness that shrinks as it freezes, what great desire, or aspiration, can that “blessed” bring? F. D. H.
3. Poor in spirit.** It denotes, not circumstances, but inward character; not a condition of life, but a state and temper of mind. It is put at the fore-front of the other graces, because it is the meet and impressive introduction to all. It is he who feels most poignantly his need of all, who will most heartily hail the promise of the free gift of all. The philosophers did not reckon humility among their virtues, but Jesus puts it first. Self-denial is the first lesson in his school, and poverty of spirit entitles it to the first beatitude. A. V.—To be beaten utterly out of conceit with one’s own strength, goodness, and wisdom; to feel that apart from God’s grace we are nothing, can do nothing; to be assured that our best resolves are like water or stubble, and to depend with great simplicity upon Christ for all things: this is the grace which lies at the foundation of every other. Gouldburn.—Our Saviour says, we are happy, blessed, in proportion as we feel our own want, our own emptiness, in things spiritual. Surely this first opening of his mouth in systematic teaching was at once a gospel. The more we are poor, the more are we rich! V.—This poverty of spirit being the condition of every blessing, therefore to it is attached the promise of the kingdom of heaven, which is inclusive of all blessings; for all the beatitudes which follow are but the unfolding of this first one. T.
4. That mourn.** Self-love, pride, and covetousness have their tears, but God wipes away only those of humility, repentance, and love. Q.—The sorrow that is blessed is that of the true penitent. Such a one sees his real position; his vain confidence is broken up, and self-righteous presumption is cast aside. The past, with its abused privileges, despised chastisements, its thousand resolutions violated, and its ten thousand transgressions of the divine law perpetrated, flashes upon his mind, and fills him with concern. Especially is an agonizing Saviour seen, standing between him and the gleaming sword of justice, and receiving its thrust into his own heart. No wonder that he bitterly deplores the effects of sin, and grieves over its odiousness. This sorrow, however, is only that which endureth for a night, to be succeeded by the joy that cometh in the morning. They are blessed, and “they shall be comcomforted.” The Saviour’s promise is actualized already in this life, and destined to its complete fulfilment in the perfected life to come. A. V.
5. The meek.** It is the opposite of all that is arrogant, forward, and self-asserting. It is the expression before men of a spirit which has already breathed itself before God. V.—The “inheritance of the earth” is that world-dominion which Christians are more and more to obtain, as the kingdom of God shall win increasing sway over mankind; and the power which is to gain this world-dominion is meekness; the quiet might of gentleness it is with which God’s kingdom is to subjugate the world. N.
6. Righteousness.** In brief definition, the completeness of human duty toward all with whom we have to do; toward God above, no less than toward man below. Our Lord pronounces his benediction here upon those whose whole soul is hungering and thirsting after goodness, after sanctification. V.—Augustine cannot find the entire fulfilment of the appended promise, for they shall be filled, in the present life; for now our lips are but sprinkled with a few drops from that river of joy, whereof then we shall drink to the full. Yet the longing now is needful, if there is to be a satisfying of the longing hereafter; and the more longing, the ampler satisfaction, for this longing is itself the dilating of the vessel that it may contain the more. T. [This and other notes upon the sermon are taken from Trench’s rendering of Augustine’s “Exposition.” Much of the richness and value of the thoughts, as here rendered, proceeds from the large mind of the interpreter; while some of the best comments cited are his own. Ed.]
7. The merciful.** It is a pitifulness of wider reach than the relief of temporal needs, embracing the whole outcomings of a Christian’s heart, whether in inward sympathies or outward acts, in relation to the sorrows and sufferings of his brethren. And here the blessed retaliations of the kingdom of God shall find place. T.—Obtain mercy. It is not that the merciful obtain mercy by virtue of their mercifulness, but rather that their mercifulness stamps them as inheritors of the free forgiveness. V.—Thou art sought, and thou seekest. As thou dealest with thy seeker, even so will God deal with his. Thou art both empty and full. Fill thou the empty out of thy fulness, that out of the fulness of God thine emptiness may be filled. Aug.
8. The pure heart** Augustine explains rightly as the single heart, the heart without folds; and this, with the promise of seeing God which is annexed, causes him to connect this passage with others wherein our Lord speaks of the single eye, that eye of the soul, which, only when healthy, is receptive of divine light, and the channel of light to the whole interior man; that declaration being identical with this, that only the pure in heart shall see God. It is to the attaining of this pure heart, this purged eye of the soul, that all helps and appliances of grace are tending. This is the great meaning and purpose of them all, to prepare and fit us for this, for a time when we shall be enabled to see the Seer. For in that seeing all blessedness is included; without it there were no heaven, with it there could be no hell. T.
