21. 'Hxouffars, ye have heard) From public readings, to which you have given your assent. In the New Testament the teachers are referred to their reading of the law, the people to their hearing of it. See John xii. 34 ; Rom. ii. 13, 18.— on eppsdr), that it has been said) An impersonal form of speech, to which is elegantly opposed, / say. Moses said it truly ; the interpreters of Moses said it with altered meaning : the hearers did not distinguish the meaning of Moses from that of his in terpreters. The name of Moses occurs, but with a less forcible contrast, in ch. xix. 8, 9, sc. Moses permitted, but [/] say unto you, where I is not expressed in the original, for there is no conten tion between Moses and Christ : the Jews had departed from both Moses and Christ. The language of Christ does not exceed the law of Moses (see ch. vii. 12) ; for concupiscence, pro scribed in ver. 28, is also prohibited by the law : see Rom. vii. 7. He however restores the truths which the Scribes had taken from the law, and clears away the falsehoods which they had added ; see ver. 43. The phrase, " But I say" is an antithetic formula, by which Christ, as if Moses had never existed (for the servant gives place to his Lord), orders all things simply, not in the guise of a Legislator or Interpreter, but as the Son declaring the will of His Father : see ch. vii. 21, and cf. ch. iii. 17. The law is perfect : whatever the Saviour prohibits or commands in this passage, the law had previously prohibited or commanded : it judges the secrets of the heart (see Rom. vii. 14) ; but on account of the hard heart of the people, it more frequently expresses outward acts. Therefore the Lord says, " But I say unto you" not, " Moses however said unto you" The Jews were in many things otherwise cir cumstanced in the time of the Pharisees than in the time of Moses. — ro?$ ap'/aiois, to them of old time]) sc. the fathers in the time of Moses. The Scribes wished to appear to be in conformity with the ancient and primitive rule. Antiquity should be maintained, but it should be genuine antiquity.2
1 E. V. ly them of old time.— (I. B.)
1 In fact, it was not in the time of Moses, and to the ancients [" to them of old time"], that the rather lax interpretation of the law was set forth, hut in the time of the Scribes and Pharisees, and to the men of that age. The Scribes themselves were the persons who crusted over with the plea of anti-