Matthew 5:13

13. Ye This must have been addressed especially to the apostles, who doubtless formed the front circle immediately around our Lord. Indeed, Matthew 5:12 seems to show that the benedictions were addressed to them. Yet the multitudes, as listeners, were entitled to appropriate their share.

Salt of the earth The earth, the living world of men, is like a piece of meat, which would putrify, but that the grace and Gospel of God, like salt, arrests the decay, and purifies and preserves it. The apostles, and in their degree all Christians, are the substance and body of that salt. They are the substance to which the saltness inheres. Salt have lost its savour If the living body to which this gracious saltness inheres doth lose that quality, whereby shall the quality be restored? Wherewith shall it shall what? be salted? The it refers to the solid salt which has lost its saltness or savour. What, alas! shall ever resalt that savourless salt? The Christian is the solid salt, and the grace of God is his saltness; that grace is the very salt of the salt. Now this solid salt is intended to salt the world with; but, alas I who shall salt the salt? This question the Saviour answers by pronouncing it unanswerable. It is thenceforth good for nothing This shows that it is the savourless salt which needs the salting. And this strong answer shows, too, that in the case supposed, the saltness is not almost, but completely gone. Not a particle of the grace of God remains, or the loser would not be quite good for nothing. Nor is it to be rightly viewed as a mere abstract possibility, which God secures shall never happen, but a practical matter, which may be believed to happen often and ordinarily. Surely the Antinomian dogma that assures the Christian that God secures him from losing divine grace, cannot stand before this warning passage. Trodden under foot of men The symbol of utter perdition.

Our Lord’s allusion to salt that has lost its savour is not without a foundation in natural fact. Salt does lose its saltness by chemical decomposition. But we are inclined to think (with Schoettgen) that the allusion is to the bituminous salt from Lake Asphaltites, which was strewn over the sacrifices at the temple in order, by its fragrant odour, to neutralize the smell of the burning flesh, and which, when spoiled by exposure to sun and atmosphere, was cast out upon the walks to prevent the feet from slipping. Dr. Thomson (vol. ii, p. 44) says: “Indeed, it is a well-known fact that the salt of this country, when in contact with the ground, or exposed to rain and sun, does become insipid and useless. From the manner in which it is gathered, much earth and other impurities are necessarily collected with it. Not a little of it is so impure that it cannot be used at all and such salt soon effloresces and turns to dust, not to fruitful soil, however. It is not only good for nothing itself, but it actually destroys all fertility wherever it is thrown; and this is the reason why it is cast into the street. There is a sort of verbal verisimilitude in the manner in which our Lord alludes to the act: ‘it is… cast out’ and ‘trodden under foot;’ so troublesome is this corrupted salt, that it is carefully swept up, carried forth, and thrown into the street. There is no place about the house, yard, or garden, where it can be tolerated. No man will allow it to be thrown on to his field, and the only place for it is in the street, and there it is cast, to be trodden under foot of men.”