Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Luke 6:17
And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases;
17. And he came down with them, and stood in the plain ] Rather, And descending with them, He stopped on a level place. Topos pedinos also occurs in Isa 13:2, LXX. If it be thus rendered there is no discrepancy between St Matthew, who says that “He went up into the mountain, and when He sat down His disciples approached Him” (Mat 5:1). I believe that St Luke here meant to give such portions of the Sermon on the Mount as suited his design. Combining the two narratives with what we know of the scene we see that what occurred was as follows. The previous evening Jesus went to one of the peaks of Kurn Hattin (withdrawing Himself from His disciples, who doubtless bivouacked at no great distance), and spent the night in prayer. In the morning He called His disciples and chose Twelve Apostles. Then going with them to some level spot, either the flat space (called in Greek plax) between the two peaks of the hill, or some other spot near at hand, He preached His sermon primarily to His disciples who sat immediately around Him, but also to the multitudes. There is no need to assume two discourses one esoteric and one exoteric, &c. At the same time there is of course no difficulty in supposing that our Lord may have uttered the same discourse, or parts of the same discourse, more than once, varying it as occasion required.
out of all Judea ] St Matthew adds Galilee (which was to a great extent Greek), Decapolis, and Peraea; St Mark also mentions Idumaea. Thus there were Jews, Greeks, Phoenicians, and Arabs among our Lord’s hearers.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And stood in the plain – It is not affirmed, however, that he stood in the plain when he delivered the following discourse. There has been some doubt whether the following discourse is the same as that recorded in Matt. 5; 6; 7, or whether the Saviour repeated the substance of that discourse, and that Luke recorded it as he repeated it. The reasons which have led many to suppose that they refer to the same are:
- That the beginning and the close are alike.
- That the substance of each is the same. And,
- That after the discourse was delivered, both affirm that Jesus went to Capernaum and healed the servant of the centurion, Mat 8:5-13; Luk 7:1-10.
On the other hand, Matthew says that the sermon was delivered on the mountain Mat 5:1; it is thought to be implied that Luke affirms that it was in the plain. Matthew says that he sat; Luke, that he stood. Yet there is no reason to suppose that there is a difference in the evangelists. Jesus spent the night on the mountain in prayer. In the morning he descended into the open plain and healed many. While there, as Luke says, he stood and received those who came to him, and healed their diseases. There is no impropriety in supposing that, being pressed by multitudes, he retired into the mountain again, or to an eminence in the plain, or to the side of the mountain, where the people might be more conveniently arranged and seated to hear him. There he sat, as recorded by Matthew, and delivered the discourse; for it is to be observed that Luke does not say that he delivered the sermon on the plain, but only that he healed the sick there.
Tyre and Sidon – See the notes at Mat 11:21.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Luk 6:17; Luk 6:19
And the whole multitude sought to touch Him: for there went virtue out of Him, and healed them all
Christ the fountain of health
The subject will be found to involve two considerations; what is the virtue which proceeds out of Christ?
by what means is it appropriated to men?
I. We begin by observing, that in addition to the superiority of our Lords miracles in point of number over those of every other, there is also a great distinction in the manner of their achievement. The apostles, for example, nowhere pretend to have accomplished the prodigies which they performed by their own ability. The words of healing are, In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk. The distinction to which we advert is very obvious; the miracles of the apostles were wrought by an agency not their own; their touch, their voice, their shadow, had no inherent power to do cures; from Christs own person went out immediately the virtue which healed them all. The difference is remarkable. It is as though the indwelling Godhead did so impregnate the human flesh with life-giving energy, that no sickness or weakness could remain after contact with that immaculate frame. There resided in that sinless body a fulness of grace. It was, as it were, a spring of life to the bodies of others; the virtue dwelt in it, and was drawn forth by an act of faith in the diseased. Such we conceive to be the original meaning of the text; and thus understood, it will be found accurately to describe also the influence of Christ upon ourselves. The fact is not only that God chose to regard the offspring of Adam as iniquitous, but that they really were so. Thus, we repeat, it is not sufficient to consider that Adams fault placed his descendants in the position of criminals; it did really and actually render them corrupt. And what has Christ done for the vast family of man thus contemplated? We reply, in the words of the text, virtue goeth out of His body to heal them all. The Redeemer, we are told, took not on Him the nature of angels, but of men. Christ Jesus, the Second Adam, is set forth to be the Restorer of human nature. He removes the inherent disease, He destroys the natural defilement. From Him a new period commences; to all His disciples He is the new Stock, the Root, the Stem.
II. It remains that we very briefly allude to THE MEANS BY WHICH THE HEALING VIRTUE WHICH RESIDES IN CHRIST, IS APPROPRIATED TO MAN. Now as respects the communication of the healing virtue of Christs Manhood to our souls, we hesitate not to place it in the two Sacraments of Baptism and the Lords Supper. These are between us and the Second Adam, what fleshly procreation is between us and the first Adam. There is healing virtue in the Second Adam; we obtain a share of it through our union with Him by His appointed ordinances. By the Sacraments we are spiritually connected with Christ, as closely as we are carnally connected with Adam and Eve. We are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. In Him was life, but how was this life to be communicated to others? In Him was purity, but how should it be transmitted? He was the Being set forth to make all things new, but how was a connection to be wrought out between Him and us t Indeed not by any carnal alliance, but in a new and living way. Through these Sacraments, duly administered and faithfully taken, virtue goeth out of Him for the healing of the nations. And in connection with the present subject of discourse, it seems appropriate to remind you, in conclusion, that whilst our Lords Incarnation as a whole is full of healing virtue for all generations of believers, so are the several events of His life, taken separately, imbued with a similar efficiency. We have been very much struck with that most solemn part of the Litany, in which we call upon God the Son to deliver us, making mention of the various pains which He endured. By Thy holy Nativity and Circumcision; by Thy Baptism, Fasting, and Temptation; and then, in deeper and more thrilling strain, By Thine Agony and Bloody Sweat; by Thy Cross and PaSsion; by Thy precious Death and Burial, Good Lord, deliver us. It is probable that by many the passage is only regarded as an adjuration to the Second Person to be merciful unto us, by the strong plea of what He has done and suffered. The Church reminds her Lord, if we may so speak, of His own sorrows, and by the thought of them claims His grace. But is this all? We think not. We believe there is implied in the awful supplication the truth, that every one of the Redeemers acts, one by one recalled, is full of its own peculiar virtue. Thus in praying to be saved by His Nativity, we pray that we may be born anew unto holiness. The Collects for the days on which these single acts of Christ are commemorated, teach us what appropriate power belongs to each act. Turn to the Collect of the Circumcision. We find the mention of Christs Circumcision connected with the true circumcision of our spirits, the mortification, i.e., of our hearts and all our members. The Fasting and Temptation of the Saviour, as brought before us on the First Sunday in Lent, are to enable us to subdue our flesh to the Spirit. His Cross and Passion are to convey to us the grace of patience like His own. His Burial is to qualify us to be buried with Him, that through the grave and gate of death we may pass to our joyful resurrection. And thus are we to regard everything that He did; every act of His is as it were sacramental in its nature, associated with its own appropriate grace. You will at once see what a stupendous importance is thus attached to the least action of Christ. Here, then, is the Fountain of our life; there is no sin so great that Christ cannot cleanse; no weakness so inherent which He will not strengthen. Neither time nor distance can set bounds to those health-giving streams which flow from Him. (Bishop Woodford.)
Healing for the soul
I. Then, as it respects the soul of man, THERE IS A DISEASE WHICH IS COMMON TO US ALL; AND THE ANALOGY BETWEEN THE SOUL AND BODY MUST HERE BE MANIFEST TO THE MOST SUPERFICIAL OBSERVER. In the great majority of instances, you need not inform even a child of the existence in any individual of bodily disease; for, however incompetent he may be to investigate the cause, he is perfectly familiar with the effect. Sometimes the morbid affection disfigures the countenance, sometimes it distorts the shape, sometimes it impedes the motion and paralyzes the limbs; in one it affects the utterance, in another it obscures the faculties of the mind, in a third it is betrayed at intervals by convulsive starts and spasms of sudden agony, in a fourth it antedates the halting step and wasted form of age ere yet the noon of life is past, and causes its victim to walk abroad amongst the living, impressed in their sight with the ghastly lineaments of death. And are not the effects, or symptoms, of the spiritual disease precisely similar? But here, again, an important feature in the analogy is presented to us, by the expedients which men employ, whether of business, or pleasure, or intemperance, or excess, in order to stifle thought. These things act upon the soul like opiates on the body; they mitigate the present suffering, but they aggravate the symptoms of the disease; they obscure the perception of danger, but they enhance and accelerate the danger itself. Under this head, moreover, we may learn another lesson, namely, that a knowledge of the disease is a prerequisite to the seeking of the remedy. They who brought to the Lord Jesus all that were diseased, laid the sick before Him in the streets; but neither would the sick have consented to be brought, had they not been conscious of the malady within, nor would their friends and kindred have brought them, had they not discerned the symptoms of it, as developed and exhibited without.
II. Such, then, being the disease, WHAT, IN THE NEXT PLACE, IS THE REMEDY? NOW, there can be no reasonable doubt, that on the occasion to which my text refers, and on other similar occasions, many sad effects of human infirmity and suffering, not a few of them incurable, and acknowledged to be so, by all human skill, because inaccessible to all known remedies, were exhibited in the presence of the Lord. We must set ourselves in right earnest to apply to the throbbing festering conscience the balm of Christs atonement, and to embody in the life the features of Christs example.
III. Since, then, THE REMEDY FOR OUR SPIRITUAL DISEASE IS JUST AS UNIVERSAL AS THE EXTENT OF IT–for all that believe are justified freely by Gods grace–and since it is also unfailing in its efficacy, for the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin; the narrative of the context is to teach us, next, the process of its application, In every ease they did what they could; and we should at least learn, from their example, this lesson, that what we can do we are not to leave undone.
IV. it only remains, then, that we complete our view of this most instructive and interesting analogy, by looking at THE RESULT OF THE APPLICATION OF SUCH A REMEDY–that remedy being the blood of Christ applied by the prayer of faith, or, if you will, the prayer against unbelief. What this will be, we may gather from the narration of either evangelist, which speaks of recovery at once universal and complete. As many as touched Him, said St. Matthew, or rather, as the margin reads, as many as touched it (that is, the hem of the garment), were made whole; and as you have heard by St. Luke in the text, though there was a multitude around Him, there went virtue out of Him, and healed them all. If the sick had not come, or had not been brought to Jesus, they would not have been healed; many blind were there in Israel, many lame, many palsied, many lepers, many demoniacs, many lunatics, who did not come, and therefore were not healed. But the amount of our individual responsibility depends upon the amount of our individual knowledge and of our individual opportunity; and if we know that all were healed who did come, or who were even brought, in faith, what greater encouragement and inducement can we desire for ourselves? (T. Dale M. A.)
Christ healing bodily disease emblematic of the Churchs functions
The whole multitude sought to touch Him; for there went virtue out of Him, and healed them all.
1. Familiar as this statement must be to us, there is something in it truly wonderful and most worthy of admiration–I mean, that there is in the gospel this universal power to adapt itself to man. It constitutes perhaps its most wonderful and distinctive feature. We shall search in vain in any other system for its resemblance. In many systems, more or less of human invention–in systems of philosophy, so called–we may find attempts to remedy some of the evils under which man labours; one applies itself to one kind, and another to another; but often the remedy for one is fatal to the other. But the gospel is a universal remedy. In a word, there is truly no form of evil which the gospel of Christ does not meet and rectify; no want which it does not supply; no real good which it does not impart.
2. And scarcely less remarkable is it to observe how it takes hold of all the natural forms of character, and turns them to due account; how it enlists on the side of what is good even the natural temperaments of men. The burning zeal of a Peter, the restless energy of a Paul, the fervour and impetuosity of a John and James–it takes them all, sanctifies them all, concentrates them all on one holy end. These, and such like human dispositions, left to their natural courses, would have branched off into various forms of evil. But lo! they are touched by Gods Spirit from above, the gospel pours down upon them its sanctifying influences, turns the dross into gold, and makes what would have been natural imperfections (to say the least) to become noble features in the Christian character. Such, my brethren, is the power of the gospel; such is the virtue which goes out of Christ to heal. For if we inquire how the gospel possesses and exerts this influence, the reply assuredly is–By making Christ known to us. And here, too, the incident before us is strikingly emblematic. The thronging multitude were healed by touching Christ; and to us the gospel is made the power of God unto salvation, simply by bringing us, so to speak, into spiritual contact with Christ. The power of His blessed sacraments consists in this: holy baptism uniting us to Christ and giving us spiritual life in Him–the holy Eucharist sustaining that life through the communion of thebody and blood of Christ. And so the Word of the gospel is effectual to its appointed end by testifying of Christ. He is the centre and the source of all its blessings.
3. But now let us carry this emblematic style of our blessed Lords teaching one step further. If we study the character of His ministry, there is no feature in it which we shall find more prominent than this: that it bore on its very front the aspect of mercy, and this not only in respect to the salvation of the soul from sin and misery, but also in a compassionate care for the bodily necessities of men. And now, my brethren, let us consider the application of this matter to ourselves. It is the high and holy prerogative of the Church to be on earth the representative of her Divine Master. Her highest and most glorious function–nay, we may say her only function–is to carry on and perfect the work of mercy which He began; ofspreading the knowledge of salvation through the world, and of blessing all who come within the influence of the Churchs sphere. We all know, from the history of the Acts of the Apostles, how well the early Church sustained this blessed office; not only by working miracles while that power lasted, but also by her self-denying charity–by a common fund, abundantly supported by the liberality of the first Christians, for the relief of every want and of every woe, to which our fallen human nature is subject. Wherever the Church was planted, there a fountain of mercy and goodness was opened; there a tree was planted, whose leaves were for the healing of the nations. It brought, indeed, richer mercies than the natural eye could see or the natural ear could hear–salvation for the immortal soul, deliverance from the bands of sin and death, and the glorious liberty of the children of God; but in its zeal for the salvation of the immortal soul, it did not overlook the transient sufferings of the perishing body. It did not wait until the blind eyes and the dull hearts could perceive and appreciate those higher blessings which it had to bestow; but it accompanied the Word of grace with acts of more ostensible mercy. (W. Dodsworth, M. A.)
Christs healing power
Miracles, according to the records of Christs life, were of most frequent occurrence, not occasional. They were the simple details of His life, coming as naturally from Him as acts of kindness from the benevolent heart or gifts from the charitable. It was thus He expressed His sympathy with the poor and suffering. In this way Christ showed His message of mercy to man, and revealed the nature of that redemption of the race which He began by living and dying for the world. In no other way could He so deeply have impressed the world with the distinctive character of His redeeming power.
I. CHRISTS POWER TO HEAL THE SOUL IS IN HIMSELF ALONE. It is not easy to understand this–that Christ, and Christ alone, is the source of all healing. We can understand that a doctrine received by the mind shall restore the mind to health; or that the heart may find rest in some object on which it shall place its affections; but that it is only from Christ that this healing power comes–why, it is hard to conceive. Men cannot apprehend the truth of God, even as Jesus reveals it, without Divine aid. The reason is strong, the will vigorous, the understanding clear; but there is need of the power of Gods Spirit, and that can only come through our personal touching of Christ. Power goes forth from Him–as the soul receives the Holy Ghost.
II. CHRISTS POWER TO HEAL IS NOT EXERCISED INDISCRIMINATELY, BUT ONLY UPON THOSE WHO GO TO HIM. There are always many who see Him, and yet do not know Him, and are not healed by Him? Why? Because they do not seek to touch Him. You must go to Him, not trust a mothers prayers–you must go yourself. Observe here, too, that the touch was effectual; touch His body and bodily disease was cured, because it was the touch of faith. Not the accidental touch, but the touch on purpose; not the touch which may be put forth out of curiosity, nor to escape the evil consequences of your sin; but the touch of the soul that wants to be healed.
III. CHRISTS POWER IS EXERCISED TO HEAL ALL WHO TOUCH HIM. None were disappointed. None were too ill, too diseased. There was no asking, How came you in this state? Your own faults, &c. (H. W. Butcher.)
