WORDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT AND EXHORTATION

The final cadence of the Sermon on the Mount conveys to us the most characteristic feature of Jesus' teaching:

    "He taught as one who had authority, and not as one of their teachers of the law" (Matt. 7:29).
It should be borne in mind that from the ordinary person's point of view Jesus was merely a 30-year old carpenter from Nazareth. His authority is not only evident in the fact that he "beatified" people with prophetic command, but also in the content of his words of exhortation. The latter half of the Sermon on the Mount gives a hint of what his audience would feel in their hearts on hearing those words:
    "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also . . . No-one can serve two masters.For he will either hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Mammon . . . Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?. . . Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. By their fruit you will recognise them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognise them . . . Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven."
We can observe, in the way this exhortation is presented, something which has gone unnoticed by Western theology, something which exemplifies a style of rhetoric typical of the Midrashim. In all these examples we first find the issue presented, then its obverse followed by the grounds which support the argument. The Orthodox Jewish professor Myron Bialik Lerner devotes much space in his doctoral thesis on Midrash Ruth to the Midrash literature's presentation format, citing, at several points, the words of Jesus. He sees in the figure of the "good tree" an invertible structure:
     a) Likewise every good tree
     a) bears good fruit
     b) but a bad tree
     b) bears bad fruit
     a) A good tree
     b) cannot bear bad fruit
     b) and a bad tree
     a) cannot bear good fruit

Lerner also refers to the words of Jesus regarding the serving of two masters and cites the Midrash's interpretation of Job 3:19, according to which in the Grave the "small and the great" are on equal footing, and the "slave is freed from his master". The Midrash says "'And the slave is freed from his master': This man, in his life, served two masters; He was the slave of his Creator and of his nature
     a) while doing his Creator's will
     b) he was frustrated in his nature,
     b) and while doing according to his nature,
     a) he vexed his Creator."29

Professor Lerner gives grounds for the early date of Midrash Ruth from the gospel of Matthew because of the identical presentation format of both. Referring to the the Beatitudes and Woes of the Sermon on the Mount he says that:

    "Clearly, the preaching style of the gospels reflects an early rhetorical style as manifested in the first Christian century and thereafter. The same style evident in the older strata of Midrash Ruth suggests that it too exemplifies the preaching of the Tannaite period." 30
The observations we have made raise a sensitive question. New Testament exegesis has been dominated for the past 50 years by the theory of Rudolf Bultmann that the gospels were not composed until after the destruction of the Temple, and that they reflect "what the Church believed," the kerygma or 'preaching' of the Church's beliefs, rather than the unadulterated teaching of the historical Jesus. The task of the theologian was thus to strip them of their mythical garb. In the words of Professor David Flusser, such "demythologising" results, effectively, in the "estrangement [of the gospels] from all historicity" (Entrealisierung), and does not correspond to the true picture of the ground from which they arose.

Bultmann may nevertheless have had some inkling that the form in which the gospels are cast is in fact reminiscent of the Midrash style, and that in this respect their preaching quality ought to be acknowledged. But the Midrash strives to record ideas as accurately as possible. Nowadays, when we are better placed to compare the message of the NT with the Jewish roots underlying it, and when the composition of the gospels is apparently to be given a very early date, the most trustworthy way to understand Jesus is still to take his words as they stand.

Jesus' allegory of the Broad and Narrow Ways is another which accords well with Jewish thought. When describing eternal punishment and eternal death the Talmud states that there are "two roads before us; one to paradise and the other to perdition"31 Regarding judging our neighbour, Rabbi Meir, the foremost pupil of Rabbi Aqiba, says in the second Christian century: "In the measure with which one measures, so will it be meted out to him."32 In a discussion which appears later it is said that, "He who defends his friend will likewise be defended . . . to the same extent that he who is on my side, God will be on his side in the Judgement."33 Jesus' audience well understood what he meant.

The analogy of the Mote and the Beam is similarly echoed in the Talmud. Rabbi Terphon, who received his instruction from contemporaries of Jesus, the elder Gamaliel and Johanan Ben Zakkai, says that "If someone urges you to remove the speck from your eye, he must be given the answer, 'Take the plank out of your own!"'34 One hundred years later, a certain Johanan commenting on the first verse of Ruth - "In the days when the judges judged . . ." - says that, "this generation judges its judges; but if someone should say to you, 'Remove the speck from your eye,' say to him, 'Remove the plank from your own eye."35

When Jesus says that we cannot serve "both God and mammon", because we can only love one or the other, he may have been alluding to something well-known and generally acknowledged. In Deut. 6:5 we read the commandment to love God "with all your heart, all your soul and all your strength". The Synagogue's officially approved Targum, that of Onqelos, interprets this as, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul and with all your possessions." Targum Jonathan renders the end of the verse as, "and with all your mammon". Both of these old renditions seek to direct love into practical channels. Luke 12, which might be considered a continuation of the Sermon on the Mount's analogy, speaks of "purses . . . that will not wear out" and "treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near". Speaking of the danger of needless anxiety it says, "A man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions." There is indeed good reason to examine these two figures from Luke's gospel when trying to determine what lies behind the Sermon on the Mount.

