13. ''Ὑμεῖς ἐστε τὸ "ἅλας τῆς γῆς: ἐὰν δὲ τὸ ἅλας ” µωρανθῇ, υ Mk. ix, so.
k. xiv.
ἐν tive " ἁλισθήσεται; eis οὐδὲν ἰσχύει ἔτι, εἰ μὴ βληθῆναι] ἔξω, a4- Col.
v Lk. xiv. 34. Rom. i. 22.
lv
1 Cor.i.20. where and in Mk. ix. 49.
1βληθ v in NBC 1, 33, Origen, which carries along with it the omission of και
after εξω,
temper. It is the joy of the Alpine climber standing on the top of a snow- clad mountain. But the Teacher gives two reasons to help inexperienced dis- ciples to rise to that moral elevation.— ὅτι 6 μισθὸς .. . ovpavois. For evil treatment on earth there is a com- pensating reward in heaven. This hope, weak now, was strong in primitive Christianity, and greatly helped martyrs and confessors.—ottws yap ἐ. τοὺς προφήτας. If we take the γὰρ as giving areason for the previous statement the sense will be: you cannot doubt that the prophets who suffered likewise have feceived an eternal reward (so Bengel, Fritzsche, Schanz, Meyer, Weiss). But we may take it as giving a co-ordinate season for joy = ye are in good com- pany. There is inspiration in the “goodly fellowship: of the prophets,” quite as much as in thought of their posthumous reward. It is to be noted that the prophets themselves did not get much comfort from such thoughts, and more generally that they did not rise to the joyous mood commended to His disciples by Jesus; but were desponding and querulous. On that side, therefore, there was no inspiration to be got from thinking of them. But they were thoroughly loyal to righteousness at all hazards, and reflection on their noble career was fitted to infect disciples with their spirit.—rovs πρὸ ὑμῶν: words skil- fully chosen to raise the spirit. Before you not only in time but in vocation and destiny. Your predecessors in function and suffering; take up the prophetic succession and along with it, cheerfully, its tribulations.
Vv. 13-16. Disciple functions. It is quite credible that these sentences formed part of the Teaching on the Hill. Jesus might say these things at a comparatively early period to the men to whom He had already said: I will make you fishers of men. The functions assigned to disciples here are not more ambitious than that alluded to at the time of their call. The new section rests on what goes before, and postulates possession of the attributes named in the Beatitudes. With these the disciples
will be indeed the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Vitally important functions are indicated by the two figures. Nil sole et sale utilius was a Roman proverb (Pliny, H. N., 31, 9). Both harmonise with, the latter points expressly to, a universal destination of the new religion. The sun lightens all lands. Both also show how alien it was from the aims of Christ to be the teacher of an esoteric faith.
_ Ver. 13. ἅλας, a late form for GAs, ἅλος, masculine. The properties of salt are assumed to be known. Com- mentators have enumerated four. Salt is pure, preserves against corruption, gives flavour to food, and as a manuring element helps to fertilise the land. The last mentioned property is specially insisted on by Schanz, who finds a reference to it in Lk. xiv. 35, and thinks it is also pointed to here by the expres- sion τῆς γῆς. The first, purity, is a quality of salt per se, rather than a con- dition on which its function in nature depends. The second and third are doubtless the main points to be insisted on, and the second more than the third and above all. Salt arrests or prevents the process of putrefaction in food, and the citizens of the kingdom perform the same function for the earth, that is, for the people who dwell on it. In Schanz’s view there is a confusion of the metaphor with its moral interpretation. Fritzsche limits the point of comparison to indispensableness= ye are as necessary an element in the world as salt is; a needlessly bald interpretations Necessary certainly, but why and for what ?—+7s γῆς might mean the land of . Israel (Achelis, Bergpredigt), but it is more natural to take it in its widest significance in harmony with κόσμον. Holtzmann (H. C.) sets κόσµου down to the account of the evangelist, and thinks γῆς in the narrow sense more suited to the views of Jesus.—Ver. 14. µωρανθῇ. The Vulgate renders the verb evanuerit. Better Beza and Erasmus, infatuatus fuerit. If the salt become insipid, so as to lack its proper preserving virtue— can this happen? Weiss and others reply: It does not matter for the poini