Sermon on the Mount of Jesus Christ about human behavior. Jesus Christ, sermon on the mount

K. G. Bloch. "Sermon on the Mount". 1877. Oil on copper. Danish Museum of National History, Frederiksborg...
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Jesus preached this sermon (around 30 C.E.) on a mountainside to his disciples and a crowd of people.
The mountain on which the Sermon on the Mount was delivered was called the “Mount of Beatitudes.”
According to ancient Byzantine legend, this was Mount Karnei Hittin...

Karney Hittin

The most famous part of the Sermon on the Mount is Beatitudes , placed at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount also includes prayer Our Father , the commandment “do not resist evil” ( Matt. ), “turn the other cheek”, and also Golden Rule . The following expressions are also often quoted: “ salt of the earth ", "light of the world", and "judge not, lest ye be judged."

Many Christians consider the Sermon on the Mount to be a commentary on the Ten Commandments. Christ appears as the true interpreter of the Law of Moses

Beatitudes[wiki text]

• Blessed [Μακάριοι - happy] are the poor in spirit [πτωχοὶ τῷ πνεύματι - those in need of the Spirit, aware of the need for spiritual improvement, - spiritually improving], for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.


• Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.


• Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.


• Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.


• Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.


• Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.


• Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.


• Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.


• Blessed are you when they revile you and persecute you and slander you in every way unjustly because of Me.


• Rejoice and be glad, for great is your reward in heaven: just as they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Other commandments of the Sermon on the Mount

1 An indication of the need for Christians to help people find the way to God (as to the Heavenly Father), first of all, through their good deeds (their work for God - their righteousness).

2 An indication that the coming of Jesus Christ fulfills the prophecies of the Old Testament:

3 Explanation of the heavenly hierarchy.

4 An indication of the need to increase one’s righteousness (Benefiting God by increasing one’s spiritual level and the spiritual level of one’s neighbors.)

• You have heard what was said to the ancients: do not kill; whoever kills will be subject to judgment.


• But I tell you that everyone who is angry with his brother without cause will be subject to judgment; whoever says to his brother: “raqa” is subject to the Sanhedrin; and whoever says, “You fool,” is subject to fiery hell.

6 Instructions that you should make peace with your neighbors before turning to God:

• You have heard what was said to the ancients: Thou shalt not commit adultery.


• But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

8 An indication of the need to decisively eliminate everything that leads to sin:

9 Explanation about divorces:

• It is also said that if anyone divorces his wife, he should give her a divorce decree.


• But I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for the guilt of adultery, gives her a reason to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

• You have also heard what was said to the ancients: do not break your oath, but fulfill your oaths before the Lord.


• But I say to you: do not swear at all: neither heaven, nor earth, nor your head, because you cannot make a single hair white or black.


• But let your word be: yes, yes; no no; and anything beyond this is from the evil one.

• You have heard that it was said: an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.


• But I tell you: do not resist evil. But whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other also to him;

13 Commandments of Love:

• I give you a new commandment, that you love one another; just as I have loved you, let you also love one another.


• By this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.

(John 13:34-35)

14 Call for spiritual improvement:

• Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.

• Be careful not to do your alms in front of people so that they will see you: otherwise you will have no reward from your Heavenly Father.


• so that your alms may be in secret; and your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you openly.

• And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, who love to stop and pray in the synagogues and on street corners in order to appear before people. Truly I tell you that they are already receiving their reward.


• But you, when you pray, go into your room and, having shut your door, pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you openly.

18 Directions for prayer and how to pray:

• Pray like this: Our Father who art in heaven! Hallowed be Thy name;


• Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven;


• Give us this day our daily bread;


• and forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors;


• and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

19 An indication of the need to forgive other people so that our Heavenly Father will forgive us our sins:

21 An indication of the existence of a person’s heartfelt attachment to his existing values...:

• Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal,


• But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in and steal,


• for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

22 Instruction to look at everything from a spiritual point of view:

23 An indication that the desire to accumulate earthly riches distracts from the full pursuit of God (the search for the Kingdom of Heaven):

• No one can serve two masters: for either he will hate one and love the other; or he will be zealous for one and neglectful of the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.

• Judge not lest ye be judged,


• For with whatever judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

• Do not give holy things to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and turn and tear you to pieces.

26 Instructions to ask God for help in your needs:

• Ask, and it shall be given you; seek and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you;


• For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.

27 Instructions to treat others as you would have others treat you:

28 An indication that the path to the Kingdom of God is difficult, and there are few pointers on it...:

29 The instruction to beware of false teachers and the criterion for recognizing them:

• Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.


• By their fruits you will know them. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?


• So every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.

"Moses with the Tablets of the Laws", Rembrandt, 1659.

Ten Commandments

1. I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. May you have no other gods before Me.


2. You shall not make for yourself an idol or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth below, or that is in the waters under the earth. Do not worship them or serve them; For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the iniquity of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate Me, and showing mercy to a thousand [generations] of those who love Me and keep My commandments.


3. Do not take the name of the Lord your God in vain; for the Lord will not leave without punishment the one who takes His name in vain.


4. Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you. Work six days and do all your work; and the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. You shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your maidservant, nor your ox, nor your donkey, nor any of your livestock, nor your stranger who is with you, so that your servant and your maidservant rested, as did you. And remember that [you] were a slave in the land of Egypt, but the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.


5. Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, so that your days may be long, and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.


6. Dont kill.


7. Don't commit adultery.


8. Don't steal.


9. Do not bear false witness against your neighbor.


10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, and you shall not covet your neighbor’s house, nor his field, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that your neighbor has.

Sermon on the Mount- a collection of sayings of Jesus Christ in the Gospel of Matthew, mainly reflecting the moral teaching of Christ. Matthew chapters 5 through 7 tell us that Jesus preached this sermon (around 30 C.E.) on a mountainside to his disciples and a crowd of people. Matthew divides Jesus' teaching into 5 parts, the Sermon on the Mount being the first. Others concern the disciples of Christ, the church, the Kingdom of Heaven, as well as harsh condemnation of the scribes and Pharisees.

The most famous part of the Sermon on the Mount is the Beatitudes, placed at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. Also included in the Sermon on the Mount is the Lord’s Prayer, the commandment “not to resist evil” Matt. ), “turn the other cheek”, and the Golden Rule. Also often quoted are the words about “salt of the earth,” “light of the world,” and “judge not, lest ye be judged.”

Many Christians consider the Sermon on the Mount to be a commentary on the Ten Commandments. Christ appears as the true interpreter of the Law of Moses. It is also believed that the Sermon on the Mount contains the main content of Christian teaching; this is how many religious thinkers and philosophers, for example Leo Tolstoy, Gandhi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King, treat this part of the Gospel. This view is one of the main sources of Christian pacifism.

Persian miniature depicting the Sermon on the Mount

Mount of Beatitudes

Catholic Church of the Beatitudes on the northwestern shore of Lake Galilee, on a hill near Tabgha.

The mountain on which the Sermon on the Mount was delivered was called the “Mount of Beatitudes.” Although there are no real mountains in this part of Galilee, there are several large hills to the west of Lake Galilee. Additionally, some scholars believe that the Greek word used in (Matthew) is more accurately translated as “mountainous region” or “hills” rather than simply “mountain.”

