p. 197 | The Sabbath School

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 5, 1881

The Sabbath School.

LESSON FOR PACIFIC COAST.—MAY 8. The Sermon on the Mount. Matt. 5 : 13-37.

LESSON COMMENTS.

Of the preaching of Jesus, the gospel preserves numerous fragments, but no lengthened abstract of any single discourse, except that of the “Sermon on the Mount.” It seems to have been delivered immediately after the choice of the twelve, to the disciples at large and the multitude who thronged to hear the new Rabbi. Descending from the higher point to which he had called up his apostles, he came towards the crowd, which waited for him at a level place below. There were numbers from every part—from Judea and Jerusalem in the south, and even from the sea-coast of Tyre and Sidon; some to hear him, others to be cured of their diseases, and many to be delivered from unclean spirits. The commotion and excitement were great at his appearance, for it had been found that to touch him was to be cured, and, hence, all sought, either by their own efforts or with the help of friends, to get near enough to him to do so. After a time, however, the tumult was stayed, all having been healed, and he proceeded, before they broke up, to care for their spiritual, as well as he had already for their physical wants.

Tradition has chosen the hill known as the “Horns of Hattin,” two horn-like heights, rising sixty feet above the plain between them—two hours west of Tiberias, at the mouth of the gorge which opens, past Magdala, into the wild cliffs of Arbela, famous in the history of the Zealots as their hiding place, and famous also for Herod’s battles in mid-air at the mouths of their caves, by means of great cages filled with soldiers let down the precipices. It is greatly in favor of this site, to find such a writer as Dean Stanley saying that the situation so strikingly coincides with the intimations of the gospel narrative, as almost to force the inference, that, in this instance, the eye of those who selected the spot was rightly guided. The plain on which the hill stands is easily accessible from the lake, and it is only a few minutes’ walk from it to the summit, before reaching which, a broad “level place” has to be crossed—exactly suited for the gathering of a multitude together. It was to this, apparently, that Jesus came down, from one of the higher horns, to address the people. Seated on some slightly elevated rock—for the teacher always sat while he taught—the people and the disciples sitting at his feet, on the grass; the cloudless Syrian sky over them; the blue lake, with its moving life, on the one hand, and in the far north, the grand form of Hermon, glittering in the upper air; he began what is to us the Magna Charta of our faith, and to the hearers must have been the formal inauguration of the new kingdom of God.

—Geikie’s Life of Christ, pp. 417, 418.

“Ye are the salt of the earth.” The people could see the white salt, glistening in the pathway, where it had been cast out because it had lost its savor and was therefore useless. Jesus used salt as an illustration of the Christian’s life and teachings upon the world. Were it not for the few righteous who inhabit the earth, the wrath of God would not be delayed a moment from punishing the wicked. But the prayers and good works of the people of God preserve the world; they are the savor of life. But if Christians are only so in name, if they have not virtuous characters and godly lives, they are like the salt that has lost its savor. Their influence upon the world is bad; they are worse than unbelievers.

Jesus took objects in the view of his listeners as emblems by which to teach his truth. The people had come together to hear him while it was yet early morning. The glorious sun, climbing higher and higher in the blue sky, was chasing away the shadows that lurked in the valleys and among the narrow defiles of the mountains. The glory of the eastern heavens had not yet faded out. The sunlight flooded the land with its splendor, the placid surface of the lake reflected the golden light, and mirrored the rosy clouds of morning. Every bud and flower and leafy spray glistened with dew-drops. Nature smiled under the benediction of a new day, and the birds sang sweetly among the spreading trees. The Saviour looked upon the company before him, and then upon the rising sun, and said to his disciples, “Ye are the light of the world.” The figure was peculiarly striking. As the sun lit up the landscape with his genial rays and scattered the shades of night, so the disciples were to diffuse the light of truth, and scatter the moral darkness that brooded over the world. In the brilliant light of morning the towns and villages situated in the surrounding country, stood forth clearly and made an attractive feature of the scene. Jesus, pointing to them said, “A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in Heaven.” In these words Jesus taught his disciples that if they wished to direct others in the path of righteousness, their own example should be correct, and their acts reflect the light of truth.

“Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily, I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.” Here Jesus refutes the charge of the Pharisees. His mission to the world is to vindicate the claims of that sacred law which they charge him with breaking. If the law of God could have been changed or abolished, then Christ need not have come to a fallen world to suffer the consequence of man’s transgression. Jesus came to explain the relation of the law of God to man, and to illustrate its precepts by his own example of obedience. He further declares that, “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of Heaven.” Thus did the Saviour declare the validity of the moral law. Those who disobey the commandments of God, and teach others to do the same by their example and doctrine, are condemned by Christ.—Spirit of Prophecy, Vol. 2, pp. 214, 215, 218.

Jesus had a very different conception of the law from that of the Rabbis. To him it meant the sacred moral commands given from Sinai. The whole apparatus of ceremony and rite at first connected with them, were only rude external accommodations to the childhood of religion, to aid the simple and gross ideas of early ages. Looking beneath the symbol to the essential truth, it was a lofty, religious, moral, and social legislation, far deeper, wiser, holier, and more complete than the highest human system. He knew how the prophets had drawn from it the pure and exalted conceptions they had enforced, anticipating in their spirituality his own teaching. But centuries lay between him and the prophets, and Judaism had sunk to a painful idolatry of the letter and outward form of the law, to the neglect of its spirit and substance. The exile had weakened and perverted the national conscience, and a burning zeal for rigid external observance of the letter had followed the just belief that their national troubles had been a punishment for previous shortcomings.—Geikie, p. 426.