The philanthrophy of Christianity
The power which Jesus Christ exercised over physical disease was a guarantee that as long as He lived He would be surrounded by great multitudes of people. Those who would never go to Him for spiritual gifts would be sure to find Him in the time of physical pain and fear. It is thus that, even now, God binds the human race to Himself. They hunger and thirst; they are in sorrow and great distress; times of impoverishment and desolation overtake them; and under such circumstances the better nature rises and yearns for protection and comfort. The Church should create for itself a large sphere of practical service, because there are many who cannot understand the metaphysics of Christianity who may be touched by its philanthropy. Jesus Christs plan was to take hold of human nature as it chose to present itself to his attention; hence we find him not only speaking essential truths to Nicodemus, but attending to the bodily necessities of those who had no understanding whatever of the spiritual kingdom which He came to establish. (Dr. Parker.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 17. And stood in the plain] In Mt 5:1, which is supposed to be the parallel place, our Lord is represented as delivering this sermon on the mountain; and this has induced some to think that the sermon mentioned here by Luke, though the same in substance with that in Matthew, was delivered in a different place, and at another time; but, as Dr. Priestly justly observes, Matthew’s saying that Jesus was sat down after he had gone up to the mountain, and Luke’s saying that he stood on the plain when he healed the sick, before the discourse, are no inconsistencies. The whole picture is striking. Jesus ascends a mountain, employs the night in prayer; and, having thus solemnly invoked the Divine blessing, authoritatively separates the twelve apostles from the mass of his disciples. He then descends, and heals in the plain all the diseased among a great multitude, collected from various parts by the fame of his miraculous power. Having thus created attention, he likewise satisfies the desire of the people to hear his doctrine; and retiring first to the mountain whence he came, that his attentive hearers might follow him and might better arrange themselves before him – Sacro digna silentio mirantur omnes dicere. HORACE. All admire his excellent sayings with sacred silence. See Bishop Newcome’s notes on his Harmony of the Gospels, p. 19.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Such passages as these we meet with several times in the evangelists, who not writing a particular account of the several miracles wrought, or discourses made, by our Saviour, oftentimes they give us a general account of more than they particularly mention. Some think that Luke refers here to Mar 3:7,8; but Mark seemeth rather to refer to a multitude that followed him before he went up to the mountain, which yet might be the same people coming again the next morning, and waiting for Christs coming down from the mountain.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
17. in the plainby somerendered “on a level place,” that is, a piece of hightableland, by which they understand the same thing, as “on themountain,” where our Lord delivered the sermon recorded byMatthew (Mt 5:1), of which theytake this following discourse of Luke to be but an abridged form. Butas the sense given in our version is the more accurate, so there areweighty reasons for considering the discourses different. This onecontains little more than a fourth of the other; it has woes of itsown, as well as the beatitudes common to both; but above all, that ofMatthew was plainly delivered a good while before, while thiswas spoken after the choice of the twelve; and as we know thatour Lord delivered some of His weightiest sayings more than once,there is no difficulty in supposing this to be one of His moreextended repetitions; nor could anything be more worthy of it.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And he came down with them,…. With the twelve apostles, from the top of the mountain, where he had been praying all night, and where he had been that morning, ordaining, and giving instructions to the twelve he had chosen:
and stood in the plain; in a lower part of the mountain, in a plain place on it; which was large, and capable of holding a great number of people; for it was still upon the mount, that Christ taught his disciples, and said many of the things hereafter mentioned in this chapter; see Mt 5:1.
And the company of his disciples: not only the twelve, but the large number out of which he had chosen twelve;
and a great multitude of people; who were hearers of him, and attendants on him, and who had a great esteem for him, though they were not as yet of the number of his disciples; who came
out of all Judea, and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon: drawn from these several parts by the fame of him, some for one thing, and some another; some of
which came to hear him: to hear him preach, and that they might know what manner of doctrine he taught: and others of them,
to be healed of their diseases; their bodily diseases, and some came perhaps for both.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
He came down with them ( ‘ ). Second aorist active participle of , common verb. This was the night of prayer up in the mountain (Mark 31:3; Luke 6:12) and the choice of the Twelve next morning. The going up into the mountain of Mt 5:1 may simply be a summary statement with no mention of what Luke has explained or may be a reference to the elevation, where he “sat down” (Mt 5:1), above the plain or “level place” ( ) on the mountain side where Jesus “stood” or “stopped” (). It may be a level place towards the foot of the mountain. He stopped his descent at this level place and then found a slight elevation on the mountain side and began to speak. There is not the slightest reason for making Matthew locate this sermon on the mountain and Luke in the valley as if the places, audiences, and topics were different. For the unity of the sermon see discussion on Mt 5:1f. The reports in Matthew and Luke begin alike, cover the same general ground and end alike. The report in Matthew is longer chiefly because in Chapter 5, he gives the argument showing the contrast between Christ’s conception of righteousness and that of the Jewish rabbis. Undoubtedly, Jesus repeated many of the crisp sayings here at other times as in Luke 12, but it is quite gratuitous to argue that Matthew and Luke have made up this sermon out of isolated sayings of Christ at various times. Both Matthew and Luke give too much that is local of place and audience for that idea. Mt 5:1 speaks of “the multitudes” and “his disciples.” Lu 6:17 notes “a great multitude of his disciples, and a great number of the people from all Judea and Jerusalem, and the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon.” They agree in the presence of disciples and crowds besides the disciples from whom the twelve apostles were chosen. It is important to note how already people were coming from “the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon” “to hear him and to be healed (, first aorist passive of ) of their diseases.”
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
In the plain [ ] . There is no article. More literally, and better, as Rev., in a plain or level place. There is a discrepancy in the two narratives. Matthew says he went up into the mountain and sat down. Vv. 17 – 19 are peculiar to Luke.
Judaea and Jerusalem. See on chapter Luk 5:17.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “And he came down with them,” (kai katabas met, auton) “And descending (from the mountain) with them,” the twelve newly ordained apostles and the church disciples from whose company He had called and ordained the twelve, Luk 5:12-13; Mar 3:13.
2) “And stood in the plain,” (heste epi topou pedinou) “He stood upon a level locality,” a plain below the mountain where He had chosen and ordained His apostles and set them in His church company, believed to be between the mount of Beatitudes and the Sea of Galilee, Luk 5:20-39.
3) “And the company of his disciples,” (kai ochlos polus matheton autou) “And the huge company of his church disciples,” who had gone up with Him, or come to Him, Luk 5:14; They were even then His chosen new covenant fellowship, Joh 15:16; Joh 15:27; Act 1:20-21.
4) “And a great multitude of people,” (kai plethos polu tou laou) “And a huge multitude of the people of the country,” that is called the holy land, from the following areas, far and near, Mar 3:7-8; Mat 4:25.
5) “Out of all Judaea and Jerusalem,” (apo pases tes loudaias kai lerousalem) “From out of all Judaea and Jerusalem,” inclusive of Galilee, Mat 4:25; Decapolis, Idumaea, and Perea, Mar 3:7-8. In the crowd were racially Jews, Greeks, Phoenicians, and Arabs.
6) “And from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon,” (kai tes parallou turou kai Sidonos) “And the coastal country of Tyre and Sidon,” land of the Phoenicians, mostly Greeks of that day, Mar 3:8.
7) “Which came to hear him,” (hoi elthon akousai autou) “Who came of their own will, choice, or accord to hear him,” both teach and preach, with great expectation.
8) “And to be healed of their diseases;” (kai iathenai apo ton noson auton) “And to be cured from their diseases,” or made whole, Mar 3:9-12; Psa 103:3; Psa 107:17-20.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
Appleburys Comments
Jesus Teaching the Crowds
Scripture
Luk. 6:17-19 And he came down with them, and stood on a level place, and a great multitude of his disciples, and a great number of the people from all Judaea and Jerusalem, and the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases; 18 and they that were troubled with unclean spirits were healed. 19 And all the multitude sought to touch him; for power came forth from him, and healed them all.
Comments
and he came down with them.Matthew describes a similar incident, but clearly states that when Jesus saw the multitudes He went up into the mountain and sat down. Then His disciples came to Him and He taught them (Mat. 5:1-2). Is Luke just giving another version of the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 56-7)? The similarities are many and striking, but the differences must be accounted for. Luke says that Jesus came down to a level place (perhaps on the mountain), but Matthew says that He went up into the mountain. Matthew presents eight beatitudes; Luke gives four beatitudes and four woes. And there are other differences.
While it is possible to view these as two accounts of the same incident, it seems more likely that Luke tells about another occasion when Jesus taught the multitudes using much of the material He had used before. This would account for the differences. What of the similarities? Surely Jesus repeated these basic truths many times in the course of His teaching ministry. It is natural to suppose that He would change the message to suit the needs of the audience. While these matters are interesting, we should not become so involved in trying to answer the problems that we lose sight of the lessons taught.
and a great number of people.The report about Jesus activity spread throughout the whole country from Judea to Tyre and Sidon (Mat. 4:24-25).
to hear him and to be healed.People came to hear Jesus and to be healed of their diseases. The demon possessed were healed also.
all the multitudes sought to touch him.He could have spoken the word and they would have been healed, but the touch of His hand gave them added assurance. The power went forth from Him and healed them all.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(17) And he came down with them, and stood in the plain.We are again confronted with harmonistic difficulties. In St. Matthew (Matthew 10) the mission of the Twelve is followed by a full discourse on their Apostolic work and its perils. Here it is followed by a discourse which has so many points of resemblance with the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5, 6, 7, that many have supposed it to be identical. It is a partial explanation of the difficulty that St. Mark and St. Luke distinguish the choice of the Twelve from their mission, the latter meeting us in Luk. 9:1, Mar. 6:7, and that in a form which implies the previous existence of the Twelve as a distinct body; but we still have to face the fact that events which St. Mark and St. Luke place even before the choice, St. Matthew places after the mission. (See Note on Luk. 6:13.)
Stood in the plain.Better, on a plain, or on a level place. The Greek has no article.
A great multitude of people.The description that follows has many points of resemblance both with that in Mar. 3:7-12, and with that in Mat. 4:24, immediately before the Sermon on the Mount. It is probable enough that each separate report of any of our Lords great discourses dwelt upon the multitudes who were present to hear them.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
‘And he came down with them, and stood on a level place, and a great multitude of his disciples, and a great number of the people from all Judaea and Jerusalem, and the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases.’
Having chosen the twelve He then came down with all His disciples to a level place, quite probably still on the mountain. There He found a great crowd of disciples, people who came regularly to hear Him, and along with them hosts of people from all around, from Judaea and Jerusalem in the south, to Tyre and Sidon in the north. While there were many Jews in Tyre and Sidon there were also many Gentiles, and it is quite likely that Luke wants us to realise that Gentiles came too, and were welcome. Many had come in order to be healed.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Jesus Heals the Multitudes ( Mat 4:23-25 ) In Luk 6:17-19 we have the story of Jesus healing the multitudes. Luke continually emphasizes the fact that Jesus’ public ministry was not carried out in secret, but many people bore witness to His miracles.
Jesus Trains His Disciples by Example – This passage of Scripture demonstrates the need to train disciples to do the work of the ministry by example. Also, note that on this occasion Jesus healed the people before teaching them.
Luk 6:17 “which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases” Comments – The people who were healed are those received from Jesus because they believed in His Words. When the Scriptures say that they came “to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases,” it describes the attitude of their hearts. Those who heard were the people whose heart was opened and they believed His Gospel and were able to receive healing.
Luk 6:19 Word Study on “virtue” In Luk 6:19 the Greek word (G1411) is translated “virtue” ( KJV).
Comments It is interesting to note that Jesus Christ healed the multitude of all of their illnesses prior to teaching them.
Comments Jesus touched those who needed healing as a means of imparting the power of the Holy Spirit to heal. Jesus appeared to Kenneth Hagin and gave him a special healing anointing by touching the palms of his hands with Jesus’ finger. Kenneth Hagin says that when he laid hands upon someone, he could feel the anointing flow through him and into the individual if the person believed. If the person was doubting, then the anointing would not flow. [193]
[193] Kenneth Hagin, A Commonsense Guide to Fasting (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Faith Library Publications, c1981, 1994), 21-2; Kenneth Hagin, I Believe In Visions (Tulsa, Oklahoma: Faith Library Publications, c1984, 1986), 53-4, 57.
Scripture References – Note other examples of people who came to touch Him:
Mar 5:28, “For she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole.”
Mar 6:56, “And whithersoever he entered, into villages, or cities, or country, they laid the sick in the streets, and besought him that they might touch if it were but the border of his garment: and as many as touched him were made whole.”
Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures
Miracles of Healing and Preaching. Luk 6:17-49
Healings of various kinds:
v. 17. And He came down with, them, and stood in the plain, and the company of His disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear Him, and to be healed of their diseases;
v. 18. and they that were vexed with unclean spirits; and they were healed.
v. 19. And the whole multitude sought to touch Him; for there went virtue out of Him, and healed them all. This passage shows how far the influence of Christ’s ministry extended. As Jesus came down from the summit of the mountain and reached a plateau on the mountainside, He had before His eyes a great gathering of people. Not only was there a large number of His own disciples, but a large multitude of people from all Judea, from proud Jerusalem, from Tyre and Sidon, the cities by the Mediterranean Sea. They all had come to hear Jesus and to be healed of various diseases. But there were also many of such as were bothered or troubled with evil spirits: all of them gathered about the great Teacher and Healer. The popularity of Jesus had reached its greatest height. All these sick people sought to touch Him; and the pity and sympathy of His Savior’s heart went out to them. Strength, the power of the almighty Physician, went out from His person, and they were all healed.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Luk 6:17. And stood in the plain; Dr. Macknight is of opinion that this sermon was not the same with that declared in the fifth and following chapters of St. Matthew. Amongst other reasons which he urges to shew the difference, he remarks, that the sermon recorded by St. Matthew was delivered on a mountain, in a sitting posture; for he went up into a mountain, and sat down to pronounce it, Mat 5:1 and after he had finished it, came down to the plain, Mat 8:1 whereas when he pronounced this which St. Luke speaks of, he was in a plain or valley, where he could not sit because of the multitude which surrounded him, but stood with his disciples. But though there were not an evident disagreement in the facts preceding and following these two sermons, the reader might easily have allowedthat they were pronounced at different times, because he will find other instances of things really different, notwithstanding in their nature they be alike, and were preceded and followed by similar events. For example, the two miraculous dinners were not only alike in their natures, but in their circumstances also; for they were introduced by the same discourses, and followed by like events; particularly at the conclusion of both, Jesus passed over the sea of Galilee; nevertheless, both being in the same evangelist, no reader can possibly think them the same. See the note on Mat 5:1.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Luk 6:17 . ] according to the connection of Luke (Luk 6:12 , ; Luk 6:17 , ), cannot be otherwise understood than: on a plain ; not: over a plain (Michaelis and Paulus); nor: on a small overhanging place of the declivity (Tholuck); comp. Lange, who calls the discourse in Matthew the Summit -sermon, and that in Luke the Terrace -sermon. The divergence from Mat 5:1 must be admitted, and remains still, even if a plateau is supposed on which jutted out a crest previously ascended by Jesus (Ebrard; comp. Grotius, Bengel, and others; a vacillating arbitrariness in Olshausen). Matthew’s narrative is original; Luke has a later tradition. As the crowd of hearers, according to this later tradition, came from greater distances, and were thus represented as more numerous, a plain was needed to accommodate them. According to Baur, Evang . p. 457, this divergence from Matthew is due also to the tendency of Luke to degrade the Sermon on the Mount, which would surely be a very petty sort of levelling.
. . .] scil . . See on Luk 6:13 . A similar structure in the narrative, Luk 8:1-3 .
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
First Section: Salutation of Love
(Luk 6:17-26.)
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Luk 6:17. And He came down with them.We have therefore to conceive the Saviour as surrounded by a threefold circle of hearers; the first indicated by (the recently chosen Twelve), the second described as an , and this latter again closed around by , who come partly even from beyond the boundaries. Comp. Mat 4:23-25.
Luk 6:19. For there went virtue out of Him.Comp. Luk 5:17; Luk 8:46. As therefore the choice of apostles is preceded by silence and prayer, so is the Sermon on the Mount immediately preceded by miraculous works. Here in fullest significance is the sublimest symbolism of the kingdom of heaven whose fundamental laws He will forthwith reveal to the world. The might of deed must support the might of the word. So is the faith of the just-chosen ones strengthened and the people prepared for hearing.
Luk 6:20. And He lifted up His eyes.It belongs to the peculiarities of Luke that he in some passages gives us to feel the eloquence of the look of Jesus even when this is not indicated by others. See here and in Luk 22:61.