According to ancient Byzantine tradition, this was Mount Karnei Hittin (lit. "Horns of Hittin", as it has two peaks), which is located on the route between Tabor and Capernaum, about 6 km west of Tiberias. Following the Byzantines, the Crusaders also thought so, and the Catholic Encyclopedia still insists on this version. Greek Orthodox tradition also considers the slopes of this mountain to be the site of the Sermon on the Mount. During Napoleon's time, some believed that the Mount of Beatitudes was Mount Arbel, located on the western shore of Lake Galilee, south of Capernaum.

Since the mid-20th century, after the construction of a Catholic temple dedicated to the Beatitudes on the top of Mount Nachuma, in close proximity to Tabgha, it became known as the Mount of Beatitudes. The mountainside is an amphitheater with good acoustics. Today, Christian pilgrims of all faiths and simply tourists visit this peak as the Mount of Beatitudes.

Listeners

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus sits down before delivering a sermon, which may indicate that it was not intended for the whole people. The teachers in the synagogue always sat teaching doctrine. Matthew shows that the disciples were the main listeners of Christ, and this view is supported by church tradition, which is reflected in works of art (in the paintings the disciples sit around Jesus, and the people are at a distance, although they can hear what is spoken). Lapide believes that the sermon was intended for three groups of listeners: the disciples, the people and the whole world. John Chrysostom believed that the sermon was intended for the disciples, but had to spread further, and therefore was written down.

Structure

The Sermon on the Mount consists of the following parts:

Introduction Matt. )

A large crowd gathers because Jesus has performed the healing. Christ climbs the mountain and begins to speak.

Beatitudes Matt. )

The Beatitudes describe the properties of people in the Kingdom of Heaven. Christ gives the promise of beatitude. There are eight (or nine) beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew, four in the Gospel of Luke, and after them come four “woe to you” (Luke). Matthew, more than Luke, emphasizes the moral, spiritual component of Christian teaching.

Parables of Salt and Light Matt. )

Completes the Beatitudes dedicated to the people of God and introduces the next part

Explanation of the Law of Matt. )

Main article: Jesus Explaining the Law of Moses

According to Christian doctrine, unlike the Ten Commandments of the Old Testament, which were restrictive and prohibitive in nature, the 9 Beatitudes indicate that spiritual disposition that brings a person closer to God and leads him to spiritual perfection and the Kingdom of Heaven. Here Jesus does not abolish the Law of Moses, but clarifies and interprets it. So, for example, the commandment “thou shalt not kill” was interpreted in its literal, narrow sense; in the New Testament it receives a broader and deeper meaning and extends its effect even to vain anger, which can become a source of enmity, with its disastrous consequences, and to all sorts of contemptuous and humiliating expressions for a person. In the New Testament, the law no longer punishes only the hand that commits murder, but also the very heart that harbors enmity: even a gift brought to God is rejected while the heart of the bringer harbors some evil feeling. The sinfulness of adultery - violation of marital fidelity (Lev., Deut.) is seen even in looking at a woman “with lust” (Matt.).

Jesus re-interprets and re-interprets the Law of Moses, and especially the Ten Commandments, in a portion of the Sermon on the Mount called Antitheses(see Jesus' Interpretation of the Law of Moses): behind the introductory phrase Have you heard what the ancients said follows the interpretation of Jesus.

Do not do as the hypocrites do (Matthew chapter 6)

Main article: Sermon on the Mount about hypocrites

Only such almsgiving, fasting and prayer are pleasing to God, which are not done “for show”, for the sake of human praise. Disciples of Christ should not worry about earthly well-being while seeking the treasures of the heavenly Kingdom.

Lord's Prayer

The Lord's Prayer is included in the part of the Sermon on the Mount dedicated to hypocrites. This is an example of a prayer that should be prayed to God. The Lord's Prayer contains parallels to 1 Chronicles 29:10-18

Judge not, lest ye be judged (Matthew 7:1-5)

Main article: Judge not lest ye be judged

Jesus tells us how easy it is to avoid condemnation and rebukes those who judge others before themselves.

Heavenly Father's goodness and holiness (Matthew 7:7-29)

Main article: Completion of the Sermon on the Mount

Jesus ends the Sermon on the Mount with a warning against false prophets, and emphasizes that man cannot do anything good without God. The base should rest on the stone.

Interpretation

The Sermon on the Mount has generated a lot of interpretation and research. Many holy fathers and teachers of the church, for example John Chrysostom and Augustine, lovingly dwelt on the interpretation of the Law of Moses, and then new literature began to abound in treatises devoted to it (for example, Tholuck, “Bergrede Christi”; Achesis, “Bergpredigt”; Creighton, “Great Charter of Christ”, etc.). A prominent place is given to the Sermon on the Mount in all major exegetical works. In Russian literature there are many separate discussions about the Sermon on the Mount: it is hardly possible to name a more or less outstanding preacher who would not explain it (for example, Filaret of Moscow, Macarius of Moscow, Demetrius of Kherson, Vissarion of Kostroma and many others). The line “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” often causes difficulty for those who read the Sermon on the Mount. Priests (both Orthodox and Catholic) interpret the “poor in spirit” not as unspiritual people, but as people who understand their need for the spirit, who are hungry for spirituality, as well as humble people who consider themselves insufficiently spiritual and take active steps to make up for spiritual poverty.

One of the difficult questions of Christian theology is how compatible the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount is with the everyday life of a Christian. Theologians of various Christian denominations interpret the Sermon on the Mount differently.

Sermon on the Mount and the Old Testament

The Sermon on the Mount is often misunderstood as the abolition of the Old Testament, despite the fact that at the very beginning Jesus Christ clearly said against it:

• « Do not think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets: I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle shall pass from the law."(Matt.);
• « If you want to enter eternal life, keep the commandments"(Matt.);
• « For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed Me, because he wrote about Me. If you do not believe his writings, how will you believe My words?"(In.);
• « if they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, then even if someone were raised from the dead, they will not believe" (OK. ).

Notes

Links

• A series of lectures on the Sermon on the Mount, delivered by Dmitry Shchedrovitsky
• Is the Sermon on the Mount a paraphrase of Stoic philosophy? , V.A. Kozhevnikov

Orthodox materials

• Alexander (Mileant), bishop. Sermon on the Mount
• Theophylact of Bulgaria Interpretation of the Gospel of Matthew (Chapter 5)

Calvinist materials

Literature

• Betz, Hans Dieter. Essays on the Sermon on the Mount. translations by Laurence Welborn. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.
• Kissinger, Warren S. The Sermon on the Mount: A History of Interpretation and Bibliography. Metuchen: Scarecrow Press, 1975.
• Knight, Christopher The Hiram Key Century Books, Random House, 1996
• Kodjak, Andrej. A Structural Analysis of the Sermon on the Mount. New York: M. de Gruyter, 1986.
• Lapide, Pinchas. The Sermon on the Mount, Utopia or Program for Action? translated from the German by Arlene Swidler. Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1986.
• McArthur, Harvey King. Understanding the Sermon on the Mount. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1978.
• Prabhavananda, Swami Sermon on the Mount According to Vedanta 1991 ISBN 0-87481-050-7
• Stevenson, Kenneth. The Lord's prayer: a text in tradition, Fortress Press, 2004. ISBN 0-8006-3650-3.