9. The peacemakers: children of God. The peacemaker has more of God’s direct work to do than any other person. His office, as such, is the very office of God. The child bears the father’s likeness: they who are like God are his children: and the peacemaker is, of all, the likest God. “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God;” and the choicest fruit of the Spirit is peace and peacemaking. V.
10-12. This eighth beatitude returns upon the first, having the same promise, the kingdom of heaven. In the intermediate ones this promise has not been forsaken, for it comprehends all the others; but it has been contemplated successively in its various aspects. Its return here, indicates that now the perfect and complete man has on all his sides been declared. For these are not different persons that will be differently blessed. It is not that one, being pure in heart, will see God; another, being merciful, will obtain mercy; and a third, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, will be filled. But these are different sides of the same Christian character, with the capacities of blessedness which are linked to each. It might be added, that in these beatitudes thus distinguished from one another, there is an implicit summons to seek to complete the Christian character in all its aspects. T.
12. Reward: not of debt, but of grace, as the parable of the laborers clearly represents it, where the reward is not what is earned, but what was covenanted. A.—The reward in heaven does, indeed, bear a relation to that which is done or suffered for Christ’s sake on earth, yet is it a relation of grace and not of debt. God has chosen, and of his own free will and unmerited bounty appointed, that there should be such a relation, and “he is faithful that promised.” The doctrine of preventing grace, legitimately carried out, must forever exclude the notion of any claim, as of merit properly so called; not that there are not merits, or rather graces, which will hereafter be recognized, but that these merits are themselves gifts of God, so that eternal life will be but the adding of one more, one crowning gift, to all that preceded. It will be but “grace for grace.” T.
3-12. Each one of the beatitudes is a saying which contradicts man’s opinion, and is a distinct cross to flesh and blood. Blessed are, not the rich, but the poor: not the joyful, but the sorrowful: not the self-satisfied, the triumphant, the magnificent, but the meek, the merciful, the peacemaker, and the pure. Blessed are they that actually suffer; the despised, the ill-used, the reviled, and the outcast! V.
L. 24. Woe unto you. Our Saviour speaks here, not as a judge, pronouncing sentence on the guilty, but as a prophet, divinely enlightened as to the consequences of men’s actions, and impelled by his zeal for their good to give them warning. Campbell.—That are rich! Who, having received your portion of good things in this life, live in voluptuousness, and place all your happiness in the enjoyments of the present world. So, in the next verse, “you that are full—that laugh,” you who live in pleasure here, and never think of what is to come hereafter. 26. Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well! When, by propagating such doctrines as encourage men in their sins, ye gain their applause; for thus, in old time, false prophets, who accommodated their doctrines to the passions of men, were better received than the true prophets of God. S. C.
13. The salt of the earth. In the East salt was the very life of life; the universal antidote to decay and putrefaction. It must enter into everything, or the food of man and beast would fall rapidly to corruption and decay. And thus salt became the very word for uncorruptness, sincerity, fidelity. To be the salt is to do everything in our power, by word, by persuasion, by influence, by example, to make those around us more pure, more thoughtful, more Christ-like than they would have been without us. V.—Good for nothing. It is a well-known fact that the salt of this country (Palestine), when in contact with the ground, or exposed to rain and sun, does become insipid and useless. It is not only good for nothing itself, but it actually destroys all fertility wherever it is thrown; and this is the reason why it is cast into the street. So troublesome is this corrupted salt that no man will allow it to be thrown on to his field, and the only place for it is the street, and there it is cast to be trodden under foot of men. W. M. T.
14. City set on a hill cannot be hid. As used in the English Scriptures, city denotes hamlet, or village, as well as a town of the larger class. Add to this that the houses are often built of chalky limestone, or are whitewashed. Very expressive was the Saviour’s illustration as addressed to those living in a hilly country where almost every summit glittered with a village. H. B. H.
16. Let your light shine. Profession is only the badge of a Christian, but practice it is which translates Christianity from a bare notion into a real business, from bare speculations into substantial duties, from an idea in the mind into an existence in the life. One great end of religion is to proclaim and publish God’s sovereignty. Our faith indeed recognizes him to be our God, but it is our obedience only that declares him to be our Lord. When a man lives a good life, every hour he lives is virtually an act of worship. But if inward grace is not drawn forth into outward practice, men have no inspection into our hearts, to discern it there. R. S.
