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A JOURNAL OF BIBLE AND THEOLOGY

~

APRIL 1987

nterpreta ti on

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EDITOR

PAUL]' ACHTEMEIER

Profe.l,wr olBiblicalln/elpre/a/ion* ASSOCIATE EDITORS JACK DEAN KINGSBURY, Book Reviews Pmfe,uor olBibliml Theolo/{l'*

JOHN B. TROTrI, Marketing Librlll-ian, Pmf'e,I,\(J/' 0( Biblio!{raPh)'* EDITORIAL BOARD T. HARTLEY HALL, IV, Chairman Presidell/*

JAMES L. MAYS

Prof'e,uor of' Hebrew ami Old Te,l/amell/*

D. CAMERON MURCHISON

AS,locia/e Prole_H(}/" of' Pas/oml Theolo/{l' alUl Educa/ion*

CHARLES M. SWEZEY

Pmfe,uor 01 Chris/iall E/hiC.\*

REBECCA H. WEAVER

A.I.Iis/(III/ Prof'e,lsor of' Church HiJ/()/~'* *Union Theolo!{iml Semilllll)' ill Vilginia ADVISORY COUNCIL WALLACE M. ALSTON, JR.

Pm/or, Na.uau Pre,'h)'lenllll Church Prince/on, New jn,e;.'

FRED B. CRADDOCK

Prole,I,lOr of' New Tes/amen/ (jlld Preachill!{ The Candler School of'Theo/rI/{l' Emll/~' Univf1:"il)'

GABRIEL F ACKRE

Proje,uor of' Chi,l/iol/ Theolo/{l' Andover New/on T/telllo!{imi Center

DAVID M. GUNN

Prof'e,uor of' Old Te,l/amen/ Lml!{Ua!{f, Li/em/ure, alUl E,w/{fsis Columbia Theolo!{ical Semin(jJ~'

ROLAND E. MURPHY, O. CARM.

Prole,uor ol Biblical Studies The Divinil)' School, Duke UniveJ:,il)'

PHEME PERKINS

Pmf'e,uor of'Thelllo/{l' Bos/on Col/e!{e

JOHN H. P. RWMANN

Pmle,uor of'New Tes/amen/

Lu/hemn Theolll!{imi Semiuan' al Phiirllid/J/tia

DAVID C. STEINMETZ

Profenor of Church History and Doctrine The Divinity School, Duke University

GEORGE W. STROUP

Professor of Theology Columbia Theological Seminary

STAFF

MARY T. ATKINSON, Managing Editor

PHYLLIS]' DOUTHAT, Circulation Associate

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Interpretation

A JOURNAL OF BIBLE AND

THEOLOGY

JANUARY 1987

VOL. XLI • NO. 1

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Interpretation

[~[

A JOURNAL OF BIBLE AND THEOLOGY

VOLUME XLI

CONTENTS

115 Editorial

APRIL 1987

117 Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

ROBERT A. GUELICH

NUMBER 2

131 The Place, Structure, and Meaning of the Sermon on the Mount

JACK DEAN KINGSBURY

144 The Ethical Implications of the Sermon on the Mount

LISA SOWLE CAHILL

157 The Sermon on the Mount as Radical Pastoral Care

RICHARD LISCHER

170 Expository Articles 170 Matthew 5:43-48

BONNIE BOWMAN THURSTON

173 Matthew 6:5-15 PHILIP B. HARNER

179 Matthew 6:24-34 CHARLES E. CARLSTON

BOOKS

184 Major Book Reviews

184 The Hebrew Bible: A Socio-Literary Introduction, by Norman K. Gottwald

J. GERALD JANZEN 187 Matthew as Story, by Jack Dean Kingsbury

DENNIS DULING

190 Preaching, by Fred B. Craddock

RICHARD LISCHER

193 Revelation and Theology: The Gospel as Narrated Promise, by Ronald F. Thiemann

196 Shorter Reviews and Notices 220 Books Received

RALPH HJELM

Copyright 1987 by Union Theological Seminary in Virginia. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America.

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Editorial

I

F PEOPLE KNOW ANYTHING at all about the Bible, it will surely include material found in Matthew 5-7. The Golden Rule, turning the other cheek, the Lord's Prayer, walking the straight and narrow-all are drawn from its content. Yet despite its familiarity, the three chapters that make up what is popularly known as the Sermon on the Mount (wrongly named; Matthew 5:2 refers to it not as preaching but as teaching) continue to intrigue, baffle, and enlighten interpreters even after some two millenia of study. Its importance for the Christian church can hardly be exagger-ated. It was the most widely cited passage of Scripture in the Ante-Nicene Fathers, played a major part in the way various reform movements of the sixteenth century understood their relationship to secular society, and has continued to playa role in the way Christians understand themselves and their role in contemporary life. It is therefore an appropriate topic for those interested in biblical interpretation to address.

A broad survey of the many ways the Sermon on the Mount has been interpreted makes up the content of the first article. In it, Robert Guelich isolates the characteristic ways of viewing this biblical passage which have emerged in critical periods of the life of the church, and shows how each view has influenced the way Christian life was understood within the larger society of its time. Despite what Guelich calls the "sea of literature" thus produced, the Sermon, showing itself to be anything but self-evident in meaning, continues to challenge interpreters who seek to find the Christian path within secular society. The article is an excellent guide into that challenge and some of its possible solutions.

Because the Sermon on the Mount is part of the larger literary entity we know as the Gospel of Matthew, an understanding of the Sermon depends in large measure on an understanding of its place and function within the larger context of that Gospel. In the second article, Jack Dean Kingsbury leads the reader step by step through an analysis of that context and the way the Sermon is related to it. Using this larger context to interpret the Sermon, Kingsbury tackles the vexed problem of the intention of these chapters: Did Matthew intend them to be an impossible ideal, or did he intend them as an actual guide for Christian living? Considering the Sermon passage by passage, from the opening Beatitudes to the closing parable of Houses, Kingsbury shows how Matthew made clear his inten-tion. The article thus constitutes an invaluable aid for the interpreter of this portion of Matthew's Gospel.

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In the third article, Lisa Sowle Cahill invites the reader to consider with her the broader implications for Christian ethics which a careful interpre-tation of the Sermon on the Mount inevitably provokes. Assuming the canonical authority and the literary coherence of the Gospel of Matthew, Cahill examines the ethical implications of the Sermon for a variety of contemporary problems, including ethics as relationship and action, and as imitation of God; the impact of eschatological judgment on ethical decision making; and the social dimensions of the righteousness expected of the Christian disciple, including the problems of nonviolence and nonresistance to evil. Thoughtful reading of this carefully reasoned article will increase one's sensitivity to the ethical implication for contemporary life of the sayings of Jesus found in these three chapters of Matthew.

Because the Sermon on the Mount represents an address not only to the individual believer but also to the community of believers, it is necessary to view it from that perspective as well. In the final article, Richard Lischer looks at the Sermon from the perspective of the actual life of that commu-nity to see what resources it has to offer. Noting what he finds to be a puzzling lack of references to the Sermon in contemporary literature devoted to the practical aspects of church life, a lack all the more sur-prising because of the organic relationship Lischer finds between this passage from Matthew and the life and ministry of the present-day congregation, Lischer examines how the Sermon can function in two of those aspects: pastoral care and the liturgical life of the community. Written from a close acquaintance with theology and biblical interpreta-tion, this essay will reward those who read it carefully with a renewed appreciation of the value of the Sermon on the Mount for the Christian life of the community of believers.

The interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount is continued in the three expository articles, each dealing with a passage chosen from the material contained in it. In an exposition of Matthew 5 :43-48, Bonnie Bowman Thurston examines the intimidating demand that the Christian be "perfect" and aids the reader in finding the levels of meaning contained in that command. Philip B. Harner looks at Matthew 6:5-15 and helps the reader to a fuller understanding of the prayer Jesus commended to his disciples. In the third exposition, Charles E. Carlston examines Matthew 6:24-34, warning of the dangers of understanding the Word of God as a law, or simply as an exhortation to "try harder."

Taken together, these articles provide the reader with a careful look at a most familiar yet most enigmatic passage from the Bible.

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Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

ROBERT A. GUELICH

Teaching Minister and Theologian in Residence The Colonial Church of Edina, Edina, Minnesota

Although interpreters have been occupied with the Sermon on the Mount for nearly two millenia, and have produced widely differing results, the challenge of these verses for Christians remains undiluted.

A

CCORDING TO W. S. KISSINGER, "No portion of the Scriptures was more frequently quoted and referred to by the Ante- N icene writers than the Sermon on the Mount." 1 The same may still obtain for our

day when one recognizes that the so-called Sermon on the Mount of Matthew 5: 1-7:29 contains such well-known passages as the Beatitudes (5:3-11), the Lord's Prayer (6:9-13), and the Golden Rule (7: 12). Several exhortations have become ethical maxims such as turning the other cheek (5:39), going the extra mile (5:41), loving one's enemies (5:44), and walking the straight and narrow (7: 13-14).

Familiarity, however, does not insure understanding. The sea of litera-ture on the Sermon demonstrates that the meaning of the Sermon is anything but self-evident. So vast is this literary sea that no one has undertaken the task of charting the waters by writing a complete history of the Sermon's interpretation.2 Yet trends and issues have emerged over the

l. The Sermon on the Mount: A History of Interpretation and Bibliography, ATLA Biblio-graphy Series 3 (Meteuchen, NJ: 1975), p. 6.

2. Four works offer some guidance: Harvey K. McArthur, Understanding the Sermon on

the Mount (New York: Harpers, 1960); Kissinger, The Sermon on the Mount; Ursula Berner,

Die Bergpredigt: Rezeption und Auslegung im 20. Jahrhundert (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1979); Clarence Bauman, The Sermon on the Mount: The Modern Quest fOT its

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centurie,s that provide an important setting for one seeking to understand and interpret the Sermon for an audience removed by nearly two mil-lennia.

1. THE PRE-REFORMATION ERA

A review of the Ante-Nicene writers' use of biblical texts reveals that "the fifth chapter of Matthew appears more often in their works than any other single chapter, and Matthew 5-7 more frequently than any other three chapters in the entire Bible.,,3 Those writers indicate that the early church understood these teachings to be from] esus and prescriptive for the life of the Christian. For example, the Didache made frequent reference to passages from the Sermon in its exposition of the "way of life." Justin drew from much of Matthew 5 to describe Christian conduct in his apology addressed to the Emperor Antonius Pius (Apol. I, 14-16). Augustine prefaced our oldest commentary on the Sermon by referring to it as "the perfect measure of the Christian life.,,4

Though the question of practicability never directly arose during this period, we do find indirect signs of the early church's struggle to apply these teachings. "Without cause"s softens] esus' prohibition of anger. ]ustin's]ewish partner in dialogue, Trypho, hints at the idealistic tone of

these demands when he says, "But the precepts in what you call your Gospel are so marvelous and great that I don't think that anyone could possibly keep them" (Dial. with Trypho, 12). Chrysostom may also betray this concern in his exhortation on 6:25-34: "Let us not therefore suppose his injunctions are impossible: for there are many who duly perform them, even as it is.,,6

After Constantine and the mass conversion of the populace to Chris-tianity, a tendency towards a two-level Christianity emerged. Those for whom conversation meant rigorously following] esus' demands that eventuated in an ascetic withdrawal from the world stood in contrast to the masses who professed Christ and were baptized into the church.

This distinction was clearly spelled out by Aquinas. The masses lived by the "precepts" or "the commandments" necessary for salvation, while those who chose a higher way towards perfection and greater merit followed the "counsels of perfection" or the "evangelical counsels" which the Lord added to the "precepts" (Summa Theol. I, IIae. cvii-cviii). More and more the Sermon's demands came to be interpreted as "evangelical counsels" attainable by a few. Thus one concedes the Sermon's

imprac-3. Kissinger, The Sermon on the Mount, p. 6.

4. The Preaching of Augustine, ed. Jeroslav Pelikan (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1973), p. l. 5. Eikei in

l

D L W 0 fl.l3 it syr; irlaL OrPL.

6. The Preaching ofChrysostom: Homilies on the Sermon on the MOLl,nt, ed. Jeroslav Pelikan (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1973), p. 174.

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Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

ticability by recognizing that most of the demands were not even for every Christian.

2. THE REFORMATION ERA

A major shift in interpreting the Sermon emerged from the sixteenth-century reformation. Oversimplified, three approaches arose: Luther's, Calvin's, and the Anabaptists'.

The "Anabaptists" or radical reformers 7 stand out because they took the Sermon to be the charter for the Christian life. Viewed as a compendium of Jesus' teaching, the Sermon represented a new law commensurate with the coming of the Kingdom of God and provi~ed the norm for every believer.

Inevitably the demands of the Sermon did not mix with the socio-political realities of this world. Consequently, some took a revolutionary tack and attempted to build a new society, the Kingdom of God, based on the Sermon's principles (e.g., Munzer, the Zwickau prophets, the Mel-chiorists). The majority, however, settled for a radical separation of church and state and a withdrawal from direct participation in socio-political structures that might compromise the principles of the Sermon (e.g., the Swiss Brethren and the Mennonites). Thus, in their own way, the radical reformers illustrate the impracticability of the Sermon's demands for life in the "real" world.

Luther's work on the Sermon addressed specifically the issue of prac-ticability by focusing on two targets, the "canonists" and the Anabaptists.8 On the one hand, he confronted the double standard of the "canonists" of the Roman Church who took the Sermon's demands as optional "coun-sels" for a select few, while holding the "precepts" or "commandments" to be necessary for salvation for all. On the other hand, he confronted the radical reformers who sought to apply the Sermon's demands literally for all believers leading either to an uncompromising withdrawal from the world or to an attempt to construct a new world.

According to Luther, both had failed to distinguish between two divine-ly ordained orders, "two kingdoms," the secular kingdom of the world and the spiritual Kingdom of Christ. He viewed the secular order to be ordained by God as the ordering principle for society with roles ("offices") and laws, the ignoring of which would lead to anarchy and chaos. At the same time, he viewed every believer to be called to live and work in faith and love according to the demands of the Sermon. Consequently, one

7. Luther often used Schwiixmer ("enthusiasts"), but "anabaptists," "schismatics," and "sectarians" have all been used to refer to the often diverse followers of Thomas Munzer and the Zwickau Prophets, the Melchiorists or Hoffmanites, the Mennonites, the Hut-terites, and the Swiss Brethren.

8. Luther's "commentary" comes from a series of weekly sermons preached between 1530-1532 prepared for publication by his students with a preface written by Luther.