• Index in the “Collection of Articles” by M. Barsov (Simb., 1890, vol. I, p. 469 et seq.), as well as
• “Explanatory Four Gospels” by Bishop. Mikhail.

The views expressed on this subject by L. N. Tolstoy have generated a significant literature in refutation of them; see in particular:

• prof. A. F. Gusev, “The Basic Religious Principles of L. N. Tolstoy” (Kazan, 1893);
• prot. Butkevich, “The Sermon on the Mount” (in the magazine “Faith and Reason” for 1891 and 92);
• prot. Smirnov, in the “Orthodox Interlocutor” for 1894.

Sermon on the Mount. Interpretation. Did Jesus abolish the commandments of the Law of Moses, such as an eye for an eye? “You heard what was said, but I tell you”

QUESTION FROM ANDRIAN
Why do you write that the Law of Moses is relevant? But in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus changed the law of Moses beyond recognition. “It is written in the law.., but I say..” “It is written - fulfill your oaths before God, but I say - do not swear at all.” Those. With these words, the commandment about swearing is actually REMOVED from the law!

Today, in a number of Christian churches, it is widely believed that Jesus Christ abolished the commandments of the law of Moses. The commandments of the law of Moses mean the commandments of God written by Moses in the Torah (the Pentateuch of Moses - the first five books of the Bible). Among these commandments were both moral and ritual commandments concerning service in the temple, where substitutionary sacrifices were made for the sins of people.

Let's read together the words of Christ with which He began talking about the law in the Sermon on the Mount:

« Don't think that I have come disrupt the law or the prophets: I came not to destroy, but to fulfill b (in the original - fill, fulfill, supplement). For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle will pass from the law until everything is fulfilled. So who will break one of these least commandments ().

A word-by-word translation of the Bible from the original can be viewed online at www.biblezoom.ru. I have already partially analyzed the Sermon on the Mount in my book “” and answering questions in the material “”. Now we will analyze it in more detail.

First, we will analyze the words of Christ quoted above from the Sermon on the Mount, remembering that they were an introduction to Jesus listing some of the commandments of the Law of Moses:

« Don't think that I have come disrupt (in the original - to destroy, demolish, crush, overthrow, overthrow, abolish, cancel) law or prophets:..."

Jesus here clearly and unequivocally stated that the purpose of His coming is not to DESTROY, TEAR DOWN, ABOLISH, ABOLISH... law and prophets. The phrase “ law and prophets” is often used to refer to the Tanakh - what we today call the books of the Old Testament - this is the Pentateuch of Moses (Torah), which contained the law of Moses, and the writings of the prophets (see Matt. 7:12: 11:13; 22: 40; Luke 24:44; Acts 13:15 and many others).

“I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill (in the original - fill, fulfill, supplement)"

Christ repeated that he came . This is exactly what Jesus did throughout His ministry. He did not violate His entire life from birth, but fulfilled the law. Also, He is the performer, that is, the embodiment, the implementation of all forms of service in the Israeli temple to cleanse people from sins. Jesus became the true sacrificial Lamb, who gave his life for the sins of people, and also the Priest in the heavenly temple, which is clearly seen from the book of Hebrews 7-10 chapters. Jesus explicitly stated that He is the temple and even greater than the temple (see John 2:19-22, Matt. 12:6). In addition, Jesus became the fulfillment of the predictions of the law and the prophets about Christ (translated as Messiah):

“And he said to them: ... it is necessary come true everything written about me V law Moiseev and in the prophets and psalms"(Luke 24:44)

“For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle (letter and sign)will not pass away (won't disappear)from the law until all is fulfilled (in the original - everyone, every, whole)»

After Jesus convincingly declared that He had come not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it, He explained why exactly He said and did this: "For" - because.

So, let’s read together the abbreviated phrase of Christ: I did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill and complete it, because until heaven and earth end, not a single letter or sign will disappear from the law until each of them is fulfilled (see). People familiar with the Hebrew alphabet will understand the strange expression of Jesus, because in Hebrew writing not only every letter, but also every sign was valuable.

Let us remember Christ's statement that ALL letters and signs in the law are valid until their God-given purpose is fulfilled! It’s not for nothing that Jesus said “ For”, i.e. “ because" He recalled that God spoke more than once in Scripture about the eternity of His law, see chapter “”. And at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, which marks the beginning of His earthly ministry, Jesus emphasized this!

And then we read about the responsibility that, according to the Lord, threatens for failure to fulfill law and prophets:

So(conclusion) who breaks one from these commandments (we are talking about the commandments of the law, which were mentioned above) the slightest (simple) and if he teaches people this way, he will be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven; and whoever does and teaches will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.” ().

Attention! After Jesus warned of responsibility for violating the simple commandments of the law of Moses and incorrectly teaching people the law of God, Christ immediately moved on to denounce the Pharisees and scribes. He directly said that if the disciples of the Pharisees and scribes had the same demonstrated righteousness as their teachers, then they would not enter the Kingdom of Heaven:

“I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you WILL NOT ENTER the Kingdom of Heaven.” ().

It is worth emphasizing that texts 19 and 20 are closely connected. Previously, the Bible was not divided into verses, much less into chapters. Therefore, any individual speech was studied in full - as one whole sermon, which is what it was. Therefore, verses 17, 18, 19, and 20 should be taken as one phrase with a common main idea. In our case, this is the immutability of the law and responsibility for its incorrect implementation. Thus, in verses 19 and 20, Jesus pointed out that the Pharisees and scribes often taught the people incorrectly: incorrectly, formally, superficially understanding the instructions that God gave to His people in the law of Moses. And only having finished with responsibility and warning, Christ moved on to a direct analysis of the Pharisees and scribes’ misunderstanding of the commandments of the law of Moses, which, let us recall, He came not to cancel, but to fulfill, fill, supplement...

You heard what was said, and I tell you... Let's look at the commandments of the Law of Moses from the Sermon on the Mount

“You have heard that it was said to the ancients: Do not kill; whoever kills will be subject to judgment.” ()

Here Jesus quoted the commandment "dont kill"() and responsibility for murder. The teachers of Israel understood literally this instruction of the Law of Moses: it means you cannot kill. Of course this is true. But is this all that the commandment proclaims? Let's now see whether Christ abolished this commandment or explained and supplemented it?:

“But I tell you that everyone who is angry with his brother without cause will be subject to judgment; whoever says to his brother: “raqa” is subject to the Sanhedrin; and whoever says, “You fool,” is subject to fiery hell.” ().

Did Jesus say that now the commandment "dont kill" canceled and you can kill? Of course not! He explained what this commandment essentially means: not just “ dont kill", and don’t even be angry, because anger is already a form of antipathy towards a person, and don’t insult, because even a word can cause enormous pain.