Blessed are ye poor.This is indeed an admirably sweet friendly beginning of His doctrine and preaching. For He does not proceed like Moses or a law-teacher with command, threatening, and terrifying, but in the friendliest possible way, with pure, enticing, alluring, and amiable promises (Luther). The question whether the most original and exact form of the Beatitudes is to be found in Matthew or Luke appears to us to admit an answer in favor of the former. This gives us the right even at this point to call to our help as a legitimate subsidium interpretationis, the of Matthew. That the Saviour means no other than the spiritually poor is quite as plain as that those at this day were commonly found among the poor in worldly respects; comp. Jam 2:5. Luke is here as far as in chs. 12 or 16 from the thought of conceding to external poverty, considered in and of itself, even the least advantage. With the confessedly universal and Pauline character of his Gospel such an Ebionitic tendency is incompatible. Comp. moreover Lange on the passage, and upon the inner connection of the different Macarisms, Kienlen in the Studien und Kritiken, ii., 1848.
Luk 6:21. Ye that hunger nowye that weep now.According to what is said above, only spiritual hunger and trouble for sin and the suffering arising from the same can be understood. As only such come with eager longing to the kingdom of God, so could Gods kingdom and truth only come to these. In answering the question how satisfaction and comfort should fall to their lot, we have not only to bear in mind the word of the kingdom of heaven, which was perfectly to satisfy their spiritual necessities, but especially also the new spiritual life, which was to be bestowed upon them in communion with the King Himself.
Luk 6:22. Blessed when men shall hate you.Comp. Mat 5:11-12. A noticeable climax is found in the description of this hatred in Luke, first, as the foundation of all that follows, , then the severing of the thus hated from general and special intercourse (), and moreover, alongside of this negative persecution, also the more positive and more malicious ( ), finally, the formal excommunication from the synagogue ( ); comp. Joh 9:34; Joh 16:2.And all this is not purely personal injuriousness, but is an opposition in principle against the principle of faith represented by them: and cast out your name as evil; to be understood of the name which they bore as Jesus disciples. What, however, alone can make such a suffering the ground of a beatitude is the adjoined: for the Son of Mans sake. Not every ignominy, only the ignominy of Christ gives the ground for joy and renown. Comp. Act 5:41; Heb 11:26.
Luk 6:23. Rejoice ye.Comp. Act 16:25; Rom 5:3; Rom 8:35-39. Great is your reward in heaven. Deus est debitor noster, non ex congruo, sed ex promisso. (Augustine.) At the same time an indirect intimation that they for their approved faithfulness must not expect too great a reward on earth. It is especially noticeable how the Saviour at once places His scarcely-called apostles in one rank with the prophets of the Old Testament, and in the demand that they should be ready for His names sake to suffer shame, shows the sublimest self-consciousness. Such intimations must also, above all, not be overlooked by those who are paying attention to the Christology of the Synoptical gospels. As to the rest, it scarcely needs pointing out how completely the idea that they were to suffer in such society, surrounded by such a , was adapted to strengthen the courage and the spiritual might of the witnesses of the Lord.
Luk 6:24. But woe unto you.The force and application of these four , which are only found in Luke, is, after what has been said, self-evident. Had the Saviour been able to find among the rich also the spiritually poor, He would not the less have pronounced them blessed. The rich Chuza with his wife (Luk 8:2-3), or the family of Bethany (Luk 10:38-42), had surely never for an instant drawn this upon themselves. But if even a Nicodemus ventured only in the night to come to Jesus, if the rich young man went away sad, and if there were innumerable proofs of the truth of the declaration Mat 19:23-24, no wonder that here there proceeded forth a terrific Woe over the rich, who for the greater part were self-satisfied and proud characters; sumptuous livers who suffered a pious Lazarus to pine away at their gate, unrighteous ones who stinted the wages of the poor (Luk 16:20; Jam 5:4). These threatenings also are, therefore, directed against a moral degeneracy, which however at that time was a chief sin of the rich and powerful. A poor man who merely on account of his neediness should have made claim to the kingdom of heaven, must have been pride itself, have been no truly hungry soul, but one spiritually full, who should be left empty. Comp. Luk 1:53; Rev 3:17, and from the Old Testament, Isa 65:13-14; Hos 2:9.Ye have received your consolation.As something perishable (De Wette); comp. Mat 6:2; Luk 16:25.The retribution which here is first described only as a coming short of the expected consolation is in the two following threatenings, , , represented as a direct feeling of hunger, pain, and sadness.
Luk 6:26. Woe, when all men shall speak well of you.Is this Woe like the first three addressed to unbelievers (Meyer), or to the disciples, in opposition to the Beatitudes of Luk 6:22-23? (De Wette, Kuinoel, and most.) Without doubt the former is demanded by symmetry. Those who accept the praise of the hostile world are compared by the Saviour with the ; but disciples who could so far forget themselves as to take any special pains to secure the praise of all men, would be properly no longer disciples. The Saviour first begins again in Luk 6:27 to address Himself directly to the circle most nearly surrounding Him. It is, however, of course, self-evident that the rule here expressed by the Lord can be easily applied to His first disciples and to all further witnesses of His name.
As to the rest, there is not the slightest ground respecting the four Woes in Luke to assign them to the later formation of the later tradition (Meyer), in other words, to deny that the Saviour Himself uttered this fourfold judgment. If one is not disposed to assume that He delivered it immediately after the seven Beatitudes of Matthew, there is yet nothing against the supposition that the Saviour first uttered this Woe on another occasion, and that Luke has (very fittingly) taken it up into his abridged redaction. Respecting all the Beatitudes, comp. the admirable homily of Herder in his complete works.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. There are moments in the public life of the Lord in which, if possible, even more than at others, He does everything to prepare the coming and founding of His kingdom in Israel. To such culminating points of the light of His glory belongs also that to which we have now drawn near. The calling of the twelve apostles is in the fullest sense of the word a decisive step towards His goal. A rich fulness of miracles shown forth urges at the same time the enthusiasm every moment higher. An incomparable sermon exalts and intensifies this impression. Even before the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount it is already shown into how wide a circle the report of His words and deeds had gone out, and certainly this circle now enlarges itself to a yet more significant extent. Within a few hours there is concentrated thus a work of love which at another time might have been divided through several days. It is the hour of the preparation for a great decision. That Israel did not know and use such a increases its shame and guilt.
2. There exists an inward connection between the choice of apostles and the Sermon on the Mount. Now when the heralds of the King are appointed, the Magna Charta of the kingdom of heaven is proclaimed. All which the recently called hear is, on the one hand, adapted to inflame the holy fire on their altar, on the other hand, fitted to extinguish the fire that is fed by the stubble ofearthly expectations.
3. The Beatitudes present to us, even in the imperfect form given in Luke, a clear mirror of the kingdom of heaven. The first and the last of the Beatitudes preserved in the evangelical history (Luk 1:45; Joh 20:29) agree in this, that they promise salvation to those who believe even without seeing. Between these two Beatitudes stand those of the Sermon on the Mount in the midst. They reveal to us the glory of the King of the kingdom of heaven as the Christus Consolator of suffering and sorrowing mankind (an admirable work of art representing this by Ary Scheffer); comp. Luk 4:18-19. They give us to see the final purpose of the kingdom of God as in the highest degree adapted to satisfy the deepest spiritual interests of man. They present before us the image of the citizen of heaven, as well as the character that is peculiar to him, and the destiny that stands before him. The highest blessings of the kingdom of heaven, perfect satisfaction, joy, and consolation, do they make known to all that desire salvation; yea even into the future of this kingdom of God there is granted us here as in a prophetic sketch a glance. Thus does already the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount deserve to be called a short summary of the whole preaching of the gospel, as indeed the words in Nazareths synagogue, Luk 4:18-19, already were.
4. The four Woes, which in Luke follow the Macarisms, are as little unworthy of the Saviour as the fact that in the Old Covenant over against mount Gerizim there stood mount Ebal, and that in the Gospel of Matthew (Luke 23) the eight woes uttered by the Saviour stand over against the eight Beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount. He might have reiterated here what Moses at the end of his last address testified, Deu 30:18-19. In this respect there exists a noticeable agreement between the beginning and the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount, which in Luke also ends with a proclamation of a blessing and a curse in a parabolic form. This blessing and this woe might even be named a typical symbol of that which in sublimest wise shall hereafter repeat itself; comp. Mat 25:34-40. It is the audible resonance of the and of the of the prophets (comp. Jer 17:5-8), with the distinction that here in true evangelical wise the precedes the .
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The King of the kingdom of heaven for the first time in the circle of His future ambassadors.Christ the Physician of body and soul.The might of deed and word.The Saviours gracious look upon weak yet sincere disciples.The Beatitudes of the New Testament: 1. In their sweetness, 2. in their holy earnestness.Blessing and cursing, life and death.The common character of the Macarisms as: 1. Enigmatical utterances, 2. utterances of truth, 3. utterances of comfort and life.The Mount of Beatitudes and the Mount of the Law-giving: 1. How they stand over against one another; 2. how they condition one another.The first beatitude on earth, the last in heaven, Rev 22:14.What is foolish before the world that hath God chosen, 1Co 1:26-31.The beatitude and description: 1. Of the character; 2. of the salvation of the heavenly citizen: 1. a. poor, b. hungry, c. weeping, d. hated by men; 2. a. riches, b. full contentment, c. joy, d. reward of a prophet.The identity in the reception of the prophets of the Old and the apostles of the New Covenant in the unbelieving world: 1. The exactness, 2. the ground, 3. the significance of this identity for all succeeding centuries.The King of the kingdom of heaven: 1. The Friend of the poor, 2. the Bread of the hungry, 3. the Joy of the sorrowing, 4. the Judge of the oppressed.Even under the day of grace a Woe.Self-righteousness and unrighteousness the two hindrances to entering into the kingdom of heaven.The distinction between reality and semblance among those called to the kingdom of heaven: 1. The unfortunate not seldom least to be commiserated, 2. those worthy of envy not seldom furthest removed from the salvation of the Lord.The kingdom of heaven: 1. The riches of the poor, 2. of all poor, 3. of the poor alone.It is blessed, 1. To need consolation, 2. to receive consolation, 3. to enjoy consolation.The alternation of joy and pain in the life of the disciple of the Lord: 1. Joy of the world must become sorrow for sin, 2. sorrow for sin must become joy in Christ1. No disciple of Christ without hatred of the world; 2. no hatred of the world without rich compensation; 3. no compensation without steadfast faithfulness.The great reward in heaven: 1. To whom it was once given and why; for whom it is even now prepared and how.How the self-righteous man stands in respect to Christ and how Christ stands in respect to the self-righteous.The hungering of the already satisfied; 1. a painful, 2. a self-caused, 3. an unending hungering.Universal praise of the world a stigma for the Saviours disciples, since it brings them into the suspicion, 1. of unfaithfulness, 2. of characterlessness, 3. of the lust of pleasing.False prophets can ever reckon upon loud applause.
Starke:Jesus has an entirely different office from Moses.Love of riches and love of God can never agree together in one heart.Rich enough, whoever has the kingdom of God.Quesnel:Tears belong to time, but true joy to eternity.Whoever finds it irksome to bear the cross of Christ understands not its worth.Osiander: Godless rich men have their heaven on earth, and after this life hell is made ready for them.For a good Christian name we must certainly strive, but not against our consciences speak to please every one. Gal 1:10.Many a one might come to repentance if flattery did not, so to speak, bar the door against conversion. Jer 23:15-22.
St. Martin (lhomme de dsir, 1790):Voulezvous que votre esprit soit dans la joye? faites que votre me soit dans la tristesse. [Would you have your spirit joyful? Contrive that your soul may be in heaviness.]Kern:Heaviness and highness, sadness and gladness of true Christians.
Entirely original treatment of the Sermon on the Mount (according to Matthew) by Dr. C. Harms, in twenty-one sermons, Kiel, 1841. Examples: The first Beatitude: 1. It opens the door of the kingdom of heaven that we may look in, 2. bids us stand still to inquire: Are we therein? 3. It is the call at the door of the kingdom of heaven to enter in, and 4. a word of encouragement to those entered in, that they may also remain therein.The second: 1. the Who, 2. the When, and 3. the How.The third: We discourse 1. of righteousness, 2. of the longing after it, and 3. of the promise which is given to this longing.
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
.The Sermon on the Mount (Luk 6:17-49)
17And he came down with them, and stood in the plain [having come down with them, he stood upon a level place, ], and the [a] company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the sea-coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases; 18And they that were vexed [harassed] with unclean spirits: and they16 were healed. 19And the whole multitude sought to touch him: for there went virtue out of him, and20[he, V. O.17] healed them all. And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed 21be [are] ye poor; for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. 22Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of mans sake. 23Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets. 24But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation. 25Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. 26Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep. Woe unto you [om., unto you18], when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets. 27But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, dogood to them which hate you, 28Bless them that curse you, and19 pray for them which despitefully 29use you. And [om., And] unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also. 30Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again. 31And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them like wise. 32For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them. 33And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same. 34And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive,20 what thank have ye? for21 sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again. 35But 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 [lit.: sons] of the Highest:for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the22 evil. 36Be ye therefore23 merciful [or, compassionate], as your Father also is merciful.24 37Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven: 38Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over [or, heaped up],25 shall men [they] give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal [measure with] it shall be measured toyou again. 39And he spake a parable unto them; Can the blind lead the blind [a blindman lead a blind man]? shall [will] they not both fall into the ditch? 40The disciple is not above his [the, V. O.26] master: but every one that is perfect shall be as his master 41[when completely trained, every one will be like his master]. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brothers eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine 42own eye [but the beam in thine own eye dost not perceive]? Either27 how canst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brothers eye. 43For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither 44[yet again28] doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes. 45A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart [om., treasure of his heart, V. O.29] bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the [his] heart his mouth speaketh. 46And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? 47Whosoever cometh to me, and heareth my sayings, and doeth them, I will shew you to whom 48he is like: He is like a man which built a house, and digged deep [building a house, who dug deep], and laid the foundation on a [the] rock: and when the [a] flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it; for it was founded upon a rock [because that it was well built30]. 49But he that heareth, and doeth not, is like a man that without a foundation built a house upon the earth; against which the stream did beat vehemently, and immediately it fell [in a heap, ]; and the ruin of that house was great.
GENERAL SURVEY
1. As to the question whether the Sermon on the Mount was twice delivered by the Lord, or whether we meet in Matthew, chapters 57; Luk 6:20-49, with the same discourse, the views have always been different. We feel obliged to concur with the interpreters who maintain the identity of the discourse. Its commencement, contents, course of thought, and conclusion, certainly agree remarkably, in Matthew and Luke. Each is followed immediately by the healing of the centurion at Capernaum, and although the one mentions a mountain and the other a , yet even this discrepancy can be reconciled. [Robinson and Stanley both describe the Tell Hattn, which the Latin, though not the Greek tradition, connects with the delivery of the Sermon on the Mount, as consisting of a ridge, from which rise two horns or peaks, known as the Horns of Hattn. If the tradition is correct, as Stanley is disposed to regard it (and even Robinson finds nothing contradictory to it in the situation of the hill), our Lord ascending the ridge into one of the peaks, would have gone up into the mountain, and coming down afterwards, for greater convenience, upon the ridge, would have been upon a , without having left the mountain.C. C. S.] If Jesus appears, according to Matthew (Luk 5:1) to have sat, according to Luke (Luk 6:17), to have stood, yet this latter may be regarded as having been the case, some moments before the beginning of the discourse, while as yet the sick were coming to Him, and the people were sitting down to hear. The Jewish teachers were certainly accustomed to impart their instruction sitting, and even if Matthews report were unknown to us we should have to supplement that of Luke in this way: that Jesus, first standing, soon sat down. In this way the two accounts can be brought into unison. Many single proverbial expressions of this discourse the Saviour may often without doubt have repeated, but that He, at different periods in His life, should have made use of the same commencement and the same conclusion of His discourse we consider as on internal grounds improbable. It would only be conceivable if we assume with Lange that the Sermon on the Mount, as given in Luke, immediately followed that of Matthew, and that the former was an esoteric one, delivered on the summit of the mountain before the disciplesthe second an exoteric one, delivered on the same day on a less elevated part of the mountain. See the more detailed developments of this view in his Leben Jesu, ii. pp. 568570. Nevertheless even in this view it is conceded that the two discourses in their fundamental ideas and essential substance are one discourse and two different redactions.
