Jesus doesn’t teach like scribes.

Mark 1.21-22, Matthew 7.28-29. Luke 4.31-32.

As Jesus wrapped up his Sermon on the Mount, Matthew includes a comment about the way he taught his lessons, and the way his listeners reacted to it:

Matthew 7.28-29 KWL

28It happens when Jesus finishes these lessons,

the masses are amazed at his teaching:

29Jesus’s teaching isn’t like their scribes,

but like one who has authority.

It’s much the same way Mark and Luke described it when Jesus first began teaching in synagogue. Even walking-around rabbis like Jesus would teach in synagogue: They’d teach their kids on weekdays, and the general population on Sabbath—meaning Friday night after sundown. (Jewish days go from sundown to sundown, not midnight to midnight.)

Pharisee custom was for the synagogue president to let anyone anyone he recognized as a valid teacher, have the floor. Visiting rabbis and scribes, new guys, or young teachers spoke first. This wasn’t necessarily to honor them. If any of ’em turned out to be wrong, as sometimes they did, the last teacher—usually the synagogue’s senior scribe—would correct them, and get the last word. Synagogues were schools, Pharisees liked to debate, and sometimes they’d spend all night debating. Good thing it was Sabbath; in the morning everyone could sleep in.

Anyway, debates kept synagogue really interesting. But if the synagogue president (and later the Christian ἐπίσκοπος/epískopos, “supervisor”) couldn’t keep order, or when people lack the Spirit’s fruit, it could also become chaos. As you know, some people just don’t know how to be civil. They deliberately pick fights, or make personal attacks. Some will nitpick stupid things, defend loopholes, and spread misinformation. The evening could become an unprofitable waste. Happened among the early Christians too. Tt 3.9-11 Which is discouraging.

Into the belly of this beast, Jesus went to teach about God’s kingdom. Mark says this happened after he collected his first students from their boats; Luke puts this story before he collected ’em. Either way.

Mark 1.21-22 KWL

21Jesus and his students enter Capharnaum.

Next, on entering synagogue on Sabbath,

Jesus is teaching—

22and people are amazed at his teaching.

For in his teaching, Jesus acts like one who has authority,

and not like scribes.

Luke 4.31-32 KWL

31Jesus comes down to Capharnaum,

a city in the Galilee.

He’s teaching the citizens on Sabbath.

32 and they’re amazed at Jesus’s teaching—

because his word is given with authority.

The house on the rock.

Matthew 7.24-27, Luke 6.47-49.

Jesus concludes his Sermon on the Mount with his well-known analogy of building a house on bedrock, as opposed to building it on sand. Living by his teachings is building on bedrock. Ignoring his teachings is building on sand.

I live in California, where we see examples of this analogy played out on a yearly basis: Bad weather comes, and houses which were not built on anything solid either slide down hills, slide off cliffs, or slide into the ocean. Modern-day construction doesn’t bother to dig for bedrock; we build our own “bedrock,” namely steel-reinforced concrete foundations. Which is fine on a level plain which isn’t in danger of flooding, but people build houses everywhere, and don’t always plan for the worst.

Before Jesus became a rabbi he was a builder. Mk 6.3 Or “carpenter,” if you wanna go with the traditional interpretation of τέκτων/tékton—which doesn’t account for the fact a tékton is a person who builds stuff. Could be out of wood, but téktoni could also work in stone or metal, and could build both small things and large—including houses. So when Jesus discusses house-building, he knew what he was talking about. Heck, as Creator, Jn 1.3 when he discusses creating anything, he knows what he’s talking about.

Matthew 7.24-27 KWL

24“So whoever hears these teachings of mine

and does them

will become like a wise man

who builds himself a house on bedrock.

25The rain comes down,

the current comes in,

the winds blow,

and slam into that house—

and it doesn’t fall down,

for it was grounded on bedrock.

26And whoever hears these teachings of mine

and doesn’t do them

will become like a stupid man

who builds himself a house on sand.

27The rain comes down,

the current comes in,

the winds blow,

and slam into that house—

and it falls,

and it’s a huge disaster.”

Luke 6.47-49 KWL

47“Everyone coming to me,

hearing my teachings, doing them—

I’ll show you² what it’s like.

48It’s like a person building a house,

who digs, digs deep,

and makes a foundation on bedrock.

The flood-tide coming, the river bursts upon that house,

and isn’t strong enough to shake it,

because it’s well-built.

49Hearers who don’t do as I teach:

It’s like a person building a house

directly on the ground, without a foundation.

The river bursts on it,

and next it collapses.

The destruction of that house becomes great.”

When Jesus says, “I don’t know you.”

Matthew 7.21-23, Luke 6.46, 13.23-27.

Christians, particularly Evangelicals, quote this next teaching of Jesus a lot. But we tend to do this because we wanna nullify it. It’s scary.

See, it implies there are people who wanna get into God’s kingdom, who honestly think they’re headed there… but when they stand before Jesus at the End, they get the rug pulled out from under them. Turns out they have no relationship with Jesus. Never did. He never knew them. Psyche!

It sounds like the dirtiest trick ever. How can a Christian go their whole life thinking they’re saved, only to find out no they’re not, and they’re not getting into the kingdom? And by process of elimination, they’re therefore going into the fire? Holy crap; shouldn’t this keep us awake nights?

So like I said, Christians figure the solution to this quandary is to nullify it. “Chill out, people: This story isn’t about you. ’Cause you’re good! You said the sinner’s prayer and believe all the right things. This story applies to the people who won’t say the sinner’s prayer, don’t believe all the right things, and don’t realize they’re heretics or in a cult. You’re good. Relax.”

Or you can instead take the Dispensationalist route: “Remember, people, God saves us by grace, not works. And notice what Jesus says in this story about “Law-breakers” Mt 7.23 and “unrighteous workers.” Lk 13.27 He’s clearly talking to the people of the last dispensation, back when God didn’t yet save anybody by grace, and they still had to earn salvation by following the Law. It was true in Jesus’s day, but isn’t anymore. So we can safely ignore these scriptures. They don’t count for our day. They’re null.”

Obviously I’m not going with either of these explanations. I’m no dispensationalist (and neither is Jesus); humans never did earn salvation by racking up good works. Nor by racking up correct beliefs. Humans are saved by grace, and always have been.

So why doesn’t grace appear to apply to these poor schmucks, who tried the narrow door only to find it bolted shut?

Luke 13.23-27 KWL

23Someone told Jesus, “Master, the saved are few.”

Jesus told them¹,

24“Strive to enter through the narrow door.

I tell you² many will seek to enter,

and not be able to.

25At some point the owner could be raised up,

and could close the door.

You² standing outside might begin to knock at the door,

saying, ‘Master, unbolt it for us!’

And in reply he tells you², ‘I don’t know you².

Where are you² from?’

26Then you’ll² begin to say, ‘We ate with you¹!

And drank! And you¹ taught us in the streets!’

27And the speaker will tell you², ‘I don’t know where you’re² from!

Get away from me, unrighteous workers.’ ”

What’d’you mean the Master won’t recognize us? Isn’t he omniscient? Didn’t he at least remember all the times we hung out together? We had a meal with him! (Or at least holy communion—hundreds, if not thousands of times!) We studied what he taught! Why’s Jesus suffering from amnesia or dementia all of a sudden?

Like I said, scary idea. Lots of us like to imagine our salvation is a done deal, a fixed thing, something we can never lose unless we actively reject it. This story throws a bunch of uncertainty into the idea, and we hate uncertainty. We wanna know our relationship with Jesus is solid and real, and gonna continue into Kingdom Come.

Watch out for fake and fleshly prophets.

Matthew 7.15-20, 12.33-35, Luke 6.43-45.

Right after Jesus’s teaching about the narrow gate, Jesus gives a warning about people who pretend be prophets, but aren’t.

By prophet we Christians mean someone who’s simply heard from God, and shares whatever he’s said. If God tells me he loves someone, and I tell that someone God loves ’em, that’s prophecy. It’s not complicated. Any Christian who listens to God can do it. It’s why he gave us the Holy Spirit—so “your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: and on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy.” Ac 2.17-18 KJV Every Christian can prophesy, and oughta try.

