I. The sermon on the plain (6:17–49)
I. The sermon on the plain (6:17–49)
Matthew gives three chapters to the sermon on the mount. Luke’s sermon ‘on a level place’ has many parallels, but is much shorter. However, in addition he has much similar matter scattered through his Gospel. Many feel that the same sermon lies behind both accounts, and they usually hold that Matthew has supplemented it by bringing together material from a variety of Q contexts. This is possible, but the differences are many. Preachers usually make use of the same or different matter in different sermons, especially if they speak without a written script. This habit of preachers seems a better explanation of the combination of resemblances and differences than extensive editorial activity.
This sermon begins with the beatitudes and the woes, and goes on to the kind of conduct appropriate to those in the kingdom, with special stress on love and on the importance of not judging others. The principle that the tree is known by its fruit is brought out and Jesus ends by likening the attitude of his hearers to that of a man building a house. Throughout we are reminded of what it means to be a disciple: it is more than fine words, it is a whole way of life.
1. The multitude (6:17–19)
Jesus stood on a level place (perhaps on the mountain side; it is not the usual word for a plain), where he was joined not only by a great crowd of his disciples, but also by a great multitude of people. Clearly some who had not as yet given their allegiance to Jesus were attracted by reports of his teaching and wanted to hear more. Some of them wanted healing. They came from great distances, as far south as Jerusalem and as far north as Tyre and Sidon. Sick people were healed and Luke particularly mentions those troubled with unclean spirits (see on 4:33). Jesus healed them all.
2. The beatitudes (6:20–23)
Together with the following woes these beatitudes make a mockery of the world’s values. They exalt what the world despises and reject what the world admires.
21. Jesus looked at his disciples, to whom the following words are plainly addressed, and pronounced a blessing on them as poor (cf. 4:18). He is not blessing poverty in itself: that can as easily be a curse as a blessing (cf. Prov. 30:8–9). Nor is he (as some hold) pronouncing a blessing on one social class above all others (‘the gospel canonizes no sociological state’, Talbert), and this for something they did not choose and would escape if they could. He is speaking of his disciples. They are poor and they know that they are without resource. They rely on God and they must rely on him, for they have nothing of their own on which to rely. It is in this spirit that in the Old Testament ‘the poor’ is often almost equivalent to ‘the pious’ (e.g. Pss. 40:17; 72:2, 4). Matthew brings out the meaning with ‘poor in spirit’. The rich of this world are often self-reliant. Not so the poor, and it is these humble people who receive the kingdom of God (see on 4:43). Jesus says yours is, not ‘yours will be’. These poor enter the kingdom now.
21. In Matthew there is the addition ‘and thirst for righteousness’ after the blessing on those who hunger, which makes explicit what is implicit here. But it is typical that Luke should emphasize the need. It is those who have the need who will be satisfied. Matthew has no equivalent to Luke’s blessing on you that weep now. This fits in with the two previous beatitudes. It cannot mean those who cherish some personal grief, but will refer to people who are sensitive to evil, to the world’s rebellion against God and the world’s consequent suffering. It is those who see these realities of life who will in the end laugh.
22–23. The next unexpected blessing is for the persecuted. It is not suffering in general of which Jesus speaks, but suffering on account of the Son of man. Those who suffer in this way are not to be pitied: they are blessed. Jesus tells them to rejoice and to leap for joy. They have an eternal reward. And they are in a godly succession: the prophets were treated in the same way. God’s people can expect nothing else. Jesus promised his followers that they would be absurdly happy; but also that they would never be out of trouble.
3. The woes (6:24–26)
These woes (found in Luke only) are the natural correlative to the beatitudes. They pronounce a surprising verdict on qualities and states which people have universally regarded as desirable. But the world’s blessings may encourage an attitude of self-sufficiency which is fatal to spiritual growth. Woe does not convey the exact force of Jesus’ ouai. It is more like ‘Alas’ (NEB) or ‘How terrible’ (GNB). It is an expression of regret and compassion, not a threat.
24. The first woe is for you that are rich. This is not addressed to the disciples, for they were not rich. It may be the natural correlative to ‘you poor’(20). Or Jesus may have been addressing rich people in the ‘great multitude’ (17). Wealth predisposes people to think they have need of nothing. They then rely on riches, not on God. Their attitude is the very opposite of that commended (20). To the rich Jesus says, you have received your consolation. His verb is one often used in receipts with a meaning like ‘Paid in full’ (see MM). The expression ‘they have had it!’ is an interesting contemporary illustration of the meaning. When all that anyone has is worldly wealth he is poor indeed. That kind of prosperity goes with an inner emptiness. Comfort is not to be mistaken for blessedness.
