Wake Wesley Summer Bible Study Part Three--Matthew 5: 17-48

This Bible study was designed a little bit differently than the first two: much more discussion based. So, I am going to share with y'all the questions I had written down to ask, some of the pertinent information or quotes I might have dredged up, and if I can remember any comments people made I will try to include that (but don't hold your breath on that, remember i am, according to most of y'all, 100+ years old!).

Matthew 5: 17-20. Jesus affirms that he has not come to abolish the Law, but has come to extend or clarify what the Law should mean. Most of the "sections" within this chunk of Scripture (21-26; 27-30; 31-32; 33-37; 38-42; and 43-48) are organized around the writing/speaking principle of "You have heard it said/But I say to you." This construction and the translation supporting it have historically set up almost an oppositional tone to these passages-- the Law says one thing, but Jesus says another. (It is for this reason that this section of Matthew is often known as the "Antitheses.") But recent commentators have said that the word translated "but" is better translated as "and"-- the Law says one thing and Jesus says you must add this next statement to it to bring about full righteousness. The sense here is that Jesus is calling us to surpass just the legal requirement of the Law to look at the spirit and essence of the commandment. The commentators also make it clear that Matthew intends for his readers to understand clearly that Jesus is the final arbiter of what the Law is saying; Jesus is the fulfillment of the Law, he is the new Moses and beyond-- He doesn't just "bring" the Law, he explains it too. The overall sense of what Jesus is saying is, "What more can you do?" I think as you look more closely at each of these following sections, this sense of "what else can you do?" will become clearer. [One particular way of helping to understand these verses is to consider the commentator's statement that in Matt. 5: 21-31, Jesus is expounding upon laws/commandments from Exodus and Deuteronomy, and in 5: 32-48, He is expounding upon laws from Leviticus.] 


Matthew 5: 21-26: In these verses, Jesus is saying that, in the ways in which we live out our relationships with others, having unresolved conflict between you and another person is the equivalent of murder! Questions to consider: are there times when it is justified to be angry with someone? is it different to be angry with an institution as opposed to an individual? what can we learn from Jesus and being angry-- see Mark 1: 41; Mark 3: 5; Matthew 21: 12-17? what help does Jesus offer in the way of suggestions as ways we can deal with these situations of unresolved anger and conflict? (see verses 23-25)

Matthew 5: 27-30: Jesus is saying that lusting after someone in your heart is the same as committing adultery with that person. Our discussion centered around the issues of what was the difference between a thought and "lusting;" and the question of the literalness of Jesus saying that we should gouge out our eyes or cut off our hands rather than use them in lusting or committing adultery. Consider these quotes on this issue as a whole: "Luther got it right: 'It is impossible to keep the devil from shooting evil thoughts and lusts into your heart. But see to it that you do not let such arrows stick there and take root, but tear them out and throw them away.'" (Allison, The Sermon on the Mount, p. 74). Allison says that the issue is not so much about the use of the eyes as it is about the use of the imagination and the soul that controls that! Dietrich Bonhoffer offers a more rigid (in my opinion) view on these issues: "'Both eye and hand are less than Christ, and when they are used as the instruments of lust and hinder the whole body from the purity of discipleship, they must be sacrificed for the sake of him.... When you have made your eye the instrument of impurity, you cannot see God with it.'" (Allison, p. 76)


Matthew 5: 31-32: Introduced this section by saying that I did not want any of us, in particular me as the chief motormouth of the Bible study, to give the impression that we are sitting in judgment on anyone's family members who might be divorced or in the process of doing so. We are trying to get at the sense of what Jesus was saying about divorce and, I think, what most importantly Jesus is saying about marriage! (To see more of Jesus' statements on marriage and divorce, please see Matthew 19.) I introduced this topic by saying that a Wesley person I know feels that Jesus' injunction against divorce is so unequivocal that an abused wife should remain married to her husband--just not live with him or anywhere where she or any children could be threatened. How do you feel about that statement? Is divorce justified for any reason but infidelity? The general consensus of the group was that staying with an abuser was unnecessary because by abusing the spouse or the children, that was equivalent to marital infidelity (marriage vows were broken). I also am of the opinion that if a couple has tried and tried to make the marriage work (by prayer, seeking counseling, etc.) and their married life is loveless in spite of all that, I personally would not be one to tell someone that they had to stay married. Other people disputed me on that--we are a true Wesley gathering!


Matthew 5: 33-37: The Bible quotes God-fearing people as using oaths, so what is Jesus' beef? Well, for one thing, it seems that the people of his time would use oaths liberally--about any and every thing. The point seems to be that Jesus wants people's speech to be so truthful that oaths should not be necessary. The discussion moved from oaths to cursing and whether we should use certain words as a part of our Christian witness. General questions to consider: have we ever made a promise to someone? have we ever made someone promise something to us? if we are truthful in our day to day living, should we have to "promise" something as extra insurance? does our asking for a promise indicate a lack of trust in the people we are around? what place do curse words have in our daily living? should they have a place at all? are curse words just the victim, as it were, of bad press and Victorian morality?


Matthew 5: 38-42: Jesus seems to be saying, "Do not resist an evil person." But what do we do about bullies? what should we have done about Nazi Germany? We discussed the injunction to "turn the other cheek." I had everyone "slap" another person, using the right hand to strike the right cheek of the other person. The only way that action was possible in a realistic way was if the striker used the back of his/her hand to hit the other person's right cheek. Hitting someone with the back of your hand was considered a great insult in the time of Jesus; some commentators have said that Jesus telling someone to turn the other cheek, inviting another back-handed hit, would put such a degrading and aggressive cast on the other person that, these commentators feel, the striker would be "shamed" into not hitting again. Likewise, giving away all those clothes would mean that some people would be naked; the suggestion is that offering to get naked in front of all the village would put such an unfavorable cast upon the person demanding the clothing that he/she would again be shamed into not making the request. Some commentators pointed out that Jesus was giving early examples of "creative, non-violent activism"--foreshadowing Ghandi and Dr. Martin Luther King by a number of centuries! We generally concluded that Jesus was not calling us to be beaten up or vilified every day, but to find non-violent ways in which to respond that would still stop the abusive behavior. 


Matthew 5: 43-48: The last of the Antitheses calls us, in its last verse, to "be perfect." It is significant, scholars feel, that this injunction comes after Jesus calls us to love the unlovable, the people that have hurt us, the people who love God and those who don't. These commentators state that leading a perfect life is not the same as leading a sinless moral life; leading a perfect life is, as suggested by Jesus' comments leading up to his injunction, leading a life where we attempt to love as God loves. In other words, we need to love others freely, openly, and completely. And love is, as suggested in this passage, a matter of action: Jesus offers 3 concrete ways we can love others--pray for others, do good for them whether or not they have been good to us, and remember always to greet them (don't ignore them). Check out the following Scripture passages: I Peter 1: 13-25; I John 4: 7-12.