The Church of Christ is organically a luminous body; a city set on a hill which cannot be hid. It shines because it exists; but it exists, and therefore shines, only when its life is hid with Christ in God. To the disciples whom he would leave behind him to represent his life and doctrine among men, Jesus said, “Ye are the light of the world.” And this was said of a little company of obscure men—fishermen, small farmers, here and there a publican, a few women in humble life, the poor of a subjugated and despised race; not a priest, a scholar, or a ruler among them—for as yet there was not in their whole circle so much of human learning as the Apostle Paul afterward brought to the illustration of the Christian faith, and though Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea had been secretly drawn to Jesus, they had not avowed him as the Messiah—of such unlettered, untitled, uninfluential men, with absolutely no position and no prospect in the world, was it said, they were not simply a light to their sect, their times, their country, but the light of the world. And how marvellously has this declaration been fulfilled in five of that little band, Matthew, Mark, John, Peter, and James, who have given to the world more of the light of truth and holiness than all the wisdom of the ancients had been able to produce. And wherever now the light of knowledge, truth, virtue shines brightest and purest, there the gospels and epistles of those primitive disciples are the fountain and the glory of that light. So penetrated were they with the life of Christ that, by reproducing him—the incarnate Word, the atoning Saviour, the risen Lord—they have become the transparencies through which his image shines; and whatever the form of outward representation, we see in all the living Christ. . . . Every soul that receives Christ as its life becomes transparent with his image, and according to its sphere an enlightener of mankind. And so the Church—not as represented by organization, sacraments, forms, structures, officers, rituals, councils, creeds, though these all have their intermediate functions—but the Church as constituted of living disciples, true to their faith, true to their Lord, true to their stewardship of the manifold grace of God, true to their commission to evangelize the nations, the Church of renewed, praying, living souls, is the light of the world—the light as they receive and manifest the life; for the Scriptures declare that these “shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life.” J. P. T
Section 36.—Sermon on the Mount. The Law in its Spirit. The Sixth Command.
17. THINK not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to 18 destroy, but to fulfil. For verily, I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or 19 one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do, and teach them, the same shall 20 be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you, That except your right- eousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. 21 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whoso- 22 ever shall kill, shall be in danger of the judgment: but I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause, shall be in danger of the judgment: and who- soever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever 23 shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell-fire. Therefore, if thou bring thy gift to 24 the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.
25. Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles thou art in the way with him; lest at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, 26 and thou be cast into prison. Verily, I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.
HERE was a new man on the earth, clear as the light of the sun, fresh as the morning dews; knowing man, knowing God and his truth, discarding musty traditions, idle babblements, smiting home to the very core of the matter, and revealing at a stroke what it really concerned men to know—the real blessedness of life, what we must be and do to be true men, and to win true men’s goal and reward. With the vision of a seer he saw, with the fearlessness of a prophet he told, where the true blessedness of man lay: not in walking the circles of ceremonious religionists, but in being meek, pure, lowly, peaceful, generous, forgiving; in being right-hearted, liberal-handed, devout, true, good.
This authoritative speech of Christ will never become obsolete, and never can be superseded. He spoke to us of God and our relations to him, and God and our relations can never change. He spoke to us of eternity, and eternity never waxes old. He spoke to us of man, and man in his great original traits is the same as when Christ spoke to him. The truth on all these themes is not affected by the lapse of years. Centuries wear the mountains, and they come to naught, but they alter not the eternal truths of God and man. The Sermon on the Mount is as fresh and beautiful to-day as when the lips of Jesus first parted to utter it in the ears of the multitude. So long as man is what he is, so long the words of Jesus will be to him what they have ever been—the brightest jewels of our lost humanity. Jesus may become the obsolete Teacher of the world when a new God ascends the throne, when a new law issues from him, and a new Saviour tabernacles in clay. Till then, Jesus will be the fresh, unctuous Teacher of the race, speaking to every succeeding generation of men in the same tones of authority that he uttered to that gathered throng of Jews on the mountain-slope of Palestine. J. D.