We look at the next commandment of the Law of Moses "thou shalt not commit adultery"(Ex. 20:14), which Jesus allegedly canceled in the Sermon on the Mount:

“You have heard that it was said to the ancients: You shall not commit adultery.” ()

« But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in my heart" ()

The Lord here points out that adultery begins in the heart and only then is realized in reality... Not in vain, another commandment of the Law of Moses teaches: "You shall not covet your neighbor's wife"(Ex. 20:17). Unfortunately, among the Jews there was a widespread division of the commandments into major and minor. They say that the main ones must be observed as a priority, while sacrificing supposedly minor ones. Jesus repeatedly objected to this misunderstanding of God's law: one should not ignore commandments that seem secondary or unnecessary to a person, because God gave these instructions to people in vain (see Matt. 23:23).

Let's move on to the next commandment, which found its interpretation in the Sermon on the Mount:

“It is also said that if anyone divorces his wife, he should give her a divorce decree.” ().

I invite you to look at the commandment of the Law of Moses, mentioned by Christ, which stated the possibility of divorce with the issuance of a letter of divorce:

“If a man takes a wife and becomes her husband, and she finds no favor in his eyes, because he finds SOMETHING UNHAPPY in her(in the original the phrase “ something nasty"has the translation " it's a shameful thing, naked, naked») , and will write her a letter of divorce..." ()

At that time, Jews interpreted this commandment differently. The school of Rabbi Hillel taught that the text permitted divorce for almost any reason, but the school of Shammai argued that the commandment only spoke of sexual immorality. Jesus clearly confirmed the second position:

“But I say to you, whoever divorces his wife EXCEPT for the crime of adultery(in the original - any illegal sexual relations, debauchery) , he gives her a reason to commit adultery" ().

Christ recalled more than once that the family was created by God as one indivisible whole, so He explained that divorce is possible only due to negative sexual behavior that is unacceptable for the spouse. This is exactly what is written in the commandment, using the original phrase about sexual immorality.

So what are we seeing? Did Jesus cancel the commandment of the Mosaic law regarding divorce? No, He gave it the correct interpretation!

Let us proceed to the analysis of the following commandment of the Law of Moses interpreted by Christ in the Sermon on the Mount:

“You have also heard what was said to the ancients: don't break your oath but fulfill your vows to the Lord.” ()

Let's open the Law of Moses and read this commandment:

“If anyone makes a vow to the Lord or swears an oath, ... then he must not violate his words but must do everything that came out of his mouth."(Num. 30:3).

We see that in the Law of Moses it is written that a man was not to break his oath. Following the logic of those Christians who believe that Jesus abolished the law of Moses, then in the Sermon on the Mount there should be a phrase from Christ that it is now possible to break oaths. But we won't see this:

"Don't swear at all(Attention! the phrase does not end here, but continues with the enumeration): neither heaven, because it is the throne of God; neither the earth, because it is His footstool; ... neither Do not swear by your head, because you cannot make a single hair white or black. But let your word be: yes, yes; no no; and anything beyond this is from the evil one.” ()

I don’t see here that Jesus abolished the need for a person to fulfill his word - an oath. Did He say that it was now okay to break His promise? There is also no prohibition on swearing, that is, making a promise. But here there is a clear prohibition on swearing by SOMETHING (“ heaven, earth..."), what is not in your power and does not depend on you! Many experts in the history of Israel understand what Jesus was talking about here. At that time, the Jews came up with a circumvention of the commandment of the Law of Moses about the prohibition of breaking oaths. They decided that they could swear on something so that they could then refuse to fulfill the promise. Jesus spoke about this in more detail in chapter 23:

"Woe to you, blind leaders(Pharisees and scribes) who say: if anyone swears by the temple, then NOTHING, and if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, then GUILTY..."(Matt. 23:17) .

Jesus was deeply outraged by this hypocrisy and the attempts of people to evade fulfilling their promise, that is, the oath. That's why He said that the oath should contain only words Yes or No, what's more? meaning objects and things that support words, that is from the evil one.

We come to a very important principle from the Law of Moses, which many Christians consider to be abolished:

“You have heard that it was said: an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.”()

Many people think that before the coming of God the Son Jesus, God the Father was cruel, who taught revenge on the offender by proportionate injury. And Jesus suddenly came and began to teach that God the Father was wrong and gave evil commandments, but I, the Son, am changing the law and will give good commandments! In fact, many theologians believe that it was Jesus who originally gave commandments to people (see Isa. 63:9; Acts 7:38; 1 Cor. 10:4). Besides, Jesus is God, but how can God contradict himself and say that I was wrong before? Despite the fact that this same God has said more than once that He is unchangeable and His law is eternal!

Everything will fall into place if you understand what the commandment called for “ an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth"(Lev. 24:20, Exod. 21:24)

Where this commandment appears in the Law of Moses, next to it is an explanation of its application:

“Whoever kills an animal must pay for it, one animal for another”(Lev. 24:18).

“When they are quarreling, and one person hits the other with a stone or with his fist, and he does not die, but goes to bed, then if he gets up and leaves the house with a stick, the one who hit will not be guilty of death; just let him pay for stopping his work and give him for his treatment.”(Ex. 21:18,19).

You can ask any simple Jew or rabbi and they will explain to you that NEVER the commandment “ an eye for an eye, tooth for tooth” was not applied literally, as a complete command. This part of the Law of Moses is about the proportionality and adequacy of punishment and the need to make restitution when someone's rights are violated, rather than retaliating in the same way. By the way, in the Law of Moses there is a specific commandment prohibiting revenge:

“Do not take revenge or have any grudge against the sons of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself.”(see Lev. 19:18).

Did God really teach His people only commandments? loving others as oneself, don't take revenge, and then in another commandment he wrote that for a fracture the arm of the guilty party should be broken, and the one who knocked out his eye should also have his eye knocked out!? And next to these words, as we read above (in Ex. 21:18,19, Lev. 24:18), God gave a command so that the culprit would restore the damage and compensate for the downtime in work of the one to whom he caused harm. It turns out that the culprit needs to gouge out his eye and ask him for compensation?

Of course not. God's law often uses imagery. For example, there is a commandment:

“If you find your enemy’s ox or his donkey lost, bring it to him; If you see your enemy’s donkey fallen under his burden, do not leave him; unload with him"(Ex.23:4,5)

Here God teaches to respect even enemies and help them. And of course, here we are not talking ONLY about the donkey and the will. This applies to both the horse and the wallet, and if the enemy himself lies wounded... Every Jew understands that one must not LITERALLY fulfill this commandment, but it points to a principle. The same applies to the commandments of the Law of Moses an eye for an eye– it points to the principle of proportionality of liability and restoration of damage. This principle is applied in a Jewish court, and does not call for a pre-trial order to immediately knock out the offender's eye in response to a knocked out eye.

As evidence, we can cite the comments of Jewish rabbis. Here is a quote from a Jewish site about the Law of Moses (www.threeda.ru):

“The written law: An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth - was never observed in its truest sense. Tradition knew only about the imposition of material penalties, but when people appeared who interpreted an eye for an eye in the literal sense, the Chazal (sages) were forced to explain and interpret what was written.”