But of course if there’s a real thing, and it’s valuable, there’s gonna be knock-offs and counterfeits. Hence there are such creatures as fake prophets. More than likely you’ve met some. They pretend to hear God—and they’ve learned some really good tricks to make it sound like they really did!—but they didn’t. For one of many reasons:

• Money, obviously. Churches might pay them to visit, and prophesy over people. Conferences might hire them as speakers. They could sell books and videos. Fans will send ’em money on a regular basis… instead of financially supporting their churches like they should.
• Control over others. They want people to listen to them and obey, because they supposedly speak for God. They want your pastor and church to obey them. They want the government to obey them. When they say jump, you don’t even ask “How high”—you just try to jump as high as you can.
• When sad people hear good news, it makes them so very happy. Well, prophets are in a great position to give sad people good news: Tell ’em what they want to hear! Tell ’em what they’re dying to hear. “You’re worried your atheist grandma went to hell when she died; well I’ve got some great news for you! She repented at the last second and I can see her in heaven right now, giving Jesus a big ol’ hug!” They’ll get so much love for saying such things. Feels great!
• People often presume prophets are extra-special Christians. God’s favorites. More gifted, more blessed, probably more devout. They wanna get revered like Roman Catholics revere their saints, so they try to make sure everybody’s aware they’re a prophet—i.e. automatic sainthood.
• And thanks to that automatic sainthood, fewer people are gonna notice—or believe it—when you sin. It’s a great cover for hypocrites.

There are plenty others. Hence there have always been fake prophets. And in his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us a really handy way to quickly identify a fake prophet: Their character. Their behavior. If they’re legit, they’re gonna be following the Holy Spirit and producing his fruit. If they’re not, they won’t.

Matthew 7.15-20 KWL

15“Watch out for the fake prophets,

who come to you² dressed as sheep,

but underneath they’re greedy wolves.

16 You’ll² recognize them by their fruits.

People don’t pluck grapes from thornbushes,

nor figs from thistles, do they?

17So every good tree grows good fruits,

and a rotten tree grows bad fruits.

18A good tree doesn’t grow bad fruits,

nor a rotten tree grow good fruits.

19Every tree not growing good fruit

is cut down and thrown into fire.

20It’s precisely by their fruits

that you’ll² recognize them.”

When we follow the Spirit, usually his personality makes a serious impact on our personalities. We begin to act like him. More love, joy, peace, patience, and all the godly traits Paul listed in Galatians, Ga 5.22-23 plus other traits God has which we see mentioned in the New Testament. Like grace.

If you’re a fake prophet, y’might be able to fake the prophecies convincingly. Maybe even the fruit… temporarily. People who observe you up-close, long-term, will know whether you’re legitimately producing fruit or not. Which is why a lot of the fakes who aren’t, try to make sure people don’t observe ’em up-close, long-term. It’s why they prefer independent prophetic ministries, separate from any churches which might be able to catch ’em when they’re not performing. Why they travel, stay in town just for a weekend, and their riders insist on separate hotel accommodations—instead of staying with anyone from the church, and spending significant time with them. It’s why the stuff they preach sounds so iffy when you actually know your bible… and why the fruit they profess also sounds kinda fake.

The narrow gate. Or door. Either way, tricky to get in.

Matthew 7.13-14, Luke 13.23-24.

Most people are universalist, meaning in the end—if not at Judgment Day, at least way, way further down the road—God’s gonna relent, and let everybody into his kingdom.

Doesn’t matter how much they want nothing to do with God in this life. They might be full-on atheist. Might embrace another religion altogether. Might not even be good; they’re selfish, wicked, rebellious, downright evil. But universalists figure God loves everybody, so in the end he’ll just forgive all and let every last bloody one of ’em in. Even traitors, child molesters, genocidal mass murderers. They might have to spend a few thousand years in hell or purgatory first, but eventually they’ll get out and go to heaven. You get the kingdom, and you get the kingdom, and everybody gets the kingdom! (That last line works best if you can imagine it in Oprah Winfrey’s voice. But you don’t have to.)

The problem is Jesus said he’s not letting everybody in. He said this more than once. Today’s verses are two of the instances.

Matthew 7.13-14 KWL

13“Enter through the narrow gate.

The broad {gate}, the wide road, leads to destruction.

Many are entering destruction by it.

14The narrow gate, the tight road,

leads people to life.

Few are finding it.”

Luke 13.23-24 KWL

23Someone told Jesus, “Master, the saved are few.”

Jesus told them¹,

24“Strive to enter through the narrow door.

I tell you² many will seek to enter,

and not be able to.”

In a number of early copies of Matthew, Jesus only said, “The broad, wide road leads to destruction.” Possibly some copyist threw an extra πύλη/pýli, “gate,” in there before the fourth century; it kinda works, so most bibles go with it. As for Luke, it uses the word θύρας/thýras, “door” instead—but in the Textus Receptus Desiderus Erasmus swapped it for pýlis to make it match Matthew, which is why the KJV has “gate” in both places.

Jesus says there’s a broad gate and a narrow one. A wide road and a tight one. An easy way in, and a somewhat difficult way in. You wanna take the difficult way, ’cause it’s the right one.

Not because Jesus wants it difficult! Not because God doesn’t wanna save everyone. He does. 1Ti 2.4 But entering God’s kingdom means we gotta do it on God’s terms. People would much rather define the terms ourselves, or take a “shortcut” which turns out to be the wrong way entirely. Even when Jesus warns us away from alternate routes.

There’s an open invitation, an open door, and plenty of room. But people would much rather go to their destruction. Partly ’cause it looks like the path of least effort: They get to be absolutely self-centered and awful to everybody, and Pascal’s Wager—the worry there are eternal consequences to these actions—doesn’t sway them in the slightest. Partly ’cause goodness, grace, love, kindness, and generosity make them sick: They prefer karma and reciprocity, and they’re gonna hate how the kingdom lets in all these freeloaders.

Partly ’cause they think their path is smarter, more clever, more exclusive… as if they put one over on God, and found a loophole like the loopholes they find in their taxes. They forget God’s more clever than they. But that’s humanity for ya.

Can we really ask God for anything we want?

Matthew 7.7-11, Luke 11.9-13, John 14.13-14, 15.7, 16.4.

These passages are found in the middle of Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, in Jesus’s teaching on prayer requests in Luke, and as part of Jesus’s Last Supper lesson in John. Obviously the Matthew and Luke bits line up more neatly than the John bits, but the same idea is found in the John verses.

I tend to summarize this idea as “If you don’t ask, you don’t get.” If we want something from Jesus, ask! It’s okay for us to do that. He does take prayer requests.

Matthew 7.7-11 KWL

7“Ask!—it’ll be given you².

Look!—you’ll² find it.

Knock!—it’ll be unlocked for you².

8For all who ask receive,

who seek find,

who knock God’ll unlock for.

9Same as any of you².

Your² child will ask you² for bread;

you² won’t give them¹ a cobblestone.

10Or they’ll¹ ask you² for fish;

you² won’t give them¹ a snake.

11So if you’re² evil,

yet knew to give good gifts to your children,

how much more will your² heavenly Father

give good things to those who ask him?”

Luke 11.9-13 KWL

9 “And I tell you²: Ask!—it’ll be given you².

Look!—you’ll² find it.

Knock!—it’ll be unlocked for you².

10For all who ask receive,

who seek find,

who knock God’ll unlock for.

11Any parent from among you²:

Your² child will ask for fish,

and instead of fish do you² give them¹ a snake?

12Or they’ll¹ ask for an egg;

do you² give them¹ a scorpion?

13So if you² evildoers

knew to give good gifts to your² children,

how much more will your heavenly Father

give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”

John 14.13-14 KWL

13“You² can ask whatever in my name.

I’ll do it so, in the Son, the Father can be thought well of.

14When what you² ask me is in my name,

I’ll do it.”

John 15.7 KWL

“When you² stay in me

and my words stay in you²,

whenever you² want, ask!

It’ll happen for you².”

John 16.24 KWL

“Till now you’ve² never asked anything in my name.