Practical life and obedience are clearly apparent in the final section of the Sermon, in which Jesus speaks of the "hearing and doing" of his words. In Hebrew the word 'hear' is used in two different ways. If it is conjoined with the prefix eth-, which marks the accusative, we 'hear something'. If, on the other hand, it is followed by the "inessive" marker be- (meaning 'in'), then 'hearing' becomes 'hearkening': we 'obey' the word. Jesus always makes an appeal to our 'inner being' and looks for practical conclusions as the result of the words we have heard. We remember St Peter testifying before the Sanhedrin to the work of the Holy Spirit:

    "We are all witnesses of these things and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him."
There is in the Talmud a parable which is reminiscent of Jesus' allegory of the houses built on sand or on rock:
    "The man who has studied the Torah extensively and who has many good works brings to mind a person who has built his house with a foundation of stone and the upper part of clay. When the floods come and surround it, the stones will remain in their place. But of whom is the man reminiscent who learns the Torah but has no good works? He is like one who builds the foundation of clay and the rest of stone. Even a small stream will demolish his house immediately."36
This story, which dates from the beginning of the second century, may well betray Christian influence, since the Rabbi to whom it is attributed, Elisha Ben Abuya, ultimately converted to Christianity. Finnish folk humour has come up with a similar saying: "Many are the fools on this earth: they build a house on the ice and then ask in the village if it will last."

Although Jesus did in fact teach as one with authority, we see, none-theless, that he used language common to the scribes. We must, how-ever, remember that all Christian acts of charity receive their impulse from the love of Jesus rather than anything else. He it was who, availing himself of the characteristic Midrash mirror form, taught in Matthew 25:35-46:

    "For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat . . . For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat . . . Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty . . . Whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me!"
It is this Midrash reciprocal style which gives the gospel its strength and firmness of purpose.

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

The teachings of Jesus by their very nature raise the classic question as to which came first, the chicken or its egg. Did Jesus get his Torah from the learned scholars of his time or vice versa? In the West the thinking is generally like that of the stamp collector, that the older the data the more valuable its testimony. In Judaism the belief goes that the interpretation of tradition is constantly developing and that the later schools of Rabbis give more valuable material for the interpretation of the Torah.

A comparison of Jesus' words with those of the Talmud shows us immediately that Rabbinic parallels to the gospel sayings date mostly from hundreds of years after Jesus' time and so could not have been borrowed by him. The Synagogue, furthermore, strove consciously to avoid any interpretation which might have been construed as Messianic. This can be seen, to cite one example, in the fact that the Targum of Jonathan was shunned because of its particularly pointed Messianic tenor. The Talmud tells us how the Bath Qol, the 'daughter of a voice' or voice from heaven, was heard to say "Enough!" when Jonathan began to interpret the prophets, "For they speak of the Messianic End-Times", qets ha-Mashiah37 Synagogal prejudice is further attested to by the fact that the word MIMRA - the equivalent of the Greek logos - which appears almost 600 times in the Targums and which in the Rabbinic literature refers in many places to the Messiah, has been completely censored from the Talmud. When the celebrated R. Aqiba suggested that the plural "thrones" set before the Ancient of Days in Daniel 7:9 indicated "one for God and one for the Messiah", he was rebuked by R. Yosi for lending support to Jewish-Christian ideas.38 The Talmud similarly describes how R. Eliezer, a friend of Gamaliel, was accused towards the end of his life of being a Jewish Christian, and that he was forced to live in isolation in his home in Lydda, excommunicated from the Synagogue.

