137. Going beyond the commandments
137. GOING BEYOND THE COMMANDMENTS
What is the relation between the Ten Commandments of the Old Law and the Beatitudes of the New Law?
. . . [T]he sermon which Our Lord delivered on the mountain contains the whole process of forming the life of a Christian (I-II,108,3).
The difference between a counsel and a commandment is that a commandment implies obligation, whereas a counsel is left to the option of the one to whom it is given. Consequently in the New Law, which is the law of liberty, counsels are added to the commandments.
. . . [W]hen a man follows not his (own) will (desire) as to some deed which he might do lawfully, he follows the counsel in that particular case; for instance if he do good to his enemies when he is not bound to, or if he forgive an injury of which he might justly seek to be avenged (I-II,108,4).
The relation between the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes is not one of identity, nor is it one of opposition, nor is it one of simple difference. It is one of fulfillment. Christ said, “Do not think I have come to abolish the law and the prophets [the Old Covenant]; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfill them” (Mt 5:17). The Beatitudes are one example of that.
The fulfillment of the old transforms and transcends the old. Therefore Christ’s new law, summarized in the Sermon on the Mount (Mt 5-7), the greatest sermon ever preached, goes far beyond the old law in its ideals and expectations, because there is now a new power to attain these higher ideals, viz. Christ Himself, now present in souls and in the Church’s sacraments because of the Incarnation.
This New Law is not made up of “commandments” but of “counsels”. The difference is freedom. We obey commandments because they morally (not physically) bind us. These binding commandments are not abrogated—all of us are still, and always, under absolute obligation to obey all of them because they directly express the Will of God for all mankind at all times. But “counsels” of perfection are offered to our free choice, not imposed as duties. They are a higher road. They are a maximum; the commandments are a minimum. The motive for obeying the commandments is duty, or obligation. (Thus the ethic of the commandments is Kantian: they are “categorical imperatives.”) But the motive for obeying the counsels is love. (Thus Kantian ethics, however honorable, is radically deficient.) Love is by its essence free. This is so even if it is commanded (and it is: “Thou shalt love”), because love is by its essence a free choice of the will. If love were essentially a feeling, it could not be commanded, for feelings are not free, not directly under our control; but choices of the will are.
The Commandments define obligatory justice. The counsels invite us to freely choose to practice love and mercy and forgiveness to our enemies even when we have just cause to punish them. For that is what God did to us. In fact, in the only prayer Christ gave to us, He made forgiveness so important that He told us to pray for our own damnation if we did not forgive our enemies—to ask God to “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” And He reiterated and emphasized this one petition after giving us the prayer (Mt 6:14-15).
Paradoxically, the deepest will of the Christian is “Not my will but Thine be done” (Mt 6:10, Mt 26:39). This is the essence of following the higher way (which St. Thomas calls “counsels” as distinct from “commandments”). But “counsels” would be a seriously misleading term if it suggested “take it or leave it”, mere “advice”. It is nothing less than the meaning of life and the only road to supreme joy. True, it is offered as a road map for us to freely choose to follow rather than imposed as a threat; but it is not one among many roads but “the way, the truth, and the life” (Jn 14:6).
The only way to the supreme joy that Jesus has is to freely embrace His way to that joy, the way of His cross (Heb 12:2).