25. You that are full means much the same as ‘you that are rich’, but there is more emphasis on the state of the persons concerned. They are not only rich but have all they want and feel they lack nothing. People who live thinking that what they have is all-sufficient, who allow material possessions to be all-in-all and who think they have no need of God, are assured you shall hunger. This does not necessarily refer to physical hunger, for the satisfied often remain satisfied throughout life. Jesus is referring to ultimate reality. In the kingdom of God it is these people who are the paupers. One day they will see this for themselves.
A similar comment must be made about you that laugh now. Obviously Jesus is not objecting to laughter as such. His whole ministry was a protest against the killjoy attitude. He enjoyed life and must have laughed often. So with his disciples. But there is a laughter that is the expression of superficiality (‘the carefree expression of contentment with the success of the present’, Fitzmyer). It is this shallow merriment that will give way to mourning and weeping.
26. It is a danger when all men speak well of you, for this can scarcely happen apart from some sacrifice of principle. There is, it is true, a sense in which being ‘well thought of by outsiders’ (1 Tim. 3:7) is important, but that is different from universal popularity. It is the false prophets who win wide acclaim (cf. Jer. 5:31). A true prophet is too uncomfortable to be popular.
4. Love (6:27–36)
The heart of this sermon is the need for love. Jesus stresses that his followers must love the unlovely as well as those that appeal to them. There were several words for ‘love’ in Greek. Jesus was not asking for storgē, natural affection, nor for erōs, romantic love, nor for philia, the love of friendship. He was speaking of agapē, which means love even of the unlovely, love which is not drawn out by merit in the beloved but which proceeds from the fact that the lover chooses to be a loving person.
27. Love your enemies is uncompromising. As Matthew reports the equivalent saying, people have been ready to love their neighbour and hate their enemy (Matt. 5:43). But Jesus goes beyond that. His follower cannot be selective in his love. He must love all, including his enemies, in the spirit of the Master, a widening of the scope of love that appears first in the teaching of Jesus.8 It is not enough to refrain from hostile acts. He is also to do good to those who hate him. To people living in occupied territory such words must have sounded odd. Must not the Romans be opposed and hated and hurt? To people of strong nationalistic leanings Jesus’ teaching was downright immoral. But, as Caird says, ‘He who retaliates thinks that he is manfully resisting aggression; in fact, he is making an unconditional surrender to evil.’
28. The believer’s love finds expression in his words. Some will curse him, but he will bless them, the opposite of what might have been expected and of what the world will do in a similar situation. Some will abuse him. He is not to retalitate in kind. He is to pray for such.
29. Jesus illustrates from physical violence. The cheek is siagōn, which is rather the jaw. Jesus is speaking of a punch to the side of the jaw rather than a light slap in the face. The natural reaction to such a blow is to strike back hard. Jesus enjoins his follower to offer the other side of the jaw. He is speaking about an attitude. When we receive injury we must not seek revenge, but be ready if need be to accept another such injury. A literal turning of the other side of the face is not always the best way to fulfilling the command (cf. Jesus’ own attitude to a blow, John 18:22f.). One worldly wit advised, ‘Always forgive your enemies. Nothing infuriates them more.’ It is possible to be outwardly forgiving without showing real love. But it is love that Jesus looks for. This lies behind his words about the coat and the shirt (the coat, himation, was the normal outer garment, and the shirt, the chitōn or tunic, the usual undergarment). One must not react in anger against the one who takes the coat but let him have the shirt as well.
30. Once again it is the spirit of the saying that is important. If Christians took this one absolutely literally there would soon be a class of saintly paupers, owning nothing, and another of prosperous idlers and thieves. It is not this that Jesus is seeking, but a readiness among his followers to give and give and give. The Christian should never refrain from giving out of a love for his possessions. Love must be ready to be deprived of everything if need be. Of course, in a given case it may not be the way of love to give. But it is love that must decide whether we give or withhold, not a regard for our possessions. Give, incidentally, is in a continuous tense. Jesus is talking about the habitual attitude, not the occasional generous impulse.