The harshest form of exclusion from the Synagogue, herem, meant in practice that as far as the subject's family was concerned, he was more or less dead. We should not, therefore, be surprised that one of the chief appellations for Jewish-Christians, meshummad, 'the annihilated', was always the lot of those who professed faith in Jesus. R. Aqiba decreed that, "he who reads uncanonical books has no part in the future life" referring to the literature of the Minim, the Jewish-Christians.39 The Rabbis further ruled that the books of the Minim were not to be rescued from a fire; "May they burn and their memory with them". Nor could they be salvaged "from ruins or from water".40 By such harsh means the Synagogue did indeed succeed in preventing the intrusion of Christian teaching into Judaism, but surprisingly, as several critics have shown, in its relation to the superstitions and other customs arising from alien Babylonian idolatry the Talmud was unable to maintain an equally hard line.41

The Rabbis were not, however, afraid of borrowing from Christianity when they saw fit to do so. Ernest Renan, the Jewish-born French thinker and orientalist, says in his Life of Jesus that there are innumerable pronouncements in the Talmud ascribed to Jewish Rabbis but which belong originally to Jesus.42 Many of these have undergone obvious modifications, the saying of R. Sheshet (ca. 285 AD), for example, that, "If a man even looks lustfully at a woman's little finger, he has committed adultery with her,"43 and that of Rabba (ca. 320-363 AD) that, "The people are wont to say: 'If someone asks you for an ass, give him the saddle with it'."44

We must concede that there is much in common between the language and questioning style of Jesus and of the Rabbis. In dozens of Rabbinic utterances, however, the influence of the Judaeo-Christian Church on the Synagogue is clearly apparent - how could it be otherwise? These parallels to the gospel in the Talmud are nevertheless rare pearls on the bed of an infinite ocean, as has already been observed, and they are truly few and far between.45 Bearing this in mind it must be granted that Jesus' teaching is neither an adaptation of the ideas of his contemporaries nor the mere expression of the Church's beliefs, but that it originated with himself.

The parables of Jesus in chronological order.

One of the most intractable of all New Testament problems is the placing of everything in its correct setting and order. This renders difficult both the finding and the understanding of the parables and teaching. When we group Jesus' preaching and parables into historico-chronological order we will notice not only the fundamental nature of each gospel but also its purpose.

The gospel of Mark is the clearest interpreter of Jesus' deeds. Papias at the beginning of the second century tells us that:

    "Mark, indeed, having been the interpreter of Peter, wrote accurately, howbeit not in order, all that he recalled of what was either said or done by the Lord . He kept a single aim in view: not to omit anything of what he heard, nor to state anything therein falsely."
In Matthew, on the other hand, we find a long list of Jesus' parables and preaching. Luke's work shows that he travelled the length and breadth of the Holy Land questioning and collecting an abundant harvest of teaching and parables which were entirely lacking from the Galilean Levi. Perhaps Matthew did not consider Jesus' Perean ministry as important as did the Gentile-born Luke. John, however, as we can see at a glance, strictly disciplined himself to describing only the events to which he himself had been an eye-witness and which had not been related by the others. The evangelists division of labour was remarkably clear and consistent.

The grouping of the parables and teaching sessions into historico-chronological order will make things clear both for those who wish to familiarise themselves with the Bible on their own and for Bible study groups. At the same time the breadth and scope of Jesus' ministry is made clear.
 
The Galilean Phase  Matt. Mark Luke
1. Two debtors 7:36-50
2. The Parable of the Sower 13:1-23  4:1-20 8:4-15 
3. The Growing seed 4:26-29 
4. The Weeds 13:24-30, 36-43 
5. The Mustard Seed  13:31-32 4:30-32
6. The Yeast  13:33 
7. The Hidden Treasure  13:44 
8. The Pearl of Greatest Price  13:45-46 
9. The Net  13:47-50
Eight of these parables speak of the nature of the kingdom of heaven. From the period between the Galilean and Perean phases Matthew gives the parable of the
 
10.Unmerciful Servant  18:21-35     
The parables from the ministry in Perea are recorded by Luke. Now the main issues are how people relate to Jesus and the acceptance of the love of God. The various stages of Perea give the light to Jesus' own missionary activity.
 
The Perean area  Matt. Mark Luke
11. The Good Samaritan 10:25-37
12. The Rich Fool  12:16-21
13. The Tree without Fruit 13:6-9
14. The Places of Honour at the Wedding Feast  14:7-11
15. The Great Banquet 14:15-24
16. The Cost of being a Disciple  14:25-35
17. The Lost Sheep  15:1-7
18. The Lost Coin  15:8-10
19. The Prodigal Son  15:11-32
20. The Shrewd Manager 16:1-13
21. The Rich Man and Lazarus 16:19-31 
22. The cause of sin and the millstone 17:1-2 
23. Faith which can uproot a mulberry tree 17:5-6
24. The Unworthy Servant  17:7-10
25. The Persistent Widow  18:1-8 
26. The Pharisee and the Publican in the Temple 18:9-14
27. The Workers in the Vineyard 20:1-16   
28. The Ten Talents and the nobleman -  who went to a far country   19:11-28 
 
The Parables of Passion week
 
29. The Two Sons and the request to work  in the vineyard 21:28-32
30. The Vineyard to which the owner  ultimately sends his own son 21:33-46 12:1-12 20:9-19 
31. The Wedding Banquet 
     and the invited guests		 22:1-14
32. The Ten Virgins  25:1-13
33. The servants and the 
     talents they received 		 25:14-30
 
We can see that the parables are mainly divided between Matthew and Luke. Matthew records three parables about a vineyard, traditionally a type of Israel, and two descriptions of weddings. As a general rule we could say that the parables connected with the Kingdom of Heaven and with Jesus' Second Coming are found in Matthew, the others in Luke.

