Man would have hidden all this assuredly; he would have preferred to put forth either some flaming account of ancient and august ancestry, or to concentrate all the honour and glory in one, the lustre of whose genius eclipsed all antecedents. He tells them, that given opprobrious language to our brother is tongue-murder, calling him, Raca, and, Thou fool. The reason why we must have this unconquerable benevolence and goodwill is that God has it; and, if we have it, we become nothing less than sons of God, godlike men. When we look to Jesus and see His patience, love and forgiveness of others, how can we put down those He came to save? And when a man sees sin in all its horror he cannot do anything else but experience intense sorrow for his sin. The true wonder of man is not that he is a sinner, but that even in his sin he is haunted by goodness, that even in the mud he can never wholly forget the stars. The Church was in no doubt where a man's duty lay. Christ illustrates his meaning by Jewish practices. Thus it is evident that in this further word of the Lord we have answers to the differences already hinted at. But to Jesus a statement required no authority other than the fact that he made it. To the Jew the Law was absolutely holy and absolutely divine; it is impossible to exaggerate the place that the Law had in their reverence. , here used, and which is often used in the New Testament for "hell", is but the Hebrew , "Ge-Hinnom", the valley of Hinnom, where the children were caused to pass through the fire to Moloch. (verses Matthew 7:5-11.). That may well be the picture here. Now, I shall proceed with all simplicity, the Lord helping me, first taking up the gospel before us, in order to point out, as far as I am enabled to do, the great distinguishing features, as well as the chief contents, that the Holy Ghost has here been pleased to communicate. Are There White People in the Bible? As Joseph belonged to the Solomon-branch, he would have barred the right of our Lord to the throne, looking at it as a mere question now of His being the Son of David; and we are entitled so to take it. It is clear that in many passages of the Old Testament, Sheol can only mean "the grave", and is rendered thus in the Authorized Version; see, for example, Genesis 37:35; Genesis 42:38; 1 Samuel 2:6; Job 14:13. Again the very use of this phrase indicates that the material in the Sermon on the Mount is no chance piece of teaching. Hades never denotes the physical grave nor is it the permanent region of the lost. If you feel an answer is not 100% Bible based, then leave a comment, and we'll be sure to review it. The one saving clause was that he must return her dowry intact. To the heirs of the kingdom the Lord is unfolding the principles of that kingdom most blessed and rich instruction, but instruction in righteousness. This earth is not the earth that God created. At that time the world was in danger of witnessing the almost total break-up of marriage and the collapse of the home. Now reading these characteristics you'd say, oh that guy ought to be, you know, just well-accepted anywhere he goes. For it is no longer a question of mere acts, but of the soul's condition. There is the name of Rachab, a Gentile, and a Gentile bringing no honourable reputation along with her. Do not even the tax-gatherers do that? Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. The outstanding example in history of the wrong way to deal with such thoughts and desires was the hermits and the monks in the desert in the time of the early Church. Children should learn that to use such words is highly offensive to God, for we must give an account for every idle word which we speak in the day of judgment, Matthew 12:36. The light with which the nation or the man of God shone was a borrowed light. Matthew 5:22 - Bible Verse Meaning and Commentary - Bible Study Tools The Jews were quite clear that a man had to do his utmost to put things right himself before he could be right with God. With Him all things are possible; and faith receives all with assurance. The word most frequently used, (occurring twelve times), in the New Testament for the place of future punishment is Gehenna or Gehenna of fire. The same thing is true of what follows: "Ye are the salt of the earth" it is that which keeps pure what is pure. There was nothing for him to do but to wrap his head in his burnous and turn his back to the wind, and wait, while the swirling sand filled his nostrils and his throat until he was likely to suffocate, and until he was parched with an imperious thirst. He did it as having a right to do it; and he that has a right to ordain and change laws in the government of God must be himself divine. More than a hundred years after this a man came to Tertullian with this very problem. This is obviously a case of debt, for, if peace is not made, the last farthing will have to be paid. Even in worldly affairs an offender would be wise to reach agreement with his opponent quickly. Isn't that neat? There is always something thrilling in even being present on the great occasion, in being there when something memorable and crucial is happening. So rejoice, be exceeding glad, you're in good company. It's the same Greek word that is used here; "be ye therefore perfect", same Greek word.You are complete or you are perfect in Him. Now you've heard that it had been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth ( Matthew 5:38 ): But let me explain the way they were teaching this law. A light is often the warning which tells us to halt when there is danger ahead. Matthew 5:23 - Bible