And, finally, the duty of righteousness is most
*Mt 721 Ob wes 6 Aéywy poor Kipis xbpie civeredoerces sis cay Bacirsioy rev odpavav, LAN 6 woidiv Oo OeAnuw rol rarpos jeov TOU by rois oupavois. Lk 646 Ti 52 we xwrcize Kipie xbpse, zal od woicire oe Aéyo ;
t+ So Feine, Godet, Ibbeken, Weizsiicker, Wendt, and others. The parallel sayings, Mt 722f=Lk 1826f, give the same idea, with wide divergence of expression. It may be true, as Ibbeken thinks, that the three acts named in Mt 722 sound improbable on Jesus’ lips (certainly they are foreign to the Sermon), and they may therefore reflect the experiences of the Apostolic age. But Lk 1326 ‘We did eat and drink in thy presence, and thou didst teach in our streets,’ is also not without difficulty, because so insipid and un-Jewish. The better explanation is that the Matthzan verses are authentic, but belong to the close of the ministry ; while Lk 1326 has been universalized. In the second verse of each passage, Mt 723=Lk 1327, there is identity of thought, with some variation of language. The phrase, ‘ Depart from me, ye that work iniquity,’ is a quotation from Ps 68 (cf. Mt 13%1f. 2541); its two Greek forms here, &roywpeirs ca’ éov of EpyocGomevos ry cevopeiocy (Mt.) and drooryre cx’ Emod, rcvres tpyeros adimies (Lk.), present an interesting minute problem of transla- tion and transmission.
t Mt 721-23 has a value also for determining the Christological conceptions of the Synoptic Gospels. See particularly Schlatter in Greifswalder Studien (1895), pp. 83-105. This passage is only one of a number where Jesus appears as claiming the Divine prerogative of Judge at the Final Judgment (Mt 2531-46 10s2f. 1127-30, Mk 888, Li 2018; ef, Jn 5271248, Ac 1731, Ro 216, 2 Co 510), a function appropriate to the Messiah. It would require a radical treatment of the Gospel narratives to explain this idea of Jesus as Judge as an exaggerated Apostolic appreciation of Him, The uniqueness of Christ in mission, person, teaching, and career—in other words, His Divinity—cannot well be denied by a serious historical interpretation of the Gospels; and when this uniqueness is recognized, it is not difficult to admit Jesus’ office as Judge.
44 SERMON ON THE MOUNT
impressively set forth at the close of the whole discourse by the parable of the Two House-builders (Mt 724-27 Lik 6*”-#),* That this piece belongs to the Sermon, and forms its remarkable conclusion (as the of in v.*4 suggests), can be considered certain. The parable follows logically upon v.*}, enlarging and enforcing the teaching therein. It is a saying of tremendous strength. The life which Jesus has depicted in the Sermon as the ideal life is wonderfully beautiful, inspiring, and attrac- tive to every sincere soul. But men were likely to recognize and to reverence this ideal without achieving it, since that is the earnest and arduous labour of a lifetime. Hence Jesus meets them with the solemn affirmation that the duty of actually doing what He teaches is imperative ; that it shall be of no avail for them to have listened to His words, if they do not straightway go and live the life which as God’s will He has described to them.
5. THE RELATION OF THE SERMON ON THE Mount To JESUS’ TEACHING AS A WHOLE.—The teaching contained in the Sermon on the Mount was given in the middle portion of Jesus’ Gali- lean ministry, when enthusiastic multitudes were hearing Him and many followers attended Him. It was in this period that He gave the general teaching about the Kingdom of God—what it consisted in, what it brought to men, what it required of men, what relation He Himself sus- tained to it, and what its future was to be. The Sermon is an epitome of this general. teaching, condensing the whole into a brief statement and exposition of the ideal of life, given for the prac- tical purpose of a simple guide to right thought and conduct. It showed the multitude what He as a teacher of religion had to present as truth and duty, with which they could readily contrast their own and the current ideals.
Jesus confined His teaching entirely to the religio- ethical field ; and in this field He dealt with essen- tial truths, facts, and principles rather than with the speculative mysteries of the universe or with the casuistry of ethics. Consequently, He taught again and again the same things, to different persons, under different circumstances, and in different ways and lights. A close organic relation unites all Jesus’ teachings, each involving the other, and all together illuminating the path of human existence. The Gospel was so brief and simple that it had not to be committed to writing like the philosophy and the ethics of the schools. Common men could comprehend and communicate Jesus’ teaching. His was a universal message which all could grasp; it presented an ideal to which all could aspire and attain.
As has been abundantly seen, the Sermon on the Mount sets forth Jesus’ conception of what men should be and do as members of the Kingdom which He came to establish in the world (not as a new movement entirely, but as giving higher con- tent and greater impulse to a movement which God had inaugurated with the very creation of the human race). The true righteousness is de- termined by God; as He is the source of all life, so it is He who determines what that life shall be. Ethical obligations rest therefore upon religious truths. The ideal of a man’s life is to be derived from God, and for its realization he is responsible to God. The aim of man’s life is to achieve that personal character and service which fulfil the true manhood, after the pattern of Christ, and to advance as far as possible the real brotherhood of