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must distinguish between a believer's "office" and "person," the one pertaining to the kingdom of the world and the other to the Kingdom of Christ. Therefore, as a citizen, jurist, or soldier one carried out the commensurate responsibilities established by civil law while personally in keeping with the Sennon intending no harm and grieving over the adverse consequences for those involved.9

By separating the "two kingdoms," Luther avoided the "papist" error of subsuming the temporal or secular authority under the church and the "schismatic's" error of imposing the spiritual upon the secular and/or withdrawing from the latter. Yet by delineating two kingdoms, Luther too recognized implicitly what had come to be accepted by the "papists" and the "schismatics," namely, the impracticability of Jesus' demands in the Sermon on the Mount for the socio-political structures of this world.

Calvin also addressed the same two fronts.10 He objected to the "Schoolmen" relegating Jesus' demands to optional "counsels" and thus failing to recognize Jesus as a "Lawgiver" (Institutes, I, 419). He also rejected the literalism of the Anabaptists whose limited focus on the Sermon and strict application, for example, of the prohibition of oaths and the use of the judicial system illustrated their failure to interpret Scripture in light of Scripture as a whole. Like Luther, Calvin took the Sermon as applicable to all believers, but his response to the "Schoolmen" and the "Anabaptists" stems from a different approach to the Sermon.

First, apropos the "Schoolmen" he raised into bold relief the issue of Jesus' role as "Lawgiver" in relationship to Moses and the law by disputing any distinction between "commandment" and "counsel." Jesus does not represent any discontinuity with the law. Calvin argued strongly for the "sacred tie between the law and the Gospel" (Commentary, I, 278) seen in Jesus' coming as the fulfillment of the law by restoring the true meaning of

the law and stripping away the Pharisaic distortions (Institutes, I, 373-74). Jesus clarified the spirit of the law which remains binding for all.

Second, Calvin countered the Anabaptists' narrow literalism and cushioned the Sermon's radical demands by reading them against the broader witness of Scripture. For example, he maintained that Jesus' prohibition of oaths only excludes oaths that "abuse and profane the sacred name" (Commentary, I, 295). "God not only permits oaths ... but commands their use ... [Exod. 22: 10-11]" (Institutes, I, 391). Conse-quently, properly understood against the broader context of Scripture the Sermon's demands prove practicable even for one involved in the struc-tures of society.

9. Luther's Works, Vol. 21: The Sermon on the Mount and the Magnificat, ed. Jeroslov Pelikan (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1956), p. 113.

10. One must extrapolate Calvin's treatment of the Sermon from his Commentmy on the

Harmony of the Evangelists, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949) and his Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, The Library of Christian Classics XX, XXI (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960).

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Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

3. THE POST-REFORMATION ERA

With the coming of the Enlightenment and the rise of historical criti-cism, new questions emerged. The Sermon survived the early stages unscathed as an accurate statement of Jesus' teaching, though the de-mands were often colored by the interpreter's view of Jesus.

Wilhelm Herrmann, the professor of Dibelius, Bultmann, and Barth, wrote against the backdrop of Leo Tolstoy and Friedrich Naumann.II

Tolstoy sought to implement the Sermon's imperatives literally in society even more rigorously than the Anabaptists. Naumann also took the Ser-mon's demands as imperatives for life but found them so impracticable as to be irrelevant for contemporary living.

Herrmann concurred with Naumann that a literal observance of Jesus' commands was impossible but agreed with Tolstoy that Jesus' teaching had validity for the human situation. He combined these convictions by denying that Jesus' demands were ever intended to be commandments, new laws, or legalistic regulations to be slavishly followed. Rather the demands were more illustrative. Their intent was to call for a new mind set, a "disposition" or "attitude" (Gesinnung) based on the awareness that God is God and that love free from all legal and external constraints is the ultimate good. Thus, while impracticable, the Sermon's demands are applicable illustrations of how one should live. This interpretation became the trademark of Liberal Protestantism.

Johannes Weiss' study on the Kingdom of God in Jesus' preaching concluded that Jesus proclaimed an imminent, eschatological kingdom, apocalyptic in character, that was to be inaugurated supernaturally. 12 This view eventually spelled the doom of the view that the Kingdom of God was essentially an ethical reality in the heart of the individual. 13 Albert

Schweit-zer then placed Jesus' ethical teachings, the Sermon in particular, within the framework of his apocalyptic proclamation as an ethic of repentance to prepare the disciples for the imminent kingdom and catastrophic judg-ment.14

Jesus' expectation of an imminent kingdom makes the present but an "interim" in which to prepare for the coming judgment by responding to demands so foreign to this world they tear one away from all natural

11. Ethik (Tubingen: Mohr, 1901) and Die sittliche WeisungenJesu. lhr Missbmuch und ihr

richtiger Gebmuch, 2d ed. (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1907).

12. Jesus' Proclamation of the Kingdom of God, tr. Richard H. Hiers and David L. Holland (Philadelphia : Fortress, 1971).

13. See Adolf von Harnack, What is Christianity, tr. Thomas B. Saunders (New York: Harper and Row, 1957).

14. The Mystery of the Kingdom of God, tr. Walter Lowrie (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1914) and The Kingdom of God and Primitive Christianity, tr. L. A. Garrard (London: A & C Black,

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moorings. IS Accordingly, the Sermon's demands deliberately negate all

the values of this world. Schweitzer recognized the impractical character of the demands but maintained all the more that this "interim ethic" was meant to be followed by the disciples.

The lesser known work of Hans Windisch contributed primarily to the area of methodology by distinguishing between historical and theological exegesis. 16 "Historical exegesis," he argued, looks exclusively at the text in its historical and literary context. "Theological exegesis" seeks to interpret through theological and philosophical insight the text for the individual in his or her own situation.

He subjected the Sermon to a "historical" analysis that shows a differ-ence between the Sermon in Matthew and the demands of Jesus. The eschatological thrust correctly seen by Weiss and Schweitzer belongs particularly to "Matthew's" emphasis in the Sermon. Viewed more closely, many of Jesus' demands, the stuff of the Sermon, have only a secondary interest in eschatology. "The teaching of Jesus, like that of the prophets, was the proclamation of salvation and of damnation and the declaration of an ethic of obedience" (Meaning, p. 121). His demands were meant as commandments to be fulfilled literally by the individual as a basis for ultimate salvation. Therefore, Matthew's Sermon unabashedly in line with Jesus' teaching offers a "religion of 'works' and eschatological salvation . . . . The commands of the Sermon on the Mount are conditions of admittance to the Kingdom of Heaven."17

Having determined the meaning of the Sermon by "historical exegesis," Windisch rejected the current options provided by "theological exegesis." He refused the "literalism" of Tolstoy and the Anabaptists because one was simply unable to meet the demands. Without any hint in the Sermon of help from God or the Spirit, ours is the fate of the "many" in 7: 13

(Meaning, p. 172-73). Windisch also refused the "Paulinization" of the Sermon which takes the demands as another expression of the law to bring us to God as sinners in need of God's forgiving grace effected in the obedient, atoning work of Christ for us.IS

Instead Windisch found the theological key in the Beatitudes. Whereas doing the will of God is prerequisite for entrance into the kingdom

15. The "ethics of the Sermon on the Mount is (sic) interim ethics" that "make one meet for the kingdom of God," Mystery, p. 97. "Detachment from all that belongs to this world is therefore essential," Schweitzer, Kingdom, p. 96.