Ask!—and you’ll² receive,

so your² joy can be fulfilled.”

This needs to be said, ’cause some folks don’t entirely believe it is okay to ask God for stuff.

When I was a kid, I’d ask my parents for stuff, sorta like the kids in Jesus’s examples. Except those kids asked for bread, fish, and eggs; and I’d ask for a Commodore 64. Sometimes my parents gave me what I asked for. Other times, not so much. Computers weren’t cheap.

When I got persistent—when I wouldn’t take no for an answer, and kept right on asking, seeking, knocking—they’d respond, “Would you stop asking?” Not always because they didn’t want me to have these things. Sometimes they did, but they wanted me to earn money and buy it myself.

And sometimes they’d pull this sort of evil stunt: Say yes, just so I’d suffer the consequences.

Calvin and Hobbes, 25 May 1986. Calvin’s mom teaches him an unnecessary “little lesson.” GoComics

The punchline—“Trusting parents can be hazardous to your health”—is exactly right. Calvin’s mom thought she was teaching him a valuable lesson. She was… but she didn’t do it in a kind way. She did it in a cruel way: She didn’t warn him away from the consequences. She let him suffer them, and suffer ’em even more by surprise. And because humans will do this, sometimes we wonder whether God’ll do likewise: God says yes, and we ironically find out we didn’t want this at all. Meanwhile, up in heaven, he chuckles at our hubris. Ps 2.4

No. That is not how God works. If our flawed plans have unintended consequences, he warns us of those consequences, like he did when Israel demanded a king. He’s not a dick. He’s not secretly evil, plotting our downfall for his amusement or entertainment. Read the Prophets: Why suffer when you don’t have to? Ek 33.11 Turn to God and live!

God wants to give good things to his children, Mt 7.11 and for us to experience the joy of getting what we ask for. Jn 16.24 He wants to give us his kingdom. Lk 12.32 Starting with answered prayer requests.

Deaf ears aren’t opportunities.

Matthew 7.6, Luke 13.6-9.

Way back in my seminary days, I was at my home-away-from-dorm, a popular Capitola coffeehouse called Mr. Toots. (Figured I’d throw ’em a free plug.) I got to talking to some UC Santa Cruz students, ’cause they quickly figured out I was a fellow student and wanted to know which school I went to. Once they realized I was a biblical studies major—a “God expert” (in training, anyway)—they wanted to talk God.

A lot of pagans go through a phase when they head off to school where they question their faith. And rightly so, ’cause they need to question everything, and get rid of those things in their religions which don’t grow their relationships with God. But many will ditch their faith altogether—if they even had any. Some of ’em dabble in other religions; some of ’em even invent their own. And some of ’em flirt with nontheism—either because they honestly think there might be no God, or because they’re jerks and just wanna enrage theists.

That’s what our conversation quickly deteriorated into. These guys wanted to try out their freshly-learned anti-God arguments on the religious guy. Kinda like a kid who just learned a new judo hold, wants to fight everybody with it, and foolishly picks a fight with the taekwondo black belt. Not that I was a black belt in Christianity… and since argumentativeness is a work of the flesh, it’s really the wrong metaphor! But I had been studying Christian apologetics since high school, and since I went to seminary in my late 20s, I did have about a decade on these guys. It wasn’t hard at all to slap their commonplace arguments down.

Still, the arguing grew tiresome, as I realized it was never gonna go anywhere. These guys weren’t curious about God. At all. Didn’t care to learn anything new about him; didn’t wanna listen, repent, and become Christian. This was entirely an intellectual exercise for them. They were just killing time at the coffeehouse. I was just tossing pearls to swine.

Yep, just like in the Sermon on the Mount.

Matthew 7.6 KWL

“Don’t give holy things to the dogs,

nor throw your² pearls before the pigs.

Otherwise they’ll trample them under their feet,

and they might turn and attack you².”

So I called a truce. “Wanna talk about something different?” I said. “I mean, to you this is just light conversation. But to me this is something I take very seriously and personally. I’m having trouble not taking all your God-bashing personally. Wouldn’t you rather talk politics?”

“Yeah, okay.”

So we talked politics. And after a bit, they left.

Double standards.

Mark 4.24, Matthew 7.1-5, Luke 6.37-38, 41-42.

When people don’t wanna condemn anyone, “Judge not, that ye be not judged” Mt 7.1 KJV is a popular proof text they’ll quote. It’s not the best quote though. I already wrote an article about how people take it out of context. Jesus didn’t say it to forbid us from making any judgment statements whatsoever. It’s part of his instruction to make fair judgments.

This bit of his Sermon on the Mount comes right after Jesus teaches us not to worry. And while we’re not worrying, let’s also not prejudge people unfairly.

Matthew 7.1-2 KWL

1“Don’t criticize.

Thus you² won’t be criticized,

2for you’ll² be critiqued

by the very criticism you² criticize with.

The measurement you² measure with,

will measure you².”

Luke 6.37 KWL

“Don’t criticize,

and you² won’t be criticized.

Don’t judge,

and you² won’t be judged.

Forgive,

and you’ll² be forgiven.”

Obviously I translated κρίνετε/krínetë, “criticize,” differently than the KJV’s “judge.” Our English word judge includes a few additional ideas—specifically the idea of formal judgment, official judgment, binding judgment—which aren’t meant to be part of Jesus’s teaching. He’s talking about making up one’s indiviudal mind, not handing down a formal ruling for the community to follow. There’s a whole other word for that, and Luke uses it in verse 37: Κατεδικάσατε/katedikásatë, “pass sentence.” That word is what we nowadays mean by judging. Krínetë is really just about whether things are acceptable in our personal evaluation. Nothing more.

And this kind of personal judgment is something we all do—and should. Everybody evaluates stuff. Daily. It’s part of our ordinarly decision-making processes. We judge which shoes to wear, which breakfast cereals to eat (or not), which coffees to drink (or not), which movies to watch, whether to read TXAB on a daily basis… Life is choices. Every choice involves weighing our options, and critiquing those options. Jesus doesn’t just expect us to do it; he designed us to do it. It’s why he created you with a brain in your skull. It’s not just for memorizing pop lyrics and baseball stats!

This is why he follows up “Don’t criticize” with “you’ll be critiqued by the very criticism you criticize with.” It’s a warning: When we apply our criticisms to others, we’re gonna be held up to the very same standard. As we should. We set that standard fairly, right?—we didn’t make ourselves an exception to the rule, right?

Well… maybe we did. ’Cause that’s human nature. It’s to always selfishly consider ourselves the exception. When we critique other people, we decide whether they meet our approval—and when we do the very same things they do, our standards suddenly change to favor ourselves. If your dad tells a lame “dad joke,” it means his sense of humor is defective; if we tell the very same joke, we’re having ironic fun. If the neighbor cheats on her husband, it’s adultery and awful; if we do it… oh you just don’t understand the circumstances; we’re in love. And so on. We grant ourselves a free pass. Others, not so much.

But Jesus makes it clear we don’t get a free pass. If we ordinarily recognize a behavior is offensive, wrong, or sinful, it’s still just as bad when we do it. We’re not beyond similar criticism. Are we doing right? Because we’ve no business setting ourselves above criticism, like a king who figures he alone has the power to do as he pleases. We aren’t exceptional. Especially when we fall short of our own judgment.

This does not mean the proper response is to critique ourselves more harshly. Jesus says as much in the Luke version of this teaching: “Forgive, and you’ll be forgiven.” When others slip up, forgive. And when we slip up—and people are gonna fairly hold us to the same standard we set for others—our behavior will reflect the Spirit’s fruit more so than yet another self-righteous a--hole. We’re gonna receive grace instead of condemnation. As Jesus intends.

Don’t you worry ’bout a thing.

Matthew 6.25-34, Luke 12.22-32.

Right after Jesus stated in his Sermon on the Mount how we can’t have both God and Mammon as our masters, he gets to the core reason why we humans tend to slide away from trusting God, and instead put our trust in our wealth:

When it comes to basic daily needs, we first look to our wallets. Not God.