31. Jesus sums it all up in the golden rule, as you wish that men should do to you, do so to them, a principle that governs all of life. If anyone lives by it he needs little else as his guide. In its negative form the rule is pre-Christian. The great Hillel, for example, said to an inquirer, ‘What is hateful to you, do not to your neighbour: that is the whole Torah, while the rest is the commentary thereof ’ (Shabbath 31a). The negative form is found also in the Epistle of Aristeas 207 and similar teaching is given by a variety of sages in a variety of cultures. But significantly Jesus gives the rule in the positive form, which nobody else seems to have done. It is not enough for him that his followers abstain from acts they would not like done to them. They must be active in well-doing.
32–34. The nature of the loving attitude is brought out with three illustrations of the way Christians must surpass sinners. Even people who own no allegiance to God practise some virtues. They love those who love them. They repay good deeds done to them. They lend to those in need if they can be sure of getting their money back or perhaps rely on getting loans in return when they themselves are in need (the verb for lend, incidentally, means ‘lend on interest’). If Christians do these things they are doing no more than the world does. It is easy for believers to congratulate themselves on some virtue they fancy they detect in themselves. But before they can claim that they are obeying Christ’s command they should ask whether they are doing anything more than sinners do in similar circumstances.
35–36. Again there is the positive attitude, first love your enemies, then do good, then lend. There is a difficulty with the following expression. The context seems to require a meaning like expecting nothing in return, but the verb apelpizo never has this meaning elsewhere. It is used in the sense ‘despair (of)’, to give the meaning here ‘never despairing’ (RV), or ‘despairing of no one’ (Rieu). It is probably better to take the word in its normal meaning. Christians should lend, despairing of nothing and nobody. When his followers live like that, Jesus tells them, your reward will be great. He never urges people to serve for the sake of reward. To do that is no more than to exchange material selfishness for spiritual selfishness. But he insists that the reward is there: it is one of the facts of life. Browning draws attention to a point made by K. E. Kirk, that a refusal to contemplate reward tends to lead to a subtle self-centredness: ‘It turns the mind from God and forces it back upon the self and its own successes and failures.’ In any case Christian reward is to be understood in terms of communion with God and opportunity for further service. Jesus goes on to point out that it is in living in this spirit that we fulfil our calling as members of the heavenly family. God is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish (this last word is more general and means ‘the wicked’, GNB). He is merciful. His good gifts, like sunshine and rain, seedtime and harvest, are sent to all, saint and sinner without distinction. And ‘like Father, like son’. The qualities that are seen in the Father are the qualities the children should make their aim.
5. Judging other people (6:37–42)
A number of sayings are here loosely connected, their unifying theme being leadership. In more than one of them there is a possible double application and we cannot always be sure which Jesus meant or whether he had both in mind. This section provides a further application of the love for which Jesus looks: love is to be seen in our attitude to judging our fellows.
37. Jesus’ opposition to our judging other people is put in a peremptory command, Judge not. He goes on to the consequence, you will not be judged. A similar injunction to avoid condemning follows and an instruction to forgive. In all this Jesus is not of course rejecting legal processes. He has in mind not law-courts but the all-too-common practice of assuming the right to criticize and condemn one’s neighbours. This, he says, we must not do. It is not quite clear whether you will not be judged refers to the present judgment people pass or the future judgment of God or both. If we are harsh with our judgments on other people we generally find that they return the compliment and we ourselves are widely condemned, whereas if we do not pass judgment on others our neighbours are slow to condemn us. But the words apply also to more permanent consequences. The person who judges others invites the judgment of God upon himself. It is the one with the forgiving attitude who is forgiven. This is not salvation by merit: rather the thought is that the true disciple is not judgmental. When God accepts people God’s grace changes them. A forgiving spirit is evidence that the person has been forgiven.
38. The forgiven are open-hearted and open-heartedness has consequences. Jesus commands his hearers to keep giving and reminds them that when they do this people respond in kind. And not only in kind, for he speaks of good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over. The metaphor is from measuring out grain in such a way as to ensure that full volume is given. Your lap is really your ‘bosom’ (kolpon) and refers to a fold in the outer garment made as it hung over the girdle. It was used as a kind of pocket. Jesus concludes this section with a reminder that there is a reciprocity in the affairs of life. We get back what we put into life. He is apparently making use of a proverbial saying which in one form or another turns up in a number of rabbinic sayings.9
39. Jesus now turns to the responsibility that rests on disciples to make more disciples. He uses a series of metaphors to bring out the importance of living on the highest level as they do this. First he speaks of a blind man trying to lead another. As the leader can see no more than the led, the only future for both is disaster. This spells trouble for those who put their trust in such people as the Pharisees. It is a warning to be careful whom we follow. But there is also a warning about the leadership Jesus’ followers will exercise. The Christian cannot hope to act as guide to others unless he himself sees clearly where he is going. Lacking love, he does not. If a man does not know the way of salvation himself he can lead others only to disaster.