2. As to the questions, when, where, before whom, and for what purpose, this discourse was held, we believe that we find the most exact account in Luke (contra Meyer). Altogether unfounded is the assumption that it was uttered even before the calling of Matthew; on the contrary, it was, as far as we know, the first extended discourse which Matthew, after his own calling and after the setting apart of all twelve apostles, heard. From this very fact it is explicable that he assigns it a place so early in his gospel, although it at once strikes the eye that Matthew here binds himself to no strict chronological sequence; as indeed even his statement, Luk 4:23-25, refers not obscurely to a point of time not in the beginning, but about in the middle of the public life of our Lord. Even the open opposition to Phariseeism and the not obscure declaration of the Saviours Messianic dignity in this discourse appear to intimate a later point of time. As to the place, see Lange, Matthew, p. 100. Comp. Josephus, De Bell. Jud. iii. 108. Among the hearers we have to distinguish the nearer circle of his , including the just-called apostles and the wider circle of the people, who also listened to it, and left the Mount in holy rapture. Mat 7:28; Luk 7:1. From the substance of every utterance in it, it is perfectly easy to conclude to which part of this numerous audience it was especially directed, and as respects the purpose of the whole discourse: Jesus must undoubtedly, after He had gradually gained so great a following and attracted so much attention, and after He had by parables intensely excited the expectation of His hearers, have certainly at last been obliged for once frankly to declare what He meant. All His working hitherto took the form of means,the end had not yet been manifested. The sick He had healed, the dead He had raised, of a , which, He had come to found, He had spoken in enigmatical images. The people had opened their ears; all, more clearly or more obscurely, more purely or more impurely, had surrendered themselves to the hope that Jesus was the promised Messiah. They followed after Him; they were willing to take part in His kingdom: should He therefore now any longer keep silence? must He not give to this wavering, perplexed mass definite form: Such and such is the nature of my kingdom; this is its form, this the true disposition for it; these are my requirements? (Ebrard.)
3. The praise of the greatest originality and exactness in the report of the Sermon on the Mount we do not give to Luke (Schneckenburger, Olshausen, B. Bauer, and others), but to Matthew. We believe that the more systematic arrangement of the thoughts in Matthew does not proceed from him, but from the Saviour Himself. The view of Sepp (II. p. 261), that Matthew as well as Luke does not properly communicate anything here but the complex whole and sententious summary of all the didactic deliverances, as it were the themes of the sermons which our Lord, during His whole Messianic activity, delivered, is too arbitrary to receive any particular critical notice. He has no other ground than the explications which the godly Catharine Emerich von Dlmen gave in her visions, an authority which the Protestant can hardly acknowledge.
4. The question why Luke communicates the Sermon on the Mount in a much less regular and perfect manner than Matthew, may be differently answered. It may be that Luke only found this short extract in his written authorities (Ebrard), or that oral tradition preserved this instruction of the Saviour in more than one form (Meyer a. o.) In no case must we overlook the fact that Luke has indeed proposed as his end exactness in his accounts, but not completeness, and might pass over much, e.g., of the controversy against Phariseeism, Mat 5:20-48, which for his friend Theophilus was unnecessary and perhaps not even intelligible. Other portions of the Sermon on the Mount he communicates in another connection, and it is therefore very possible that the Saviour delivered them more than once. On the other hand, he has even in his shorter redaction some additional sayings of the Saviour, which perhaps Matthew communicates in a more correct connection. (Accordingly Stier himself, in reference to Luk 6:45 compared with Mat 13:52, is obliged to acknowledge that Luke has made a mistake. Reden Jesu, i. p. 302.) By no means is the opinion well grounded (Bauer, Schwegler) that the redaction of the Sermon on the Mount in Luke bears a thoroughly Ebionitic character. See below in the exegetical remarks.
5. The peculiar character of the Sermon on the Mount comes in Luke also into sufficiently clear relief. Even 1. considered in and of itself, the substance as well as the form is incomparably beautiful. It is perhaps possible, in respect to some particular sayings which are here found, to adduce parallels from Rabbinical, nay, from heathen authors, but the whole is inimitable, and the spirit which streams through all its parts and joins them all together is completely unattainable. 2. In its historic connection, without being an actual consecratory or inaugural discourse of the Twelve, it is nevertheless in the highest degree adapted for the frame of mind and need of the moment. It was intended, more than had hitherto been the case, to draw the attention of a numerous throng to His person and His work, and by the very reason of its great difference from the mode of teaching of the Pharisees and Scribes, it called forth of itself an impression all the deeper. If we consider it 3. finally as well in relation to the Old Testament as to the chief substance of the Gospel in its strict sense, it soon becomes clear to us that the requirements here uttered are at the same time the expression of the eternal spirit of the Mosaic law, from which even the Saviour could not absolve. And lastly, if we give ear to the Beatitudes, the distinction in principle between Law and Gospel comes at once unmistakably to light. The doctrine of faith and grace is here, it is true, not announced in many words, and so far there is truth in the pregnant expression of Hase: The Sermon on the Mount is not the completion but the one side of Christianity. On the other side, it must however be remarked, that silence as to that which the people from their position could not yet bear, is by no means a contradiction of it; that the doctrine of sin and its wretchedness is here manifestly presupposed; that even in Luke there is no want of intimation as to the Saviours person (Luk 6:22; Luk 6:40-46), and that therefore R. Stier is not without reason in saying (Reden Jesu, i. p. 312): Oh, ye rationalists, who are so willing to hear the ethics of the Sermon on the Mount, hear, hear, I pray you, also its dogmatics!The Sermon on the Mount is the Magna Charta of the kingdom of God, and at the same time places before the eyes of all the disciples of the Lord the unchangeable principles by which the new life of faith must be guided. It is a practical commentary on the word of the Baptist, Mat 3:8. Whoever finds difficulty in the ethical requirements of the Sermon on the Mount has an unhealthy, and whoever will hear of no truth of salvation which is not contained in the words of the Sermon on the Mount has a superficial, a one-sided Christianity.
6. Since the Sermon on the Mount in Luke is, in respect to form, inferior to that of Matthew, it is not possible to give so organic a disposition of its contents as was the case in the notes on Matthew; but if any one is disposed, in order to make the general survey, at least to attempt a division, we may distinguish
I. The Salutation of Love (Luk 6:17-26).
II. The Requirement of Love (Luk 6:27-38).
III. The Importunity of Love (Luk 6:39-49).
Footnotes:
[16]Luk 6:18.The Rec.: before has A., B., [Sin.,] D., L., Q., and 33 other Codd. against it. The independent sense which this omission gives to Luk 6:18 directs the attention still more definitely to these possessed, as a special class of sick. [This omission of is accepted by Lachmann, Meyer, Tregelles, and Alford, but disapproved by Tischendorf.C. C. S.]
[17]Luk 6:19.This insertion of He before healed, appears unnatural, and seems to proceed from an unnecessary anxiety to emphasize the voluntariness of the Saviours healings.C. C. S.]
[18]Luk 6:26. is here, as before , Luk 6:25, spurious. [Om., , Luk 6:25, B., Sin., K., L., S.; ins., A., D., E., 10 other uncials. Om., , Luk 6:26, A., B., Sin., E., 15 other uncials; ins., C., D., .C. C. S.]
[19]Luk 6:28.The [E. V.] has and pray, &c.: the is critically untenable.
[20]Luk 6:34.The reading of Tischendorf, , appears preferable to that of Lachmann, . [Sin. has .C. C. S.]
[21]Luk 6:34.The Rec.: ., …, appears to be taken from the preceding verse. [Cod. Sin. omits .C. O. S.]
[22]Luk 6:35. , the unthankful and evil. One class designated by two qualities; not the unthankful and the evil, two classes.C. C. S.]
[23]Luk 6:36Rec.: . appears to have crept in quite early on account of its connecting the sentences more exactly. [Lachmann, Tregelles, and Alford omit the , supported by B., D., L., ., [Sin.]; Tischendorf and Meyer retain it, supported by A., R., X. Meyer remarks: How easy to overlook it before the syllable OI! An internal ground of omission, considering the congruousness of to the sentence, is hardly to be assumed.C. C. S.]
[24]Luk 6:37.At the beginning of Luk 6:37 is to be retained, in the second clause, on the contrary, to be expunged (against Rec.). [All the critics agree in retaining the first , opposed only by D. But Tischendorf and Alford retain the second also, supported by B., L., S., X., Sin.C. C. S.]
[25]Luk 6:38.The repeated before the last two adjectives, can without danger to the purity of the text very well be dispensed with. [Om., Sin.]
[26]Luk 6:40.Rec.: . [ approved by Tischendorf, om. by Lachmann, Tregelles, Alford, Cod. Sin.C. C. S.]
[27]Luk 6:42. , … Rec. approved by Lachmann, bracketed by Tregelles. Cod. Sin. gives ., …C. C. S.]
[28]Luk 6:43.Tischendorf has rightly received into the Greek text the word , which was bracketed by Lachmann. Weighty authorities support it, and many appear to have omitted it only because it is not also found in the similar passage, Mat 7:18. [Ins., Cod. Sin.]
[29]Luk 6:45.We read with Tischendorf: . What more the Rec. has are plconastic supplements, whose genuineness is doubtful. [Tischendorfs reading is confirmed by Cod. Sin.C. C. S.]
[30]Luk 6:48.Rec.: . Comp. Mat 7:25. One cannot help supposing that the reading defended by Tischendorf: , although only supported by a few manuscripts (D., L., and cursives), was the original one, which, however, quite early was supplanted by the Rec., from a harmonistic striving. [Tischendorfs reading is not supported by D., but by B., L., ., and Cod. Sin., the latter, however, having .C. C. S.]
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
(17) And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases; (18) And they that were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were healed. (19) And the whole multitude sought to touch him: for there went virtue out of him, and healed them all.
Here is a beautiful view of Jesus, and his College of Apostles, coming down from the mount where He had ordained them. Can we suppose the ordination service to have been less solemn than that of the Prophet Jeremiah? see chap. 1 throughout. True, Judas was among them; but this became no bar to the Lord’s special sanctification of the rest; while Jesus well knew, when he called the traitor, that he was a devil, and consequently unsanctified. Joh 6:70-71 . Solemn consideration!
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
XXVIII
OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE
Part III THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT
Harmony pages 45-82 and Mat 5:1-7:29
The historians of the Sermon on the Mount are Matthew and Luke, mainly Matthew. The scene of that sermon was a level place upon the mountains of the northwestern shore of the sea of Galilee. The audience consisted of the twelve disciples whom he had just appointed and of a large number of other disciples who had been instructed somewhat in the principles of his kingdom, and of a vast multitude of people from Judea and Samaria and Phoenicia. It was an immense audience. Luke says, “The company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon.” It was such an audience as one could not put in a house any kind of a house. And it is a noticeable fact that whenever a great reformation commences, I mean a movement that has life and fire in it then the reformers take to field preaching. They quit the houses; they go into the streets or fields or out in the open somewhere, for only such places as have the skies for a ceiling and the horizon for a boundary can hold the crowds of people that will always gather when a deep and fiery movement of the Christian religion is in progress. So with this audience of Jesus.
The occasion of the Sermon on the Mount was this: He had Just selected twelve men, commencing the organization of his movement. These twelve men were to share with him the burden of responsibility and labor, and it was quite important that they should be thoroughly instructed in the first principles of the kingdom which he announced. It was equally necessary that the larger body of his disciples should understand those fundamental principles, and that the miscellaneous and ever-shifting crowd, drawn together by their expectations of a king, and looking to the establishment of an earthly monarchy which would overturn Roman supremacy and give to Judea the sovereignty of the universe that this mixed rabble should have their misconceptions concerning the nature of the kingdom of Jesus Christ removed, and forever.
The setting or background of the sermon must never be overlooked. The multitudes, incited mainly by desires of relief from physical, temporal, and external woes even the better informed and more spiritually minded but dimly recognizing the greater spiritual needs these constituted the occasion of the Sermon on the Mount.
The design of it has been partly suggested by the occasion, but we need to erect just here a pillar of caution. The design has a negative as well as a positive aspect. First, then, negatively: It was not intended to be, as some have supposed and claimed, an epitome of doctrine and morals, neither of the one nor of the other. It falls very short of being a full synopsis of the doctrines of Jesus Christ. There is not a word in it directly of regeneration. There is nothing in it concerning the doctrine of the vicarious atonement and justification by faith, so elaborately set forth by the Saviour himself and his apostles. So there are some departments of morals not here inculcated. Hence, one makes a very great mistake when he counts the Sermon on the Mount as a complete standard of life. We hear people say sometimes: “If I live by the Sermon on the Mount that will do.” I say that this sermon is not all of the standard.
Positively, then, what was the design of it? The design of it was introductory an opening or rudimental discourse setting forth the foundation principles of the messianic kingdom, showing that these principles are internal, spiritual, practical and not external, ritualistic, theoretic; setting forth first the characteristics, privileges, and happiness of the messianic subjects in the Beatitudes. Showing next the importance, influence and responsibility of the messianic subjects, comparing them to the light of the world and the salt of the earth. Then follows a discussion of the relations of the messianic kingdom. Relations to what? Relations to the Jewish law, whether ceremonial, civil or moral; to the prophets; to rabbinical traditions ; to the world; to practical life, and to destiny. Such was the design of the Sermon on the Mount, intending afterward, as in fact he did, to unfold, to develop other doctrines related to these, and letting his whole life’s teaching present the fulness of his doctrine and of his morality.
So the Sermon on the Mount is not a disconcerted jumble of fine sayings, but exhibits remarkable unity as a discourse, as will be observed when I briefly state the outline and analysis of it. Indeed, I much question if any speech has ever been delivered more remarkable for unity than the Sermon on the Mount.
Next, the matter of this sermon is every bit every-day matter, but while every-day matter, it is as deep and as important as human life and destiny. One makes a great mistake in supposing that great teaching touches only the strange, exceptional, and startling. The best and sublimest teaching upon the earth concerns the every-day life, and such is the matter of this sermon.
The following adjectives will convey a description of the style:
It is simple, familiar, direct, sententious, paradoxical, startling, illustrative, conversational, practical, and authoritative.
It is a simple talk. I mean that every one in that audience could understand it. There was no attempt at big words; the language of the common people, as they spoke it and as they understood it, was used by our Saviour. It was familiar in that it was as homely in its phrases as if he were sitting by the fireside or out on the housetop in the cool of the evening or on the curbing of the street and talking with the passing people. It was not an oration, for there is an utter absence of declamatory, theoretical elocution, and rhetoric, as there must be in all great teachers. I mean to say that there is not an indication of a single strained mental effort after rounded phraseology, euphonious diction, rhetorical effect, dramatic gesticulation. It is direct. I mean to say that it does not intend to reach things by cannoning, hitting here and intending by glancing shot to strike out yonder. He moves right straight forward to the accomplishment of his object.
The style is paradoxical. A paradox is something which seems to be contradictory and is not contradictory, as, for instance, “happy are the unhappy” that is, “Blessed are they that mourn.” That is a paradox, but there is nothing contradictory about it. There is a comparison between present unhappiness and future happiness. As Luke keeps bringing it out, “Blessed are ye that hunger now, for ye shall be filled hereafter.” “Woe unto you that are rich now, for ye shall be poor hereafter.” Yes, it is intensely paradoxical. It is illustrative. The illustrations do not have to be explained, as some men’s illustrations. They illustrate. They preach a sermon by themselves that is, they carry in their familiar imagery their own application. He selects objects that are perfectly well known to the people and so thoroughly familiar that when used as an illustration there can be no misconception as to the meaning. Sometimes he illustrates by a hen and chickens, sometimes by a lily, other times by rocks and thorns and sheep and birds. It is conversational in its style, and unquestionably the greatest preachers are preachers who adopt the easy, off-hand, conversational style, like Dr. Broadus. But the distinguishing characteristic in style is that which most impressed his audience, because of its intrinsic power and of its marked dissimilarity to the methods of their ordinary religious teachers. He taught as one having authority, and not as the scribes and Pharisees. The style then was authoritative. Just look at the difference. A rabbi would get up before the people and with his eyes cast down would begin to say, “Rabbi Ben Israel says in the Talmud that Rabbi Joseph said that Rabbi Amos said that maybe such is the interpretation of the passage, but Rabbi Issachar quotes Rabbi Ephraim as saying that Rabbi Eleazer thought it might mean a different thing.” It was all indeterminate, uncertain; it did not take any positive shape. The pupil was perplexed by a balancing of conflicting probabilities. One leader doubtfully said, “Lo, here,” while another distrustfully said, “Maybe, yonder.” But Jesus spoke with authority authority vested in himself. He leaned on no human buttresses did not attempt to defend his doctrine, nor to vindicate it. He spoke as God speaks, and without stopping to give an explanation of his manner and so ought men always to speak who speak for God. Let him speak as the oracles of God. Now as to the rank of this Sermon. Daniel Webster says that no mere man could have produced the Sermon on the Mount.
Old age and wisdom bow before the simplicity and sublimity of this incomparable teaching. Little children sweetly imbibe its spirit as if it were milk, and aged saints draw from it the strong meat which supplies their sinews of strength. Babes in Christ by it take their first step in the practical walk of Christian life while the men or women in Christ Jesus by it soar on eagles’ wings into the anticipations of the heavenly world. It is peerless, matchless, divine.
