Jesus Did Not Come to Abolish the Law and Prophets (2023)

Introduction

Did Jesus come to make sure his followers continue to keep the Old Testament laws? How does he not “abolish” the Law but “fulfill” it? What is meant by a “jot and tittle” not passing from the Law? Are there “more important” and “less important” commands? What is implied by us being the “salt of the earth” and “light of the world”? These and other questions, Chad Bird will address in this week’s Reading the Gospels through Hebrew Eyes on Matthew 5:13-20.

Content

Welcome to this week's episode of reading the gospels through Hebrew eyes, what is exactly, what exactly does it mean to be the salt of the earth and what does it mean to be the light of the world? Well, those are two of the questions we want to address because we're looking at Matthew chapter 5, verses 13 through 20 today, but those two questions about those two metaphors of Salt and Light then lead into where Jesus says that he did not come to abolish or to nullify or to set aside the law and the prophets.

So what's the implication of that? Well, that's an important question.

We're going to spend a few minutes talking about that, so we're going to jump in with verse, 13 and first of all, discuss what it means for us to be.

The salt of the earth will transition to the light of the world and then we'll get to this material about the law and the prophets so verse, 13 Jesus says you are the salt of the earth.

We we in Texas would say y'all, because this is a second person.

Plural, so you all are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, the Greek has a strange verb there.

It is Morino which literally means to become foolish, and here it's used in the sense of losing its flavor or losing its taste.

So if salt should lose its taste or flavor, then how shall its saltiness be restored? It's not good for anything except to be thrown out and Trampled Under people's feet.

So what what aspect of salt is Jesus focusing in on here, because, as a metaphor, salt could stand for any number of things.

Well, I think it would be a mistake to kind of narrow it down to one thing and say: well, Jesus is talking about how his disciples, his followers, are, going to be the the way of preserving the Earth or flavoring the Earth, or something like that, because salt was used in a variety of different ways and it's the characteristics of metaphors to connect poetry, to allow for a multiplicity of applications.

So, for instance, we know that in the ancient world, as in today's world as well, salt was used for for flavoring.

For preserving for cleansing, it was added to the sacrifices, as we have it described in The Book of Leviticus.

It was used for practical purposes such as brightening lamps and enhancing the ovens that were used in Israel and depending upon the quantity it could either be used to fertilize the soil or to make the soil unfruitful Paul uses the image of seasoning in Colossians 4 6, where he says.

Let your speech always be gracious seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you want to answer each person.

So with all these variety of usages of salt, which one does Jesus have in mind well again, I expect that he has more than one of these in mind, because that is the nature of the metaphor itself, so you're to be the salt of the earth, whether that's in flavoring or in preserving or kind of the sacrificial quality, is implicated here.

All of these together is what it means for us to be the salt of the earth.

But if salt has lost its flavor well, then it's not good for anything.

I mean you just said: well: throw it away right now the question that permanently comes up when, when this, when this verse arises, is well, how can salt become unsolved? That's that's a chemical impossibility.

Well, there's a couple different ways that we can explain.

This RT France, for instance, says that, yes, strictly speaking, sodium chloride is a stable compound.

It can't lose its quality, but the salt used in Palestine derived either from the deposits around the Dead Sea or from salt pans in which its water was evaporated.

Wasn't pure sodium chloride, wasn't pure salt, and so the salt could Leach out, leaving other minerals like like gypsum, so maybe that's what he had in mind.

I think what's going on is, is that the? How doesn't really matter how salt could become unsalty is beside the point.

The point is that unsalty salt is useless, it's as useless as dry water or hot ice, or a dark Sun.

That is it's antithetical to its very nature, it's being untrue to its very nature.

His point is that if we as the Disciples of Jesus, become unsalt, well, then we're being untrue to the very way in which God our father has made us to be.

So we are to be true to that nature.

True, to who God has made us to be in Christ, that's what it means to be the salt of the earth and, if we're not well, then we've lost the very nature which has been given to us by God in Christ, so we're the salt of the earth and that salt is used by God for all these different sorts of ways.

So that's the first image, the salt.

Now, what do we have coming next? This is verse 14 through 16.

you again, this is y'all, so you all second person- plural, you all are the light of the world I think by the way, the the second person plural is important.