You can also quote from the open encyclopedia Wikipedia about the commandment of an eye for an eye:

“Of the following (after the phrase an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth) of the Torah verses, it is OBVIOUS that all physical injuries inflicted by one person on another - provided that they do not lead to death - must be given a monetary value, and the one who caused the damage must compensate for them. Thus, the expression of the Torah “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand, a foot for a foot” should be understood as a requirement to compensate the victim for the damage caused by paying a fine in the amount that the judges determine as the cost of loss of health, disability, etc. ."

Another commandment of the Law of Moses speaks about this:

“And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Tell the children of Israel, If any man or woman commit any sin, AGAINST PERSON, ...then let them confess their sin which they have committed, and WILL RETURN IN FULL what they are guilty of» (Num. 5:5-7)

In addition, not all Christians know that many Jewish theologians (for example, Abraham Geiger, Joseph Salvador, etc.) recognize Jesus as a good rabbi and agree that he taught to correctly understand and observe the law of Moses. They believe that the Jews might have taken him for a prophet if his disciples had not deified him. There is also Messianic Judaism - Jews who recognize Jesus as the Messiah (Christ), who correctly taught the people the Torah (law), but not all of them consider Him God.

But of course the greatest proof is that Jesus understood the commandment an eye for an eye Precisely as a call to make amends for the damage caused, and not to take revenge, this is the comment of Jesus Himself:

“But I say to you: do not resist evil. But whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other also to him; and whoever wants to sue you and take your shirt, give him your outer clothing too.”()

It is obvious that Jesus here is not just saying that there is no need to take revenge, this is already understandable, since there is a corresponding commandment in the law of Moses "don't take revenge"(Lev. 19:18). Please note when commenting on the commandment an eye for an eye, The Lord in verse 40 directly uses the description of the trial process: “ wants to sue"! If you look closely, you can see that Jesus here is addressing two categories of people at once in the COURT PROCESS: 1) those who suffered damage and 2) those who were sued. Jesus calls on both of them to be merciful and humble: the first - those who have been harmed - do not immediately run to court, shaking the commandment of an eye for an eye, but learn to forgive, and the second - if they are sued, then give everything required and even more...

Unfortunately, both before and now there are people who take advantage of the opportunity when some damage has been done to them. Yes, they have the right within the meaning of the commandment an eye for an eye for proportionate restoration! But some, through the courts, then almost undress the offender, even despite his lack of intent and other mitigating circumstances. They invent losses and moral damages! Jesus said to them that even though the law says about compensation in court according to the principle an eye for an eye, but the commandment an eye for an eye does not cancel the commandments of God’s law about love, forgiveness and justice! And for the second - those who were sued - Christ calls upon them to give in to such insolent people, without being drawn into a trial with them - to give even more. Naturally, God will then, over time, reward everyone with their due: both the honest and the dishonest person.

From the above it is clear that the true essence of the commandment an eye for an eye– is still relevant and has NOT been CANCELED by Jesus. After all, God's instruction an eye for an eye has never called and does not call for revenge, but is addressed, we repeat, to those who have been harmed - they have the right to proportionate compensation from the offender, and to those who themselves have caused harm - to the need to restore the harm they have caused. For example, if today one believer takes a friend's car for a ride and crashes it, then how should the commandment of an eye for an eye apply here? Of course, the harm-doer must repair it - restore it to the same condition, and not tell a friend, like, give me another car, as Jesus taught - turn the other cheek. And the victim, naturally, should be content with restoring the car, and not drag the culprit through the courts, extracting from him everything possible - fines, interest, penalties, supposedly covering his losses: loss of time, missed opportunities and moral damage.

Now we will analyze the last instructions from the series “said” discussed by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount:

“You have heard that it was said: You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.”()

First we see a quote from the commandment of the Law of Moses, which was already quoted above:

"Love your neighbor as yourself"(see Lev. 19:18).

But the commandments hate your enemy" it is not in the law of Moses, just as it is not in the entire Tanakh (Old Testament Scripture). But why did Jesus say this? Here it is appropriate to recall what I wrote about at the beginning. Jesus in Interpreted the Sermon on the Mount not so much the commandments of the Law of Moses themselves, but their incorrect, formal, incomplete interpretation by the spiritual teachers of Israel, which was reflected in the oral tradition.

So the commandment " love your neighbor" they interpreted it as love your neighbor and hate your enemy and taught this to the people. Naturally, Jesus was outraged by such a distorted understanding of the wise, just law of God, based on love for people.

“But I say to you: love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who despitefully use you and persecute you.” ()

The teaching of love was not an innovation introduced by Jesus. As we saw above, the law of Moses taught to treat enemies with respect, not by hating, but by helping them in a difficult situation. The prophets proclaimed this:

“If your enemy is hungry, feed him with bread; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink."(Prov. 25:21)

Does this phrase remind you of anything? It was quoted by the Apostle Paul in Romans 12:20.

Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount only interpreted how to correctly understand the commandments of the Law of Moses!

Let's summarize: as we can see, Jesus did not cancel a single commandment of the Law of Moses that He listed in the Sermon on the Mount. But he only explained how they should be understood correctly: as God pleases. Jesus showed by this interpretation that the commandments of God's law are eternal, and He does not abolish them. But at the same time, in the Sermon on the Mount, the Lord gave a clear understanding of when the commandments - letters and signs - in the law cease: when they are fulfilled.

“For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or one tittle(letter and sign) will not pass from the law until everything will not come true (each)" ().

Thus, after the death of Christ, all the commandments concerning the temple and the service in it, cleansing people from sins through the blood of sacrificial animals, were fulfilled. All these commandments were types and pointed to Christ, to His atoning ministry - to death on Calvary! Now there is no need to make sacrifices for the sins of people, which means there is no need for a temple, since it served specifically for sacrifices.

The ritual commandments, according to Jesus' explanation and their essence, have already been fulfilled. The remaining commandments of the Law of Moses: moral, health, family remain relevant to this day. And they will remain so." until heaven and earth pass away.”

Valery Tatarkin

The Sermon on the Mount is considered a compilation (collection) of the sayings of the Son of God, which contains the moral teaching of all Christianity. Matthew tells us that Jesus delivered these moral exhortations on a hillside in Galilee in 30 AD to the apostles and a large number of lay followers. This message contains the very essence of the Gospel, the essence of the teaching that every Christian needs to know. In its design, the sermon correlates with the traditions of the prophetic monologue of antiquity.

The Meaning of Sermon

Followers of Christ consider the Sermon on the Mount to be a full-fledged commentary on the Ten Commandments, which the Lord told Moses on the sacred Mount Sinai. The Savior appears before the people and the apostles as the true interpreter of the Mosaic Law. However, moral preaching does not serve to prohibit, but reveals a spiritual disposition that can bring a person closer to the Almighty and lead to perfection.

Icon of the Sermon on the Mount of Jesus Christ

The message of Christ, in turn, is approached by prominent theologians and thinkers who try to reconcile the words of the Son of God with the daily activities of everyone. This instruction opens with the nine Beatitudes, setting out the principles of the New Testament about spiritual rebirth.