We first ask whether we can afford it. Not whether God even wants us to do these things, much less pay for them. We don’t submit our wishes and intentions to God for his approval; we don’t even think about his approval. Either ’cause we presume we already have it… or because we think this is one of those areas in our lives where the decision is totally ours, and ours alone. Jesus is not the Lord here.

I make this mistake too. When I shop for groceries, I don’t think, “Does God even want me to buy those chocolate bars?” then ask him, and find out. I think, “I want those chocolate bars, and they’re within my budget.” Nevermind that I need to cut back on sugar; nevermind that the cocoa beans were likely picked by slave labor; nevermind that I can control my taste buds and other such urges when I choose. I don’t consider God’s will as often as I should.

And this is a much harder lesson for rich Christians to learn. In wealthy countries, we have crazy standards for what denotes our “basic daily needs.” It’s not just food, drink, and clothing, as Jesus addresses in the following teaching. It’s having a roof over your head. A bed. Electricity and gas, for the central heat and air conditioning. Oh, and since we have electricity: A refrigerator to keep the food in. Internet and wifi, and some kind of streaming service so we can watch TV and movies. A phone. An email address. Probably a car, ’cause you can’t expect us to just walk everywhere.

Food and drink is no longer just grains, vegetables, and water: We gotta have meat and dairy. If we’ve learned about some special diet we really oughta be on—whether our doctors tell us so or not—we want that accommodated too: Gluten-free grains, keto-friendly vegetables, vegan dairy products. Oh, and we gotta have coffee and beer and sugary and salty snacks. We expect a variety of good foods. And enough money to sometimes go to a restaurant.

Clothing is no longer a single loincloth, tunic, robe, and sandals, with maybe an extra change just in case: We gotta have at least two weeks’ worth of outfits. And they gotta be fashionable, so we won’t just fit in, but stand out as especially good-looking. Plus an extra-nice outfit for important occasions, like church or parties.

If you only have the basics and no more, in a rich country you’d be considered poor. Not comfortable; not okay; poor. But in a poor country, like ancient Judea… wealthy.

That’s something to keep in mind whenever Jesus talks about not having enough. Ancient Israel, where Jesus lived, whether in the Galilee or Judea, would be what Donald Trump would call a s---hole country. It was poor. The largest part of the population survived on less than $2 a day. The families who ran the Judean senate had money, but that was old-family wealth, or they got it by collaborating with the Romans, same as the taxmen. The rest of them were subsistence farmers, or day laborers like Jesus’s dad and later Jesus himself: Scratching to get by. Legitimately concerned about daily needs.

The folks Jesus preached to? They had way less than we who live in rich countries. They’d be what we consider destitute. Near-homeless. They didn’t imagine themselves so, but hey: Different countries, different millennia, different standards.

Yet in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told ’em to quit worrying. Because worry wasn’t getting them anywhere.

Matthew 6.25 KWL

“This is why I tell you²:

Stop worrying about what your² soul would eat {or drink},

or what your² body would wear.

Isn’t your² soul more than food?

—your² body more than clothes?”

Luke 12.22-23 KWL

22Jesus told his students, “This is why I tell you²:

Stop worrying about what your² soul would eat,

or what {your²} body would wear.

23The soul is more than food;

the body more than clothes.”

Try to wrap your brain around this idea: One set of clothing. Maybe three days’ worth of food in the pantry. Water comes from the creek or well. No electricity nor gasoline. No money; you gotta barter for everything. This isn’t because there’s a dire recession: This is life. This has always been life, as far as you or your parents or grandparents knew. Every day’s a struggle. And here Jesus is, telling you to stop worrying about food or clothing, because God has your back.

The typical American response to this? “Are you nuts, Jesus? I’m poor!”

Yeah, you are. Poor in faith. That’s why it’s easier to shove camels through needles than get rich Christians into God’s kingdom. Mk 10.25 We just aren’t always aware Jesus was making that statement about us.

Worshiping Mammon instead of Jesus.

Matthew 6.24, Luke 16.13

Some years ago there was a meme going round social media, warning folks what might happen if society went cashless. Some of the memes claim Dave Ramsey wrote it; he didn’t. Like most memes which go viral quickly, it’s meant to frighten people—and this one played right into many a Christian’s fears about the End Times, so Christians helped spread it. That’s how I came to see it.

My comment after yet another friend posted it on Facebook: “Isn’t it funny? The first thing Christians worry about when the Beast comes… is Mammon.”

Jesus used the Aramaic word ܡܳܡܽܘܢܳܐ/mamoná once in his his Sermon on the Mount—and in its parallel verse in Luke—to describe wealth. It got transliterated into Greek as μαμωνᾷ/mamoná (and the Textus Receptus adds a letter μ/my, so “mammoná”); then into Latin as mamonæ. John Wycliffe translated it “riches,” as did the Geneva Bible, but the King James Version turned it back into “mammon.”

Matthew 6.24 KWL

“Nobody’s able to be a slave to two masters.

Either they’ll¹ hate one and love the other,

or look up to one and down on the other:

Can’t be a slave to God and Mammon.”

Luke 16.13 KWL

“No slave is able to be a slave to two masters.

Either they’ll¹ hate one and love the other,

or look up to one and down on the other:

Can’t be a slave to God and Mammon.”

Why’d the authors of the gospels go with “mammon” instead of the usual Greek words for wealth, πλοῦτος/plútos or χρῆμα/hríma or εὐπορία/evporía? Or, because this verse is so often translated, “You cannot serve both God and money” (GNB, NIV, NLT), why not the word for money (literally “silver”), ἀργύριον/argýrion?

Well, we don’t know. It’s likely because the ancient Christians first memorized this Jesus-saying with the Aramaic word deliberately kept in it. The original-language word was important to them, and if Jesus is the one who made ’em memorize the saying, it’s likely important to him too. He wants us Christians to pay more attention to this word.

So we did. In fact when the ancient Christians preached on mamoná, they Grecianized it—they tacked on a Greek noun-ending, turning into not just a Greek word, but a Greek name. That’s why so many Christians, myself included, capitalize it. They treated Mammon like a person, ’cause Jesus said you can’t serve Mammon as well as God—and it must therefore be a competitor god. Obviously a false god, but still.

And since mamoná is a cognate of the Hebrew word מַטְמוֹן/matmón, “secret riches,” people imagine Mammon is therefore be a god of riches, wealth, or money.

In Luke, Jesus speaks of Mammon right after his Shrewd Butler Story. Maybe you remember it; maybe not, ’cause pastors hesitate to teach on it, ’cause Jesus straight-up praises an embezzler. In it, a butler makes friends by undercharging his boss’s debtors. Lk 16.1-9 Jesus’s moral: “Make yourselves friends with your filthy lucre,” Lk 16.9 or as the KJV puts it, “the mammon of unrighteousness.” And the Pharisees in his audience responded by rejecting it—’cause they were φιλάργυροι/filárgyri, “silver-lovers.” Lk 16.14

So… is Mammon the pagan god of money? Or simply Jesus’s personification of money? Or a mistranslation?

Mammon’s a person?

First of all, there’s nothing in ancient literature about the god Mammon. Seriously, there isn’t. I’ve looked; other historians have looked even harder than I have; there’s nothing.

The Mishna is a collection of what second-century Pharisees taught—and this’d include some things first-century Pharisees taught, so it’s a useful insight into what Jesus dealt with whenever he interacted with Pharisees. Whenever mamón comes up in the Mishna, Pharisees meant money. When we’re taught to love the LORD with all our might, Dt 6.5 the Pharisees said this also means with all our mamón. Berakot 9.5 They equated might with wealth. Which isn’t wrong; it’s not the only kind of might, but as we see all the time in our culture, it’s extremely mighty. It’s not an insignificant power.

Archaeologists have dug up nothing about Mammon in Israel and ancient Aramaic-speaking territories. That’s not to say one of ’em won’t discover something someday. But till something gets found, all our talk about the god Mammon, all of it, is guesswork. The ancients may have never worshiped any such god as Mammon. We’re just extrapolating all of it from Jesus’s lesson.

But this sure hasn’t stopped us Christians from extrapolating away. The mind can’t handle gaps in our knowledge, and has to fill it with something. Anything. Myths if necessary.

