Talk:Matt 5:13-48

light shine vs trumpeting good works

RobertC, Thanks for writing this up. I've been thinking about what you wrote on the commentary over the past 24 hours. And the more I think about it the more sense it makes. In the way I think about it what is said here is parallel to someone saying "do A for X reason" and "do not A for Y reason." These two statements aren't contradictory because whether we should do A depends on whether X is the case or Y. --Matthew Faulconer 12:30, 13 Jun 2006 (UTC)

Matthew and Robert. I have a double response to this situation (I call it a situation because I mean Robert's comment and Matthew's discussion of it). First, does explanation release "tension"? Should it? Tension, it seems to me, is an outward manifestation of the interplay between something heavenly and something earthly. If an explanation releases that tension too quickly, then it seems that one of two things has happened: either the tension was created entirely by a misunderstanding or the tension is, through the explanation, being misinterpreted, displaced, or misrepresented. I don't know which of these two is happening here, but I wonder that there isn't more to the tension than this first comment (Robert's) suggests. That Jesus says these statements both within the same discourse is significant. How does the broader structure of the text suggest they be read against each other, etc.? Second, building on the first and now responding more directly to Matthew, I suppose: Is "A" really a variable that can be replaced with both "letting one's light shine" and "doing alms"? It is clear that in some sense these two are connected, but how is not at all clear. Might we look more profoundly at the key word "works" in verse 16 here? Might we consider the word "hypocrite" in chapter 6 (indeed, throughout the chapter)? I think the verses remain relatively uninterpreted here, and we have some more work to do.

Let me conclude this plaintive piece with the following. None of this is to say that we are not right to feel a tension in the Sermon on the Mount. Rather, it is to say that any such tension should call our attention (at-tension?) loudly, should be heard to be calling us to think very profoundly. Every revelation of a tension is not a call for release, but a call for work, for thinking, for discovery, and so, I think, a call to work through something divine, and into the tension of tensions (to stand before God, face to face--tense moment!). And what other tensions are we releasing too quickly? Does this connect with the discussion and comments at Judg 14:19? --Joe Spencer 18:01, 13 Jun 2006 (UTC)

Joe, I agree that tensions in the text are a call to think more profoundly. I hope what I wrote is taken as a possible beginning to such thinking, not as an end in any sense. I also agree that we are not justified in equating "good works" with "giving alms," though I think it does make sense to consider parallels/similarities between the two concepts/phrases.

You say: "If an explanation releases that tension too quickly, then it seems that one of two things has happened: either the tension was created entirely by a misunderstanding or the tension is, through the explanation, being misinterpreted, displaced, or misrepresented." If your emphasis is on too quickly, then I think I understand and agree, but then your statement seems a tautology: if we dismiss the tension too quickly, then the explanation is a misinterpration (or the tension was a misinterpretation in the first place). So I think I'm not following your point here (though, as I said above, I agree that tension makes for an indespensable and rich ingredient in the scriptures). --RobertC 04:41, 14 Jun 2006 (UTC)

I agree with broadly Joe's points and Robert's. But though I often join into the meta-discussions, I wonder if this is a case similar to the one Joe pointed our earlier related to 1st Nephi: writing about how we write here is less fruitfull then writing about the scriptures themselves. Or, to put it another way, if Joe or anyone thinks the tension is released too quickly, by all means feel free to explain the difficulty of the tension more clearly by editing the commentary. I may disagree with that edit but at that point we will have something specific to discuss. The attempt to write commentary and rewrite someone else's is, in my view at least, part of the process of studying the scriptures, part of the process of (to roughly paraphrase Joe above) working, thinking, and discovering the divine.

--Matthew Faulconer 06:00, 16 Jun 2006 (UTC)

With thanks to Matthew for calling me to repentance with my own words! (There was, by the way, no tongue in cheek, no sarcasm, no joke in that thank you.) But perhaps a word of response to Matthew, and a word of response to Robert, and then on to the commentary pages. Matthew, the reason I have turned in the past few weeks to the discussion pages is because there has been no further movement in the direction of a community project. I have found that the community here seems only to emerge on the discussion pages, and so I have turned, reluctantly, to them to find the community project the wiki itself suggests. Is it worth resurrecting the suggestion that we collectively choose a block of scripture for a week or two and work on it together, mostly by working and reworking commentary (our own and each others) on that block, and with minimal discussion on the talk page as necessary to keep it going? The idea thrills me. Robert, I think you got me right, though I don't see how it becomes a tautology. My emphasis is indeed on "too quickly." If it releases too quickly, then either: one, there is no real tension, and its quick release points to the fact; or two, there is a real tension, but it is being misread, so that it releases only misunderstandingly. I do believe that some very difficult tensions will eventually release, but that can only happen with a good deal of work and time. Those, ultimately, will prove to have been no tensions, but ones we will have had to work through at some length to find that out. --Joe Spencer 17:30, 19 Jun 2006 (UTC)

Joe, by tautology, I simply meant that there is already a judgment implicit in the phrase "too quickly." Regarding tension in the scriptures, I think I may be using that word a bit too sloppily. What I have in mind is something more like an apparent contradiction which, upon further study, turns out not to be a contradiction after all. This seems similar to your view above. (As Joseph Smith put it, "In proving contraries, truth is made manifest.") --RobertC 19:27, 19 Jun 2006 (UTC)

Joe, ...uggghhh... sorry I didn't mean it to come off as a reprimand. regarding your suggesting of picking a passage and working with it for a while my problem currently is that I have too many places where I want to get back to the discussion that has already started. If we are just looking for any place what about Abraham chapter 3? I've always wondered what that was about? Other suggestions? --Matthew Faulconer 04:50, 20 Jun 2006 (UTC) (Or maybe we start with D&C 59:24 since you just started it and it seems like an interesting place to start.)

Matt 5:22-24

In verses 22-24, we see reference to the 'altar'. Upon my studying, I realised something... in the temple we find that the altar is symbolic of Christ. We are sealed over the altar which is symbolic of building our families and marriages upon the Rock (Christ). We pledge to sacrifice all of ourselves for the benefit of our loved ones and the kingdom of God, and we do it over the altar (Christ, the ultimate sacrifice). Now, if we take that in context and re-read verses 22-24, it can take on a whole new meaning. In verse 22 we see that if we have sinned (if we become angry with our brother... etc) we are in danger of the judgment, and hell fire. In verses 23 and 24, we learn exactly what we can do to escape our inevitable fate. We need to bring our 'gift' before the 'altar' and 'go thy way'. In vs. 24 it emphasises that we must leave the gift there, and we must reconsile to the person we've sinned against. I thought that the ultimate gift we can give Christ and leave with him are our sins... especially if we never come back to them. By doing this, we are showing Him that we are putting to use his amazing gift, the atonement. We are giving him our will. We are giving him the opportunity to save us. Leave your gifts upon the altar... leave your sins with Christ, and go thy way.