17. I came not to destroy, but to fulfil.
“The forms are not the law. Rites and ceremonies are only helps, for simple ages, which need material symbols. The law is forever sacred: Spoken by God, it is eternal. I come to do it honor; to confirm, but also to clear it from human additions and corruptions.” G.—Christ was not only the living gospel but also the living law. He republished the law of God in all its purity and sanctity, and taught us its inmost meaning by his own perfect obedience. He came not to destroy but to fulfil. He unfolded the law in its length and breadth—in its letter and its spirit, in its rewards and its penalties, up to the judgment of the last assize. And he so interpreted that law to the human conscience and the human heart, and he so exemplified it in his whole incarnate life, that it really in and through him became fully known to the human race as the law of life. H. B. S.—The consummation of the kingdom will be the “fulfilling” of all which was contained, in germ, in the preparatory stage; it will, on the other hand, be the “destroying” of all that was, in itself, only preparatory. In pointing to this consummation of the kingdom of God as the final “fulfilling” of all, Christ at the same time fixes the final end for the fulfilment of all the promises connected with the beatitudes. N.
As the previous dispensations were typical, he came to complete them, putting the substance in the place of the shadow. As they were predictive, he fulfils them. As they inculcate precepts and truths in relation to God and man, he develops and explains them; giving them a clearer, wider, and more spiritual application to the various duties of human life, and making them and himself a full and perfect revelation of the will and character of his Father. J. A.—Christ fulfilled the law and the prophets, by accomplishment of types, ceremonies, rites, and prophecies; by explaining, enlarging, and perfecting the moral law, by writing it on the heart, by giving grace to obey it as well as an example of obedience, by taking away its curse; and by the doctrine of free justification through faith in himself which the law prefigured and anticipated but could not give. W.
18. It is important to observe in these days how the Lord here includes the Old Testament and all its unfolding of the divine purposes regarding himself, in his teaching of the citizens of the kingdom of heaven. I say this, because it is always in contempt and setting aside of the Old Testament that rationalism has begun. First, its historical truth, then its theocratic dispensation and the types and prophecies connected with it are swept away; so that Christ came to fulfil nothing, and becomes only a teacher or a martyr; and thus the way is paved for a similar rejection of the New Testament, beginning with the narratives of the birth and infancy, as theocratic myths, advancing to the denial of his miracles, then attacking the truthfulness of his own sayings, which are grounded on the Old Testament as a revelation from God, and so finally leaving us nothing in the Scriptures but, as a German writer of this school has expressed it, “a mythology not so attractive as that of Greece.” A.
—Jot or tittle. Jot is the Hebrew Jod, the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet; tittles, literally horns, are the little turns of the strokes by which one Hebrew letter differs from another similar to it. In the Hebrew Bible are over 66,000 jots. The Hebrew copyists were scrupulous to the last degree, and regarded the slightest error in their copy fatal. For the purpose of illustration, Christ takes this well-known veneration of the copyists for the most minute details in their copying. L. A.
20. The rest of our Lord’s sermon is a comment on and illustration of the assertion in this verse. A.—The main topic is the righteousness, or right rule of life, which Christ came to teach, and its immeasurable superiority over the highest righteousness known to man before he came. All through the sermon, sometimes latent but commonly expressed, there runs this comparison between the old righteousness and the new; until the closing parable sets forth the fate of those who trusted in the old, and those who trusted in the new. S. Cox.—Christ opposed the Pharisaic statutes because they took the law in its letter, not in its spirit, and surrounded its observance with difficulties. He made it a fundamental point, that all true obedience must spring from piety and love; but still it was obedience to the law. N.—The object he urges is to pass from the letter which kills to the spirit which gives life, from an external and material obedience to an internal and spiritual obedience, from the work of the hands to that of the heart, from the offering of goods to that of ourselves. The thing required is not a new law, but a new spirit, not new observances, but a second birth. The ancient law said, Do. The new law says, Be. A. V.
Abstinence from forbidden deeds had been taken as a keeping of the divine commands. Obedience had thus come to be looked upon as a thing of outward constraint or mechanical conformity, its merit lying in the force of the constraint, the exactness of the conformity. It was thus that the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees consisted mainly in a formal adherence to the letter of the precept, to the neglect often and sometimes to the contradiction of its spirit. This fatal error Christ exposes, taking up commandment after commandment, unfolding the spirituality and extent of the requirement, showing how it reached not simply or mainly to the regulation of the outward conduct, but primarily and above all things to the state of the heart. H.—To emancipate Christianity from its connection with Judaism by a mere dictum, to produce so momentous a change by a word of command, would not only contradict the usual methods of Providence, but violate the very nature of Christianity as a system resting on the intelligent apprehension of truth. A sudden, violent rupture with the Old Testament system was not a thing to be desired. Rather were the old things to pass away, not as the result of a fiat, but by the natural expulsive power of the new. It was not a method of antagonism and destruction, but of fulfilment. Hence Christ set forth the seminal ideas of the new kingdom, and left them, through the Spirit and the agency of Providence, to produce in their own time the proper fruit. G. P. F.