This is not an individualistic sermon he's talking to a community of Believers.

We would say the church today he's talking to everyone who is part of the band of disciples.

Around Jesus, so you all are the light of the world.

A city set on a hill cannot be hidden, nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house in the same way, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your father, who is in heaven.

So, of course, a city set on a hill is designed by its very purpose, not to be hidden at the very cons.

The way in which it is constructed, the place it is constructed is intended, of course, to be seen and that's what Jesus is getting at here with the image of light and the city that's built or set on a hill cannot be hidden.

He wants his disciples, he wants us, he wants the community of the faithful to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world, and this light, of course, is going to provide illumination again.

Just like salt light has a number of different ways in which you choose throughout the scriptures, but over and over it's using this good positive sort of way in which it dispels the darkness.

It provides Clarity.

It illuminates the way before us all these various ways now Jesus says that if you have a light, what do you do with it? Well, you know you're not going to you're not going to hide it you're going to let it give light to everyone every place in the room.

Now a couple things here that are that are helpful from the Greek.

First of all, this lamp is luknos.

The Latin for light by the way is Luke's.

We get our words like, lucid and Lucifer from that Latin origin.

Now the lamp that is being talked about here is it's a small container with a wick that extends from it typically burn oil in order to give light to to a room, and because most of our Century Jewish houses were on, they didn't have interior walls just one big space.

Well, then, of course, one light would provide light illumination for the for the entire room.

Now, when he talks about it being covered up by a bushel basket, that's actually a Latin word modios, it's borrowed from Latin taken into Greek, and it just simply refers to a a standard measure for for grain.

So it's some kind of container holds about eight U.S dry quarts, and it was probably found in most most household, just the ordinary container that most families would have had.

So you don't put it you don't put that light.

You put that basket over the light.

Of course, that destroys the very purpose.

Again, it's like the salt light is created for illumination.

You don't hide the light.

Just like a sitting on a hill cannot be hidden.

Instead, it is there to provide the illumination, that is, by its very nature, how it was designed to be again it's getting back to who we are created to be as the Disciples of Jesus, Salt and Light.

This is the way in which God our father has formed us in Christ to be so that we provide that that flavoring or that preservation, or that sacrificial character of a life that salt provides, but also that we provide this illumination.

That is to say, we are the ones through whom God works, to bring the light of his word and the Light Of Hope to to the world.

Now the metaphor of light is used in all sorts of different ways.

As we see from this quote, from John Nolan's Matthew commentary, it's found in the Jewish sources.

The light of the world is applied to to God, to Adam, to distinguish rabbis to Israel, to the Torah, to the temple, to Jerusalem, now Cicero, interestingly, considered Rome to be a light to the whole world and then in John 8 Jesus is the light of the world in Isaiah, 42, 6 and 49 and chapter 60.

You had this servant.

That is a light to the Nations.

The servant being is either Israel or personified Israel in the in the Messiah.

So you have all of these different sorts of ways in which light is being used, metaphorically in the Old Testament, as well as in Jewish literature.

But the point is that you have God creating Us in Jesus Christ as his disciples to be those who provide this light so that others may see our good works, glorify Our Father, who is in heaven we are walking lights as it were, because we're filled with the spirit himself, who brings the Light of Christ into us and then shines that light through us to those who are around us.

Now.

Let's move on to the next section, which is Matthew, 5, 17 and 18.

Jesus says: do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.

I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them for truly I, say to you until Heaven and Earth pass away, not an Iota as we used to say or Yoda, not in Iota or Yoda, not a DOT will pass from the law until all is accomplished.

Okay, so there's a number question we need to ask and we need to ask what does he mean by the law? What is the law and the prophets? What's this language of abolish or destroy, and what is what does it mean to fulfill? There's? There's a number of questions that arise from this passage and I think it's one that's pretty easily understood and misapplied in a lot of different circumstances.

So let's spend a few minutes unpacking this, so we can better understand what Jesus is teaching us here.

First of all, let's identify exactly what it's meant by the law and the prophets.

So, as you probably know, the the the Old Testament or the Hebrew Bible was divided in different sorts of ways.

Today it has a three-fold division that was just emerging in the first century, but by and large it had just a twofold division in the first century, and that was the law and the prophet.