16. The Meaning of the Sermon on the Mount, tr. S. MacLean Gilmour (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1951).

17. Meaning, pp. 168-69.

18. Cf. Carl Stange, "Zur Ethikder Bergpredigt," ZST2 (1924-25), 37-74; and Gerhard Kittel, "Die Bergpredigt und die Ethik des Judentums, ZST 2 (1924-25), 555-94.

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Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

according to the Sermon's demands, the Beatitudes promise salvation to the "poor in spirit." Thus there is more than one way to God in the Sermon. This note of promise and hope sounded loud and clear in the Beatitudes becomes inaudible by the warnings of 7: 13-27. Windisch found this note to be a "pre-Christian" prophetic hope of God's gracious acceptance of those who come "poor in spirit," a state to which the Sermon's demands would inevitably lead one. At the same time, trust in God's promise gives hope and power to live more in keeping with the demands. Consequently, while we cannot take Jesus' commands literally as intended because we are unwilling to "cut ourselves loose from those ethical and religious responsibilities whose claim upon us we admit" (e.g., nation, state, family, and law), we can, for example, use legal justice in keeping with the religious attitude intended by Jesus (Meaning, pp. 189-90).

With Windisch the issue of practicability became secondary, a "the-ological" issue that no longer controlled the exegesis of the Sermon. Furthermore, "historical exegesis" shows the Sermon to have been com-posed in its final form by the Evangelist drawing on the ethical teaching of Jesus. Therefore, "historical exegesis" poses two tasks. First, one must distinguish between tradition and redaction. Second, one must inquire about the relation of Jesus' ethical demands to the law in particular and to the diverse religious, social, and political context in general of Jesus and the early church's setting. Consequently, subsequent works on the Sermon have focused almost exclusively on the issues of "historical exegesis.,,19

19. So complete is the separation of historical and theological exegesis that most commentaries pertaining to the Sermon fall into the categories of "critical" or "homiletical" commentaries.

Examples of the former: Thaddaus Soiron, Die Bergpredigt Jesu. Formgeschichtliche, exegetische und theologische Erklamng (Freiburg: Herder, 1941); Robert A Guelich, The Sermon on the Mount: A Foundationf01' Understanding (Waco: Word Publishers, 1982; Georg Strecker, Die Bergpredigt. Ein exegetischer Kommentar (G6ttingen: Vandenhoeck und Rup-recht, 1984).

More popular: Georg Eicholz, Auslegung der Bergpredigt (Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag, 1965); Petr Pokorny, Der Kern del' Bergpredigt (Hamburg: Evangelischer Verlag, 1969); Donald Carson, The Sermon on the Mount (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1978); Jan Lam-brecht, The Sermon on the Mount: Proclamation and Exhortation, GNS 14 (Wilmington, DE: Michael Glazier, 1985).

Examples of the latter: Eduard Thurneysen, The Sermon on the Mount, tr. William C. Robinson (Richmond: John Knox Press, 1963); Archibald M. Hunter, A Pattern for Life: An Exposition of the Sermon on the Mount, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1965); D. Martin Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, 2 Vols. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1959-1960); James Boice, The Sermon on the Mount (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972); Myron S. Augsburger, The Expanded Life: The Sermon on the Mount for Today (New York: Abingdon, 1972).

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4. THE CONTEMPORARY SCENE

Despite the plethora of critical literature in recent years on Matthew in general20 and the theme of Jesus and the law in particular,21 relatively few works have appeared on the Sermon as such. 22 The Sermon is no longer seen as a compendium of Jesus' ethical teaching. Rather the Sermon is treated either as a section of Matthew's Gospel, the study of which discloses primarily the Evangelist's "theology," or as a resource for traditions that, when distilled from later modifications and expansions, can lead one back to Jesus' ministry.

Of this recent literature, the work of four scholars illustrates in different ways the route "historical exegesis" has taken. For each writer the primary issue has become the Sermon's historical setting and meaning. Little or nothing about the practicability of the Sermon surfaces as a controlling factor. The issue of Jesus' relationship to the law arises exegetically from the material rather than theologically from the question of law and gospel.

William D. Davies follows the consensus of Gospel criticism by taking the Sermon in Matthew to be the Evangelist'S collection of traditions. 23 But he justifies concentrating on the Sermon by arguing that one can isolate the Sermon as a clearly defined unit (cf. 5: 1-2; 7:2Sa) which the Evangelist consciously created more as an "author" than as an "editor" by his selection and arrangement of traditions (Setting, p. 13).

Davies seeks to find an appropriate "setting" for the Sermon by viewing it in the context of Matthew's Gospel, Jewish messianic expectations, contemporary Judaism, the early church, and the ministry of Jesus. Since

20. See Donald Senior, What Are They Saying About Matthew? (New York: Paulist Press, 1983).

21. E.g., Gerhard Barth, "Matthew's Understanding of the Law" in Tradition and hzte1pretation in Matthew (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1963); M. Jack Suggs, Wisdom, Chris-tology and Law in Matthew's Gospel (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970); Alexander Sand, Das Gesetz und die Propheten (Regensberg: Pustet, 1974); John P. Meier, Law and History in Matthew's Gospel: A Redactional Study of Mt. 5:17-48, AnBib 71 (Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1976); Ingo Broer, Freiheit vom Gesetz und Radikalisierung des Gesetzes; Ein Beitrag zur Theologie des Evangelisten Matthaus, SBS 98 (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1980).

22. E. G. Jacques Dupont, Les Beatitudes: Le problhne litteraire. Les deux versions du Sermon sur la Montagne et des Beatitu.des, Vol. I, 2nd ed. (Bruges: Abbaye de Saint-Andre, 1958); Les Beatitudes. La Bonne Nouvelle, Vol. II (Paris: Gabalda et Cie, 1969); Les Beatitudes. Les Evangelistes, Vol. III (Paris: Gabalda et Cie, 1973); William D. Davies, The Setting of the Sermon on the Mount (Cambridge: University Press, 1964); Ulrich Luck, Die Voll-kommenheitsforderung der Bergpredigt, TE 150 (Neukirchen: Neukirchener Verlag, 1968); Hans Theo Wrege, Die Uberlieferungsgeschichte der Bergpredigt, WUNT 79 (Tubingen: Mohr, 1968); Hans Dieter Betz, Essays on the Sermon on the Mount (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985 ).

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Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

the Sermon is a Matthean literary product, one seeks first to find its "setting" in Matthew's Gospel. Davies concludes that the Sermon repre-sents for the Evangelist the "Messianic Torah" of Jesus Messiah which embodies not a new or different law but "a new interpretation of the Old Law" that is "authoritative in a new way (7 :28)" (Setting, p. 107). He supports this by arguing that the Evangelist viewed his community to be living in the Messianic Age inaugurated by Jesus the Messiah who, like the Teacher of Righteousness in Qumran and the Messiah with a didactic role in certain rabbinic traditions, gives the normative interpretation of the law

(halakah) for this Messianic Age (Setting, pp. 188-89). But what specifically occasioned this portrait?

Davies first seeks the answer in contemporary Judaism by comparing the Sermon with emerging Gnosticism, sectarian Essenism, and develop-ment in Pharisaism that culminated at J amnia. The last developdevelop-ment offers the primary counterpart for understanding the Sermon. Thus the Sermon on the Mount is "the Christian answer to J amnia ... a kind of Christian, mishnaic counterpart to the formulation taking place there"

(Setting, p. 313).