21,27,33. In our translation it is, Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time. The sense of the passages, and the opposition of the clauses, But I say unto you, require that it should be translated not by, but to them of old time. This connection throws a beautiful light on our Lord’s sermon; showing us that it was not his intention to set his own precepts in opposition to the precepts of the law; but to set his expositions of those precepts in opposition to the interpretations of the doctors, which they pretended to derive from Moses by tradition. M.—21 (also 27, 33, 38, 43). A maxim or a commandment is taken out of the Levitical law—in some instances with the addition of a Pharisee’s gloss upon it—and then, so far as it is God’s it is interpreted, and, so far as it is man’s it is superseded, by a precept reaching down into the very depths of the heart, and going forth into the whole width and compass of the life. V.
22. Roca often occurs in the Talmud. It is equivalent to a worthless person in a light and frivolous sense. “It is a word used by one that despises another with the utmost scorn.” Gehenna is the word here translated “hell-fire.” It was originally Gê benê Hinnom, the valley of the sons of Hinnom, under the south walls of Jerusalem. Children were burned alive there to Moloch till the days of King Josiah. The howlings of the infants and the foul idolatry made it the symbol of hell, and this was strengthened by its being afterward used as the place where the refuse of the temple sacrifices was burned up continually in a fire that was never quenched. G.—There were among the Jews three well-known degrees of guilt, coming respectively under the cognizance of the local and the supreme courts, called here “the Judgment” and the “Council” or Sanhedrim; and after these is set the “Gehenna of fire,” the end of the malefactor, whose corpse, thrown out into the valley of Hinnom, was devoured by the worm or the flame. Similarly, in the spiritual kingdom of Christ, shall the sins even of thought and word be brought into judgment and punished, each according to its degree of guilt, but even the least of them before no less a tribunal than the judgment-seat of Christ. There is here no distinction of kind between these punishments, but only of degree. In the thing compared, the “judgment” inflicted death by the sword, the “council” death by stoning, and the disgrace of the “Gehenna of fire” followed as an intensification of the horrors of death; but the punishment is one and the same—death. So also in the subject of the similitude, all the punishments are spiritual; all result in eternal death. So that the distinction drawn between cenial and mortal sins finds not only no countenance but direct confutation from this passage. 25. The sense of this verse is: “As in worldly affairs it is prudent to make up a matter with an adversary before judgment is passed, which may deliver a man to a hard and rigorous imprisonment, so reconciliation with an offended brother in this life is absolutely necessary before his wrong shall cry against us to the Great Judge, and we be cast into eternal condemnation.” A.
Section 37.—Sermon on the Mount. The Law further explained.
M. 27 Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery. 28 But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath com- 29 mitted adultery with her already in his heart. And if thy right eye offend thee [or, cause thee to offend], pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. 30 And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be 31 cast into hell. It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her 32 a writing of divorce. But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery. 33 Again, ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not for- 34 swear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths. But I say unto you, Swear 35 not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God’s throne: nor by the earth; for it is his 36 footstool: neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King. Neither shalt 37 thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black. But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh 38 of evil. Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a 39 tooth. But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on 40 thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if any man will sue thee at the law, 41 and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. And whosoever shall compel thee 42 to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee; from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away; and of him that taketh away thy goods, ask them not again. 43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine 44 enemy. But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and per- 45 secute you; that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on 46 the unjust. For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? for sinners 47 also love those that love them. And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more L. 33 than others? do not even the publicans so? And if ye do good to them which do good
34 to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same. And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners,
35 to receive as much again. But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the
36. Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.
M. 48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
THE life of Jesus, in all its aspects, is the great lesson of humanity. His death is its hope. But there lies a wondrous treasure in his words. What but a pure and sinless soul could have conceived such an idea of God as the Father of mankind, drawing us to himself by the attraction of holy and exhaustless love? “It could only rise,” says Hausrath, “in a spirit that stood pure, guiltless, and sinless before God—a spirit in which all human unrest and disturbance were unknown, on which there lay no sense of the littleness of life, no distracting feeling of disappointed ambition. Sinful man, with a stained or even uneasy conscience, will always think of God as jealous, wrathful, and about to avenge himself. The revelation that God is the Father of men could rise only in a mind in which the image of God mirrored itself in calm completeness, because the mirror had no specks to mar it.” “He has left us not only a life, but a rich world of thoughts,” says Keim, “in which all the best inspirations and longings of mankind meet and are reflected. It is the expression of the purest and directest truths which rise in the depths of the soul, and they are made common to all mankind by being uttered in the simplest and most popular form.” G.