• Christ mentions the beneficial influence his followers naturally have on their surroundings. Jesus especially emphasizes that preaching does not abolish the Law of Moses, but fully complements it. The Son of God teaches everyone to overcome the anger that comes from within, to remain chaste, honest and frank, to keep one’s word, to be able to forgive mistakes and vices, to love not only friends, but also enemies, and also to strive for spiritual perfection.
• Further, Christ calls to become truly righteous, to listen to your heart and not to bow under the yoke of your own feelings. He says that one should get rid of the desire for ostentatious holiness, as many Jews did. The Son of God emphasizes the special importance of prayers, fasting, almsgiving - all this pleases the Almighty, in whom one must believe.
• At the end of the sermon, Jesus talks about non-judgment, constancy in virtue and preserving holy things from desecration. He teaches to distinguish between false and righteous paths, warns to believe false prophets and explains to everyone that in order to overcome life's difficulties, one must strengthen one's own consciousness.

The Son of God himself says about this knowledge that “the World passes away, but the words of the Lord remain forever.” In the Sermon on the Mount, every Christian will see divine truth, which does not die and applies to every person without exception. The Law of the Lord, in which both Testaments are preserved, is immutable, despite changes in morality among people. Therefore, a Christian who strives to assimilate pure goodness must see the wisdom of the Sermon on the Mount and build a life based on the postulates set forth in it.

On a note! The hill in Galilee Tiberias, on which the Son of God delivered Christian instruction, is called the “Mount of Beatitudes.” Researchers claim that the sermon was delivered near the place where the Savior multiplied the loaves and fish. In 1935, at the foot of the hill, the ruins of a small church, built in the 4th century and destroyed at the beginning of the 17th century, were discovered. In 1938, a Catholic church was erected here; today it is part of the Franciscan monastery.

Analysis of the commandments

Each of them begins with the words “blessed”, which encourages virtue and attracts endless joy at the pedestal of the Lord. The forefathers, succumbing to sin, lost true happiness and deprived their descendants of it. Since then, this word has been viewed as an unattainable ideal, a dream. However, the Son of God descended to earth and revealed happiness in the context of a specific reality, achievable during his lifetime.

The promise from the Sermon on the Mount is fulfilled in the present, in accordance with how the person himself gradually opens his heart to true faith and frees himself from the oppression of depravity.

• A righteous Christian receives the gift of grace from the Holy Spirit himself, radiating endless joy and spiritual happiness. Such a worldview cannot be compared to any worldly pleasure, which is finite, brief and produces suffering. The holy sages made any sacrifices in order to achieve a state of closeness to the Lord, the laity should follow the example of these people.
• The Nine Commandments are structured in a logical sequence, they demonstrate the right path and means to achieve the goal. They are often compared to a staircase leading to the house of heavenly virtue.
• The Sermon on the Mount says that everyone is subject to sin - this is the tragedy of humanity. Vice darkens reason, takes away free will, and brings sadness and melancholy. The sinner is deeply unhappy and unable to understand the cause of his troubles. The first commandment rightly points out that spiritual illness gives rise to all grief.

The Sermon on the Mount and the teachings of Jesus Christ contain the basic idea that every person is a sinner

Further consideration

Christ calls for healing, the voice of God's Son sounds like the voice of a Father who has lost his son and begs him to return. When a person comes to God, he has nothing but eternal purity. Unfortunately, it is not easy for the sons of the Most High to admit guilt and turn away from pleasures, therefore volitional effort on the path to the Lord is rewarded by the Kingdom of Heaven. Restoration, healing begins with humility, which is not pessimism, but is based on the hope of being close to the Primordial Almighty and experiencing His mercy.

• Repentance is the intention to correct oneself after one’s actions. It is often accompanied by the shedding of tears, which leads to relief and consolation. After getting rid of sinfulness comes harmony in thoughts and actions. A person avoids irritation, anger and quarrels, he becomes meek and inherits the earth, as stated in the third commandment.
• A sinner recovers when the desire to do good deeds arises in his mind. In the fourth instruction of the Sermon on the Mount, Christ glorifies those who seek spiritual truth, for for them there is no longer any sensual pleasure.
• The righteous person sees that God grants him forgiveness, harmony and higher love. Mercy, responsiveness, and gratitude arise in the heart. At the fifth stage of perfection are merciful people who are naturally abandoned by misfortune. Further, the soul is transformed from overflowing with the Holy Spirit: it can be compared to a lake that was previously muddy and overgrown, but has become crystal clear. The Lord is seen by those who have achieved purity of heart - this is stated in the sixth commandment.
• The blessed become true servants of the Lord, whose calling is to save others who have drowned in the abyss of suffering. They become like the Son of God and strive to bring peace to their environment. Thus, righteous Christians ascend to the seventh step.
• The two final commandments of the Savior tell us that the world, filled with evil, is unable to accept spiritual purity and calls the saints its enemies. The righteous easily accept suffering as faith and rejoice in their return to the Kingdom of Heaven.

The Sermon on the Mount reflects the moral teaching of Christ, complementing the Laws of Moses. The Savior pronounced it on the mountainside in front of crowds of people devoted to God and the apostles, who after the Crucifixion carried the Word of God throughout the earth.

Important! Following the instructions of the Sermon on the Mount, a person becomes more righteous and gradually comes to the realization of the Lord.

Sermon on the Mount. Beatitudes

Sermon on the Mount- a sermon that expresses the essence of the New Testament moral law (moral teaching) and its difference from.

The Sermon on the Mount was preached on a hill near Capernaum in Galilee, following the calling of 12. The content of the sermon is set out in the Gospel of Matthew ch. 5-7 and Luke ch. 6, 17-49.

Sermon on the Mount

Archpriest Alexander Glebov

Biblical history of the New Testament

Only in the Gospel of Matthew there is a coherent speech of Christ, consisting of separate sayings. These sayings relate to a person’s moral life and behavior. This speech is called the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount is a very careful composition. It is presented in a single block by the Evangelist Matthew in the fifth, sixth and seventh chapters, that is, it occupies three chapters. But, of course, it was not pronounced as described by the Evangelist Matthew. For example, in the Evangelist Luke, the themes touched upon by the Sermon on the Mount are scattered throughout the Gospel, which is probably more consistent with how Christ delivered his moral teachings. We cannot talk about the Sermon on the Mount as if it were a separate sermon preached in one place. There are strong and convincing arguments that the Sermon on the Mount is much more than just one sermon. Simply, the Evangelist Matthew, for convenience, collected all the sayings of the Savior that relate to the moral life of man and relationships between people, and combined them into one composition. For example, anyone listening to the Sermon on the Mount for the first time as it is presented in Matthew would simply be overworked long before it ended. There is too much in it for it to be absorbed at once. After all, it’s one thing to sit and read, lingering, stopping while reading, comprehending what you read. It’s quite another to listen to it spoken for the first time. We can read as we are used to, at the speed we are accustomed to, but to hear it for the first time means to be overloaded with an excess of information, which means losing sight of much of the important content contained in this sermon.