So when Jesus says he didn't come to abolish the law or the prophets, basically, that's shorthand for I didn't come to abolish the whole, the Old Testament, the entirety of the Old Testament scriptures.

That's what he's talking about here so he didn't come to abolish the Bible, as it was understood by first century Jews, the the Old Testament and then he also says So It Begins by talking about the law or the prophets, and then he transitions to say that the law, so not an Iota, not a DOT, will pass from the law, but keep in mind too that the law can mean the whole Old Testament.

Ordinarily, the law was the Torah which is or the pentateuch the first five books Genesis through Deuteronomy.

However, here I would argue that when he, when he mentions the law, he's simply using law as a shorthand for the entire Tanakh, the entire Old Testament- and this is this- is found in other places in the New Testament as well, where law represents the entire Old Testament and not just the first five books.

So, for instance, John 10 Jesus says: is it not written in your law? Quote I said you are God's? Well, that's a quote from the book of Psalms, so Jesus is quoting from the Psalms, but he's saying it's in the law, because the law here is used in this very general broad sort of way for the entire Hebrew Bible same thing in John 15.

But the word that is written in their law must be fulfilled.

Quote they hate of Me Without, a Cause that is another quote from the Psalms.

So once more The Book of Psalms is said to be in the law, because the law here represents the entire Old Testament First Corinthians 14 21 Paul, says the same thing in the law.

It is written by people of strange tongues, well he's quoting from Isaiah there, and yet he says it's in the law so quotes from the Psalms in Isaiah are said in these instances to be in the law and I would argue, that's what's going on here.

So when Jesus says he didn't come to abolish the law and the prophets he's talking about the Old Testament he I didn't come to abolish our scriptures.

I didn't come to set those aside and then the second time that he mentions the law.

I would argue, he's not talking about the pentateuch.

The first five books he's talking about the entire Old Testament.

So when both the law and the prophets, as well as in the law he's using this in a very broad way to say, I didn't come to set aside the scriptures I didn't come to nullify the scriptures, I think one of the mistakes that people make is by isolating in and saying see, Jesus didn't come to abolish the law and understanding that only in the sense of, for instance, the Jewish ceremonial law or understanding only in sense of the Ten Commandments, or only understanding in a legal sort of way.

No, the law of the prophets and the law.

There are a reference to the entire Old Testament to the Hebrew.

Bible Jesus did not come to nullify or abolish him, but to fulfill them now.

What exactly? Does that mean the verb? That's translated as abolish here's Kato luo can also be translated in any number of ways, as you can see in your screen, so throw and abolish, destroy it's the idea or overthrow it's used in a number of instances, for instance in in Josephus to talk about the setting Assad or the abolishing of Customs.

So Jesus says he didn't come to abolish to nullify or to set aside the scriptures.

That's that was not his purpose.

The scriptures will stand the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament call it what you wish the law of the prophets, all of that Jesus didn't come to do away with by no means.

Instead, he came to do what with it he came to fulfill.

It is the Greek that she was there now.

This is very important.

How do we understand just think for a second? How do we understand what an author means? Well, one of the ways that we understand what he means is by context, so you look at the ways, for instance, where the way that he uses a particular word.

You can say: oh well, he uses this.

This particular verb in a number of different ways.

So let's look at those instances or he uses this noun in a number of ways.

Let's look and see how he uses that, or maybe he uses grammatical Construction in a certain sort of way.

So let's look at the the five or ten ways that he uses that, so you get an idea for what an author means by seeing how he uses a word such as we have here with fulfill.

So how does Matthew use the word fulfill? Well, let's look at these instances there's a whole bunch of them.

First of all, Matthew 1.

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophets, and all of these fulfills are the verb playro the same one used in Matthew 5.

This was to Matthew 2.

This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet out of Egypt I call my son, that's a quote from Hosea Matthew 2 17 then was fulfilled.

What was spoken by the Prophet Jeremiah Matthew 2, 23, that what was spoken by the prophets might be fulfilled.

That he'd be called a Nazarene Matthew 3 15 let this is when Jesus tells John the Baptist to let him be baptized, let it be so now for.

Thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness and then just to glance us more of these Matthew 4 is Isaiah being fulfilled.

Matthew 5 17 is the one we're looking at now.