40. The second illustration reminds the little group of their status as disciples. Somewhat similar statements are found elsewhere (22:27; Matt. 10:24; John 13:16). Clearly it is a thought that Jesus expressed more than once and in different ways. The student’s progress is limited by the teaching he gets: he cannot know more than his teacher. We must not understand this in terms of our own situation, where libraries and other facilities put endless possibilities before the student. Jesus is speaking of a time when the disciple had only his rabbi as his source of information. To claim that he was above his teacher was the height of presumption. The disciple’s one aim was to be like his teacher and he attained this only when fully taught. This last expression translates the verb katartizō, which has a meaning like ‘to render fit’ or ‘complete’. It is used of repairing what is broken (Mark 1:19) or of supplying fully (as when the world was ‘fully made’, Heb. 11:3). The follower of Jesus must make it his aim to be like him. He cannot lay aside the command to love, believing that he is past that. But the main thrust of the saying concerns human teachers. Since it is unreasonable to expect a disciple to know more than his teacher, it is important that the teacher be well advanced himself in the Christian way. Specifically he must be on his guard against spiritual blindness and lack of love.
41–42. Jesus rebukes hypocrisy with the illustration of the speck and the log, another illustration sometimes used by the rabbis.10 We should not overlook the fact that Jesus is quite ready to make his point in humorous vein. We are so often impressed with the solemnity of the issues involved in much of his teaching that we forget that Jesus had a sense of humour. Here he chooses to use the method of burlesque. He pictures the hypocrite with a great log sticking out of his eye while he solicitously tries to remove a speck from his brother’s eye. But the humorous illustration should not blind us to the seriousness of the lesson it teaches. The slight imperfection in other people is often more apparent to us than the large one in ourselves. Jesus is exhorting us to rigid self-examination before we engage in judgment. It is important that we take the log out of our own eye. It is not important that we concern ourselves with the speck in our brother’s. And it is impossible for us to put our brother right before we have dealt with our own shortcoming. We cannot see clearly enough for the job.
6. The tree and the fruit (6:43–45)
43–44. Jesus does not explain what he means by a good tree or a bad tree, but the following statement shows that the type of fruit the tree produces is in mind. Figs and grapes are set over against thorns and the bramble bush. Where we are dealing with plant life it is clear that each tree has its characteristic fruit. One cannot pick a certain type of fruit from any tree but its own. All other trees yield different fruit.
45. Good people, like good trees, produce good fruit. The good man produces his fruit out of the good treasure of his heart. It is what he has in his inner nature that determines what fruit his life will yield. So also with the evil man. His inner evil can produce only evil. The principle is stated at the end: out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks. There is always a reason for the things we say. Our words reveal what is in our heart.
7. Foundations (6:46–49)
This sermon, like that in Matthew, concludes with an impressive reminder of the importance of acting on the teaching Jesus has given. There is a difference in detail: in Matthew the difference between the two men is that they chose different sites on which to build; here they differ in what they do on the sites.
46. Evidently some had already shown themselves to be false disciples. So Jesus asks why they call him Lord, Lord, but do not obey him. To call anyone ‘Lord’ is to admit that allegiance is owed. To repeat the address is to put a certain emphasis on the admission. But words are no substitute for obedience.
47–48. Jesus speaks now of the man who takes notice of what he says. This man is like a builder who dug deep, and laid the foundation upon rock. This is essential for sound building, but it is time-consuming and it is hard work. So some avoid it. But when the storms and floods come, a house built on rock will stand. The hard work is worth it. The parallel in the spiritual life is clear. When the final test comes at judgment day it is the foundation on which our lives are built that matters (cf. 1 Cor. 3:11f.). The words certainly have an application to the storms of this life. The person with a good foundation is not easily upset by life’s difficulties; but it is the supreme final test that is specially in mind.
49. It is different with the house built on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against the house built this way, immediately it fell. It could not withstand the onslaught. So is the man who hears the teaching of Jesus but does not act on it. He is building his life without a foundation. He may have every outward appearance of respectability and he may be noted for his religious observances, but lacking a foundation he is nothing.