Matthew 5:21 - Exposition

Ye have heard ( ἠκούσατε , frequentative aorist). Our Lord does not say, "ye have read" (cf. Matthew 21:42 ), for he was not now speaking to the learned classes, but to a large audience many of whom were probably unable to read. "Ye have heard," i.e. from your teachers whose teaching claims to be the substance of the Law. So, probably, even in John 12:34 , where the multitude say that they "have heard out of the Law that the Christ abideth for ever," which, since this is hardly expressed in so many words in the Old Testament, must mean that the instructions they have received on this subject truly represent the substance of its teaching. So here our Lord says, "You have heard from your teachers (cf. Romans 2:18 ) that the substance of the sixth commandment is so-and-so." It is thus quite intelligible that in some of these utterances there should be found added to ( John 12:21 , John 12:43 ) or intermingled with ( John 12:33 ) the words of a passage of Scripture, other words which are either taken from Scripture, but from another place in it (perhaps John 12:33 ), or do not occur in Scripture at all, but merely help to form a compendious statement of a definite interpretation (here and John 12:43 ). It must remain doubtful whether our Lord himself formulated these statements of the popular teaching, or quoted them verbally as current. If the latter, as is perhaps more likely, there remains the at present still more insoluble question whether they were only oral or (cf. the case of the 'Didaehe') had already been committed to writing. That it was said by them of old time ( ὅτι ἐῤῥέθη τοῖς ἀρχαίοις ) . By ; Revised Version, to. Similarly John 12:33 . Although "by" may be defended, "to" (Wickliffe and Tyndale downwards) is certainly right, because

(a) it is the common usage with a passive verb;

(b) it is the constant usage with ἐῤῥέθη in the New Testament ( e.g. Romans 9:12 , Romans 9:26 );

(c) the parallelism with ἐγὼ δέ κ .τ.λ ., is more exact;

(d) the popular teaching claimed to be, even in its strictest esoteric form of oral tradition, derived ultimately, not from the words of any human teachers, however primitive, but from the words of God spoken by him to them.

In the case before us our Lord accepts the popular teaching of the time as truly representing the Divine utterance in the giving of the Law, so far as that utterance was then intended to be understood. Them of old time. This can hardly be limited to "the original founders of the Jewish Commonwealth," to use Trench's curiously unbiblical expression ('Syn.,' § 67.). It probably includes all who lived a generation or more before our Lord's time (cf. Weiss). Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment. The substance, according to the popular teaching, of the sixth commandment ( Exodus 20:13 ; Deuteronomy 5:17 ). This the current form of it (based partly on Le 24:21; Numbers 35:1-34 .; Deuteronomy 19:12 ) was that murder was not to be committed, and that if it was committed the murderer was to be brought up for trial. Shall be in danger of ( ἔνοχος ἔσται ); i.e. in legal danger—legally guilty of a charge which involves the judgment (cf. Matthew 26:66 ). The judgment ; i.e. the local Sanhedrin (cf. Matthew 10:17 ), of apparently seven men in a smaller, twenty-three in a larger, town. This answers to "the congregation,'' or "the elders" of the town to which the murderer belonged, before whom he was to be tried ( Numbers 35:12 , Numbers 35:16 , Numbers 35:24 ; Deuteronomy 19:12 ).