At the same time, a look at various traditions of the early church reveals that Jesus' words, including the Sermon's radical demands, had been preserved because they constituted an indispensible part of the gospel itself. These demands were "revelatory of the nature of the gospel." Yet when used as directives for the life of the disciple, these radical, revelatory demands became more regulatory in a rabbinic manner and soon con-stituted a "base, or given ground, from which halakoth are deduced or to which they are attached" (Setting, p. 413). Therefore, for Davies the external pressures of J amnia and the internal needs of the community to use Jesus' demands as commands coalesced as the formative "setting" for the Sermon.

Georg Strecker also recognizes the Sermon to be the final product of the Evangelist's redactional reworking of traditions that have passed through stages of development but whose core has roots in Jesus' ministry.24 Consequently, he concentrates on the Sermon as a statement for a com-munity which despite its disappointment with the delayed Parousia still holds fast to the hope that the "crucified and resurrected One will appear as the Son of Man-WorldJudge and visibly establish the Kingdom of God"

(Die Bergpredigt, p. 185).

According to Strecker, the Sermon reflects the christological, es-chatological, and ethical stance of the Evangelist. Jesus for Matthew does

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not represent a "new Moses" or a Christian parallel to Jewish scribal or rabbinic teachers of the law. Rather the Sermon comes as a divine revela-tion, an epiphany, from Jesus as the "Kurios-Son of God" whose post-Easter majesty (28: 16-18) shines through his teaching seen in the moun-tain setting (5: 1, cf. 28: 16) that speaks of epiphany, of divine revelation (pp. 85-88). Jesus' teaching contains an eschatological call to decision in light of the coming eschaton that confronts one in the present tense from the first Beatitude to the concluding parable. Therefore, his "ethical exhortations" are simultaneously "eschatological demand" (Die Berg-predigt, p. 27).

In 5: 20 we find the theme of the Sermon, the demand for a "righteous-ness" necessary to enter the kingdom. This "righteous"righteous-ness" means doing the will of God (7: 21) as revealed in the "law and the prophets" (5: 17-19) which Jesus "fulfilled" by his own exemplary ministry and above all by his teaching in 5:21-7:12. This teaching, for Strecker, fulfilled the law and the prophets by "bringing the 'law and the prophets' to their fullest expression" (Die Bergpredigt, p. 57). Therefore, the Sermon sets forth the "righteousness" demanded by Jesus, Kurios-Son of God, as the entrance requirement for the Kingdom of Heaven. The concluding warnings and exhortations (7: 13-27) make clear how seriously and unavoidably one was to take Jesus' demands.

Hans Dieter Betz's essays provide the most recent treatment of the Ser-mon.25 In contrast to Davies' use of source criticism and Strecker's use of redaction criticism as their primary critical device for interpreting the Sermon, Betz employs a form of literary or genre criticism as a means for understanding what the Sermon is and how it was understood. In search of a literary parallel for the appropriation of ethical tradition called for by the Sermon, he turned to the Hellenistic ethical literature of Plutarch and particularly the diatribe literature of Epictetus where similar appropri-ation takes place (Essays, pp. 7-10).

Betz discovered the Sermon's literary genre in the "philosophical epit-ome" of Epictetus' Enchiridion (Essays, p. 11), a genre whose roots lie in Epicurus' Kurai Doxai (Essays, pp. 13-15). This genre consists of "a con-densation of a larger work" made for the specific purpose of being a systematic synopsis to help one think and apply principles of the larger work without having the benefit of studying the whole or remembering the larger work (Essays, pp. 113-14). Accordingly, the Sermon is "an epitome presenting the theology of Jesus in a systematic fashion" (Essays,

25. Essays on the Sermon, which anticipates a forthcoming commentary on the Sermon for the Hermeneia series.

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Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

p. 15). "The SM is not law to be obeyed, but theology to be intellectually appropriated and internalized, in order then to be creatively developed and implemented in concrete situations of life" (Essays, p. 16).

Betz assigns the redaction of the Sermon to a pre-Matthean Jewish Christian community within the walls of] udaism but finding themselves in tension with Judaism (5:20; 6: 1-18) and especially with a "gentile Chris-tianity of a Pauline stamp, with its freedom from the law" (5:17-19; 7: 15-20). Their distress stems from their loyalty to Jesus as the teacher of the "proper interpretation of the Torah and the correct praxis of piety" (Essays, p. 21). This community produced the Sermon apologetically and polemically to establish what] esus did and did not teach and to offer a "systematic theology" as the basis for right thinking and practice. The Evangelist preserved the Sermon in his Gospel but made little or no modifications even though he shared neither its setting nor its theology (Essays, pp. 18, 22).

For Betz the key to the Sermon lies in four "hermeneutical principles" formulated in 5: 17-20. First, 5: 17 implies the formal genre of an "epit-ome" of sayings from the] esus-tradition whose theological content shows Jesus to be" 'orthodox' in the]ewish sense." His teaching like that of any orthodox teacher of the law was interpretation, not Torah, that "fulfills" rather than "abolishes" the law (Essays, pp. 41-43). Second, 5: 18 spells out the obedience demanded by] esus to the written Torah (,jot or tittle") until the passing of this age ("until heaven and earth pass away/all things come to pass" [Essays, pp. 43-45]). Third, 5: 19 declares the binding force of ] esus' interpretation of the Torah ("these commandments") which forms the teaching of the Sermon (Essays, pp. 46-51). Fourth, 5:20 defines the goal of] esus' teaching in the Sermon, a "righteousness" as the entrance prerequisite to the kingdom that comes from those who understand and practice] esus' instructions as found in the Sermon and thus "do justice in their thought and conduct to the will of God" (Essays, pp. 51-53). In sum, the Sermon "belongs, both theologically and in terms of history of reli-gions, within the richly diverse] udaism of the first century" (Essays, p. 22). Though differing in many ways, Davies, Strecker, and Betz share two views. First, the Sermon addresses the ethical needs of a narrow, parochial community seeking to establish its identity in a diverse world of] udaism and gentile Christianity. Second, this identity comes through one's re-sponse to the Sermon viewed as] esus' normative interpretation of the law and of true religious praxis.

The vexing question of practicability that has haunted the church's reading of the Sermon does not arise. For Davies and Strecker, the Sermon represents] esus' normative interpretation of the law according to

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the Evangelist that comes as the "Messianic Torah" of or the entrance requirements for the kingdom respectively. Accordingly, practicability is assumed. For Betz, the Sermon represents a community's synopsis of theology to be developed intellectually and appliced creatively to life rather than a law set forth to be obeyed. Practicability is not the point.

More importantly these readings fail to address the issue of applicability-Windisch's "theological exegesis." What, if anything, does the Sermon have to say to the church today when "historical exegesis" leaves us with a text whose time-bound Christology, eschatology, and ethics reflect a community whose theology has proven wrong-headed and passe, unable to survive the first century?

By contrast,johnP. Meier's work on a portion of the Sermon26 shares in

common with several other studies a very different reading of the Ser-mon's Christology, eschatology, and ethics.27 The basis of these totally independent studies has been a careful redactional critical analysis of 5: 17-20 seen by Strecker and Betz as the fundamental, "hermeneutical" key to the Sermon.