To show the unity of the Sermon on the Mount, I will give an outline of it that consists of only three great heads. First, the characteristics, privileges, and happiness of the messianic subjects as set forth in the beatitudes. Second, the importance, influence, and responsibility of the messianic subjects, as set forth in the images of salt and light. And third, the relations of the messianic kingdom or doctrines that is, its relations to the Jewish law, whether ceremonial) civil or moral; its relations to the rabbinical traditions; its relations to the prophecies; its relations to the outside world in its spirit and maxims and chief good; its relations to human destiny, closing with “Whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them,” he shall be like the man who built his house upon a rock, and when the floods came and the storms buried, that house stood, for it was founded upon a rock. All through it, in all of its great divisions and subdivisions, is brought out in clearest light that the principles of the Christian religion are internal, spiritual and practical. It is not, “Do this that you may be seen of men.” It is not to wash the outside of the cup or platter. It is not a painted sepulcher, holding inside rottenness and dead men’s bones. It consists not in meat and drink, not in observances of days and months and seasons. It has not ten thousand ordinances that touch our dress and our manner. Oh, the mass of stuff that has been imposed upon the Christian religion which, in its foundation principles, was all spiritual and not ritualistic. All through it is practical. I mean to say, as opposed to theoretic or speculative. There is not a single part of it that is presented to the curious human mind as something calculated to entertain an idle person not a thing. The whole of it is designed to be not abstract, but concrete to be incarnated, to be embodied practical, all of it.
Having presented that outline of this Sermon, I want to illustrate it by considering briefly the first two divisions. First, the characteristics, privileges, and happiness of the messianic subjects, as set forth in what are called the beatitudes, commencing with a few general remarks. There are ten of these characteristics, with ten corresponding privileges or ten alternative woes. Every one of the privileges is based on character, and every one of the particular measures of happiness is based on a privilege, showing the relation between character and happiness a fixed relation, an indissoluble bond. If a man possess the kingdom of God; if a man is allowed to see God and live with him; if a man receives a reward from God at the last great day, these privileges are the springs of his happi-ness, but every privilege is predicated upon character in the man, upon the inside state of the man’s soul. As Burns expresses it: It is no’ in titles, nor in rank; It is no’ in wealth like London bank, To purchase peace and rest; If happiness have not her seat And center in the breast We may be wiser or rich or great But never can be blest.
This sermon explains why Paul, covered with wounds and in prison, at midnight, and with death awaiting him in the morning, could sing praises to God. It explains how it is, as recorded in Heb 11 , that the ancient martyrs took joyfully the spoiling of their goods, and who, while flames wrapped them about, shouted, “Hallelujah to God”; who leaped for joy that they were counted worthy to suffer for Christ’s sake. The Beatitudes express the only great philosophy as contrasted with Epicureanism and Stoicism. The Epicurean taught: “You have appetites; if you would be happy, gratify them. Eat, drink, and be merry.” The Stoic said, “You have appetites; if you would be happy, extirpate them dig them up by the roots.” This sermon says, “You have appetites; if you would be happy, regulate them. Neither gratify them immoderately nor suppress them, but divert them from improper channels and fix them upon worthy objects. You want to be rich; that is right, only what kind of riches? You want to live? Yes, but when now or hereafter? You want great substance? That is all right, but what kind evanescent or that which endures? You would treasure up yes, but where? Where neither moth nor rust corrupt, nor thieves dig through and steal.”
It will be observed that these Beatitudes are all double. I mean that they have a probable sense and an absolute sense. Take this one. Luke says, “Blessed are ye poor.” Matthew says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” The probable sense is always this, that comparing the two estates of poverty and riches, it is more probable that a poor man will get to heaven than that a rich man will. I mean to say that it is hard for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven. If one’s rent roll is $100,000 a year, then one’s chances of heaven are very slim, but that is not the absolute sense. The absolute sense is, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” Again, “Blessed are they that mourn.” The probable sense is that it is a rule better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting; that as a rule afflicted people are more apt to seek the kingdom of heaven than people who are not afflicted, but its meaning in its absolute sense is not merely to be a mourner, but to mourn in spirit for spiritual things.
We next note, generally, that each Beatitude has a corresponding woe, either expressed or implied. Luke mentions four of them. For instance, when he says, “Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven,” he then adds the alternative, “But woe unto you rich, for you have had your consolation.” So with all the others, the corresponding woe is either expressed or implied.
After these general references to all the Beatitudes, let us examine somewhat particularly the first two. Take the first, “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” What does that mean? I believe in close analysis and clear definition. Now here is the way I would read that: “Happy is the man who in his inner, higher nature [that is, in his spirit I consciously feels his poverty or need of spiritual good from God.” There is poverty yes, but it is that poverty in spirit which we consciously feel and not that which we have but do not know that we have it. Compare two scriptures for proof:
Isa 66:2 “To this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word.” Rev 3:17 “Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable and poor, and blind and naked.”
Evidently the blessing is promised, not to the poverty, but to the sense of the poverty the consciousness of the need. It is quite important to observe this distinction. Now in the case of these Laodiceans there was actual poverty in the sphere of the spirit, but there was no recognition of the poverty. On the contrary, they thought themselves to be rich and that they needed nothing.
The two states of mind are clearly represented in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican who went up into the Temple to pray. The Pharisee had spirit need enough, but he had no consciousness of that need. The publican had the same need and he deeply felt it. He smote his heart and said, “God be merciful to me the sinner.” Blessed are the poor in spirit. The prodigal son illustrates both phases of the subject. When he left his father’s house, however much he might have in external things (for he was richly endowed), in his inner nature, in his spirit, he was actually poor, but he did not know it. He thought he was rich and great, and was correspondingly proud, but there came a time when he began to be in want; when the need of his soul broke in upon his mind; when he said, “I have sinned; I will arise and go to my father and say to him, Father, I am not worthy to be called thy son. Let me be a servant. I have sinned.” Blessed are the poor in spirit. That means, happy is the man who in the sphere of the spirit (or inner or higher nature) feels his need of good from God no less, no more. “I need thee every hour, most gracious Lord.” Oh, bow sweet that hymn is! Poor in spirit. Oh, I have so few spiritual goods. I need patience, I need strength, I need clearer views of heaven, I need more of the spirit of my Master. Poor, yea, blessed are the poor in spirit.
But do not forget the contrast in the now and the hereafter. What do you need, O Dives, at the banquet? “Not a thing in the world. I have a million dollars; have the finest table in the country; every time I walk out on the streets people fawn upon me and say, ‘There goes a millionaire. Look at him I ‘ Why, I do not need a thing in the world. You never did see such eating as I have on my table; I am rich.” Rich, purse proud, feeding upon external things and starving the soul. That is the now. But let me show him in the hereafter. We will have to look a long way down into the depths of hell. Did he take any money with him? Not a cent. Is he thirsty? Hear him: “And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my parched tongue; for I am tormented in this flame” (Luk 16:24 ). See that chasm that separates him from God. Mark his apprehension that his brethren will come where he is. Mark the play of his memory. “But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things; but now he is comforted, and you are tormented” (Luk 16:25 ).
Oh, sublime Teacher, thou Teacher of the relation of time and eternity! “Blessed are they that mourn.” I would rather go to the house of mourning than to the house of laughing. But it refers to the sphere of the spirit. Do we mourn on account of sin? Do we mourn on account of our lack of conformity to the image of Jesus Christ? Do we mourn because of the low state of piety in the land? Like Jeremiah, is the cause of our grief the fact that the health of the daughter of God’s people is not recovered? “Blessed are they that mourn.”
Oh, you mourners in Zion, I say to you, you shall be comforted, and when your ashes are turned to beauty and your heaviness to the garments of praise, and your anguish to the thrilling joys of heaven, then will your consolation be deep and high and broad, with an “immeasurable” attached to every one of the adjectives.
How sweet the song of Tom Moore: Come, ye disconsolate, where’er ye languish; Come to the mercy seat, fervently kneel; Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish, Earth has no sorrow that heaven cannot heal,
“Blessed are they that mourn.” Oh, mourners, hear the blessed Saviour: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord” (Luk 4:18-19 ). We reach the fulness of the promise in heaven, for there are no tears in heaven, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain, nor death. Hear the precise words of our Lord: “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away” (Rev 21:4 ).
Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those that mourn on account of sin. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those that hunger and thirst after righteousness personal, practical righteousness, mark you, and not imputed righteousness. It means absolute, sinless perfection. Such will come after awhile. Blessed are the pure in heart; that means the fulness of sanctification, in absolute deliverance from the corruption that is in the world through lust. It, too, will come after a while. It is not all attainable now. But we may move toward it and we will be filled; we will ultimately see God. All these Beatitudes have a special meaning and each one very sweet.
Let us now consider somewhat the importance and influence and responsibility of the people who are poor in spirit and mourn, and are meek, and who hunger and thirst after righteousness, and who are merciful, and who are peacemakers, and who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake. What is their importance? What their influence? What their responsibility? Jesus, in just one verse, answers all of these questions: “Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost its savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men” (Mat 5:13 ). The importance or value of Messiah’s subjects is determined by the emphasis on the pronoun “ye.” The verb ending would in ordinary cases determine the pronoun nominative, so it would not have to be expressed. But if, in the Greek, one desires to throw emphasis on the pronoun, it must be expressed. The Greek verb este by itself means “ye are,” that is, without emphasis. But to have it “YE are,” capitalizing and emphasizing the pronoun, it must be written humeis este . How then can I give the emphasis, the deep stress our Saviour placed on that pronoun? YE YE YE are the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Thus we see that he meant to deny such importance and influence and responsibility to anything else or to anybody else.
First, there is a contrast when he says “ye.” The emphasis is on the “ye.” Ye are the light of the world. Ye are the salt of the earth. It is as if he had said, “If this world is preserved from moral corruption, if this world is wrested from the realms of darkness and bathed in light, ye will have to do it. Ye are the important ones.” O think of it, you mourners, you poor in spirit, you merciful ones, you that hunger and thirst after righteousness, you are more important in the sight of God and ten thousand times more valuable than all the rich, ungodly men that ever trod the face of the earth. I say unto you that not the philosophers (lightning bugs trying to outshine the sun), not the police, shall keep the world from corrupting and rotting; not the public school, as the politicians would have you believe. No, you can have good public schools right over the mouth of the pit. But ye are the light of the world; those whose characteristics are internal, spiritual, practical; followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. I say if the whole earth is not cracked open today it is because of you. If the cloud does not burst and the bolt fall to smite it with universal flame, it is solely because of that “ye.” Ye poor in spirit; ye Christians that are scattered about on the face of the earth ye and ye alone. Ah, me, if you were taken off the earth it would rot and stink until heaven would be compelled to burn it. I would like to know whenever philosophy or secular education or commerce or riches or secular science ever kept a community from morally rotting.
I say today, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that but for the humble, God-fearing men and women in any state, in any county, in any town, it would rot. They are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.
As the value and importance of God’s people are determined by the emphatic “Ye,” so the character of their influence is determined by the figures “salt and light.” Salt preserves keeps pure. Light dispels darkness. Heat expels cold.
The salt of the sea is the shore’s barrier against universal disease and death.
Without the light and its accompanying heat there could be no life. No plant would germinate. Darkness that could be felt would shroud the earth. More than Arctic cold would ensue. All liquids would solidify and petrify. The rivers earth’s arteries would stiffen into blocks of ice. The veins of blood would become like steel wire, harder than man’s bones. What, therefore, salt and light are to the natural world, even that are Christians to the spiritual world. And as the emphatic “ye” expresses who are earth’s important ones, and as the “salt and light” express the kind and character of their value, so their responsibility is expressed by “putting the candle on the candlestick.” “Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; 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” (Mat 5:15-16 ). Mark the emphasis on the “so.” It is commonly misunderstood. As the candle once lighted must be put on the candlestick in order to be sufficiently visible, even so when God shines into the heart the conversion must be so positioned as to be visible. It is to position and consequent visibility that “even so” refers.
I say that our responsibility is all involved in putting the candle in the right place. God himself does the lighting. Our part is not to so misplace the light as to hide it. It therefore becomes a supreme question: How do you put it on the candlestick?
First then let the divine oracles speak. Hear the Word of God:
“I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart; I have declared thy faithfulness and thy salvation; I have not concealed thy loving kindness and thy truth from the great congregation” (Psa 40:10 ). “Come and hear all ye that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul” (Psa 66:16 ). “Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.” “But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven” (Mat 10:32-33 ). “The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches: and the seven candlesticks that thou sawest are the seven churches” (Rev 1:20 ).
What then do these scriptures mean? That we must not hide God’s righteousness in our hearts. That we must tell it. Let God’s people hear our Christian experience. Let the whole world know just where we stand. Unite with the church. On every issue between righteousness and unrighteousness, between light and darkness, between Christ and Belial, take an unmistakable position on the Lord’s side. Do not try to be a secret partner of Jesus Christ, a Nicodemus who comes to see him by night. Come out and take a stand. Let the world know your alignment. Put the candle on the candlestick and let the marksman of hell try to snuff it out. To put it on the candlestick is unquestionably to join the church. Where do we get that? Why, in the book of Revelation Jesus moves among the candlesticks, and what are the candlesticks? They are the churches. The seven candlesticks are the seven churches. Why put the light there? Because the Lord Jesus Christ has made the church the pillar and ground of the truth. That is his institution. Man can organize something, but Jesus organized the church. That is an institution which has the promise of this life and that which is to come. Yea, she it is that looketh forth as the morning, clear as the sun, fair as the moon, and terrible as an army with banners.
Oh, but one says that means the invisible church. How on earth, if it is invisible, is it putting a candle on a candlestick? An invisible candlestick? He is not referring to invisibility. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. God lighted the light and it is eternal, but God says make it conspicuous, visible. Put it on the candlestick that everybody can see it shine. Unquestionably. Well, if it gets in the church, it shines. How? It will help the church publish the principles of the messianic kingdom. It will be in the church and shine, and the waves of light radiating from the church will go out into the darkened heathen land upon wings of every sermon and prayer and song. It will help advertise the truth of Jesus.
In every sermon preached and prayer offered and song sung, let it be as if upon a ladder of promises, it had gone up to the ceiling of the skies and placarded their whole scope with the promises of eternal life.
That is the way we shine. We shine in our mission work. We shine in our example at home, in the school.
And now let me say, if our religion is worth a snap of the finger, let us take it into politics. Do not misunderstand me; I do not mean to have a religious political party, separate from every other, but I do mean, that whatever religion we have, we should let it be as potent in determining a political question as any other question. Let me give a sublime illustration: William E. Gladstone was England’s prime minister. To be prime minister of England means a vast deal more than to be president of the United States, for under the present British constitution the prime minister is the sovereign the government of England. The queen has nothing more to do with it than I have, but the prime minister of England is the lord of England and her empire. The British cabinet is not like the cabinet that we have over here in our country merely advisers. Now he was prime minister of England, and had attained his premiership by combining the liberal element of the political party in England and Scotland with the Irish element. The Irish element was led by Charles Stewart Parnell. Parnell was the king and chief of the Irish contingent, and he and Gladstone stood like two brothers, working together for the accomplishment of good for the whole empire. Right in the midst of their great victory an awful thing developed. A divorce suit was instituted against Mrs. O’Shea by her husband and making Parnell co-respondent, and the fact brought out a moral depravity of heart in the case of Parnell oh, such a sickening state of facts that Gladstone said: “If it costs me the prime minister’s place I will not stand by the side of Charles Stewart Parnell. I will let the political party go; I am a Christian; I love God. I love God more than I love a political party. I will not give this man the hand of fellowship. Ireland must select another leader.” Parnell refused to yield leadership. It divided the Irish vote and lost Gladstone’s working majority in Parliament. He had to resign, and he is the only man I know that actually preferred to be right than to be prime minister.
The time sometimes comes when instead of showing we are Christians by being willing to shake hands with everybody, we must show our Christianity by refusing to take a bad man’s hand, even though he poses as a Christian.
It may be that we cannot reach him by church discipline. It becomes necessary that he may be made to feel the force of a righteous public opinion. I repeat it that there are degrees to which a church member may go in slandering his brethren, in breeding strife, in opposing or clogging the wheels of Christian progress, when to give him Christian recognition is a sin. Such a man becomes a curse instead of a blessing.
What, though a man be a Baptist, and what though some church retain him in fellowship, yet he may so go astray in doctrine that this scripture applies: “If there come any unto you, and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God-speed: for he that biddeth him God-speed is partaker of his evil deeds” (2Jn 1:10-11 ). “Others note and have no company with them that they may be ashamed” (2Th 3:14 ). Paul thus urgently entreats and exhorts the Romans: “Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly: and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple” (Rom 16:17-18 ). He also thus enjoins the Corinthians: “I wrote to you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world. But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no, not to eat” (1Co 5:9-11 ). He also urges Timothy “to turn away from” another class (2Ti 3:5 ).