Christians invented all sorts of theories about who Mammon is. Fallen angel or demon. Elder god or spiritual force. What its motives and goals are. What it plots when we’re not looking. Popular Christian mythology (namely The Faerie Queene, The Divine Comedy, and Paradise Lost) include Mammon as one of the demons under Satan. Our saints invented complicated theologies about where it fits into the devils’ hierarchy. Whole books were written. Whole industries were created.

All of it guesswork. ’Cause our only source of Mammon’s existence is the Mishna and Jesus, and neither of ’em define it as anything but money.

Is there any legitimacy to any Christian teachings about Mammon? Depends on who’s teaching. Any preacher who claims, “We know from the bible that Mammon is a demon,” knows no such thing. “We know Mammon is headquartered in the financial capitals in the world”—no we don’t. “We know Mammon gains power every time the market goes up”—we do not.

We know money is a force. Educated economists understand how we create it. Yes, we humans create it. Money’s a human invention. Originally, humans bartered, but barter’s inefficient; how’s a week of labor precisely worth one goat? But if you can trade goods and labor for grams of copper, silver, gold, or platinum, now you can meter out how much you think something’s worth—and haggle over that price. Problem is, the value of precious metals is way too easy to manipulate, so governments switched it to pounds, dollars, euros, yuan, yen, pesos, and our other currencies… and now people worry about how much governments manipulate its value. I’m not even gonna touch the constant manipulation people perform upon cryptocurrency. Not that the “cashless society” meme considers that… but I’m gonna stay off that tangent today.

People who don’t understand money, and how humans influence it, tend to imagine money has a life and power of its own. They attribute all sorts of special abilities to it. Those are myths too. Stands to reason these same folks would imagine Mammon is a living being, and it controls money, not humans. And that we’re powerless against it—when in fact we humans have a great deal of power over everything we’ve created. Yeah, even when it sometimes gets away from us.

I’m gonna stop capitalizing the word for a moment: I treat mammon as the same as money. It’s a spiritual force. Not a person. Yes it’s always possible there’s some no-foolin’ spiritual being which attaches itself to money, and claims power over it. After all, there are humans who do the very same thing; why not a devil? But that spirit has no more power over money than we do. It’s tricking us into thinking it’s mightier than it is. We can dismiss it, because through Christ we can easily defeat it. Any fear or awe we have of it is misplaced, and will simply get in the way of our understanding.

So… why’d Jesus personify mammon? Because Jesus is a poet, and this is what poets do. When the Greeks described ἔρος/éros, “passion,” as if it’s Eros, a god—one which might strike you with its arrows of love or hatred—it’s a clever way to describe what passion kinda does. Problem is, the Greeks wrongly thought you had to worship these personifications in order to gain some degree of control over them. You gotta worship Eros, and appease it, otherwise it’ll smite you with the wrong arrow, and now you’re uncontrollably horny for your slave girl; or Eros makes your wife despise you—and of course she will, now that you’re lusting for your slave girl.

The Greeks worshiped Eros same as they did Phobos (φόβος/fóvos, “fear”) or Plutos (πλοῦτος/plútos, “wealth”—not the Latin god Pluto; notice the -S at the end). But Jesus’s intent isn’t to declare Mammon is a competitor god. Just to warn us to not grant it our worship—which only rightly belongs to the LORD.

Mammon doesn’t need to become a person before humans’ll worship it. A money manager doesn’t go to any Church of Mammon to pay homage to her god; she just goes to the office. A banker doesn’t need to pray to Mammon; accessing his online bank account serves the very same function. The ancients worshiped lifeless stone gods, and Mammonists just happen to worship lifeless wealth. Worshiping a dead god is just as wrong as worshiping a spirit; the pursuit of a fake deity will lead us just as far afield.

True, every once in a while some Christian will claim they had a prophetic dream in which Mammon is one of the archdemons, battling the holy angels with its silver arrows. I’ll be blunt: A lot of these dreamers are rubbish. Basic confirmation will tell you so: They don’t forewarn us of anything, and if they do, those dreams don’t come to pass. They’re not always consistent with scripture; there’s a fair amount of Christian mythology mixed up in them, but that’s not scripture. There’s a lot of popular beliefs mixed up in ’em, and that’s not consistent with scripture either. So clearly, these “prophetic dreams” are their subconscious—and they’re too often pandering to Christian fears and wishes. So when Mammon is a mighty being in those dreams: Nope, it’s still not. It’s a force. It’s money.

Money. It’s a gas.

Money isn’t material.

I know; pocket change is a physical thing. As are dollar bills. But these items only represent the actual value of money. That’s why people will pick up a quarter when they find one in the street, but they won’t pick up a washer. (Or even pennies anymore.) They’ll pick up a $10 bill, but not a napkin. Currency makes money appear tangible. The reality is money is a cloud of mathematics, behavioral psychology, economic theory, and political theory. When we convert it into bills, coins, and bonds, we make it look tangible, solid, countable, and controllable. But it’s really not solid.

For the longest time, instead of bills and coins, humanity used metal, and we attached a specific value per gram to the metal. (Or in the States, value per ounce.) For this reason certain people wanna put us back on a gold and silver standard: They insist gold has an inherent value, and dollars don’t. But they’re wrong. Gold, like cryptocurrency, like money, is worth whatever people believe it’s worth—and humans can easily manipulate that value. One of the first events people called “Black Friday” was when Jay Gould and James Fisk tried to manipulate the New York gold market. They slowly bought up a lot of gold… then on 24 September 1869 they sold all of it, dumping it on the market. Thanks to the rules of supply and demand, too much gold caused people to value it less, and gold’s price plummeted. Gould and Fisk took advantage of the new cheap price of gold, and bought back more than they sold. And if we didn’t pass laws against this practice, people would do it again and again, just to enrich themselves. It’s why people still do this with unregulated cryptocurrency—and it’s why crypto isn’t a safe investment.

Goldbugs insist such acts artificially alter gold’s price. ’Cause they refuse to believe gold doesn’t have a fixed value. Which only proves they’ve no idea how money works. All value is entirely based on belief: What do people imagine something’s worth? Same with trading cards, collectible toys, art, memorabilia, silver, gold, and the dollar.

The U.S. dollar is worth a dollar because the American people believe it buys a dollar’s worth of something. If we figure a dollar can buy a can of soda, that’s how far its power extends: Any soda sold for more than a dollar is “too much,” or less than a dollar is “a bargain.” Everything gets tied to that dollar=soda metric. We don’t even think about why they should be equal. Says who? Um… the government? The Federal Reserve? The economy? (Clearly not restaurants.) The collective belief of every American?

Actually… yeah it is collective belief.

Gold works precisely the same way. Gold is worth $120 per gram because gold buyers believe it’s worth $120 per gram. When they don’t anymore, that’ll change. Might go up, or down. Claiming, “But its real value never changes” is the illusion: Everything’s real value changes. And you don’t want two speculators who don’t mind bankrupting the world, wielding the power to make these changes so they can enrich themselves. That’s why we abandoned the gold standard.

Stocks are a more obvious example. A corporation might make no money, and hasn’t for years, but it’s an internet company, and people are convinced they should put their hopes (“put stock”) in internet companies, so its stock is outrageously overvalued. Some ninny on CNBC with a sound effects box said it’s worth a lot, so it is. Conversely another company might be really profitable, doing great, very stable, yet its stock value is low because stockholders think it should be inexpensive.

The collective belief of shareholders just happens to be far more volatile than that of every American. But even American faith and credit has its limits. When other things take greater priority than money, like food during a famine, humans will trade a decent pile of money for donkey heads and dove crap. 2Ki 6.25

So money isn’t material. And any force which isn’t material is spiritual.

I know, some folks are gonna object to my reducing things that way. In part because many pagans imagine material things are real, and spiritual things are imaginary. And money’s real!—therefore it must somehow be material. But money isn’t material. Yet it’s real. Therefore spiritual.

