Tlie introduction of the saying in Lk ll^s-ss is due to the key-word Xi-x^os- Here, as often, Lk. groups sayings togetiier less from their internal conesi)onclence than from some verbal common element. He sharj^>ens the point of tlie savin"; by introducing v.^. As eves mav l)ecome injured by the blinding glare and dust which make ophthalmia a prevalent complaint in the Elast, so, it is im- plied, the inner disj>osition lies exposed to risk and disease, against which it is a mans duty to guard. For if the heart rules the life, the life, on the other iiand, can stain and sjwil the heart. Yet the stress of the saying falls on attention to tlie in- ward life as determining the course and value of the outer. ' "Take care of the little things of life, and the great things will take care of themselves," is the maxim of the trader, which is sometimes, and with a certain degree of truth. applie<l to the ser\"ice of God. But much more true is it in religion, that we should take care of the great things, and the trifles of life A\"ill take care of themselves. "If thine eye be single, thy whole body will be full of light." Christianity is not acquired, as an art, by long practice ; it does not carve and jwlish human nature with a graving tool ; it makes the whole man ; first jwuring out his soul before Goti, and then casting him in a mould ' (Jowetts Paul, ii. 117). — The point of v.*^ is not easy to grasp. It seems a somewhat tautological expansion of v.***" (so Blass). D, Syrc«retc., omit it. while S_\T"n has a different fonii of it ; yet, as Wellhausen obser\-es, it does not read like an in- teri>olation, and prol^ably we must be content to sus]>ect. with Westcott and Hort, e.g., Jind J. Weiss (in Meyer*, pp. 476-477), some primitive corruption of the text.
2. The connexion of v.® with the saving is not immediate. Lk 11^ is simply an eqiiivalent of Mk 5'^"'*, which is incorporated here imder the rubric of ' light,' and Luke has already more ap- jiropriately used it in S'*( = Mk4"-') in "the second phase of the light-symlwlism in the Gosi>els, viz. that of influence. The disciples are cautioneti against the tendency, whether due to motiesty or to cowardice, to refrain from letting their faith' tell
VOL. II. — 3
uixjn tlie world. In Lk 11^ it is impossible to trace any very obvious connexion lietween this and what precedes, anv more than between it and what follows, unless tlie idea of the editor is that Solomon's wistiom and Jonah's preaching were frank and open to the world (hence v.^), while no sign (v.^) is neetlcl if the inner hejirt be pure and true (vv.**-^). The context in Mt 5 is much more congenial. Jesus is warning His disciples that while their relation to the outside world is often full of annoyance and suHeiing, j'et this bitter exi>erience (v.'*'-) must not drive them into a jiarochial and secludeti attitude of negative protest. 'You are the light of the world," He urges. You owe it a diitv. Your faith lays you under an obligation to let your life tell \\\h)\\ your enviion- ment (cf. EBi, 4377, 43S4-438o), instead of weakly relapsing into some esoteric or Essene-like seclu- sion. The allusion to good works is jieculiar to Matthew. It emphasizes that frankness of spirit and necessity of good conduct which the saving \i\K>n light advocates as the sole reasonable position for Christian disciples to assume. The vocation of a Christian is to be visible. And visibility means influence. The reference is not to Ajwstles but to Christians in general, nor is preaching in \iew. What Jesus inculcates is an attitude of consistent gootiness, void of monasticism and osten- tation alike, as corre;? ponding to the nature of His Kingdom, whose proi>ertv and destiny it is to l>e- come manifest to the world (cf. Mozleys Parochial and Occasional Scnnons, p. 212 f.).
This latter idea, without the iiionil counsel, is reproduced by Mk 4-' ( = Lk S'*) as a sequel to the interpretation of the pixrable of the Seevls. as if to suggest that such knowledge as had just l>een ini- ptirted to the disciples was not to be kept to them- selves but to be difl'used like light (cf. Menzies, Earliest Gospel, pp. 112-114K the placing of the lamp in its proper iwsition perhaps conesjKinding (so Jiilicher) to the fruitful and useful qualities of the good seed in the good soil (v.*). Others, like Wrede (das Jlessiasgeheiinnis. p. 6Sf.), prefer to read the Si\j"ing in the light of the Aixjstolic age, as if it meant that after the Kesurrection all reserve upon the Christian mysteries was to l)e thro\\Ti aside (v."). This, however, cannot be the original sense of the saying, and there is no reason whv one should give up the interpretation which makes the lamp here ei^uivalent to the teaching of Jesus or the knowledge of the gosi>el (see £.cpos. Nov. 1900, on -The Peril and the Comfort of ExiK)siire'). The point is less general than in Mt 51-1-16 gm (|je essential bearing of the siiying is the same, viz. that as the function of light is to radiate, so Christian privileges imply the duty of propaganda. Similarly. Mt 10^"^= Lk 12^ (ct. Jiilicher"s Gleic/inisreden, ii. S6t.). In the fourth of the New Ox^Th^^lchlls Logia. we have the words: 'for there is nothing hidden which shall not l>e made manifest, nor bimed which shall not be raised."