A redaction-critical analysis of 5: 17-20 indicates clear evidence of the Evangelist's modification of tradition dealing specifically with the law to make a broader programmatic statement about jesus' coming and its impact on the law.28 Accordingly, the Sermon serves more a christological than an ethical or ecclesial function.29 The Evangelist portrays jesus as the

eschatological fulfillment of the prophetic hope of the Scriptures (5: 17,

18d), the one whose ministry including his deathlresurrection provides the "turning point of the old and new aeons" (Law and History, p. 165). As the one fulfilling the promise,jesus demands a "greater righteousness" (5:20) set forth in 5:21-7: 12. An analysis of the Antitheses shows that the law belongs to the old order and is transcended by jesus' "radicalizing"

26. Law and History.

27. See Robert Banks,jesus and the Law in the Synoptic Tradition, NTSMS 23 (Cambridge: University Press, 1975); "Matthew's Understanding of the Law: Authenticity and Interpre-tation in Matthew 5: 17-20,"jBL 93 (1974),226-42; Broer, Freiheit vom Gesetz; Guelich, The Sermon on the Mount; Ulrich Luz, Das Evangelium nachMatthaus, EKK III (Zurich: Benzinger Verlag, 1985).

28. Clear Matthean characteristics: (a) 5: 17-the editorial use of "or" (e), the "law and the prophets," the salvation historical use of "to fulfill" (plemun); (b) 5: 18-the broken structural pattern (A, C1, B, C2); the editorial use of "or" (e), the use of "until all things come to pass" and (c) the Matthean vocabulary of 5:20.

29. A literary critical reading of Matthew as a whole supports this redactional critical analysis of the Sermon. See Jack Kingsbury, Matthew: Structure, Christology, Kingdom (Phil-adelphia: Fortress, 1975) and Matthew as Story (Philadelphia, 1986).

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Interpreting the S erman an the M aunt

Interpretation

(5:21-22,27-28,33-37) and "rescinding" the letter of the law (5:31-32, 38-39, 43-44).30

The Sermon-expresses "kingdom ethics" for Matthew in that it calls for conduct commensurate with the presence of the age of salvation, the "kingdom of heaven," inaugurated in time by Jesus Messiah, Son ofGod.31 These demands only become "entrance requirements" for the kingdom future (cf. Strecker) because this conduct befitting the will of God demon-strates the reality of the "kingdom" or the new age in one's life (5:20; 7: 13-27). Rather than a fully developed"law" or even halakoth (cf. Davies' "Messianic Torah"), the Sermon's demands serve an illustrative role (cf. Betz's "epitome") by calling for behavior stemming from a new relation-ship of wholeness (5:48) between brothers and sisters (5:21-48; 7:12) growing out of a fundamentally new relationship with God (6: 1-7: 11). This relationship with God comes through the word and work of Jesus Messiah who announces the "good news" of God's deliverance in the opening Beatitudes (5:3-6) which he has aligned with Isaiah 61. 32

As for practicability and applicability, the Sermon addresses the people of the kingdom, all "disciples" (5: 1-2), who have turned empty-handed to God for grace (5:3-6). It offers neither a "new law" nor a more normative interpretation of the "old law." Nor does the Sermon play primarily a negative role to remind us of our failures. The Sermon, above all, sum-mons the "disciple" to a new relationship with God and others that issues in conduct befitting the age of salvation ("the greater righteousness") made possible in this age through the presence of God's eschatological rule in Jesus Messiah, Son of God. As radical demands, they both set forth the marks of the kingdom present and expose one's short fall and all casuistic self-righ teousness.

5. SUMMARY

Our survey has shown that the interpretation of the Sermon over the centuries has generally followed either a narrow, literal, and legalistic tack or a broader, more illustrative one. On the one side, the demands are interpreted literally and legalistically for the church as a whole (the early church and the Anabaptists), for a select few ("evangelical counsels"), for a select time period (Schweitzer), or for a special community (Davies, Strec-ker). On the other side, the demands are read more symbolically as

30. See also Robert A. Guelich, "The Antitheses of Matthew V. 21-48: Traditional and/or Redactional?" NTS 22 (1976-77),444-57.

31. For this interpretation of the Sermon, see Guelich, The Sermon on the Mount. 32. Robert A. Guelich, "The Matthean Beatitudes: 'Entrance Requirements' or Es-chatological Blessings?" JBL 95 (1976),415-34.

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illustrative calls for ethical and religious conduct whose application is qualified by the broader context of (1) Scripture that provides a her-meneutic such as a Two Kingdom Ethic (Luther) or Scripture specifically interpreting Scripture (Calvin), (2) the ethic of Jesus in the underlying tradition (Herrmann, Windisch) or the social-rhetorical setting of a com-munity seeking to follow their understanding of Jesus' teaching (Betz), or (3) a close reading of the Evangelist's compositional work in the Sermon supported by the literary setting in the Gospel read as a whole (Meier, Guelich).

Until this century the controlling issue for interpreting the Sermon was practicability. This issue still obtains in the so-called "homiletical" com-mentaries whose primary concern is application. But the impact of Gospel criticism has moved the focus to the historical, religious, and literary context of the Sermon and raised antecedent issues that greatly influence the question of practicability and, as we have seen, the question of appli-cability.

How does one address the antecedent questions? First, we accept the consensus of Gospel criticism that the Sermon as we know it is a "literary" product rather than a transcript of Jesus' teaching and we focus on the text. Second, we use the tools available to determine what the Evangelist has done with underlying tradition and concentrate on the import of the resultant text. Third, we check this reading and adjust it, if necessary, in terms of the structure and thought of the Gospel as a whole. Fourth, we seek a credible socio-religious setting for the Sermon as well as the Gospel in the life and times of the early church. Despite the lack of consensus in steps two through four, this writer is convinced that rigorously pursued they provide the necessary foundation for understanding the message of the Sermon and applying it today.

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The Place, Structure, and Meaning of the

Sermon on the Mount Within Matthew

JACK DEAN KINGSBURY

Professor of Biblical Theology

Union Theological Seminary in Virginia

For disciples who live in the sphere where God rules through the risen Jesus, doing the greater righteousness is the normal order of things.

A

PART FROM THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, the Sermon on the Mount is perhaps familiar to more people than any other part of Scripture. Prominently situated toward the beginning of Matthew's Gos-pel, it is an extraordinarily imposing composition. The purpose of this essay is to examine the Sermon on the Mount precisely as one section of Matthew. To guide this examination, questions such as the following will be explored. What is the place of the Sermon on the Mount within the ground plan of Matthew? In what capacity does Jesus deliver it? To whom does he deliver it? What is its structure, and what is its central theme and message? How would Matthew have the reader regard it, as an impossible ethic, or as an ethic actually to be lived?

1.

What is the place of the Sermon on the Mount within the ground plan of Matthew's Gospel? Of the several answers given this question in this century, the one by Benjamin Bacon has been advocated by more scholars over a longer period of time than any other. In Bacon's view, the Sermon on the Mount dominates the whole of Matthew's Gospel, for from it one gains insight into the structure of the Gospel and into its nature and

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purpose.

Briefly put, the thesis Bacon promulgated 1 is that the evangelist

Mat-thew was a converted rabbi, a Christian legalist, who, as a member of a church threatened by lawlessness, met this heresy by providing a sys-tematic compend of the commandments of Jesus after the analogy of the Mosaic Pentateuch. In structure, Matthew's Gospel constitutes a com-pilation of "five books" that culminate in great discourses of Jesus and are supplemented by preamble (chaps. 1-2) and epilogue (chaps. 26-28). Among the great discourses, the Sermon on the Mount is programmatic, for here Jesus sets forth the "new Law," that is to say, his "teaching regarding Righteousness."