Hub He retires into the wilderness, and applies to himself the ancient oracle of Isaiah "The voice of one crying in the wilderness." Blessed are thy that mourn ( Matthew 5:4 ): Now that really is even more paradoxical, isn't it? The punishment of Gehenna is implied also in Daniel 12:2, "some to shame and everlasting abhorrence" (a.t.). In actual fact when a man had burned his pinch of incense he received a certificate, a libellus, to say that he had done so, and then he could go and worship any god he liked, so long as his worship did not interfere with public order and decency. He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge. Therefore, if we are Gods people, we should carefully guard the words we speak. Christianity had a double background. Quintilian, the great Roman teacher of oratory, said of certain of his scholars, "They would no doubt be excellent students, if they were not already convinced of their own knowledge." They themselves spoke of Jerusalem as "a light to the Gentiles," and a famous Rabbi was often called "a lamp of Israel." Why? That part of the Bible which is known as the Pentateuch--which literally means The Five Rolls--was to the Jew The Law par excellence and was to them by far the most important part of the Bible. The houses in Palestine were very dark with only one little circular window perhaps not more than eighteen inches across. Therefore, what is the meaning of the verse? Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, Raca, is answerable to the court. The Lord Jesus thence goes forth into another scene the wilderness to be tempted of the devil; and this, mark, now that He is thus publicly owned by the Father, and the Holy Ghost had descended on Him. We don't like to be persecuted but Jesus said "rejoice". The hatred that causes one person to speak insults is the same hatred that causes one to eventually commit murder. (iii) A light can often be a warning light. In regard to indignity, the injurer had to pay damages for the humiliation and indignity which the injury had inflicted. And when I look at you, I don't look near so bad. "I will satisfy her poor with bread" ( Psalms 132:15). The rule was that if a man had means, but was too miserly to use them, a gift must be given as a gift, but afterwards reclaimed from his estate as a loan. The penalties arranged in precise order to correspond with the insults mentioned above are not to be understood as graduated penalties or punishments against crimes of more and more serious import; rather, they are to be understood as a three-fold reiteration of one overwhelming truth. And Jesus answered correctly, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength and with all their mind". Now the word "blessed" literally means "oh, how happy" and because that is the literal meaning of the word "blessed", it seems paradoxical immediately to say, "Oh how happy are the poor in spirit". Matthew 5:22 Interlinear: but I - Bible Hub Here is a great eternal truth. Clearly it is much more likely that Jesus would be thinking in terms of Jewish law; and this situation was by no means impossible under Jewish law. We see an amazing situation in which Greek men kept their wives absolutely secluded in a compulsory purity, while they themselves found their real pleasure and their real life in relationships outside marriage. I am not able to deny the principle that he states. (1.) At the back of it there is the meaning that the man who is blessed is not necessarily the man who achieves this goodness, but the man who longs for it with his whole heart. "Probably referring to Saphet up on the hills above the Galilee there, Jesus said. It means "imbecile," "numbskull," or "blockhead." When Moses laid down a law code for civil governments, he established the principle that the punishment had to fit the crime. As we have seen, the very first word of the message of Jesus was, "Repent!" She had no part even in social life. The idea is this. phulake [G5438], prison). If a person thinks, as we see it, mistakenly, he may have come through experiences, he may have a heritage which has made him think as he does. The Persic version renders it here "wicked". Now, at least theoretically, it is perfectly possible to satisfy the demands of the law; in one sense there can come a time when a man can say, "I have done all that the law demands; my duty is discharged; the law has no more claim on me." In the end the word came to signify any kind of forced impressment into the service of the occupying power. The New Standard ( Matthew 5:21-48 Continued). 1. y Vid. (iii) In the last analysis, is not that what God did in Jesus Christ? The Bliss Of The Clean Heart ( Matthew 5:8). Here, then, in Greece we see a whole social system based on relationships outside marriage; we see that these relationships were accepted as natural and normal, and not in the least blameworthy; we see that these relationships could, in fact, become the dominant thing in a man's life. For instance, to carry a burden on the Sabbath Day is to work. Now, we shall find throughout this gospel that which may be well stated here, and will be abundantly confirmed everywhere that the object of our gospel is not merely to prove what the Messiah was, both according to the flesh and according to His own divine intrinsic nature, for Israel; but also, when rejected by Israel, what the consequences of that rejection would be for the Gentiles, and this in a double aspect whether as introducing the kingdom of heaven in a new form, or as giving occasion for Christ's building His Church. In fact, the Rabbis went the length of