Indeed, there are men so adroit in the use of the forms and technicalities of the law they can, so far as human courts extend, violate with impunity the spirit of the whole moral law. Such men are to be shunned, avoided, turned from. Let no good man receive them as friends. They are incorrigible. And particularly is this true of a fomenter and breeder of strife among brethren, or one who, like Satan, is a slanderer of his brethren. If he is a man that is called a brother, if he claims to be a Christian, and does certain things, turn from him and let the whole world know that you do not claim fellowship with him. Says the apostle, “Avoid him.” If he can make us come up and stand beside him, so that he can say, “We two,” and all the time proceed in infamy, all the time reap immoral rottenness, that is all he wants. He will spread the mantle of our Christianity over his vileness.
Aaron Burr, for political reasons and from very slight causes, none such as are regarded sufficiently weighty to justify a challenge, forced a duel on Alexander Hamilton, although he knew Hamilton would never fire a shot at him, and he murdered Hamilton. Now, it was a sign that the United States was not absolutely rotting when the public sentiment spoke out as to the crime of dueling, when Burr, though he had been a leading spirit in one of the great political parties of this Union, was not socially recognized. Good people by whom he would sit down would get up and move away somewhere else.
Should we take the hand of a Benedict Arnold or Judas Iscariot? To a certain extent the public denunciation that thundered over the head of Breckenridge of Kentucky was very godlike; but, I confess, when he stood up, and without extenuation, without denying the facts, but openly confessing them confessing his sin and asking forgiveness confess then there ought to have been more mercy shown him.
If the principles of the Christian religion are not carried into society, if they are not carried into business, if they are not carried into politics, if we do not let the light shine, then the salt has lost the savour and the light is put under a bushel. We are the light of the world and the salt of the earth, says the great Teacher.
My own conclusions are never child’s play. They are always reached after profound investigation of a subject.
I would rather stand up by the side of half a dozen who were occupying the platform of that Sermon on the Mount than to be one of a million on the opposing side.
Oh, put the light on the candlestick!
The third division of this Sermon consists of several items, some of which need to be elaborated somewhat, others having been sufficiently discussed in preceding chapters. The first point under this division is the relation of the messianic teaching to the law and the current teaching. It is a fulfilment, i. e., a filling out, of the law and not destructive of the law. It is also a correction of the current teaching of our Lord’s time on many points respecting the law. The second item of this division is murder in its germ, which is anger. This is discussed by our Lord in Mat 5:21-26 . The third item is adultery in its germ, Mat 5:27-31 . The fourth item is unlawful divorce, Mat 5:32 . The fifth item is swearing, Mat 5:33-37 . The sixth item is the law of lex talionis , or the law of revenge, Mat 5:38-42 . The seventh item is the relation of the children of the kingdom to their enemies, expressed in one word love. Then follows a prohibition of ostentatious works: alms-giving, prayer and fasting, and the inculcation of singlehearted devotion to God in laying up treasures in heaven and in leaving off vain anxieties. The question under discussion by our Saviour was this: He saw men bowed down with anxieties on the bread and meat question, the duty of providing for their families. “O, what shall we eat, and what shall we drink and wherewithal shall we be clothed?” He saw them trying to settle that question and a good question it is to settle. What was the matter then? They were settling it at the wrong time and place. They were trying to settle a subordinate relation in advance of the settlement of a higher and paramount relation. What does he say? Does he say that the food is not good, that clothing is not good, that providing for the family is not good? On the contrary, this very passage offers these things: “All these things shall be added unto you.” God knows we are hungry and should be fed. He knows we need clothing and shelter. The Lord knows that provision should be made against a famine. All our wants are known unto him, and not against them does this text speak, but for them. But this let us settle this question, the biggest thing first, the fundamental thing, the vital thing. What is it? “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.” That prepares one to live now, here in this world; that prepares one for death, for both worlds. “Godliness hath the promise of the life that now is and of the life to come.” Let us look yet more carefully at this passage. What is meant here by the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of heaven? It means what it means in the third chapter of Matthew, where John the Baptist said, “Repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand”; it means the reign or government of God through Jesus Christ in the heart and life here on the earth. That is to say, in preparing to live, I must seek first an entrance into that kingdom and a title to its privileges and its joys, and when my relations to that kingdom are settled, which are my relations to God, then these other things in the order of their importance require due attention. Well, let us put it in yet other words in order to get the thought still more clearly. What do we mean by seeking first the kingdom of heaven? Seeking; that means any effort upon our part during the time which God has appointed for that purpose, to obtain reconciliation with him; that means any effort on our part toward regeneration, any effort that we may put forth to become a child of God, a subject of Jesus Christ. That is seeking the kingdom of heaven. What is meant by righteousness? “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.” Evidently from the connection the reference here is not to the imputed righteousness of Christ; that is abundantly set forth in other scriptures, and that, too is obtained in entering into the kingdom of heaven. That belongs to the initial process and is involved in regeneration. The righteousness here referred to is the personal righteousness of the subject of the kingdom, practical holiness, practical obedience to God’s command.
Now mark the order. Suppose I try to be righteous and sanctified before I am converted, surely I will fall must seek God first. “I will cultivate morality. I will pay my debts. I will tell the truth. I will be good.” How good without being reconciled to God, how good without regeneration, how good without the motive of love of God in the heart? The thing can’t be done. Next, what is meant then by “shall be added to you?” It means this, that God’s care in providing for the temporal necessities of his people in this life is just as efficient as his care for the salvation of their souls.
I say that if we will first settle our relation to God by becoming a Christian, and then from the basis of regeneration, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, being now saved, we follow on into good works and into holy living, then the Bible promise is that all these other things shall be added.
Let me now show what the Bible says about this life, and how these things shall be added. Let us take a passage from Psa 37 ; it has never been falsified; it holds true in every age of the world: “Trust in the Lord and do good, so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.” What is the anxiety here? “I was afraid I would not have a place among men in the land. I was afraid I would not have provision.” “Trust, in the Lord and do good and verily thou shalt be fed.” “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.” Again: “Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.” Again: “Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass. And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light and thy judgment as the noonday,” the very righteousness of this passage. “Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for him.” Yet again: “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord and he delighteth in his way. Though he fall he shall not be utterly cast down.” “I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree. Yet he passed away and lo, he was not. But mark the perfect man, consider the upright the end of that man is peace.” Peace here, peace at the end. “O, that I might die the death of the righteous and that my last end might be like his.” That same psalm says, “I have been young and now am old, and yet never have I seen the righteous forsaken nor his seed begging bread.” Take this one: “The Lord God is a sun and a shield. No good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.” Take this scripture: “All things work together for good to them that love God; to them that are the called according to his purpose.”
And it means all things above, here, below, night, day, moon, stars, breezes, storms, calms, afflictions, and bright days of prosperity, enemies EVERYTHING. Even hell shall work for our good if we love God.
For example and by way of illustration, consider the things that to an outsider seem to be the hardest things on this earth to do, nor can he understand how a Christian does them, First, giving money. I have had men to look at me as if I were crazy and they seemed to be sorry for me that I should feel constrained to give so liberally to the cause of Christ. They don’t know anything about it. Take giving then as an illustration and let me show that if first we have given ourselves to God (mark that for we do not give money to obtain salvation, but if first we have entered the kingdom of God,) and, moved with a love of God, we freely give, then for w God brightens earth and the grave and heaven. How is that? Does it help in this life? Our Saviour said, “Give, and it shall be given unto you, good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over.” That is in this life; that is here.
I do say it, and the Lord beareth me witness that I lie not, that for the protection of my family in the matter of support I have never had one single anxiety since the day that my wife and I, without a dollar in the world, covenanted with God and settled the question of our financial relation to him, and I never more expect to have any. I say that it is the truth that not one wave of anxiety or trouble as to how I am to be fed and clothed, has ever rolled over my mind since that eventful day twenty-seven years ago, I determined to settle that question, and it was settled from top to bottom.
Well, now, suppose the question was asked me: “Has God taken care of you? Has he been good to you? Has he kept you? Has he clothed you? Has he kept you out of debt? Has he enabled you not only to have, but to have in order to give?” Why, I would have to say, “Lord, it has been good measure; it has been pressed down; it has been shaken together, and it runs over all the time in this life.” And never on the earth was anything truer than that.
Now let us take the life to come on this question. Listen to the Saviour: “Whosoever shall give a cup of cold water to a disciple in the name of a disciple, shall receive a disciple’s reward.” Hear him again when he says, “Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness that when it shall fail they [the friends that you have made by it] shall receive you into everlasting habitations.” Listen again, and I want to show that such is the life to come. The charge of Paul, the charge to rich men: “Charge them that are rich in this world that they be not high minded nor trust to uncertain riches, but in the living God who giveth us all things to enjoy. Charge them that they do good; that they be rich in good works; that they be ready to distribute and willing to contribute, laying up in store for themselves a good foundation against the time to come that they may lay hold on eternal life.”
I take one other scripture only. I will take it from a scene that ought to touch every heart. It is from the judgment day. Graves have opened, death and hell have given up their dead and all nations are standing before God, and I see them separate right and left, and I hear the words of the Lord: “Come ye blessed of my Father; enter into the kingdom of heaven prepared for you from the foundation of the world, for I was sick and ye visited me. I was hungry and ye fed me. I was naked and ye clothed me.” Lord, when? When did we do this? “Inasmuch as you did it unto the least of my disciples you did it unto me.” Here, then, is giving the giving of a converted, of a saved man, brightening the hearthstone of every one who thus lives, and bringing blessings on a dark, lonely traveler on the mountain’s height; brightening the shadows of death and the realms beyond; brightening the home that is on high.
Our Saviour follows this with several other items of interest, such as the prohibition of censorious judgments, the privilege of a messianic subject to come to God as a child comes to an earthly parent, the exhortation to enter the straight gate, the unchangeable law that the tree is known by its fruits, and last, the principle that discipleship is manifested, not by profession but by obedience.
There are several items here that need to be emphasized, but they are brought out in the interpretation of other passages. Therefore I will only mention them, citing where may be found my discussion on these subjects. First, the question of offending members, here raised in Mat 5:29-31 , is discussed in connection with Mar 9:47 in this volume. Second, the divorce question, here raised in Mat 5:32 , is discussed in connection with Mat 19:1-12 in The Four Gospels, Part II of “The Interpretation.” Third, the question of oaths here raised in Mat 5:33-37 , is discussed in Exodus-Levitictis of “The Interpretation.” Fourth, the comment of our Lord on the model prayer relative to forgiveness, is discussed in connection with the subject of repentance, in chapter XV of this volume. Fifth, the question of the “few saved” of Mat 8:13-14 , is discussed in connection with Luk 13:23 , in Part II of The Four Gospels.
This Sermon on the Mount closes with a vivid description of the two builders, showing the beauty and permanency of a life founded upon the teachings of our Lord and the awful crash of life structure built on any other foundation than Christ, the Rock of Ages. One is here reminded of the modern song, “On Christ the Solid Rock,” which, like this passage, shows the necessity of building on the rock, as 1Co 3:10-15 shows the necessity of the right sort of material to be placed in the building on the rock. “All other ground is sinking sand”; all combustible material will be consumed. But whatever the material, if on the sand, it must fall and “great will be the fall thereof.”
QUESTIONS
1. Who were the historians of the Sermon on the Mount?
2. What was the scene of this sermon?
3. What the occasion of it?
4. What was the design of it, negatively and positively?
5. What can you say of the matter of this sermon?
6. What of its style?
7. Explain the terms used to describe the style.
8. What can you say of the rank of this sermon?
9. What is the evidence of divine authorship in this sermon?
10. What are the three great heads of the outline of this sermon?
11. What relations are expressed under the third great head?
12. What are the characteristics of the principles of the Christian religion as brought out in this sermon? Illustrate.
13. How many Beatitudes here? Repeat them from memory.
14. What is revealed in each of these Beatitudes? Quote Bums in point and illustrate by New Testament examples,
15. How do these Beatitudes correspond with the teaching of Epicureanism and Stoicism?
16. Show how these Beatitudes are double.
17. Give the woe of each Beatitude, either expressed or implied.
18. What, more particularly, the interpretation of the First Beatitude? Illustrate by New Testament parables.
19. For what do the blessed here in the Second Beatitude mourn?
20. How is this thought expressed by Tom Moore?
21. How does Jesus express the comfort of this thought elsewhere and where do we reach the fulness of the promise here?
22. Give briefly the import of all the other Beatitudes.
23. What is the responsibility of the subjects of the kingdom, how is it expressed and how is the importance of it shown? Illustrate.
24. Show the value and importance of God’s people from the figures used.
25. How is our responsibility in the matter expressed, and what is the general application?
26. What should be the application of this principle to politics? Illustrate.
27. What is it’s application to Christian and church fellowship? Give scriptural proof.
28. What are the points in the Aaron Burr and Breckenridge cases, respectively?
29. What several subjects are treated in the third main division of this sermon?
30. What, in detail, is the interpretation of Mat 6:33 , what are the several scriptures cited to corroborate this interpretation, and what is the application?
31. What other subjects here need to be emphasized and where may be found a discussion of each?
32. How does our Lord close the Sermon on the Mount?
Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible
17 And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases;
Ver. 17. And stood in the plain ] And yet he delivered the same sermon (in effect) that he delivered at another time, sitting on the mount, Mat 5:2 , .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
17. ] Having descended from the mountain, He stood on a level place i.e. possibly , as has been suggested by some, on a flat ledge or shelf on the side of the mountain; but more naturally below the mountain: see on Mat 5:1 . Whether Luke could thus have written with the Gospel of Matthew before him , I leave the reader to judge: premising, that is, the identity of the two discourses.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Luk 6:17 . , descending , with the Twelve, suggesting descent to the foot of the hills, the plain below. Yet the expression is peculiar; hardly what we should expect if the reference were to the plain beside the lake; rather suggestive of a flat space lower down the hill. , here only in N. T. The descent takes place in order to the delivery of a discourse which, with the choice of the Apostles, constitutes the occasion with reference to which Jesus had spent the night in prayer. The audience consists of three classes separately named (1) the Twelve, (2) the company of disciples described as an , (3) a multitude ( ) gathered from a wide area. This is the same multitude from which in Mk.’s narrative Jesus escaped to the hill, taking His disciples with Him, to get rest, and presumably to devote some leisure time to their instruction. Of this desire to escape from the crowd, so apparent in Mk., there is no trace in Lk. In indicating the sources of this great human stream Lk. omits Galilee as superfluous, mentions Judaea and Jerusalem, passing over ldumaea and Peraea (Mar 3:8 ), and winds up with Tyre and Sidon, defining the territory there whence people came by the expression ( understood), the sea-coast. The people come from all these places to hear Jesus ( ) in the first place, as if in expectation of a great discourse, and also to be healed. The eagerness to get healing even by touch, of which Mk. gives so graphic a picture (Luk 3:10 ), is faintly indicated by ( , T. R.).
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Luk 6:17-19
17 Jesus came down with them and stood on a level place; and there was a large crowd of His disciples, and a great throng of people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon, 18who had come to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases; and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were being cured. 19And all the people were trying to touch Him, for power was coming from Him and healing them all.
Luk 6:17 This is paralleled in Mat 4:24-25 and Mar 3:7-8. This introduces the sermon called “the Sermon on the Mount” in Matthew 5-7 and “the sermon on the Plain” in Luke.
Luk 6:18 “to be healed of their diseases; and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were being cured” In the Gospels, distinctions are made between physical sickness and demon possession. See SPECIAL TOPIC: THE DEMONIC (UNCLEAN SPIRITS) at Luk 4:33 and notes on exorcism at Luk 4:35. Although demonic forces might cause physical symptoms, the cure for each is different. Jesus healed all those who were brought to Him. We know from other accounts that healing was sometimes based on
1. the faith of the individual
2. the faith of the sick individual’s friends
3. sometimes it came without much faith at all (cf. Joh 5:1-9 a)
Physical healing did not always mean or imply immediate spiritual salvation (cf. John 9).
Luk 6:19
NASB”for power was coming from Him”
NKJV”for power went out from Him”
NRSV”for power came out from him”
TEV”for power was going out from him”
NJB”because power came out of him”
This is an imperfect passive (deponent) indicative. The Spirit’s power resided in Him and flowed to others in need (cf. Luk 5:17; Luk 8:46; Mar 5:30). Ministry took something out of Jesus.