Despite the enormous influence Bacon's understanding of the structure of Matthew has enjoyed, it has not been without its critics. Indeed, the arguments marshaled against it are of such force that there are many who regard it as having already been overthrown.2 Nevertheless, Bacon's outline of Matthew continues to exert strong appeal. How is this to be explained?

The principal reason, it would appear, is that the method almost all scholars have used in their study of Matthew over the last forty years has been redaction criticism. In redaction-critical perspective, Matthew is generally looked upon as an amalgamation of traditions and as in some sense a revision of Mark. When Matthew is held to be founded upon Mark, the single, most striking, feature distinguishing it proves not to be the story it tells but the presence in it of the Sermon on the Mount and the other great discourses. Because Bacon's outline identifies exactly the great discourses as the climactic feature of Matthew, scholars seem predisposed to accept it as necessarily being correct.

Recently, however, the near monopoly that redaction criticism has had on the study of Matthew has begun to show signs of strain owing to the emergence of a new method, literary criticism. According to one form of literary criticism, a Gospel such as Matthew is not to be construed as an amalgamation of traditions but as a unified "narrative" that is made up of a "story" and its "discourse.,,3 Part and parcel of a story are the "events" being told, and these in turn are so arranged as to form a "plot." In the case of Matthew, the driving force of the plot is the element of conflict, and this pits Israel and especially the Jewish leaders against Jesus. Analyze

Mat-1. Cf. Benjamin Bacon, Studies in Matthew (London: Constable, 1930), pp. xiv-xvii, 29, 40-41, 47, 81-82, 165-68.

2. For a review of the arguments against Bacon's position, cf. Jack Dean Kingsbury,

Matthew: Structure, Christo logy, Kingdom (Philadelphia and London: Fortress Press and SPCK, 1975), pp. 1-7; and especially David R. Bauer, "The Structure of Matthew's Gospel, Diss. Union Theological Seminary in Virginia 1985, pp. 75-81 (forthcoming from Almond Press).

3. For a literary-critical treatment of Matthew that also explains the method, cf. Jack Dean Kingsbury, Matthew as Story (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1986).

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The Place, Structure, and Meaning of the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

thew, therefore, in terms of its story-and plot-development; and the climax of the story occurs, not in the presentation of the Sermon on the Mount and the other great discourses of Jesus but in the narration of his passion.4 It is through the narration of the passion that the reader is told of the resolution of the conflict Jesus has with the Jewish leaders; Whereas the leaders bring Jesus to the cross and believe that they have thereby triumphed over him and the error he has perpetrated in Israel, God vindicates him through the resurrection so that, at the last, Jesus is seen to be the one through whom God has accomplished the salvation of J ew and Gentile alike (chaps. 26-28).

If literary criticism shows that the climactic feature of Matthew is in fact the narration of Jesus' passion, what importance is one to assign the Sermon on the Mount and the other great discourses? The importance of each of the great discourses is commensurate with the role it plays within the plot of Matthew's story. In the case of the Sermon on the Mount, it has its place in 4: 17-11: 1, where the narrator tells of Jesus as proffering salvation to Israel through his ministry of teaching, preaching, and heal-ing (4:23; 9:35; 11: 1). Since the narrator characterizes the Sermon on the Mount as "teaching" (5: 1-2; 7:28-29), it becomes the example par excel-lence of this facet of Jesus' activity. In any event, Jesus' delivery of the Sermon on the Mount is not the climactic event in Matthew to which all else is made subordinate. The climax toward which the whole of Matthew steers is, again, the passion.

II.

Although Matthew's story of Jesus culminates in the passion, It IS

nonetheless testimony to the great store' that Matthew sets by Jesus' teaching that the Sermon on the Mount is the imposing composition it is. In what capacity does Jesus deliver the Sermon on the Mount, and to whom does he deliver it?

Bacon's views have been almost as instrumental in determining schol-arly opinion on the Christology of Matthew in this century as they have been in determining how scholars have understood the structure of Matthew. Bacon himself describes Matthew's Jesus as a "second Moses" or "Lawgiver."s Topping this, another scholar has referred to him as "Torah incarnate.,,6 Still other scholars, while designating Jesus more typically as "Messiah," nonetheless attest to Bacon's influence on their thinking by

4. To see how this is the case, cf. Jack Dean Kingsbury, "The Developing Conflict between Jesus and the Jewish Leaders in Matthew's Gospel: A Study in Literary Criticism" (forthcoming in CBQ).

5. Cf. Benjamin W. Bacon, "Jesus and the Law: A Study of the First 'Book' of Matthew (Mt. 3-7)," JBL 47 (1928), 207-08.

6. J. M. Gibbs, "The Son of God as the Torah Incarnate in Matthew," StudiaEvangelica, IV (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1968),38-46.

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explaining that what they mean by this is that] esus is preeminently the preacher of "sermons" or the one who delivers to the church the "new verbal revelation.,,7 The point is this: The christological corrollary of the thesis that, structurally, Matthew's Gospel culminates in the great dis-courses is that the Matthean] esus is made out to be, under one guise or another, the "Teacher."

Yet however highly Matthew esteems Jesus' activity of "teaching," "teacher" remains for him no more than a term of human respect. This is why one never discovers persons of faith or true disciples addressing] esus as "teacher" or "rabbi," but only]udas, opponents, and strangers. No, the ] esus who teaches in Matthew and who delivers the Sermon on the Mount is not the "Teacher" but the "Son of God." Nor is it idle in Matthew's eyes to press this distinction. Conceived by the Holy Spirit,] esus Son of God is also empowered by the Holy Spirit (1: 18,20; 3: 16-17). In him God's kingdom, or end-time rule, is a present though hidden reality (12:28). He therefore enjoys a unique filial relationship to God (11 :27), by virtue of which he speaks and acts on the authority of God (7:28-29). Accordingly, when ] esus engages in teaching as when he delivers the Sermon on the Mount,

he dares to speak in the stead, and as the mouthpiece, of God.

To whom does Jesus deliver the Sermon on the Mount? According to the flow of Matthew's story, ] esus has just begun his public ministry by summoning Israel to repentance (4: 17) and by calling his first disciples (4: 18-22). Atop the mountain, therefore, it is the "crowds" and these first "disciples" who receive the teaching Jesus offers (5: 1-2).

Still, to understand the crowds and the disciples as the recipients of ] esus' teaching from the mount poses a problem. Close scrutiny of the

message] esus conveys reveals that it is, in certain respects, suitable to neither group. It is unsuitable as far as the crowds are concerned because they are not, as some would claim, nascent disciples8 but "outsiders."

However well-disposed the crowds may appear to be toward ]esus,9 as early as chapter 11] esus censures them as "this [evil] generation" that has repudiated both]ohn the Baptist and himself (11 :7, 16-19), and at the end of the gospel story they of course join with their leaders in calling for the crucifixion of ] esus and in making themselves responsible for his death (27:20-26,38-44). If one keeps in mind the fact that the crowds are not nascent disciples, one has only to read the Sermon on the Mount to recognize how little the contents envisage persons who do not hold to him.

7. Cf. Willi Marxsen, Introduction to the New Testament, trans. G. Buswell (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1968), pp. 151-52; Norman Perrin, The New Testament: An Introduction (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974), pp. 174-77.