The Gospel of Matthew is, first of all, the Gospel of Christian teaching. It is characteristic of Matthew that he collects the teachings and actions of Christ into separate blocks. There is a section devoted to parables, there is a section devoted to miracles, and there is a section devoted to the doctrine of the end of the world. It is on this principle that Matthew collected the moral teaching of Christ together for the convenience of studying it. In the Gospel of Luke, the Sermon on the Mount immediately follows the election of the twelve apostles. In the person of the apostles, Christ chooses his assistants, but in order for these assistants to be able to successfully and effectively carry out their work, they must first be trained. Therefore, in the Sermon on the Mount, the Lord gives instructions to his apostles, and through them to all of us. Since the Lord himself did not write down anything, everything that we know about him came to us from his disciples, which is why it is called “Apostolic”. Therefore, one theologian called the Sermon on the Mount: “the sermon on the occasion of the ordination of the twelve.” Just as a young priest entering the ministry for the first time must be given a task, so Christ preached a sermon to the twelve disciples before they began to fulfill their tasks. There is an assumption that, having finally chosen the twelve apostles, Christ retired with them for a week, maybe even more, to some quiet place and taught them during this time, and the Sermon on the Mount is a brief summary of that teaching. But this, of course, is just a guess.

There is probably no other material in the Gospel that has been discussed as thoroughly as the Sermon on the Mount. The debate began already in the first century of Christianity and continues to this day. Some understand the commandments literally, others symbolically, and many divisions have occurred in Christianity due to different understandings of the words of the Sermon on the Mount. Some movements that arose under the influence of the Sermon on the Mount in Russian culture are well known to us, for example, the Tolstoyans are followers of the religious teachings of the great Russian writer, Count Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy. Tolstoy understood in his own way some of the provisions of the Sermon on the Mount, for example, about non-resistance to evil. Tolstoy took this literally and much more, with which he contrasted himself with the official Church. Some see in the commandments of the Sermon on the Mount demands that cannot be fully fulfilled, and therefore talk about the symbolic meaning of the commandments. Others see specific directions and talk about their literal meaning. When reading the Sermon on the Mount, we must not forget our personal experience. It is unlikely that there is any other gospel text that made such demands on us personally, on our conscience, as the Sermon on the Mount. We must take into account that the Sermon on the Mount was not delivered for our specific society, but was delivered in a specific historical setting. After all, it was not Christians who listened to this sermon, but Jews. It must be remembered that the commandments of the Sermon on the Mount were preceded by a thousand-year religious history of the Jewish people - a cult law, an ethical law. Therefore, the words of the Sermon on the Mount are addressed not just to the first person they meet, but to people who have already traveled a long path of religious and moral development. This must be taken into account when we read the Sermon on the Mount.

Let's talk about the form of the Sermon on the Mount. Evangelist Matthew tries to imitate the Torah. Christ ascends the mountain before delivering the Sermon on the Mount, from where He gives commandments to people and proclaims His moral law. In the minds of the Jews, all this was associated with the giving of the Old Testament commandments to Moses on Mount Sinai. Here the Evangelist Matthew shows Christ as the new Moses. Christ began to teach when he sat down. It is very important. Christ sat on the pulpit as a teacher. During formal teaching, the Jewish rabbi always sat. The Greek word for "pulpit" means "seat," and many European languages ​​still say that the professor's desk is the lectern. By the way, the Pope, when he speaks ex cathedra, from his seat, from his throne, when he speaks from the pulpit, then he is proclaiming a doctrine. This is precisely what the dogma of papal infallibility is based on. The rabbi often taught while pacing or walking, but he began formal teaching when he took his seat in the pulpit. Thus, the very indication that Christ sat down before he began to teach his disciples indicates that this teaching occupies a central place and is, as it were, official.

Before considering the very content of the Sermon on the Mount, we need to think about how to understand what Christ said in it. This is an important question, for it is obvious that Christ here offers his teaching in a completely different way from the ethics textbooks and even differently from the way ordinary people express the same thoughts. As a good teacher, Christ naturally uses forms of language and expression that mean a lot to those who listen to Him. His teaching contains at least three distinctive properties.

First. Most of the Sermon on the Mount is poetry, although it is difficult for us to recognize it as poetry, since our poetry is built on the effect of rhyme and stress. Jewish poetry was different. It was built on the effect of parallelism, that is, correspondence of thoughts. Similarities of thought or differences. European poetry and Middle Eastern poetry, including Jewish poetry, are built on completely different principles. We are accustomed to the so-called syllabic, rhythmic poetry. Any of our poems is divided into syllables, the stress falls on the syllables and a certain rhythm is obtained: “Frost and sun, a wonderful day...”. Syllabic rhythm creates our European poetry; it seems to come from music. But the poetry in the Bible is completely different, and the Bible is permeated with poetry. There are a lot of poems there, but when we read the Bible, the Old Testament, we don’t notice this, because we are used to other poetry. In the Bible there is not a rhythm of syllables, but a rhythm of concepts, a rhythm of words, a rhythm of symbols, and this happens in the following way. For example, any psalm is poetry. "Psalm" means "song". It is divided into lines, and when the second line in meaning repeats the first line or negates it, then these lines are parallel or antiparallel. When the second line repeats the first line in meaning, it is called synonymous parallelism. There are many examples of this in the psalms and other poetic sections of the Old Testament. Any psalm, for example, the most famous, the 50th psalm, begins like this: “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your great mercy” - this is the first line. “And according to the multitude of Your compassions, cleanse my iniquity” is the second line. They are similar in meaning, they just express the same idea in different words. “Wash me above all from my iniquity” - the first line. “And cleanse me from my sin.” But “washed from iniquity” and “cleansed from sin” are one and the same thing. In poetry this is called parallelism or rhythm by parallels. This structure permeates almost the entire Bible, because the entire Bible is very poetic. In the Sermon on the Mount, the Lord follows this poetic tradition of his people. For example, Christ says: “Do not give what is holy to dogs, and do not throw your pearls before swine.” What we have before us is genuine Jewish poetry, in which the second line repeats the thought, that is, parallels the first, but simply uses a different image. The psalm consists of stanzas, each stanza has two lines, but each line can be not only parallel, but also antiparallel to the other. The antiparallel type of Hebrew poetry is called antithetical parallelism. There are also many examples of antiparallelism. For example: “Every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit” or “He who believes in Me has eternal life, but he who does not believe goes to destruction.” Both lines contain similar lessons, but the idea is expressed using exactly opposite concepts. This kind of poetry also appears frequently in the Old Testament. Even the Lord's Prayer can be arranged poetically.

The second property of Christ’s teaching is its imagery. Sometimes the teaching is given in the form of parables, other times it is simply living illustrations from everyday life. Many parables teach moral lessons, but the Sermon on the Mount uses more real-life imagery. We often talk about ethics in the abstract, but Christ always deals with concrete things. For example, we can say this: “Materialism can be a hindrance to spiritual growth.” And Christ said this: “No one can serve two masters. You cannot serve God and mammon,” that is, more specifically.