THE sayings of our Lord herein are all to be regarded as expressing the spiritual sense of the Old Testament commands; and his explanations (with his moral precepts generally) must themselves be interpreted in his spirit. He speaks broadly and impressively, reckoning upon the candor and common-sense of his hearers. J. A.—Everything in the Sermon on the Mount points to a living and spiritual law. It contains the most emphatic protest against the falsehoods and fictions of Pharisaism; it inaugurates the true spiritual worship which is alone worthy of God. By that which it overthrows and that which it establishes, this sermon, which has been said to preach only a purified Judaism, unfurls the standard of the new covenant; the sovereign authority with which it accredits Jesus is compatible only with his incomparable dignity as Son of man and Son of God. De P.
27, 33, 38, 43. “Ye have heard that it was said (not by, but) to them of old times.” By these words Jesus sets himself in opposition, not to Moses and his law, but to the Pharisees and their exposition of it. “Them of old times” we are to understand as signifying the ancestors of the Jews and contemporaries of the law-giver. C. B.
27. As with homicide, so in adultery, the morality of the new kingdom traced the crime home to the heart, and condemned the unclean glance as a virtual commission of the crime itself. The thoughts were nothing, in the loose morality of the day; but Jesus arraigns the secret lusts of the breast, with an earnestness unknown to the rabbis. G.—28. The man who can deliberately gaze with a view to feed unlawful desire has in thought committed the deed. A.—29, 30. Occasions of sin, at whatever cost, are to be sacrificed, on pain of “hell-fire.” Such language from lips so gentle bespeaks awful danger. B.—The eye to be plucked out is the eye of concupiscence, and the hand to be cut off is the hand of violence and vengeance—i. e., those passions are to be checked and subdued, let the conflict cost us what it may. P.
31,32. He knows that the happiness of mankind, as well as the moral position of women, depend essentially upon the married state. He makes of the sanctity of marriage a fundamental law of Christian religion and society; he pursues adultery even into the recesses of the human heart, the human thought; he forbids divorce. Signal and striking testimony to the progressive action of God upon the human race! Jesus Christ restores to the divine law of marriage the purity and authority that Moses had not enjoined to the Hebrews, “because of the hardness of their hearts.” F. G.
34-36. The casuistry of the rabbis had so darkened the whole subject of oaths, that they had become utterly worthless. They were formally classed under different heads in rabbinical jurisprudence, and endless refinements opened facilities for any one to break them who wished. Their number was endless; men swore by heaven, by the earth, by the sun, by the prophets, by the temple, by Jerusalem, by the altar, by the wood used for it, by the sacrifices, by the temple vessels, by their own heads. G.—The people now use the very same sort of oaths that are mentioned and condemned by our Lord. They swear by the head, by their life, by heaven, and by the temple, or, what is in its place, the church. The forms of cursing and swearing, however, are almost infinite, and fall on the pained ear all day long. W. M. T.—37. “Whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil”—i. e., testifies to a want of that disposition of heart which every member of his kingdom ought to possess; a want of that thorough truthfulness which makes every other affirmation superfluous, and of the mutual confidence that depends upon it. N.—After this sincerity, this entire truthfulness of conversation one with another, the Lord would have his disciples strive, and to this attain. Let guile and deceit cease from among you, and the oath will cease also; for it is “of evil,” of your evil; and only that renders it so frequently offered, and so frequently required. T.
38. The Pharisees thought it no injustice nor irreligion to prosecute the severest retaliation or revenge; so that at the same time their outward man might be a saint, and their inward man a devil. No care at all was had to curb the unruliness of anger, or the exorbitance of desire. Among all their sacrifices they never sacrificed so much as one lust. R. S.
38-42. The spirit of such injunctions is evident. Hasty retaliation; readiness to stand on one’s rights in all cases; deliberate revenge rather than pity, are unworthy a member of the new kingdom. It is for him to teach by bearing, yielding, and giving, and not by words only. He must suffer wrong patiently, that the conscience of the wrong-doer—become its own accuser—might be won to repentance, by the lesson of unresisting meekness. Christ’s own divine charity and forgiveness was to be repeated by his followers. But it is far from the teaching of Christ that law is to cease, or that the evil-doer is to have everything at his mercy. Only, as far as possible, the principle of his kingdom is to be the purest, deepest, self-sacrificing love. G.