8. Cf., e.g., Paul S. Minear, "The Disciples and the Crowds in the Gospel of Matthew,"

Gospel Studies in Honor of Sherman Elbridgejohnson, ed. M. H. Shepherd,Jr. and E. C. Hobbs (Anglican Theological Review, 1974), pp. 28-44.

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The Place, Structure, and Meaning of the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

Yet even to read the Sermon on the Mount with the idea that the disciples just called by Jesus are the recipients is not wholly unproblematic. Passages like 5: 11-12 and 7: 15-23, which speak of enduring persecution on account of Jesus or tell of followers of Jesus who prophesy, cast out demons, and perform many miracles in his name but are in reality workers of lawlessness, simply have no place in the picture the narrator paints of the disciples during the earthly ministry of Jesus.

Consequently, as fitting as it is from the standpoint of the flow of Matthew's story that the crowds and the first disciples should be named as the recipients of the Sermon on the Mount, the contents themselves of the Sermon indicate that they are meant not at all for non-disciples such as the crowds and only in part for the first disciples, and that they therefore have in view still other persons. Who are these other persons? Are they those first-century Christians who comprised the membership of Matthew's church? Yes, but this is not the most accurate answer one can give, for these first-century Christians are obviously not to be regarded as living within the "world of the story" Matthew is narrating but apart from it, in the real world. The answer to be preferred, therefore, is that the persons indicated by the contents themselves of the Sermon on the Mount as being its recipients are the "implied readers" (or the "implied reader") of Mat-thew's Gospel. Still, to say this is merely to prompt another question: Who is this "implied reader"? To ascertain this, one must probe the "world" of Matthew's story.

In two or perhaps three passages, Matthew, as implied author, provides indicators of who the implied reader is whom he envisages as the recipient of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. At 27:8, Matthew remarks through the voice of the narrator that "to this day" the field bought with Judas' money is known as the Field of Blood. At 28: 15, Matthew similarly remarks that "to this day" false rumors are being spread to the effect that Jesus did not rise from the dead. At 24: 15, Matthew has the narrator abruptly interrupt the story so as to issue the reader a challenge to comprehend the meaning of the signs of the times ("Let the reader understand!"). What dis-tinguishes these three passages is that they all point beyond the immediate story being told of Jesus, which extends from birth to resurrection, to a place in time and space following the resurrection from which one can look back upon the earthly life of Jesus. This place beyond Jesus' earthly life to which Matthew points and which he includes in the world of his story is that of the implied reader. The implied reader, then, is to be looked upon as one who is a disciple of Jesus and who lives in the perilous times between the resurrection and the Parousia which are so vividly described in such passages of the Gospel as chapters 24-25.

Looking back upon Jesus' earthly life from a point beyond the resur-rection, the implied reader can relate without difficulty both to the place of

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the Sermon on the Mount within Matthew's story and to the words Jesus utters in it. On the one hand, the implied reader can easily follow the narration of Matthew's story, so that the dramatic necessity of having Jesus deliver the Sermon on the Mount at the beginning of his ministry to his first disciples and the crowds attracted to him poses no problem. By the same token, the implied reader can also relate both to the character and the tenor of the Sermon on the Mount, namely, its profoundly "Christian coloration" as a word of the Messiah Son of God and the fact that in it Jesus speaks of such "future Christian experiences" as suffering severe per-secution on account of him or encountering Christian prophets who are workers of lawlessness.

In sum, the intended addressee of the Sermon on the Mount is primarily the implied reader of Matthew's Gospel. References made hereafter to "disciples" as recipients of the Sermon on the Mount in reality have this particular disciple, that is, the implied reader, in view.

III.

We have seen thus far that the Sermon on the Mount is the example par excellence of Jesus' teaching, that he delivers it in his authority as the Son of God, and that whereas according to the dramatic setting of the story it is the crowds and the first disciples he has called who receive it, the tenor of the Sermon itself indicates that the primary addressees are such "disciples" as the implied reader. With these matters in mind, two questions arise: What is the structure of the Sermon on the Mount, and what is its theme and its message?

The narrative frame of the Sermon on the Mount describes Jesus as ascending the mountain to teach (5: 1-2) and, after finishing, as descend-ing again (7:28-8: 1). This aside, the Sermon on the Mount divides itself into five parts: (1) Introduction: On Those who Practice the Greater Righteousness (5:3-16); (2) On Practicing the Greater Righteousness Toward the Neighbor (5: 17-45); (3) On Practicing the Greater Right-eousness Before God (6: 1-18); (4) On Practicing the Greater Righteous-ness in Other Areas of Life (6:19-7:12); and (5) Conclusion: Injunctions on Practicing the Greater Righteousness (7: 13-27).

As is apparent from this outline, the theme of the Sermon on the Mount is the "greater righteousness." Perhaps the passage in which this theme finds expression most clearly is the pronouncement Jesus makes at 5:20: "For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." What is one to understand by the "greater righteousness"?

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The Place, Structure, and Meaning of the Sermon on the Mount

Interpretation

of disciples of Jesus. As was mentioned, Jesus in Matthew is preeminently the Son of God (1: 18,20; 3: 16-17). As God's Son, he calls persons to follow him, which is to say that he summons them to enter and to live in the sphere of God's eschatological kingdom, or end-time rule. Those who hear Jesus' summons become his disciples (4: 18-22) and "sons of God" (5:9); they, too, know God as Father (5:45). In fact, they form a new "family" (12:48-50), described as a "brotherhood" of the sons of God and of the disciples of Jesus, which is the "church" (16: 18; 23:8; 28: 10). The "greater righteousness," then, is the quality of life which is indicative of disciples who make up the church. It is behavior that comports itself with living in the sphere of God's kingdom (5:20; 6:33).

Yet more can be said of the "greater righteousness," however. At 5:48, Jesus instructs disciples: "You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect." What "being perfect" means here is not, say, being flawless, but "being wholehearted," as this is described, for example, in an injunction like Deuteronomy 18:13: "You shall be wholehearted in your service of the Lord your God." Accordingly, to be perfect is to be wholehearted in one's devotion to God, and disciples are wholehearted in Matthew when they do God's will as this is taught by Jesus (7 :21). In Jesus' teaching, however, to do God's will is, at its core, to exercise love (22: 34-40). Loving as God loves, therefore, is of the essence of the greater righteousness (5:44-45). When disciples love as God loves, this reflects itself further in the fact that they also love the neighbor (7: 12). In sum, therefore, it is love toward God and love toward neighbor that constitute the heart of the greater righteousness.

If the greater righteousness is the theme of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus specifies in the introduction (5:3-16) the types of persons disciples are who practice the greater righteousness. The introduction falls into two sections: the Beatitudes (5:3-12) and Jesus' words on salt and light (5: 13-16).

Whereas Luke has four beatitudes balanced by four woes (6:20-26), Matthew has nine beatitudes and no woes (5:3-12).10 In pronouncing the Beatitudes, the Matthean Jesus confers end-time "blessings" upon dis-ciples who are characterized by what they are (e.g., the poor) or do (e.g., the peacemakers). These blessings assure disciples of the vindication and reward that attend the salvation of God's consummated kingdom and thus provide encouragement in time of persecution and difficulty.

To take each beatitude in turn, "the poor in spirit" are disciples who are

10. For this and the following paragraph, thanks go to Harper's Bible Dictionary, ed. Paul

References

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