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
stood = stopped.
in = on. Greek. epi. App-104.
the plain = a level [spot].
the company = a crowd.
out of = away from. Greek. apo. App-104.
healed. Greek iaomai. Compare Luk 5:17.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
17.] Having descended from the mountain, He stood on a level place-i.e. possibly, as has been suggested by some, on a flat ledge or shelf on the side of the mountain; but more naturally below the mountain: see on Mat 5:1. Whether Luke could thus have written with the Gospel of Matthew before him, I leave the reader to judge: premising, that is, the identity of the two discourses.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Luk 6:17. , them) [The Twelve] The First Class of His hearers.- , on a level spot) This spot was not in the bottom of the valley, but half-way down the mountain: a more suitable locality for addressing a large audience than a completely level plain.[60] Such a locality is called in LXX. Isa 13:2, , a mountain table-land [but Engl. Vers. from Hebr., Lift ye up a banner upon the high mountain].- , a crowd of His disciples) The Second Class, which was divided further [by the selection of the Seventy], ch. Luk 10:1. Supply , stood.- , a great multitude of the people) The Third Class.-) viz. , , the seacoast.
[60] Comp. Gnomon on ch. Luk 1:1. Obs. 2, Note, Marg.-E. B.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Christ’s Ethical Teaching — Luk 6:17-26
And He came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of His disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear Him, and to be healed of their diseases; and they that were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were healed. And the whole multitude sought to touch Him: for there went virtue out of Him, and healed them all. And He lifted up His eyes on His disciples and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of Mans sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets. But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation. Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep. Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets- Luk 6:17-26.
In considering the Gospel of Luke we have come now to what answers to the similar sermon on the mount, which is given more thoroughly in the Gospel of Matthew. Luke gives us a brief account, whereas in Matthews Gospel there are three chapters of the sermon on the mount.
All down through the centuries right-minded people have recognized the fine moral tone and deep spirituality of the sermon on the mount. Generally speaking, that sermon has given us the highest ethical teaching in the world. It is the heart of Christs instruction. However, when you examine it carefully, you will find that it is not the gospel at all, for the gospel is the declaration of God concerning His blessed Son. In the sermon on the mount, we do not have any reference made to the work of our Lord Jesus Christ, but it is a message to the disciples from Christ as to how they who profess to know Him should behave. It gives us the principles that will ever characterize His kingdom.
That kingdom is to be set up here eventually. The sermon on the mount sets forth the principles that should control the disciples during the time of His absence, while still rejected by the world. It would be foolish to say that it only applies to the millennium, because it predicates conditions which will not prevail then. There will be no such circumstances in the millennium, as people being called upon to suffer for righteousness sake. Here, however, the Lord Jesus speaks of blessings which belong to them in a special way. In that day of triumph Christs authority will be recognized everywhere. This sermon gives the principles that should actuate and motivate the disciples while they are waiting for their Master to return in power and glory.
There are many who say that it does not apply at all to us today. But we need to realize that everything that is spiritual in any age applies to the people of God in this dispensation as well as in any other period. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for our guidance as we go through this godless world, while waiting for our Lords return. Therefore, I cannot ignore any part of the Scripture if I want to be a well-furnished man of God today, living to His glory. What about the law? Do we not recognize the fact that believers are delivered from the law and are under grace? Yes, the curse of the law is what we have been freed from. But the Epistle to the Romans, which tells us that the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made us free from the law of sin and death, also declares that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. Everything of a righteous character which the law requires of man will be fulfilled in the lives of godly men and women today.
It is well to remember, as one has said, that, Some things are right because they are commanded; other things are commanded because they are right. The law said, Thou shalt not steal. But it is always wrong to steal. It was just as wrong to steal in the days from Adam to Noah and from Noah to Moses, as after the law was given. Everything that was morally right in any age applies to us today. Therefore, when it comes to the ethical and spiritual instruction given in the sermon on the mount, we are not to ignore or seek to set it aside.
Now a word or two as to the circumstances under which this sermon was preached. In Matthew 5, we read that Jesus went up into a mountain and sat down. But Luke tells us that He came down with them and stood in the plain, and the company of His disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear Him, and to be healed of their diseases. While standing in the plain, He gives this sermon on the mount. There have been some who have been quick to say that there is a discrepancy here. Matthew says mountain and Luke says plain. A few years ago it was my privilege to stand with some members of my family at the foot of that mountain, near Capernaum. You can see a road ascending until it comes to a broad tableland and then goes up higher and higher until it reaches the peak. Our Lord went up first into the mountain, that is, to the very top. Then in the morning He came down to the plain. And it came to pass in those days that He went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God. And when it was day, He called unto Him His disciples; and of them He chose twelve, whom also He named apostles; and He came down with them and stood in the plain And turning to His disciples, while the multitude listened, He spoke to them. There is no contradiction here. The only trouble is that if one does not understand the circumstances he jumps at conclusions. One has well said that the more he studied the Word of God the more he came to the conclusion that no one knows enough to charge that Word with inconsistencies. This is just one such instance.
Now the Lord, having gathered His own about Him, lifted up his eyes on His disciples and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. This is not mere temporal poverty. He is not saying that men should just be content to be poor, but He is comforting those who are poor by telling them that though they may be poor in this world, they may be rich in faith. It is a remarkable fact that in some way or other the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ are almost always poor. Our Lord said, The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His head. The followers of the Lord Jesus, in a large measure, have been among the poor and lowly, but oh, how much the grace and love of Christ has meant to them. How many a lowly and humble home has been brightened by the fellowship of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is not saying a word against rising up from poverty, but is encouraging those who are poor in purse and poor in spirit by assuring them of part in the kingdom of God. It is in Matthews account that we find Jesus emphasizes, not simple poverty as to material means, but says, Blessed are the poor in spirit. What does this mean? It is to be without spiritual assets. It is to acknowledge that in yourself you have absolutely nothing to satisfy God, but when you trust His grace then you can say that yours is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Matthew says, Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness. If you feel a great yearning in your soul for something that you have not found in this world, you may take heart and turn to Him who supplies the living bread, which satisfies the hunger of all who put their trust in Him. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. And oh, how many of Gods people have had to go through trial and distress! Savonarola said, A Christians life consists in trial and distress, doing good and suffering evil. As you try to follow your Lord in a world like this, many a tear will roll down your face. Your Saviour was a Man of tears, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, but for the joy that was set before Him He endured the cross, despising the shame, and is now set down at the right hand of the throne of God. All the suffering the people of God will ever know is right here on earth, for they will have joy forever with Him in the world beyond. But those who seek to find their joy here without Christ will have sorrow and grief in the world beyond.
Then Jesus gives a word to those who are suffering for His names sake: Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of Mans sake. You would not like to give up that beatitude, would you, Christians? You would not want to lose the good of it. Thank God, it is always true until Jesus establishes His kingdom and authority over all the world.
Life with trials hard may press me,
Heaven will give me sweeter rest.
This is the only world in which we can have that privilege of suffering for His names sake. Let our hearts cry out, Beautiful cross, wonderful cross! I will embrace it. Jesus said that whosoever cometh after Me, let him take up his cross and follow Me.
And now we have the four woes: Woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation. Even as, on another occasion, the Lord speaks of the once-rich man, suffering in Hades, who had received his good things in this life and now his day was past. When death comes, such are poorer than the poorest.
Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Those who gorge themselves with present worldly enjoyments, ignoring the more important spiritual realities, will find themselves left in a state of bitter disappointment and unsatisfied yearning when lifes short day is ended.
Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep. To live for pleasure and seek after folly and carnal mirth in a scene where there is so much reason to be serious and sober-minded, means to face an eternity of tears and mournings as one realizes the sadness of wasted talents and opportunities.
Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets. To be highly esteemed by worldlings indicates that one is just part of the world, and the world loves its own; but Jesus said that if we follow Him we need not wonder that the world will hate us, for they hated Him before they hated us. It is no evidence that a man is going on with God because he has the good-will of unspiritual and Christless people. The world delights in those of its own kind. We who are Christians have been called out from this world to the One whom they reject. God give us grace to enter more and more into fellowship with our blessed Lord, who is still in the outside place!
Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets
and a: Mat 4:23-25, Mat 12:15, Mar 3:7-12
the sea: Mat 11:21, Mat 15:21, Mar 3:8, Mar 7:24-31
which: Luk 5:15, Mat 14:14
to be: Psa 103:3, Psa 107:17-20
Reciprocal: Mat 4:25 – followed Mat 15:30 – great Mar 2:15 – General Mar 3:20 – so that Luk 12:1 – an
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
8
This paragraph corresponds with Mat 4:23-25, which see.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Observe here, 1. The great zeal and forwardness of the people in attending upon our Saviour’s ministry; he had newly begun to preach in this place, and the people flocked after him from all parts, from Judea, from Jerusalem, from Tyre and Sidon, to hear his doctrine and see his miracles. When our Saviour first began to preach the people came unto him from every quarter. His ministers find it thus: at our first coming among a people, our labors are most acceptable, and they do most good. Our people’s affections are then warm, and perhaps our own too.
2. What sort of people they were who attended thus zealousy on our Saviour’s ministry: they were the common and ordinary people; the poor received the gospel; the learned scribes, the knowing Pharisees, those wise men after the flesh, the mighty, the noble, the great and honorable, these despised our Saviour’s person, slighted his ministry, yea, sought to take away his life.
Thus from the first plantation of the gospel to this day, the poorer and meaner sort of people have entertained the glad tidings of salvation; it is a sad but a certain truth, that heaven is a place where few, comparatively but very few, of the great men of the world, are like to come; their temptations are many, their corruptions strong, and their great estates, through their own abuse, become fuel to their lusts.
Lord, how rare it is to find those that are eminently great, exemplary good!
Observe, 3. The nature of our Saviour’s miracles. Moses’s miracles were as great judgments as wonders, but Christ’s miracles were as great mercies as wonders; they were salubrious and healing: there went virtue out of him, and healed them all.
Christ’s miracles were like the author of them, full of goodness; yet would not the obstinate Pharisees be convinced, either by the goodness that was in them, or by that omnipotent power which wrought them.
All our Saviour’s miracles were wonderful, but wonders of love and mercy.
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Luk 6:17-19. And he came down with them, &c. After he had acquainted these twelve persons with his design, and had given them such private instructions as he judged necessary to render their attendance on him subservient to the execution of their important office, he came down from the mountain with them, and stood in the neighbouring plain; where were assembled, not only the rest of his disciples, but a great multitude of people collected from parts at a great distance from each other, namely, not only out of all Judea and Jerusalem, but from the coast of Tyre and Sidon Many of whom came to hear and be instructed by his discourses, and others to be healed of their diseases: circumstances these which prove beyond contradiction, how universal the persuasion now was, that he was a divinely-commissioned teacher; and that real miracles were wrought by him. And the whole multitude sought to touch him, &c. In order to multiply the proofs of his mission, and to render them indubitable, he caused virtue to go out from himself, and to heal all, without exception, who came and touched, though it were but his clothes, in expectation of being healed; and that, in some instances, in which Christ did not so much as take any apparent notice of the cases. By this benignity he put the cure in the power of the diseased themselves; and wrought many more miracles than could have been performed in the way of a formal application to him for a cure.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
XLII.
THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT.
(Concerning the Privileges and Requirements of the Messianic Reign.
A Mountain Plateau not far from Capernaum.)
Subdivision A.
INTRODUCTORY STATEMENTS.
aMATT. V. 1, 2; cLUKE VI. 17-20.
c17 and he came down with them [the twelve apostles whom he had just chosen], and stood on a level place [Harmonists who wish to make this sermon in Luke identical with the sermon on the mount recorded by Matthew, say that Jesus stood during the healing of the multitude, and that he afterwards went a little way up the mountain-side and sat down when he taught ( Mat 5:1). The “level place” is meant by our translators to indicate a plateau on the side of the mountain, and not the plain at its base. In this translation they were influenced somewhat by a desire to make the two sermons one. It is more likely that the sermons were not identical, yet they were probably delivered about the same time, for in each Evangelist the sermon is followed by an account of the healing of the centurion’s servant. As it is a matter of no great importance whether there was one sermon or two, and as they contain many things in common, we have taken the liberty of combining them to save time and space. The sermon is an announcement of certain distinctive features of the kingdom of heaven, which was said to be at hand], and a great multitude of his disciples, and a great number of people from all Juda and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases; 18 and they that were troubled with unclean spirits were [227] healed. 19 And all the multitude sought to touch him; for power came forth from him, and healed them all. [By comparing this with the foregoing section, we shall find that Mark had described this same crowd; the only difference between him and Luke being that he tells about it the day before Jesus chose the twelve apostles, while Luke describes its presence on the day after the event. Thus one substantiates the other.] a1 And seeing the multitudes, he went up into the mountain: and when he had sat down, his disciples came unto him [In sitting he followed the custom of Jewish teachers. The instruction of Jesus was at no time embellished with oratorical action. He relied upon the truth contained in his words, not upon the manner in which he uttered it.]: c20 And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples [Luke notes the eloquent look of Jesus here and elsewhere ( Luk 22:61). While spoken to all, the sermon was addressed to the disciples, revealing to them the nature of the kingdom, and contrasting with it: 1. Popular expectation; 2. The Mosaic system; 3. Pharisaic hypocrisy], a2 and he opened his mouth, and taught them, cand said, {asaying,} [Jesus spoke with the full-toned voice of power–with open mouth.]
[FFG 227-228]
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
Verse 17
Tyre and Sidon. These cities were north of Galilee, on the Mediterranean. They have not been mentioned before as reached by the fame of Jesus.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
6:17 And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the {c} sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases;
(c) From all the sea coast, which is called Syrophoenecia.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
2. The assembling of the people 6:17-19 (cf. Matthew 5:1-2)
The similarities between the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7 and what Luke recorded in Luk 6:20-49 seem to suggest that Luke condensed that Sermon. However the introductions to the two sections have led many students of these passages to conclude that Jesus gave two different addresses on separate occasions. Harmonization of the introductions is possible, and this would point to one sermon that Luke edited more severely than Matthew did. Matthew wrote that Jesus was on a mountainside when He delivered this address (Mat 5:1), but Luke said that He was on a level place (Luk 6:17). The place where Jesus gave this sermon is the major problem in harmonizing the two accounts. [Note: See J. Manek, "On the Mount – on the Plain (Mt. Luk 6:1 – Lk. VI. 17)," Novum Testamentum 9 (1967):124-31.]
Apparently Jesus went up into a mountain near Capernaum to pray all night (Luk 6:12). There in the morning He selected the Twelve (Luk 6:13; cf. Mar 3:13-14). Then He descended to a level place where He met a large crowd that had come to hear Him and to receive healing (Luk 6:17-19). Luke tells us that they came from as far away as Judea and Jerusalem to the south and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon to the north (Luk 6:17). Such a site as Luke described exists near Capernaum. [Note: J. A. Findlay, "Luke," in Abingdon Bible Commentary, p. 1037.] Next Jesus apparently went back up the mountainside to get away from the huge crowd (Mat 5:1 a). There His disciples came to Him and He taught them (Mat 5:1-2). As the sermon progressed, more people made their way up the mountainside and began listening to what Jesus was teaching (Mat 7:28; Luk 7:1; cf. Mat 7:24; Luk 6:46-47). [Note: Martin, p. 219.] Another possibility is that the place where Jesus preached may have been a level place in a mountainous region (cf. Isa 13:2; Jer 21:13). [Note: Bock, Luke, p. 187.] I believe the two sermons were really one.
Luke’s emphasis in this section was on Jesus’ widespread appeal and His willingness to give of Himself freely to help those who came to Him in need.
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
Chapter 16
THE MIRACLES OF HEALING.
IT is only natural that our Evangelist should linger with a professional as well as a personal interest over Christs connection with human suffering and disease, and that in recounting the miracles of healing He should be peculiarly at home; the theme would be in such thorough accord with his studies and tastes. It is true he does not refer to these miracles as being a fulfillment of prophecy; it is left for St. Matthew, who weaves his Gospel on the unfinished warp of the Old Testament, to recall the words of Isaiah, how “Himself took our infirmities and bare our diseases”; yet our physician-Evangelist evidently lingers over the pathological side of his Gospel with an intense interest. St. John passes by the miracles of healing in comparative silence, though he stays to give us two cases which are omitted by the Synoptists-that of the noblemans son at Capernaum, and that of the impotent man at Bethesda. But St. Johns Gospel moves in more ethereal spheres, and the touches he chronicles are rather the touches of mind with mind, spirit with spirit, than the physical touches through the coarser medium of the flesh. The Synoptists, however, especially in their earlier chapters, bring the works of Christ into prominence, traveling, too, very much over the same ground, though each introduces some special facts omitted by the rest, while in their record of the same fact each Evangelist throws some additional coloring.