No, others will argue; it’s intellectual. It’s psychological. It’s conceptual. Pick any synonym with means “immaterial but real,” and they’d far rather use that word than “spiritual.” ’Cause that word “spiritual” bugs ’em, and they wanna strictly limit it to religious stuff. Stuff they don’t believe in. They believe in money, but God’s another deal. If money is spiritual just like God is spiritual, perhaps they’ve gotta take another look at God… and they really don’t wanna.

If that’s your hangup, get over it. Spiritual is real. God is real. Stop treating religion as if you’re only pretending. This is substantial stuff.

And too often money has taken religion’s place. It’s why Jesus warned us about making a master of it. People look to money to save them! It solves their problems, achieves their dreams, Ec 10.19 secures their futures, buys their health, conquers their adversaries, gives them peace. Heck, if they can afford to be cryogenically frozen, it’ll even offer them an afterlife.

But like every false god, it destroys more than it gives, and all its promises are deceptions. The Beatles figured out money can’t buy you love. I sometimes joke, “No; but you can rent it.” Sadly, for a lot of people, renting will do.

In Jesus’s day: The opposite problem.

Back when Jesus first taught about Mammon, it was to remind his students money is substantial. Y’see, they had the opposite problem from us: God was real, but money not so much.

First-century Palestine didn’t practice free-market capitalism. Back then the Roman Empire was on the gold standard, but gold wasn’t common enough for common people to use. (Hence the big parties they’d throw when you found a lost coin. Lk 15.8-10) Only the wealthy had actual coins. For everyone else, wealth was tied up in property: Land, slaves, animals, and personal possessions. They practiced barter-based theocratic feudalism: Everything ultimately belonged to their lord, i.e. the LORD. And every seven years the LORD decreed they’d cancel debts and free their slaves. Not all wealth would last.

Under this system, God was more tangible to them than money. As he’s supposed to be.

Jesus taught about Mammon because he wants people to take money more seriously. Well, nowadays we do—often too seriously. In fact our economic system is rigged in such a way, it’s no longer possible to follow the rules set out in the Law. Selling yourself into slavery to pay debts? On the up side, slavery’s illegal; on the down side, debt repayment might take the rest of your life, and consume every single dollar you earn. Debts aren’t cancelled every seven years. And whenever government takes part of our income to help the needy, same as the Hebrew priests did with tithes, conservatives scream bloody murder about socialism.

Every once in a while I hear of some Christian money-manager who holds a seminar, who claims he’ll teach you some biblical principles for dealing with wealth. I’ve been to a few. What they actually teach is free-market capitalism. (Not that there’s anything wrong with learning about capitalism; it is the system Americans live under.) The rest is about debt avoidance, based on various scriptures quoted out of context to support their ideas. Again, not that debt avoidance is a bad idea; it’s a really good idea. But what they teach about money, and Mammon, come from free-market economics, not bible.

Economics in the bible were greatly different than economics today, so of course what these money-managers teach doesn’t wholly jibe with the bible. Problem is, it doesn’t always jibe with the parts of the bible which can apply to our culture. Generosity, fr’instance. Giving to the needy so we can have treasure in heaven. Mt 6.19-21 Giving to everyone who asks, and not turning people away. Mt 5.42 Money-managers don’t teach that. Instead they teach “stewardship”—a concept which they claim is biblical (and it does exist in the bible, Lk 16.1-13) but it’s not about giving; it’s about gathering. It’s about investing our money, and spending none of it, so that our pile of money will grow, so the power and security of Mammon might increase. It’s about storing up treasure on earth, disguised as “kingdom principles.” It’s part of the “prosperity gospel.”

True Christianity is forsaking everything, everything, to follow Jesus. When we spend too much time on wealth “stewardship,” rather than making God’s kingdom grow, we forget to be generous. We forget to take leaps of faith with our money: It’s not prudent to be foolish and wasteful, even if it’s for the kingdom’s sake. We trust our pile, instead of trusting the ultimate Owner of every pile, who can easily tap those other piles for our sake. We serve the wrong lord. And as Jesus said, we just can’t serve both.

But dammit, we Americans are convinced we can serve both if we try hard enough.

The Mammonist gospel.

One particularly American teaching—one popular among the poor, and one we’ve even exported to poor countries—is God doesn’t want his kids living lives of defeat. (Which is true.) He wants us to find success in everything we do. (Which is also true.) He wants us to be rich. (Wait a minute…)

Supposedly God wants us to have so much wealth it makes pagans jealous, and want to get in on this Christianity stuff so they too can become fat and comfortable. (Wait, God tells us not to covet, Dt 5.21 but it’s okay to use covetousness to spread his kingdom?) So to these folks, Mammon isn’t God’s opponent or competitor. The love of money isn’t a root of evil. On the contrary: Money is God’s tool, and money-love is God’s bait. It’s our reward for trusting him, following him, for giving money away to Christian charities or churches. God’s gonna open heaven’s windows and make it rain, baby. Make it rain!

This prosperity-gospel bushwa isn’t a new idea. Pharisees believed in it too. It’s how the rich justified their many possessions… and their stinginess. They were wealthy because God blessed them… and the poor had nothing because God didn’t bless them. Why? Well, they must’ve sinned or something. Some defect of character.

Properly this philosophy is called social Darwinism. Like Darwinism, everybody fights to survive, and the “fittest” do. The wealthy are the “fittest”—they struggled, came out on top, and deserve their wealth. Even if they inherited it, or if they stumbled into wealth through dumb luck: Those are just other forms of God’s blessing, claim the wealthy.

In bible times this was how Pharisees believed the world worked. It’s why Jesus’s students were floored when their Master informed them the rich are gonna have the darnedest time getting into his kingdom. Mk 10.23-27 To their minds, the rich were already in the kingdom—it’s why they were rich! But in this age, God gives people wealth for one and only one reason: To spread his kingdom. Not to grow our own. If we aren’t growing his kingdom, we may not even be in it. We’re worshiping Mammon… but we call it “Jesus,” and pretend its power came from God.

Nope, prosperity gospel folks aren’t worshiping God. Really he’s a means to an end, and that end is wealth. They’re Mammonists. Whether they think God’s got a mansion and a crown waiting for them up in heaven, or they think God’s gonna get them a Bentley and an Apple Watch here on earth, they’re following him for the bling. They’re proclaiming their ideas to an impoverished world because hopeful Christians who believe their tripe will send them donations, and these contributions fund their lifestyle. They’re exploiting the poor, same as plutocrats who make 10,000 times what their underpaid employees do. They irritate God just as much.

I used to say I have no problem with billionaires, or preachers who make really good salaries. I’ve learned better. These people are poisoning themselves. Unless they’re giving so much to the needy it endangers their billionaire status, they’re rendering themselves wholly unfit for God’s kingdom; by embracing Mammon they’re embracing hell. I’m not saying we have to overthrow them; Jesus will do that. Although we really should stop giving them tax breaks; why are we tempting and corrupting them further by making them richer?

And one of the surest signs we’re dealing with a Mammonist instead of a Christ-follower, is when people justify this sort of behavior. I’ve heard many a Mammonist misquote Jesus’s story of the Equal-Pay Vineyard, “Isn’t this my money, to do with as I please?” Mt 20.15 They miss the whole reason the employer said this: To justify his generosity, not his miserliness. In Jesus’s culture, the only one who really owns everything is God. And it just so happens, the employer in Jesus’s story represents God. It is his money, to do with as he pleases—and it pleases him to be generous, and it pleases him when his children are likewise cheerful givers. 2Co 9.7

’Cause when we’re not, when we’re fruitless and tight-fisted, we’re likely not his children either. We’re Mammon’s.

Generosity and stinginess in God’s kingdom.

Matthew 6.22-23, Luke 11.34-36.

Some of Jesus’s teachings tend to get skipped entirely. Sometimes because they’re too hard to understand—and they’re not really; we just need to learn their historical context. Today’s Sermon on the Mount passage is one such example.

And sometimes because we just don’t like them. Libertines hate what Jesus has to say about still following the Law, ’cause they don’t wanna. Hypocrites hate what Jesus has to say about public acts of devotion, ’cause it’s way easier to do that than produce good fruit. Ingrates hate what Jesus has to say about loving the “unloveable,” forgiving the “unforgivable,” and going the extra mile. Mammonists hate what Jesus has to say about money—and today’s passage is about money, so it’s likewise one such example.