A cleaving to the letter of this and similar precepts, will continually issue in a violation of the spirit of Christ’s commandments. Thus, in his case who dared to lift up his hand against the Lord, to have offered him the other cheek would have been no love, for it would have been a tempting of him to repeat his fearful offence. It must be that our Lord is legislating here for the inward spirit of man. This offering of the other cheek may be done outwardly; but only inwardly can it be always right; being as it is the meekness of the spirit under wrong, the preparedness of heart to bear as much as has been already inflicted or more, if so any good may come to the injurious person. But Christian love and prudence are in each case to decide whether it is also a precept for the outward conduct. It may be so; it will be so often; for instance, if thou thinkest that thy offending brother will be won by thy Christian patience, and his evil overcome by this exhibition of thy good, then it will be thy duty, if he has done thee one wrong, to lay thyself open for a second. But if thou countest that his evil will grow with impunity, that he will strengthen himself in his sin, and therefore in his misery, through thy forbearance, then it is thy duty to turn to him thy love on its severer side, to repress the outcomings of his evil, though it will be the same love that dictates this line of conduct or the other. The commands are to stand fast evermore in all their breadth and fulness; their only limitation is this, that love and the Spirit of God are in each case to be their interpreters, to apply them to the emergent necessity. Where this love and this Spirit are wanting, the precept must be interpreted wrongly. God dealt with men by law and by gospel, and the same love was in each, as the law punished and the gospel forgave, each for the bringing about an end beyond itself, and the same end, even the righteousness of the sinner, though they sought it by ways so different. So will there be counterparts to both in the wise and loving conduct of a Christian man toward his offending brother. The everlasting rule is, that thou render good for thy brother’s evil: the shape in which thou shalt render it, love shall prescribe. T.
42. Give to him that asketh thee. The command then, “Give,” as interpreted by the life of him who uttered it, is ever to stand fast. But it is, give that which will make the receiver truly richer; and often in this sense a seeming denial will be the most real giving, as on the other side there are gifts which are no gifts, which as it was wrong to ask, so would it be far better never to have received. He who gives these does not really give; and while he seems to be keeping the letter of this, is indeed violating the spirit of all Christ’s commandments. T.—To give everything to every one, the sword to the madman, alms to the impostor, the criminal request to the temptress, would be to act as the enemy of others and ourselves. Ours should be a higher and deeper charity, flowing from those inner springs of love which are the sources of outward actions sometimes widely divergent; whence may arise both the timely concession, and the timely refusal. A.
44. Love your enemies. Love as God loves, regardless of merit and of the reciprocity of love; loving because you would be like God, loving because God has first loved you. V.—There is nothing greater than to imitate God in doing good to our enemies. If God had not loved us while we were his enemies, we could never have become his children; and we shall cease to be so, if we cease to imitate him. This precept alone is a sufficient proof of the holiness of the gospel, and of the truth of the Christian religion. None but God could have imposed a yoke so contrary to self-love; and nothing but the supreme and infinite love could have made men practise a law so insupportable to corrupt nature. Q.—He who has exhorted and taught us to pardon, is undoubtedly a God who pardons. His anger, all divine, takes nothing from his love. Were he man, he would pray for these enemies of his will. Jesus Christ, his Son, prayed for the enemies of his Father. The more our personal resentment is effaced in the sadness of seeing our Father offended, the weak scandalized, the seeds of sin multiplied, the empire of darkness extended, the more will our heart be free to pardon, to love, and to pray. A. V.
45. That ye may be the children of your Father in heaven.** One chief feature of the teaching in the gospels is found in the word Father. Jesus appears among men in the character of the Son. His first spoken word utters the consciousness of that relation. In right of this relation he straightway associates in it those who receive him: and when, in his first instructions, he lifts up his eyes on his disciples to teach them the principles of the kingdom of God, he bases everything upon this relation between them and their God. So the whole course of his teaching tends to the intertwining of his own relation to God with theirs, which is finally expressed on the eve of his departure: “My Father and your Father, my God and your God.” T. D. B.