Grouping together the miracles of healing-for our space will not allow a separate treatment of each-our thought is first arrested by the variety of forms in which suffering and disease presented themselves to Jesus, the wideness of the ground, physical and psychical, the miracles of healing cover. Our Evangelist mentions fourteen different cases, not, however, as including the whole, or even the greater part, but rather as being typical, representative cases. They are, as it were, the nearer constellations, localized and named; but again and again in his narrative we find whole groups and clusters lying farther back, making a sort of Milky Way of light, whose thickly clustered worlds baffle all our attempts at enumeration. Such are the “women” of chap. 8. ver. 2 {Luk 8:2}, who had been healed of their infirmities, but whose record is omitted in the Gospel story; and such, too, are those groups of cures mentioned in {Luk 4:40; Luk 5:15; Luk 6:19; Luk 7:21}, when the Divine power seemed to culminate, throwing itself out in a largesse of blessing, fairly raining down its bright gifts of healing like meteoric showers.
Turning now to the typical cases mentioned by St. Luke, they are as follows: the man possessed of an unclean demon; Peters wifes mother, who was sick of a fever; a leper, a paralytic, the man with the withered hand, the servant of the centurion, the demoniac, the woman with an issue, the boy possessed with a demon, the man with a dumb demon, the woman with an infirmity, the man with the dropsy, the ten lepers, and blind Bartimaeus. The list, like so many lines of dark meridians, measures off the entire circumference of the world of suffering, beginning with the withered hand, and going on and down to that “sacrament of death,” leprosy, and to that yet further deep, demoniacal possession. Some diseases were of more recent origin, as the case of fever: others were chronic, of twelve or eighteen years standing, or lifelong, as in the case of the possessed boy. In some a solitary organ was affected, as when the hand had withered, or the tongue was tied by some power of evil, or the eyes had lost their gift of vision. In others the whole person was diseased, as when the fires of the fever shot through the heated veins, or the leprosy was covering the flesh with the white scales of death. But whatever its nature or its stage, the disease was acute, as far as human probabilities went, past all hope of healing. It was no slight attack, but a “great fever” which had stricken down the mother-in-law of Peter, the intensive adjective showing that it had reached its danger point. And where among human means was there hope for a restored vision, when for years the last glimmer of light had faded away, when even the optic nerve was atrophied by the long disuse? And where, among the limited pharmacopoeias of ancient times, or even among the vastly extended lists of modern times, was there a cure for the leper, who carried, burned into his very flesh, his sentence of death? No, it was not the trivial, temporary cases of sickness Jesus took in hand; but He passed into that innermost shrine of the temple of suffering, the shrine that lay in perpetual night, and over whose doorway was the inscription of Dantes “Inferno,” “All hope abandon, ye who enter here!” But when Jesus entered this grim abode He turned its darkness to light, its sighs to songs, bringing hope to despairing ones and leading back into the light of day these captives of Death, as Orpheus is fabled to have brought back to earth the lost Eurydice.
And not only are the cases so varied in their character, and humanly speaking, hopeless in their nature, but they were presented to Jesus in such a diversity of ways. They are none of them arranged for, studied. They could not have formed any plan or routine of mercy, nor were they timed for the purpose of producing spectacular effects. They were nearly all of them impromptu, extemporary, events, coming without His seeking, and coming often as interruptions to His own plans. Now it is in the synagogue, in the pauses of public worship, that Jesus rebukes an unclean devil, or He bids the cripple stretch out his withered hand. Now it is in the city: amid the crowd, or out upon the plain; now It is within the house of a chief Pharisee, in the very midst of an entertainment; while at other times He is walking on the road, when, without even stopping in His journey, He wills the leper clean, or He throws the gift of life and health forward to the centurions servant, whom He has not seen. No times were inopportune to Him, and no places were foreign to the Son of man, where men suffered and pain abode. Jesus refused no request on the ground that the time was not well chosen, and though He did again and again refuse the request of selfish interest or vain ambition, He never once turned a deaf ear to the cry of sorrow or of pain, no matter when or whence it came.
And if we consider His methods of healing we find the same diversity. Perhaps we ought not to use that word, for there was a singular absence of method. There was nothing set, artificial in His way, but an easy freedom, a beautiful naturalness. In one respect, and perhaps in one only, are all similar, and that is in the absence of intermediaries. There was no use of means, no prescription of remedies; for in the seeming exception, the clay with which He anointed the eyes of the blind, and the waters of Siloam which He prescribed, were not remedial in themselves; the washing was rather the test of the mans faith, while the anointing was a sort of “aside,” spoken, not to the man himself, hut to the group of onlookers, preparing them for the fresh manifestation of His power. Generally a word was enough, though we read of His healing “touch,” and twice of the symbolic laying on of hands. And by the way, it is somewhat singular that Jesus made use of the touch at the healing of the leper, when the touch meant ceremonial uncleanness. Why does He not speak the word only as He did afterwards at the healing of the “ten?” And why does He, as it were, go out of His way to put Himself in personal contact with the leper, who was under a ceremonial ban? Was it not to show that a new era had dawned, an era in which uncleanness should be that of the heart, the life, and no longer the outward uncleanness, which any accident of contact might induce? Did not the touching of the leper mean the abrogation of the multiplied bans of the Old Dispensation, just as afterwards a heavenly vision coming to Peter wiped out the dividing-line between clean and unclean meats? And why did not the touch of the leper make Jesus ceremonially unclean? For we do not read that it did, or that He altered His plans one whir because of it. Perhaps we find our answer in the Levitical regulations respecting the leprosy. We read in {Lev 14:28} that at the cleansing of the leper the priest was to dip his right finger in the blood and in the oil, and put it on the ear, and hand, and foot of the person cleansed. The finger of the priest was thus the index or sign of purity, the lifting up of the ban which his leprosy had put around and over him. And when Jesus touched the leper it was the priestly touch; it carried its own cleansing with it, imparting power and purity, instead of contracting the defilement of another.
But if Jesus touched the leper, and permitted the woman of Capernaum to touch Him, or at any rate His garment, He studiously avoided any personal contact with those possessed of devils. He recognized here the presence of evil spirits, the powers of darkness, which have enthralled the weaker human spirit, and for these a word is enough. But how different a word to His other words of healing, when He said to the leper, “I will; be thou clean,” and to Bartimaeus, “Receive thy sight!” Now it is a word sharp, imperative, not spoken to the poor helpless victim, but thrown over and beyond him, to the dark personality, which held a human soul in a vile, degrading bondage. And so while the possessed boy lay writhing and foaming on the ground, Jesus laid no hand upon him; it was not till after He had spoken the mighty word, and the demon had departed from him, that Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up.
But whether by word or by touch, the miracles were wrought with consummate ease; there were none of those artistic flourishes which mere performers use as a blind to cover their sleight of hand. There was no straining for effect, no apparent effort. Jesus Himself seemed perfectly unconscious that He was doing anything marvelous or even unusual. The words of power fell naturally from His lips, like the falling of leaves from the tree of life, carrying, wheresoever they might go, healing for the nations.
But if the method of the cures is wonderful, the unstudied ease and simple naturalness of the Healer, the completeness of the cures is even more so. In all the multitudes of cases there was no failure. We find the disciples baffled and chagrined, attempting what they cannot perform, as with the possessed boy; but with Jesus failure was an impossible word. Nor did Jesus simply make them better, bringing them into a state of convalescence, and so putting them in the way of getting well. The cure was instant and complete; “immediately” is St. Lukes frequent and favorite word; so much so that she who half an hour ago was stricken down with malignant fever, and apparently at the point of death, now is going about her ordinary duties as if nothing had happened, “ministering” to Peters many guests. Though Nature possesses a great deal of resilient force, her periods of convalescence, when the disease itself is checked, are more or less prolonged, and weeks, or sometimes months, must elapse before the spring-tides of health return, bringing with them a sweet overflow, an exuberance of life. Not so, however, when Jesus was the Healer. At His word, or at the mere beckoning of His finger, the tides of health, which had gone far out in the ebb, suddenly returned in all their spring fullness, lifting high on their wave the bark which through hopeless years had been settling down into its miry grave. Eighteen years of disease had made the woman quite deformed; the contracting muscles had bent the form God made to stand erect, so that she could “in no wise lift herself up”; but when Jesus said, “Woman, thou art loosed from thine infirmity,” and laid His hands upon her, in an instant the tightened muscles relaxed, the bent form regained its earlier grace, for “she was made straight, and glorified God.” One moment, with the Christ in it, was more than eighteen years of disease, and with the most perfect ease it could undo all the eighteen years had done. And this is but a specimen case, for the same completeness characterizes all the cures that Jesus wrought. “They were made whole,” as it reads, no matter what the malady might be; and though disease had loosened all the thousand strings, so that the wonderful harp was reduced to silence, or at best could but strike discordant notes, the hand of Jesus has but to touch it, and in an instant each string recovers its pristine tone, the jarring sounds vanish, and body, “mind and soul according well, awake sweet music as before.”
But though Jesus wrought these many and complete cures, making the healing of the sick a sort of pastime, the interludes in that Divine “Messiah,” still He did not work these miracles indiscriminately, without method or conditions. He freely placed His service at the disposal of others, giving Himself up to one tireless round of mercy; but it is evident there was some selection for these gifts of healing. The healing power was not thrown out randomly, falling on any one it might chance to strike; it flowed out in certain directions only, in ordered channels; it followed certain lines and laws. For instance, these circles of healing were geographically narrow. They followed the personal presence of Jesus, and with one or two exceptions, were never found apart from that presence; so that, many as they were, they would form but a small part of suffering humanity. And even within these circles of His visible presence we are not to suppose that all were healed. Some were taken, and others were left, to a suffering from which only death would release them. Can we discover the law of this election of mercy? We think we may.
(1) In the first place, there must be the need for the Divine intervention. This perhaps goes without saying, and does not seem to mean much, since among those who were left unhealed there were needs just as great as those of the more favored ones. But while the “need” in some cases was not enough to secure the Divine mercy, in other cases it was all that was asked. If the disease was mental or psychical, with reason all bewildered, and the firmaments of Right and Wrong mixed confusedly together, making a chaos of the soul, that was all Jesus required. At other times He waited for the desire to be evoked and the request to be made; but for these cases of lunacy, epilepsy, and demoniacal possession He waived the other conditions, and without waiting for the request, as in the synagogue {Luk 4:34} or on the Gadarene coast, He spoke the word, which brought order to a distracted soul, and which led Reason back to her Jerusalem, to the long-vacant throne.
For others the need itself was not sufficient; there must be the request. Our desire for any blessing is our appraisement of its value, and Jesus dispensed His gifts of healing on the Divine conditions, “Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and ye shall find.” How the request came, whether from the sufferer himself or through some intercessor, it did not matter; for no request for healing came to Jesus to be disregarded or denied. Nor was it always needful to put the request into words. Prayer is too grand and great a thing for the lips to have a monopoly of it, and the deepest prayers may be put into acts as well as into words, as they are sometimes uttered in inarticulate sighs, and in groans which are too deep for words. And was it not truest prayer, as the multitudes carried their sick and laid them down at the feet of Jesus, even had their voice spoken no solitary word? And was it not truest prayer, as they put themselves, with their bent forms and withered hands right in His way, not able to speak one single word, but throwing across to Him the piteous but hopeful look? The request was thus the expression of their desire, and at the same time the expression of their faith, telling of the trust they reposed in His pity and His power, a trust He was always delighted to see, and to which He always responded, as He Himself said again and again, “thy faith hath saved thee.” Faith then, as now, was the sesame to which all Heavens gates fly open; and as in the case of the paralytic who was borne of four, and let down through the roof, even a vicarious faith prevails with Jesus, as it brings to their friend a double and complete salvation. And so they who sought Jesus as their Healer found Him, and they who believed entered into His rest, this lower rest of a perfect health and perfect life; while they who were indifferent and they who doubted were left behind, crushed by the sorrow that He would have removed, and tortured by pains that His touch would have completely stilled.
And now it remains for us to gather up the light of these miracles, and to focus it on Him who was the central Figure, Jesus, the Divine Healer. And
(1) the miracles of healing speak of the knowledge of Jesus. The question, “What is man?” has been the standing question of the ages, but it is still unanswered, or answered but in part. His complex nature is still a mystery, the eternal riddle of the Sphinx, and Oedipus comes not. Physiology can number and name the bones and muscles, can tell the forms and functions of the different organs; chemistry can resolve the body into its constituent elements, and weigh out their exact proportions; philosophy can map out the departments of the mind; but man remains the great enigma. Biology carries her silken clue right up to the primordial cell; but here she finds a Gordian knot, which her keenest instruments cannot cut, or her keenest wit unravel. Within that complex nature of ours are oceans of mystery which Thought may indeed explore, but which she cannot fathom, paths which the vulture eye of Reason hath not seen, whose voices are the voices of unknown tongues, answering each other through the mist. But how familiar did Jesus seem with all these life-secrets! How intimate with all the life-forces! How versed He was in etiology, knowing without possibility of mistake whence diseases came, and just how they looked! It was no mystery to Him how the hand had shrunk, shriveling into a mass of bones, with no skill in its fingers, and no life in its clogged-up veins, or how the eyes had lost their power of vision. His knowledge of the human frame was an exact and perfect knowledge, reading its innermost secrets, as in a transparency, knowing to a certainty what links had dropped-out of the subtle mechanism, and what had been warped out of place, and knowing well just at what point and to what an extent to apply the healing remedy, which was His own volition. All earth and all heaven were without a covering; to His gaze; and what was this but Omniscience?
(2) Again, the miracles of healing speak of the compassion of Jesus. It was with no reluctance that He wrought these works of mercy; it was His delight. His heart was drawn towards suffering and pain by the magnetism of a Divine sympathy, or rather, we ought to say, towards the sufferers themselves; for suffering-and pain, like sin and woe, were exotics in His.
Fathers garden, the deadly nightshade an enemy had sown. And so we mark a great tenderness-in all His dealings with the afflicted. He does, not apply the caustic of bitter and biting words. Even when, as we may suppose, the suffering is the harvest of earlier sin, as in the case of the paralytic, Jesus speaks no harsh reproaches; He says simply and kindly, “Go in peace, and sin no more.” And do we not find here a reason why these miracles of healing were so frequent in His ministry? Was it not because in His mind Sickness was somehow related to Sin? If miracles were needed to attest the “Divineness of His mission, there was no need of the constant succession of them, no need that they should form a part, and a large part, of the daily task. Sickness is, so to speak, something unnaturally natural: It results from the transgression of some physical law, as Sin is the transgression of some moral law; and He who is mans Savior brings a complete salvation, a redemption for the body” as well as a redemption for the soul. Indeed, the diseases of the body are but the shadows, seen and felt, of the deeper diseases of the soul, and with Jesus the physical healing was but a step to the higher truth and higher experience, that spiritual cleansing, that inner creation of a right spirit, a perfect heart. And so Jesus carried on the two works side by side; they were the two parts of His one and great salvation; and as He loved and pitied the sinner, so He pitied and loved the sufferer; His sympathies all went out to meet him, preparing the way for His healing virtues to follow.
(3) Again, the miracles of healing speak of the power of Jesus. This was seen indirectly when we considered the completeness of the cures, and the wide field they covered, and we need not enlarge upon it now. But what a consciousness of might there was in Jesus! Others, prophets and apostles, have healed the sick, but their power was delegated. It came as in waves of Divine impulse, intermittent and temporary. The power that Jesus wielded was inherent and absolute, deeps which knew neither cessation nor diminution. His will was supreme over all forces. Natures potencies are diffused and isolated, slumbering in herb or metal, flower or leaf, in mountain or sea. But all are inert and useless until man distils them with his subtle alchemies, and then applies them by his slow processes, dissolving the tinctures in the blood, sending on its warm currents the healing virtue, if haply it may reach its goal and accomplish its mission. But all these potencies lay in the hand or in the will of Christ. The forces of life all were marshalled under His bidding. He had but to say to one “Go,” and it went, here or there, or any whither; nor does it go for naught; it accomplishes its high behest, the great Masters will. Nay, the power of Jesus is supreme even in that outlying and dark world of evil spirits. The demons fly at His rebuke; and let Him throw but one healing word across the dark, chaotic soul of one possessed, and in an instant Reason dawns; bright thoughts play on the horizon; the firmaments of Right and Wrong separate to infinite distances; and out of the darkness a Paradise emerges, of beauty and light, where the new son of God resides, and God Himself comes down in the cool and the heat of the days alike. What power is this? Is it not the power of God? Is it not Omnipotence?