Jesus' teaching discourses in chronological order.

Just as the parables can be divided into uniform groups, the discourses too fall into broad sections, although the agreement of the Synoptists - Matthew, Mark and Luke - is most marked in the description of the miracles. We often find deeds and discourses dovetailing so perfectly together that it is difficult to work out to which section each should be apportioned. It would appear that the value of the testimony of Jesus' miracles was regarded as more important than that of his individual discourses. It is illustrative that of the miracles, 13 are related in 3 or 4 of the gospels, 8 in 2 gospels, 6 only in John and 5 only in Luke - Matthew and Mark have not a single independent miracle account. The independence of John and Luke is also clearly in evidence in Jesus' teaching discourses.

The early stages of Jesus' ministry
 
JERUSALEM   Matt.  Mark  Luke  John 
1. Nicodemus hears of the New Birth.   3:1-21 
SAMARIA 
2. The Samarian woman and the Living Water   4:4-26
The Ministry in Galilee 
3. Jesus' relationship with his Father   5:17-47 
4. The Sermon on the Mount 5-7  6:17-49 
5. The road to the Father is through the Son 11:25-30 
6. Jesus, the Bread of Life  6:22-71
7. Tradition and Hypocrisy  15:1-20 7:1-23 
8. Humbling oneself  and forgiving others  18  9:33-50 9:46-50 
9. Christ, the Light of the World 8:12-30 
10.Jesus and the legacy of Abraham 8:31-59 
The Perean periods of activity Matt.  Mark Luke  John 
11. Jesus, the Good Shepherd  10:1-21 
12. Persistence in prayer 11:1-13
13. The authority of Jesus and the inconsistences of the teaching of the Pharisees  11:14-54
14. The life of faith: its fundamentals and its impact 12:1-59 
15. The coming of the Kingdom of God 17:20-18:8
The teaching given during Passion Week
Discourses given on Tuesday Matt. Mark Luke John
16. Rebukes to the Pharisees  23:1-39 12:38-40 20:45-47
17. Teaching on the End of the Age 24-25 13 21:5-38 
Discourses on Thursday to the Disciples
18. Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life 14
19. Jesus, the True Vine 15
20. Persecutions and the consolation of the Holy Spirit  16
21. Jesus prays for his followers  17
 
 We see again that John has recorded eleven wide-ranging teaching discourses of which the other evangelists say nothing at all. Similarly, Luke, particularly from the Perean period, has collected independent discourses. All the Synoptic gospels have preserved Jesus' attitude to the Pharisees and also his teaching on the End of the Age. Surprise has sometimes been expressed as to why John says nothing of Jesus' eschatological teaching but the reason is that he more than makes up for this with his Book of Revelation.

The Jews sometimes use an old Aramaic saying, saphra saipha, 'the letter is a sword'. The compilers of the gospels have given to the Church precious and trustworthy weapons. The question does indeed arise as to what the work of the disciples would have been without the gospels they have passed on to us, or to where Paul's influence on the subsequent history of the Church would have melted away without his epistles. Truly: saphra saipha!
----------
29.    Myron Biliak Lerner, Agadat Ruth ve-Midrash Ruth Rabbah, vol. I pp 78 and 42. In Hebrew there is a pun an the words Yotsêr, 'Creator', and yetser, 'character', 'nature', and 'inclination'.
30.    Ibid. p156.
31.    Berakoth 28b.
32.    Sanhedrin 100a.
33.    Shabbath 127b.
34.    Arachin 16b.
35.    Baba Bathra 15b.
36.    Aboth, from the beginning of ch. 24.
37.    Megillah 3a.
38.    Sanhedrin 38b.
39.    Sanhedrin 100b.
40.    Shabbath 116a.
41.    The subject was written on 100 years ago by Renan, Wellhausen, Edersheim and the Jewish E. Deutsch, among others.
42.    Renan, Vie de Jésus, p108.
43.    Berakoth 24a.
44.    Baba Kamma 92b.
45.    Eg. F.W. Farrar, Life of Christ, II p485.

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