saying that in the highest kind of giving, the giver must not know to whom he was giving, and the receiver must not know from whom he was receiving. The worshipper is standing at the rail, ready to hand over his victim to the priest; his hands are on it to confess; and then he remembers his breach with his brother, the wrong done to his brother; if his sacrifice is to avail, he must go back and mend that breach and undo that wrong, or nothing can happen. There are 39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament. Matthew has said as plainly as Greek will say it that the Sermon on the Mount is not one sermon of Jesus, given at one particular time and on one particular occasion; it is the essence of all that Jesus continuously and habitually taught his disciples. Anger accompanied with an expression of contempt. Matthew 5:22 KJV - But I say unto you, That whosoever is - Bible Gateway [5.] 1. For the good that I would do I'm not doing and that which that I would not allow, that is the thing I am doing. It was supremely so with Jesus. Makarios ( G3107) then describes that joy which has its secret within itself, that joy which is serene and untouchable, and self-contained, that joy which is completely independent of all the chances and the changes of life. If you have come into a true confirmation of God in your own life, the result immediately always is that of poverty of spirit. Raca, shall be in danger of the council; and whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of the hell of fire. In the great Boulder Dam scheme in America men lost their lives in that project which was to turn a dust-bowl into fertile land. All that a man had to do was to dismiss his wife in the presence of two witnesses. The word is not the problem, but the spirit of anger behind it. In the King James Version of the Scriptures, it is the rendering adopted in many places in the Old Testament for the Hebrew word sheol (in 31 out of 65 occurrences of that word it is so translated), and in all places, save one (1 Corinthians 15:55) in the New Testament, for the Greek word Hades (this word occurs 11 times; in 10 of these it is translated hell; 1 Corinthians 15:55 reads grave, with hell in the margin). The reason is very simple and tremendous--it is that such a love makes a man like God. So the law was a schoolmaster to drive us to Jesus Christ.Now Jesus said. But in this beatitude, most unusually, righteousness is in the direct accusative, and not in the normal genitive. I go out to the ironmonger and I buy a screw-driver. The result was that if a man swore by the name of God in any form, he would rigidly keep that oath; but if he swore by heaven, or by earth, or by Jerusalem, or by his head, he felt quite free to break that oath. A man's Christianity should be perfectly visible to all men. See Matthew 2:4. And very soon the injury done was assessed at a money value; and the Jewish law in the tractate Baba Kamma carefully lays down how the damage is to be assessed. In the gospel of Luke it is not to Joseph, but to Mary. And I need to have that kind of primary emphasis in my life, the kingdom of heaven is the greatest goal, the greatest desire, and thus should bring into my life the greatest sacrifices. The Christian cannot withdraw from the world, but he must, as James said, keep himself "unstained from the world" ( James 1:27). It seems a surprising way to begin talking about happiness by saying, "Blessed are the poor in spirit." What did he mean by that? And it must also be remembered that it is better to help a score of fraudulent beggars than to risk turning away the one man in real need. E. F. F. Bishop in his book Jesus of Palestine cites a very likely explanation given by Miss F. E. Newton. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?" As someone has said, "There is an internal desire of which adultery is only the fruit.". Matthew five. He might delay or abstain from marriage for only one reason--to devote his whole time to the study of the Law. It is easy to see what an incredible novelty the Christian teaching regarding chastity and fidelity in marriage was in a civilization like that. And under the law it said if a man be married to a wife and he finds an uncleanness in her, let him give her a writing of divorcement. Salt will not communicate purity to what is impure, but it is used as the preservative power according to righteousness. A man who has reached his full-grown stature is teleios ( G5046) in contradistinction to a half-grown lad. The early Christians were called cannibals and incendiaries, and were accused of immorality, gross and shameless, because their service included the Love Feast. New American Standard Bible And yet all of this horrible anger can be boiling inside of you. All that was demanded in such a genealogy was to give adequate landmarks so as to make the descent clear and unquestionable. The breach between man and God could not be healed until the breach between man and man was healed. Daniel, when he saw the Lord said, "My beauty was turned into corruption" ( Daniel 10:8 ). And now Jesus is saying you gotta be more righteous than those guys if you're going to enter the kingdom of heaven. 