CHAPTER IV
THE REVISION OF THE OLD LAW
THE character of the citizens of the new kingdom as described by our Lord was so surprising, so paradoxical, that it was inevitable the question should arise, Was He a revolutionary who had come to upset and destroy all the old law—was this a revolutionary movement in the moral and religious world? To this question, then, our Lord directly addressed Himself. The rest of the first chapter of the Sermon on the Mount—St. Matthew v. 17 to the end—is simply a statement of the relation in which this new righteousness, this righteousness of the new kingdom, stands to the old righteousness of the Mosaic Law.
Our Lord explains that the new law stands in a double relation to the old. First, it is in direct continuity with what had gone before (vv. 17–19); and,secondly (vv. 20–48), it supersedes it, as the complete supersedes the incomplete.
(1) The continuity is thus stated:
“Think not that I came to destroy the law or the prophets: I came not to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law, till all things be accomplished. Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whosoever shall do and teach them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”
Here we get the divine principle of action. God does not despair of what is imperfect because it is imperfect. He views every institution (or person) not as it is, but as it is becoming; not by the level of its present attainment, but by the character and direction of its movement. Everything that is moving in the right direction is destined in the divine providence to reach its fulfilment. This was the case pre-eminently with the Old Testament. It was imperfect, but its tendency was directed aright. As St. Irenæus says“The commandments are common to the Jews and us: with them they had their beginning and origin, with us their development and completion.”[35] And St. Augustine: “The New Testament is latent in the Old, and the Old Testament is patent in the New.”[36] Here then we have our chief object-lesson in the method of divine education. If we examine the matter in detail, we shall see that in the New Testament every element in the Old Testament finds itself fulfilled.
Is it prophecy, in the sense of prediction? In the Old Testament an ideal is projected into the future by inspired men, and in Christ and His kingdom it is realized. Moreover, if you look to the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles or to St. Matthew’s Gospel, you will see how full the early Christians were of the sense of this realization, of the sense that in the Old Testament is a forecast and in the New a fulfilment. Or is it the ritual law? You study its enactments in Leviticus; and then you read the Epistle to the Hebrews. You see how, to the mind of the spiritual Jewish-Christian writer, in the old law is external symbol and in Christ spiritual realization. Or is it the moral law? You compare the Ten Commandments in the Old Testamentwith our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount or St. James’ Epistle. They stand to one another as preliminary education to final enlightenment. And in another sense law altogether is represented by St. Paul as only the training of slaves or children in preparation for the sonship or manhood which is reached when the Spirit is given.
Or, once more, is it types of character that are in question? You know the old difficulty about Jacob and Esau. How can we approve of Jacob who was so deceitful? How can we disapprove of Esau who was so generous and impulsive? The answer is a deep and true one.It is that Esau’s impulsive nature led to nothing; he was “profane”;[37] in fact, Edom—the race of which Esau is the parent and type—produced nothing, changed nothing, brought nothing to perfection. Jacob, for all his mendacity, knew what it was to be in covenant with God, and his race grew into the likeness of God. Israel led to something.
All the imperfect elements in the Old Testament—and, of course, they are imperfect—reach fulfilment in the New.They enshrine the will of God at a certain stage. Therefore they are worthy of respect. They are to be realized, not violated. And so our Lord goes on to warn His disciples lest, in the enthusiasm of the new teaching, they should think that they could best show their zeal by disparaging elements in the old law under which they had been brought up. For it is always the case that when people have learned something new, their first impulse is to show what they have learned by disparaging what they knew before. Thus our Lord warns them of the low place in His kingdom which they will hold who exhibit towards even the details of the older teaching a spirit of destructiveness, and of the high esteem which will be accorded to the reverent handling of it.