Children often run into conflict with the Rule of Mom. The rules moms make violate kids’ natural desires. Like, “No, you may not get a cookie out of the cookie jar,” runs against a child’s natural desire (dare I say “need”?) to have a cookie. When the Rule of Mom runs against the Desire of Kids, the kids have choices to make: Obey Mom and forego my apparent need, or disobey and risk consequences.
However, sometimes the rules moms make are not always black-and-white to the children making decisions. For instance, when growing up, during the summer my mom had a rule that we were to come inside the house when the street-lights came on. That rule seems simple enough: there was a street-light right in front of our house, and when the street-lights came on, we were to be done playing outside. But my mom just said “street-lights”, and the street-light in front of my friend’s house came on at least a good fifteen minutes after the one in front of my house. So I was perfectly justified staying out an extra fifteen minutes because my mom never said which street light I was supposed to watch for. I found the loophole in the Rule of Mom! (Unfortunately, she didn’t agree and felt perfectly justified in punishing me before bed).
A “loophole” is a way around a law. It is a way of violating the intent of a law without actually breaking it, a way of getting what you want without having to be incriminated. I violated the intent of my mom’s rule without violating her actual rule. Many do this with respect to taxes, looking for loopholes that will allow them to (legally) evade paying more than they want to.
Apparently, loopholes also existed in first century Judaism. In Exodus 20, God laid out his Commandments, making it clear the kind of conduct he expected out of his people. We, as God’s people, are to be different from those around us, and it starts by having no other gods, not making idols, honoring parents, refusing to kill, steal, covet, and so on. But people are clever, and in studying the hundreds of laws found in the Old Testament, some less-than-honorable Pharisees found every loophole available so that they could gratify their desires without having to break an actual law.
Jesus addressed some of these Pharisaical loopholes throughout Matthew 5. The first loophole Jesus addressed was with respect to murder. His hearers had heard it said, “Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.” What they had heard was actually true. Exodus 20:13 says pretty explicitly, “You shall not murder.” Further, Exodus 21:13 allows the death penalty for someone who “kills another man deliberately.” No Pharisee would argue with that.
However, let’s suppose I am a recent convert to Judaism, and there is a person who I just hate. I have a new life and a new identity as one of God’s children, and I want to know how to rid this disease of a human being from my life. So I go to my rabbi and present my dilemma: “There’s this guy, and he just gets under my skin. Every time I see him, I just want to punch him in the face. Am I allowed to kill him?”
Any good rabbi would immediately say, “No, you can’t kill him.” But alas, there is a loophole! The Bible strictly forbids murder, but it doesn’t say anything about me making his life so miserable that he wishes he were dead! There is no verse telling me I cannot slash his tires. There is nothing telling me I can’t break out his windows, or spray graffiti on his house. Nothing tells me I can’t spit in his food, or even spit in his face, should I be so bold. So, no, technically I can’t kill him, but I can make him wish he were dead!
For Jesus, this is unacceptable. “I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment.” This statement would have shamed almost everyone in attendance: Who among us hasn’t been angry with another person? And if that is the case, who among us is any better than a cold-blooded killer?
I think two things must be addressed before proceeding further. First, Jesus here, and elsewhere in the sermon, is not closing the loophole by adding another rule. That would be counterproductive. He knows a thing or two about human nature, and if people were clever enough to create a loophole to one law, certainly people would be equally clever to discover more “loopholes” in secondary laws too. His desire is not to add laws on top of laws, but to focus on the intent or the heart of the Law.
The law against murder exists not because murder is inherently bad (that is true enough), but because God has placed such a high value on life that we are to preserve it at all costs. Therefore, it is possible to violate the intent of the law by making someone’s life miserable, even if you never break the written law by physically killing another human being.
Second, here and elsewhere, Jesus speaks in absolute categories which must be understood poetically, not practically. For instance, later in the Sermon, Jesus will condemn praying out loud (Matthew 6.5-6). Yet throughout his life, he prayed out loud on several occasions. He also insists that our prayers be “short and sweet” (Mat. 6.7-8), but later recommends that we be persistent in our prayers (Luke 18:1ff).
Jesus does not contradict himself; rather, he is making a practical point about prayer in a poetic style of speaking. In Matthew 5.22, Jesus is not condemning all anger. Jesus himself displayed anger in his own life (John 2:12-16) and certainly that anger was directed at people. Furthermore, in Matthew 23:17, he addressed Pharisees as “You blind fools!” after saying here that anyone who says “You fool” will be in danger of the fire of hell. There is a difference between anger which derives from righteous indignation at sin, injustice, and inequity and anger which derives from our egos being bruised. It is the latter that Jesus is addressing.
The kind of anger Jesus condemns is the kind of anger that derives from someone having offended you, and is the kind that inevitably leads to murder if not checked. Whether you have wronged someone else, or they have wronged you, unresolved anger between two people has the potential to violate the intent of the law, the high value placed on life. Jesus wants us to get that fixed immediately.
If you are offering your gift at the alter, and anger exists between you and a brother, leave the gift and go make it right immediately. If you are singing in church on a Sunday morning, and while singing, you remember that someone has something against you, stop singing! Leave church and go make it right! Believe me, your pastor will understand! Or, if you are being sued, and anger exists between you and the suer, right those wrongs immediately.
Jesus condemns unchecked, festering anger. To let anger boil and grow is unacceptable. If vicious anger is apparent in our lives, we should not think that we are any better than someone who has actually killed another person. The loophole is closed, not by adding a new rule, but by Jesus emphasizing the intent of the law: Life is sacred, and Jesus wants reconciliation of broken relationships.
There are two other points that need to be addressed. First, if a problem exits between you and someone else, you are to take the initiative to make it right. You are not to wait for that person to come to you. Jesus says if you are offering your gift and remember someone has something against you, LEAVE! You are to go make it right. If someone wants to sue you, you settle matters while you are still with him! Often times we feel that someone owes us an apology, and anger grows while we sit on our hands waiting for them to apologize. Perhaps someone does owe us an apology, but that doesn’t matter to Jesus. He tells us that we are to take the initiative to make it right.
Second, if you are busy looking for loopholes, for ways of getting what you want without actually breaking a law, you are no better than an actual law breaker. This applies to murder, but also to adultery, divorce, taking oaths, taking revenge, and a whole host of other things Jesus does not mention in the Sermon.
Just before his words about anger and murder, Jesus tells his hearers that their “righteousness” should surpass the Pharisees’ “righteousness.” The Pharisees’ “righteousness” aims to do whatever they please, as long as they don’t actually break a law. But you are to be different. Heeding the written law while breaking it’s intent does not surpass the Pharisees’ righteousness. What surpasses their righteousness is doing the right thing, because it is the right thing to do, even when everything inside you wants to do just the opposite. If you’re wondering how that is possible, consider Paul’s conclusion:
Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?
Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
Romans 7:24-25
Comments
Post a Comment