Yep, it’s about money, not opthamology. But because people are unfamiliar with what ancient middle easterners meant by “good eye” and “evil eye”—and presume they’re about what Romans and westerners mean by it, and think they have to do with all-purpose blessings and curses—we interpret this passage all kinds of wrong. Or claim it’s too obscure, and skip it, and focus on the verses we understand, and like better.

Well. In Matthew, right after saying we oughta keep our treasures in heaven, Jesus says this:

Matthew 6.22-23 KWL

22“The body’s light is the eye.

So when your¹ eye is clear,

your¹ whole body is illuminated.

23When your¹ eye is bad,

your¹ whole body is dark.

So if the light in you¹ is dark,

how dark are you?”

Luke 11.34-36 KWL

34“The body’s light is your¹ eye.

{So} whenever your¹ eye is clear,

your¹ whole body is illuminated too.

Once it’s bad,

your¹ body is dark too.

35So watch out

so the light in you¹ isn’t dark.

36So if your¹ whole body is illuminated,

without having any parts dark,

the whole will be bright—

as if a lamp could shine lightning for you¹.”

In both gospels the King James Version uses these words to describe the eye:

• Ἁπλοῦς/aplús, “all together,” is translated “single.”
• Πονηρὸς/ponirós, “bad,” is translated “evil.”

Why? ’Cause that’s how William Tyndale translated it, and that’s what the Geneva Bible went with. It was tradition. The translators were simply following the tradition handed down by the Vulgate, which turned aplús into simplex/“single,” and ponirós into nequam, “wicked.” Thanks to St. Jerome’s inaccurate interpretation in the 390s, Christians misinterpreted this passage for centuries, and continued to misinterpret it this way even after they learned ancient Greek for themselves and tried to retranslate it into English.

These are middle eastern idioms. Jerome translated those words literally, and thought he was right to; and a lot of translators likewise think they’re right to translate idioms literally. They’re not. Idioms need to be interpreted. Literal interpretations of idioms always give people the wrong idea. If I describe an eager student as “bright-eyed and bushy-tailed,” then have that phrase translated into Chinese, my poor Chinese friend would be stunned to hear she has a tail at all, much less a bushy one. And wait, doesn’t she have brown eyes?…

By aplús and ponirós, Jesus meant how I translated it: A clear eye. One with neither blurry vision nor cataracts. Or a bad eye; not an evil one, though it might certainly feel evil to you when your eyes don’t work. When your eyes are cloudy, vision’s a problem, and you’re gonna be in the dark. When your eyes are healthy, you see just fine: Light could enter your body “as if a lamp could shine lightning for you,” Lk 11.36 which interestingly is exactly how 19th-century arc lamps worked.

But even so, Jesus isn’t trying to teach anatomy. “Clear eye” and “bad eye” aren’t literally about eyes. They’re about generosity and stinginess. This is, as I said, a teaching about money.

Treasures in heaven.

Matthew 6.19-21, Luke 12.33-34.

In Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, after he finished objecting to hypocrisy in giving to charity, in types of prayer, and in public fasting, he moved on to talk about wealth and money.

You’ll notice the three verses in Matthew I’m gonna point to today, don’t by themselves nail down precisely how we’re to stash our treasures in heaven. That, we actually have to pull from Jesus’s parallel teaching in Luke: Give to charity. And if you know your Old Testament, you might remember this proverb:

Proverbs 19.17 NKJV

He who has pity on the poor lends to the LORD,

And He will pay back what he has given.

Jesus’s first-century audience would’ve known that one… and Jesus’s 21st-century audience had better learn that one.

Matthew 6.19-21 KWL

19“Don’t hoard wealth for yourselves² on earth,

where moths and corrosion ruin it,

where thieves dig for it and steal it.

20Hoard wealth for yourselves² in heaven,

where neither moth nor corrosion ruins,

where thieves don’t dig for it nor steal it:

21Where’s your¹ wealth?

Your¹ mind will be there too.”

Luke 12.33-34 KWL

33“Sell your² possessions and give to charity.

Make yourselves² a wallet which never wears out.

Infallible wealth in the heavens,

which a thief can’t come near, nor moth destroy.

34“Where’s your² wealth?

Your² minds will be there too.”

This passage has been greatly nullified by our culture. Y’see, we have banks and insurance. Nowadays, if our minds are on our money, it’s only because we don’t have those securities; we have too much cash in our wallets, and fear someone might steal it, or we own valuables in a neighborhood full of thieves. Back then, such things were a constant fear—“Is my money secure?”—because the ancients had to secure their own wealth. Neither financial institutions, nor the government, would do it for ’em. Wasn’t their job. Wasn’t anyone’s job.

Americans tend to take property rights for granted. The ancients weren’t so naïve. If the king wanted your stuff, he’d take it. Land, cattle, wives. You remember Abraham was regularly worried different kings would swipe his wife from him—’cause kings did that. Ge 12.12-13, 20.2 Even though Abraham was powerful enough to muster his very own private army to rescue his nephew.

God mitigated this by having, “Don’t steal” Dt 5.19 apply to kings and commoners alike. True, it’s way harder to get justice when the king’s doing the thievery, like when David ben Jesse stole Uriah’s wife, or Ahab ben Omri stole Naboth’s vineyard. The LORD had to personally intervene, because nobody else could.

And in Jesus’s day, Israel wasn’t ruled by a proper king. It was ruled by Roman puppets. You could appeal to the Romans, but good luck getting justice if you didn’t have citizenship; the Romans would treat you just like Americans treat illegal aliens. (Well okay, crucifixion is way worse than how ICE treats foreigners. But still.)

So if you had wealth, you had to secure it. Just like paranoid people do today. Better build a strongroom in your house, or find a clever way to disguise or hide it. Lots of people simply buried it in a hole in the ground, just like the worthless steward in Jesus’s story of the talents. Mt 25.25 Or that buried treasure in Jesus’s other story. Mt 13.44 Hey, if nobody knows where your hole is, thieves can’t dig it up. (The KJV decided to translate διορύσσουσιν/diorýssusin, “dig through” as “break through”—a common enough way to get into a flimsy wooden house in the 17th century, but much harder to do with the solid stone houses of the first century.)

And even so, after all the precautions they took to make sure nobody could find or get at their wealth, the wealthy would worry. ’Cause any disaster could destroy it. Invading armies, or some covetous noble, could grab your land. Earthquakes could flatten your buildings. Determined looters, or even just a fire, could gut your house. Any possession could be lost. Easily.

It’s the very reason we invented insurance. Pay a little each month or year, and your possessions are protected and guaranteed? Brilliant. Now the only thing we need worry about is whether we have enough money.

So we need to climb into the first-century mindset about money before we can really understand Jesus. Imagine you’re in a really bad neighborhood, you’re not carrying a gun or taser or pepper spray, and for some crazy reason you’ve got a roll of $10,000 on you. How secure are you gonna feel about that money?

Got that mental picture? Good. Now imagine having that worry all the time.

When you fast, keep it private.

Matthew 6.16-18.

Believe it or don’t, some Evangelicals have no tradition of fasting. I run into ’em from time to time. When I talk fasting, they’re quick to reject it with “That’s an Old Testament thing” and “Jesus never told us to fast.”

True to both. In all of scripture, the LORD never commanded fasting; anyone who claims otherwise is taking the verses out of context. Fasting has always been voluntary; nobody has to fast. But certain churches do promote it. Might be a Daniel fast at the beginning of the year, a Lenten fast before Easter, an Advent fast before Christmas, a partisan fast before Election Day. But regardless of peer pressure, nobody has to fast. They’re voluntary customs. You can opt out. Don’t even need special permission from your clergy… although every year when St. Patrick’s Day falls in mid-Lent, many a Catholic who wants to get plowed will beg their bishop for a one-day pass.

The way Jesus talks in his Sermon on the Mount, he totally expects his followers to fast. Because his audience was full of Pharisees, whose custom was to fast twice a week. Jesus may not have expected them to keep fasting at that same rate—although according to the Didache, ancient Christians totally did. Didache 8.1 Either way Jesus did expect them—and us—to fast every once in a while.