5:9 Blessed are the peace-makers, for they shall be called sons of God. to learn more. He was a pastor for 10 years. Holman Christian Standard Bible (i) Originally it simply meant clean, and could, for instance, be used or soiled clothes which have been washed clean. So, get along with people, love people. That is why this beatitude is so demanding a beatitude. He claimed no personal authority at all; his only claim was that what he spoke God had told him. It is precisely this reason that accounts for the change in Luke; who, as we shall find when we come to look at his gospel more carefully, is especially the moralist. As we study the Sermon on the Mount, we are going to set at the head of each of the beatitudes the translation of the Revised Standard Version; and then at the end of our study of each beatitude we shall see what the words mean in modern English. And God has deemed it meet to recount even this to us, so that we may know and enter into His own delight in His rich grace as He speaks of the ancestors of the Messiah. The question is: How do we measure up to that? There is far more here than meets the eye, far more than a mere matter of blows on the face. Though we are unfitted for communion with God, by a continual quarrel with a brother, yet that can be no excuse for the omission or neglect of our duty: "Leave there thy gift before the altar, lest otherwise, when thou has gone away, thou be tempted not to come again." Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive Masculine 3rd Person Singular. Let it be an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.So he's just talking about equitable judgment, but it is addressed to the judges, not to individuals. (Used with permission. Nothing would have been more simple and natural, had not that Babe differed from all others, had He not been what He was, and had Simeon not known who He was. (3.) The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up." In his story of the baptism of Jesus he shows us Jesus realizing that the hour has struck, that the call to action has come, and that Jesus must go forth on his crusade. Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, 'Raca,'[ c] is answerable to the court. And Jesus is saying, look, the church is to be the salt of the earth. "Fool" (Gr. That is particularly true of this beatitude. Many times the word Hdes (G86) is wrongly translated "hell" or "grave." Paul, while a Pharisee, did not, till, by the key of the tenth commandment, divine grace let him into the knowledge of the spiritual nature of all the rest, Romans 7:7; Romans 7:14. You are the salt of the earth, that preserving influence. It is not only the sorrow which brings an ache to the heart; it is the sorrow which brings the unrestrainable tears to the eyes. If a man has injured another, he is liable on five counts--for injury, for pain, for healing, for loss of time, for indignity suffered. When things go well it is possible to live for years on the surface of things; but when sorrow comes a man is driven to the deep things of life, and, if he accepts it aright, a new strength and beauty enter into his soul. We shall see by and by why this disappears in the gospel of Luke. It is not the duty of the individual Christian habitually to find fault, to criticise, to condemn, but it may well be that his every action is a silent condemnation of the unchristian lives of others, and he will not escape their hatred. "I call God to witness against me," he writes to the Corinthians, "It was to spare you that I refrained from coming to Corinth" ( 2 Corinthians 1:23). The Rabbi did not return the greeting, but said, "You Raca! He is everywhere, all through life and every activity of life. God is far more interested in the attitude in your heart than the actions of your outward life.And they have been interpreting the law to govern the actions of man, where God intended the law to be speaking to the attitudes of man. The Kingdom of God is the possession of the poor in spirit, because the poor in spirit have realized their own utter helplessness without God, and have learned to trust and obey. The word meek can probably best be defined by putting a hyphen in the middle of it: me-ek. If it came to a choice between a loyalty and a living, the real Christian never hesitated to choose loyalty. There are only two ways to defeat the forbidden thoughts. Before husband and wife came together, the espoused Mary was found with child of the Holy Ghost. said Tertullian. and for the sorrows, and for the needs of others. That we may defend ourselves when suddenly attacked. Further, to these Easterns intimation is given of God, and they returned another way, thus defeating the design of the treacherous heart and cruel head of the Edomite king, notwithstanding the slaughter of the innocents. Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here, And hold their manhoods cheap while any speaks, That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.". Shammai and his school defined some indecency as meaning unchastity and nothing but unchastity. (ii) It is regularly used for corn which has been winnowed or sifted and cleansed of all chaff. It is used of intimate teaching with no barriers between. Nor was it less worthy of God that He should make most plain the truth of another remarkable conjuncture of predicted circumstances, seemingly beyond reconcilement, in His entrance into the world. Matthew 5:22 in all English translations. (Matthew 3:1-17) The Spirit of God carries us over a long interval, and the voice of John is heard proclaiming, "Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." And thank God he has provided that help that I needed through forgiveness through Jesus Christ through his shed blood for me.We'll wait until the next session to go on with six and seven because we'll never make it. The Jews used it as a word of contempt. We have been called to freedom (Jn 8:36). "Blessed are ye, [there is thus a change.
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