First Baptist Bible Study 8/29/23

" An eye for an eye"

Matthew 5:38-48

The old law directed judges to inflict penalties precisely equivalent to offences-’an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth’ {Exodus 21:24}, but that direction was not for the guidance of individuals. It was suited for the stage of civilisation in which it was given, and probably was then a restriction, rather than a sanction, of the wild law of retaliation. Jesus sweeps it away entirely, and goes much further than even its abrogation. For He forbids not only retaliation but even resistance. What, then, is it not to resist? Our Lord gives three concrete illustrations of what He enjoins, the first of which refers to insults such as contumelious blows on the cheek, which are perhaps the hardest not to meet with a flash of anger and a returning stroke; the second of which refers to assaults on property, such as an attempt at legal robbery of a man’s undergarment; the third of which refers to forced labour, such as impressing a peasant to carry military or official baggage or documents-a form of oppression only too well known under Roman rule in Christ’s days. In regard to all three cases, He bids His disciples submit to the indignity, yield the coat, and go the mile.