Jesus himself fasted in the desert. While he was notorious for ignoring customary Pharisee fast days, he never did ban fasting. Never declared it a done-away-with custom. It’s in the Sermon on the Mount, remember? “When you fast” means you’re gonna fast. Sometimes.

If you don’t—if you never engage in any hardcore prayer practices, which is precisely what fasting is—don’t expect your relationship with God to grow as quickly as it does among Christians who do fast.

I know, I know: “But some of those ‘hardcore Christians’ are really hypocrites.” Yes they are. Jesus definitely forbids that sort of behavior. Really it’s his only rule about fasting: Don’t show off; don’t do it to look extra pious. Do it for real, and do it only for God.

Matthew 6.16-18

16“When you² fast, don’t be

like the sad-looking hypocrites who conceal their faces

so they look to people like they’re fasting.

Amen! I promise you² this

is the compensation they receive.

17You¹ who fast:

Fix your¹ hair and wash your¹ face,

18so you¹ don’t look to people like you’re¹ fasting,

except to your¹ Father in private.

And your Father, who sees what’s done in private,

will pay you¹ back {in the open}.”

“In the open” in verse 18, same as verse 4, was added to the text in the fourth century, and found in the Codex Washingtonianus and the Textus Receptus. It’s not in the oldest copies. Yet since Jesus is described as bringing us our compensation at his return, Rv 22.12 he may very well repay us in the open.

Sad to say, a lot of fasting Christians don’t follow this rule; they totally let everyone know we’re fasting. Like our families and fellow Christians. And sometimes pagans, like coworkers and waiters and anybody whom we tell, “Oh I can’t eat that; I’m on a fast.” Well aren’t you the holy one.

Jesus wants us to keep our mouths shut about this. It’s nobody’s business we’re fasting. It’s a private matter, between us and God, and that’s it. Keep it as confidential as if you just soiled your pants: Tell nobody unless you absolutely have to. Got it?

Prayer’s one prerequisite: Forgiveness.

Mark 11.25, Matthew 5.23-24, 6.14-15, 18.21-22.

Jesus tells us in the Lord’s Prayer we gotta pray, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” (Or “Forgive us our debtors”; either way.) He elaborates on this in his Sermon on the Mount:

Matthew 6.14-15 KWL

14“For when you² forgive people their trespasses,

your² heavenly Father will also forgive you².

15When you² don’t forgive people {their trespasses},

neither will your² Father forgive your² trespasses.”

And in Mark’s variant of the same teaching:

Mark 11.25 KWL

“Whenever you² stand to pray,

forgive whatever you² have against anyone

so that your² Father who’s in the heavens

might forgive you² your² trespasses.”

Jesus elaborates on it further when Simon Peter asked him how often he has to forgive:

Matthew 18.21-22 KWL

21Then Simon Peter comes to tell Jesus,

“Master, how often will my fellow Christian sin against me,

and I’ll have to forgive them¹?

As many as seven times?

22Jesus tells him, “I don’t tell you¹ ‘as many as seven times,’

but as many as seven by seventy times.”

Followed by Jesus’s Unforgiving Debtor Story, in which a hypothetical king forgave a man who owned 260 million grams silver; the forgiven debtor then turned round and threw a man who owed him 390 grams into debtors prison; the king found this out and unforgave his debtor. Then handed him over to torturers. Mt 18.23-35

The bit about the torturers makes various Christians nervous, and some of us have invented all sorts of iffy teachings about devils and curses and hell. As if our heavenly Father plans to hand us over to torturers. No; he’s gonna do as he’s always done, and leave us to our own devices—and without his protection it’s gonna feel like torture. But fixating on the torture misses the point. God shows us infinite mercy. What kind of ingrates are we when we won’t pay his mercy forward?

For thine is the kingdom…

Matthew 6.13, Daniel 7.14.

At the end of the Lord’s Prayer, in both the well-known Book of Common Prayer version and the King James Version, it ends with this line:

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,

for ever and ever. Amen.

You’ll find other bibles don’t include it, because it’s not in the original text. In my translation I have to put it in braces, to indicate it comes from the Textus Receptus, not Matthew.

Matthew 6.13 KWL

“Don’t bring us into tribulation

but rescue us from the time of evil,

{because the kingdom, power, and glory

belong to you¹ in the age to come. Amen.}”

It comes from the Didache, an instruction manual for new Christians written in the first century. Yep, around the same time the New Testament was written. Its version of the Lord’s Prayer includes that line, whereas the oldest copies of Matthew do not. But because a lot of ancient Christians used the Didache to instruct new Christians, a lot of ’em were taught the Didache version of the Lord’s Prayer… and that last line gradually worked its way into ancient copies of Matthew. And from there into the Vulgate, the Textus, the Lutherbibel, the Geneva Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, and the King James Version.

So it’s not from the bible? No it actually is from the bible. But it’s from Daniel, not Jesus. Comes from this verse:

Daniel 7.14 KWL

The Ancient gave the Son authority,

honor, and the kingdom,

and every people, nation, and language,

who’ll bow to his authority.

His authority is permanent:

It never passes away.

His kingdom will never be destroyed.

Jesus didn’t end his prayer with “Amen,” which quickly became a Christian custom, so the authors of the Didache wanted to include it. And while they were at it, a nice worshipful closing. ’Cause the Ancient of Days is gonna grant the Son his kingdom, and authority (i.e. power), and honor (i.e. glory), forever and ever. It’s all true, so there’s nothing at all wrong with saying and praying it.

But no, Jesus didn’t tell us to say it. So it’s optional.

So if you wanna get all literalist—and a little bit legalist—fine; pray the Lord’s Prayer without the added-on line. But it’s not gonna hurt you, at all, to say it. In fact it’s a useful reminder Jesus is coming back to establish his kingdom on earth—which’ll be awesome!—and he’s gonna have authority and honor, and his kingdom is gonna last a mighty long time… and even outlast the earth itself.

And hopefully the people who prefer the Book of Common Prayer version don’t clash with the KJV fans, because the KJV only has “for ever” instead of “forever and ever.” Y’all need to make accommodations for one another, instead of demanding uniformity. We’re all saying the Lord’s Prayer here; the intent, not the translation, is what matters.

Deliver us from evil.

Matthew 6.13.

In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus has us pray not to be led to temptation—properly, not put to the test, whether such tests tempt us or not. Instead, in contrast, we should pray we be delivered from evil.

Matthew 6.13 KJV

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.

The original text is ἀλλὰ ῥῦσαι ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ/allá rýsë imás apó tu ponirú, “but rescue us from the evil.”

The Greek tu is what grammarians call a determiner, although I’m pretty sure your English teachers called it a definite article, ’cause that’s what English determiners usually do: This noun is a particular noun. When you refer to “the bus,” you don’t mean a bus, any ol’ generic interchangeable bus. You mean the bus, this bus, a specific bus, a definite bus. So when people translate tu ponirú, they assume the Greek determiner is a definite article: Jesus is saying, “Rescue us from the evil.” Not evil in general; not all the evil we’ll come across in life. No no no. This is a definite evil. It’s the evil.

So they figure we gotta personify it, and that’s what many recent bible translations have chosen to do.

ASV. “…but deliver us from the evil one.”

CSB, ISV, LEB, NET, NIV, WEB. “…but deliver us from the evil one.”

GNT. “…but keep us safe from the Evil One.”

ICB, NCV. “…but save us from the Evil One.”

NLT, NRSV. “…but rescue us from the evil one.”

Of course Christians figure “the evil one” would be the evilest one, i.e. Satan. So that’s kinda how we interpret the Lord’s Prayer:

Matthew 6.13 Message

“Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil.”

We even extrapolate this backwards into the bit about temptation: The reason we gotta ask not to be led into temptation, is because Satan wants us led there, so it can hack away at us. From time to time it’s probably appearing before God himself, asking permission to crap all over us like it did Job. Tempting God himself to remove his hedge of protection from us, and let Satan have its evil, evil way with us. And no, none of this is true. Jesus isn’t talking about Satan.