This “sun” and “rain” are the common mercies of which all are partakers. And this same unstinted bounty of God, this love which comprehends all, according to the measure in which they are capable of being comprehended by it, supplies the measure in which those who would indeed show themselves “the children of their Father which is in heaven,” are to exercise love, the pattern which they are to set before them for imitation. 46, 47. There is, first, the returning of good for good, and evil for evil; being the principle which the world recognizes and on which it acts. But beneath this there is the returning of evil for good, which is devilish; while above it is the returning of good for evil, which is divine, which is God’s principle of action; and to this the children of God are summoned here. T.
L. 35. We are not required to regard with precisely the same feeling a Christian brother, and an openly profane and profligate person—a generous benefactor and a malignant inveterate enemy. It is not possible—and, if it were, it would not be proper—to cherish the same tender regard for strangers as for “those of our own household,” the same gratitude to enemies as to benefactors, the same esteem for the bad as for the good. But we are sincerely to wish all men well, even our enemies; we are to desire their good; we are, as we have opportunity, to promote their happiness. J. B.—Hoping for nothing again. That is, “Do good” to those who will never return you any kindness, as your enemies, and those especially who never can make any recompense, as the poor and needy. S. C.
36. Be ye therefore merciful.** What degree and description of mercy is required of us is sufficiently explained here. It is that which does not restrain our affections and good offices to persons from whom we either have received, or reasonably expect, the like: it is that which forgives our very enemies, forgives so as to love them, loves so as to do them good, liberally and cheerfully: it is that which conforms our practice to the example of that Father in heaven, who grudges not the daily blessings of life to those who daily forfeit all claim to his numberless benefits. Stanhope.
M. 48. Be ye perfect. Complete, in your love of others; not one-sided or exclusive, as those just mentioned, but all-embracing and God-like. Ye is emphatic. No countenance is given by this command to the ancient heresy of perfectibility in this life. Such a sense of the words would be utterly at variance with the whole of the discourse. A.—Love, he says, not merely your friends, but your enemies; stop not short at that easier love, but go on to the harder, fulfilling the course set before you, reaching to the end of your Christian course; and do this because God does it. But he who asserts this to mean, Do all this in the measure in which God does it, and believes this possible, declares, not that he has a high apprehension of what man’s love ought to be, but that he has most poor and unworthy apprehensions of what God’s love is. T.
The word perfect never signifies in New Testament usage sinlessness, but completion in Christian character in contrast with a half-finished and partial character, a character that is Christian in some parts and worldly and selfish in others. This verse sums up that portion of the Sermon on the Mount in which Christ has developed the Christian ideal of character. In it Christ explains in what consists the fulfilment of the law and the prophets. “The ancient statutes,” says Christ in effect, “forbade murder, adultery, false swearing, cruelty in revenge. A complete obedience embraces the whole man, and brings the spirit as well as the members under allegiance to these laws. The ancient statute commanded love to your neighbor; the spirit of that statute requires love to all mankind. You are to aim, not at an external obedience to laws and regulations, but at the attainment of a character which in all its conduct shall conform to the law, and in all its faculties to the image of him whose sons you are called to be.” In brief, one may be an imperfect, but one cannot be a partial Christian. He may obey Christ imperfectly, but he cannot obey in part and disobey in part. God requires perfection of his disciples as the wise teacher continually holds perfection before his pupils; not condemning those who fall short, but not allowing them to rest satisfied with incomplete attainment. L. A.
Jesus knows humanity; he knows how fickle, how selfish, how base it is; and yet, strange to say! he does not despise it. He despises neither friends nor foes: he despairs of no man; he never fails to see in the most blinded and degraded creature the temple of God, empty and ruined although it be. He who best knows humanity, and we can add, who suffers most from it, he it is who honors it the most. He it is also who expects the most of it. That which he demands of them is not to take a step toward their true manhood, but to realize it completely.
“Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” R. C.
THE morality of Jesus was not that of a sect, a race, or a nation, but of universal man. It has no political, no local, no temporary precepts. Within its proper kingdom, the heart of man, it may dwell in every change of political relation. It has no local centre, no temple. Strictly speaking, it is no system of positive enactments. It is the establishment of certain principles, the enforcement of certain dispositions, the cultivation of a certain temper of mind, which the conscience is to apply to the ever varying exigencies of time and place. The basis of its universality was the broad and original principles upon which it rested. These two great principles the gospel first placed as the main pillars of the new moral structure: God the universal Father, mankind one brotherhood; God made known through the mediation of his Son, the image and humanized type and exemplar of his goodness; mankind of one kindred and therefore of equal rank, and to be united in one spiritual commonwealth. H. M.