Third. Christ teaches very vividly. He often resorts to exaggeration to emphasize meaning. For example, He says that “it is better to pluck out an eye or cut off a hand than to commit adultery.” It is clear that Christ does not call us to self-harm, but He uses such extravagant language to make His listeners feel the seriousness of His message. Or, for example, “whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he was drowned in the depths of the sea.” Of course, this is not a call for murder. Here we are talking about the increased responsibility of those who, by their words or actions, can shake people’s faith. He also says: “Have faith in God, for truly I say to you, if anyone says to this mountain, “Be taken up and thrown into the sea,” and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will happen, whatever he says will be done for him.” . But this does not mean that the degree of one’s faith should be tested in this way - commanding the mountains to fall into the sea. With this comparison, the Lord makes it clear what power faith in Him has. For unshakable faith, nothing is impossible, because for God nothing is impossible. When we read the Sermon on the Mount, we need to keep in mind these various techniques used by Christ in his evangelism. Recognizing the different forms can help us better understand what Christ meant and what He was talking about.

So, what ethics did Christ propose? What principles of behavior should guide those who accept the divine will in their lives? There are two points that distinguish New Testament ethics from most other ethical systems.

First. The ethical teaching of Christ is completely inseparable from His teaching about the power of God in the lives of people. Without understanding this, it is very difficult to understand the meaning of the Sermon on the Mount. All ethical systems have a foundation on which they are built. The ethical teaching of Christ is based on the claim that the God who created all things and acted in the history of Israel in the Old Testament can be known in a real, personal way. The behavior and lifestyle of His followers is the way to know God. This principle has always been central to Judaism. The Old Testament itself was based on a principle that is fundamental to the teachings of Christ and in the New Testament. This basis is that human goodness has its origin in God. The central tenet of one section of the Old Testament law was the statement: “You shall be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am Holy.” And Christ says in the Sermon on the Mount: “Be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.” In the Old Testament, the Lord calls people to holiness, but why does he call? Why should people be saints? Because God is holy and people should be like Him. “Be holy, for I, the Lord your God, am holy.” And Christ gives the same justification for his moral teaching: “Be ye perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect,” that is, we must be perfect because God is perfect. The ethical standards that God's people were required to achieve were no less than a reflection of the character of God himself. It is important for us to understand why we were given the moral law. It is completely wrong to think that if we fulfill the commandments, then when we die we will receive a reward for it, just as a child is rewarded for good behavior by his parents. And if we do not comply, then retribution awaits us in the future. Of course, retribution exists, and each of us will receive what he deserves, but divine retribution is not a judge’s sentence to a criminal for a crime committed. God in the legal sense does not punish or reward. It simply reveals the inner world of each person and the state of this world either dooms a person to suffering or reveals to him the joy of communication with God. In the Gospel there is a story about the Lord healing a demon-possessed man. It is interesting that when Christ began to approach him, the demoniac shouted: “Don’t torment me.” This means that God, who is love, was the source of torment for the demon with which a person was possessed, which means that if people liken themselves to a dark force, if they do the will of the devil, and not the will of God, then standing before God will become torment for a person. Not in the sense that God will begin to torment a person, but in the sense that a person will feel his complete incompatibility. After all, everyone feels comfortable only in a world that is natural to them, among like-minded people. For every normal person who accidentally stumbles, going to prison will be torment, because he finds himself in a world completely alien to him: with its own laws, concepts, vocabulary, views on life, and so on. But on the other hand, when an inveterate repeat offender is released, he cannot find himself among normal people. This normal world is alien to him, he suffers in it. Such people often commit crimes again not for profit, but only in order to again end up on the bunk, in the world of unfreedom, which is so frightening for any person, but for a criminal it is natural. He is in the cell like a fish in water. This, of course, is a comparison, and although each comparison is fraught with inaccuracy, it can still help us understand the nature of the suffering of the sinful human soul when it appears before God. In order for there to be no suffering, so that the world of God becomes close to the world of man, we must take upon ourselves the work of forming the world of God within ourselves. And the commandments and, in general, all the moral provisions of the Gospel teaching, set forth in the Sermon on the Mount, are those mechanisms, those tools with the help of which a person forms in himself the qualities of God. God is not something amorphous, God is a living person, which means He has a character, has some qualities, properties. In our series of conversations, I have already mentioned that man is created in the image and likeness of God. Similarity is the goal of human existence. As a result of life, a person must become like God, become like Him. Having committed sin, people lost this ability because they broke the connection with God, but in Christ the communication between God and people was restored. God entered the world by the power of his grace, and the goal of becoming like God became real again. The gift of grace is what God has done for us, and in the Sermon on the Mount the Lord tells us what we need to do to achieve this goal. With the help of the moral law, man - the image of God - develops himself to God-likeness. By fulfilling the commandments, a person develops in himself the qualities of God, His character, acts as Christ acted, and, as we know, like is recognized by like. Presenting himself after physical death in the face of God, a person finds himself in the world of the Kingdom of God that is close and natural to him.

The second basis of New Testament ethics - what is it? One scholar, summing up all the points of the Sermon on the Mount, described biblical ethics as “the science of human behavior as determined by divine behavior,” that is, people should act as God acts. One of the most characteristic features of God's action in the experience of Israel is His willingness to care for people who do not even think about Him. Abraham was called out of Mesopotamia and given a new country, not because of any moral or spiritual superiority he possessed, but simply because the attention and love of God were poured out upon him. Subsequently, Israel was preserved through all the difficulties of the exodus from Egypt and what followed, not because of its own moral perfection, but simply because of the care of a loving God. Based on these unmerited acts of grace, God made certain demands on his people. After all, the Ten Commandments begin with the statement: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery,” and so on. This is the premise on which the commandments are based. Because God has done something for His people, they must repay Him with love and obedience. The same can be found in other places of the Old Testament law: “Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God delivered you, therefore today I command you...”, then what He has already commanded. New Testament ethics has exactly the same basis. For example, it is striking that the apostle Paul, in wanting to stop the strife going on in the Philippian church, does not appeal to ordinary common sense to solve the problem, but to precisely the same aspect of God's character that we saw in the Old Testament. He gives an example of how God in Christ gave Himself for our salvation. I will read this passage: “For let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus: He, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God; but he made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant, becoming in the likeness of men, and becoming in appearance like a man; He humbled himself and was obedient even to the point of death, even death on the cross” (). This is what the Apostle Paul makes the basis of his moral call to his readers: since Christ gave up everything for us, we must be willing to sacrifice our selfishness in order to be pleasing to Him. We must act in the same way as Christ did: “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” Elsewhere the apostle will say that we must have “the mind of Christ” (). What is meant, of course, is not Divine Wisdom, but the human mind of Christ. We must think in the categories in which He thought. And what these categories are is clear from the commandments and ethical teaching of the Sermon on the Mount.

This means that there are two points on which New Testament ethics is based. First: we must be perfect and holy, because God is perfect and holy, and people must be like him. And second: we must treat God the way He treats us. Ultimately, this is what Christ Himself proclaimed as the highest and twofold commandment of love for God and neighbor. Our love for God is manifested through love for our neighbor. When we love our neighbor, we try to treat God the way He treats us.

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