Matthew 8 17 is another quote from Isaiah, which is being fulfilled.

We have Matthew 12 13 21.

All of these are in reference to with a couple exceptions which is kind of a different use of the verb.

But all of these, where you have fulfilled, are talking about the Fulfillment of the prophets or the law.

The Old Testament, whether it's Isaiah, whether it's Jeremiah Jeremiah, whether it's Zechariah or someone else.

So when Jesus says he didn't, he didn't come to to nullify or to destroy the law of the prophets, but he came to fulfill them.

Or what is he saying? Well he's saying that he came as the one to whom all the law and the prophets were pointing.

So he fills them to the full because they're all pointing to him him who is the yes and the amen to all the promises of God? So, of course he didn't come to nullify or to set aside the law of the prophets, because these were messianically designed to be pointing toward him.

Who is their fulfillment, so he's the period at the end of every sentence.

He's the exclamation point at the end of every promise.

He is the one who fills in the blank to all of these promises of God.

That's what he means that he came to fulfill them and all he has to do is simply look at all of those references in Matthew to where he uses that verb play Rao to understand what Jesus means he came to to fill up the Old Testament with himself, because he is the Fulfillment of that Old Testament, that's what he means there now.

He also goes on to say something about the the Yoda and the dot.

Now, what's going on there, he says he didn't come to to abolish but to fulfill, and then he goes on to say, amen, I, say to you or truly I, say to you until Heaven and Earth pass away, not a Yota or Iota, as we sometimes say it here in America, not a Yoda, not a DOT.

Now in Greek, a DOT is a Coria which is literally a a hook or some kind of projection, so not a jot or a tittle as the old King James put it, not a Yoda or a DOT will pass from what well we'll pass from the law of the prophets pass from the law until everything is accomplished.

Now, what's he talking about here? Well, you I have a just uh on your screen.

You can see a couple of examples of this.

First of all, when he says a Yoda, of course, that is a it's a Greek letter.

It's the smallest of the Greek letters and since he's talking about the law and the prophets which are written in Hebrew, then presumably he's talking about the equivalent to that in in Hebrew, which would be this small letter yode, which I have in red there.

For you, it's the smallest of of the Hebrew letters, so that would be the equivalent of the Greek Yoda.

So not a Yoda or not.

A yod will pass from the law now when he mentions the hook or the projection.

The kariah, which translated here as Dot and Old King James, had his Tittle.

That is a very small part of letters, so you'll see, for instance, on the uh, the Hebrew dalit, which is a d that little projection on the right hand side.

That's one of these instances of what would be a projection or a hook, a kariah and the same with the the bait, which is the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

You can see one of those sticking out.

That's just a small extension of of the line and that helps them to distinguish it from similar looking letters.

So what Jesus is saying is basically listen, he's just kind of getting in into the the fine points he says.

Not even not even the smallest part of the law is going to pass away and again by law.

Here he means the law of the prophets.

He means the entire Hebrew scriptures they're all going to stay.

There he's not nullifying them.

So he's kind of exaggerating to make a point he's saying, like you know that little bitty tiny projection on some of these letters.

Even that's not going to go away.

In other words, the word of God will stand.

I didn't come to do it with with the word of God.

I came to teach it for sure.

I came to to provide illumination as to exactly what it means.

I came to correct some of your misunderstandings of that word, but I didn't come to do away with it.

So not even the smallest part of this, not even the smallest letter is going to be done away with.

Instead, I came to fulfill this scripture.

That is the purpose for which I I came so until Heaven and Earth pass away.

These scriptures will remain and they remain for us as Christians as the The Testament of everything.

God has done from the from from creation to his choosing of Israel, to The Exodus to everything that happened with Joshua and Samuel, and the Kings all the way to the end of the prophets.

All of this Remains, the scriptures that God has given to us that bear witness to the one who is the Fulfillment of those scriptures all right.

We have one section to finish, and this is Matthew 5 19-20.

Therefore, whoever relaxes now the verb used her in Greek is luo.

It's related to kataluo kataluo is the one that was translated to nullify or to abolish.

Jesus did not come to kataluo the law and the prophets.

So there's a connection here between the verb uses used here and the verb used earlier, so whoever luo relaxes looses one of the least of these commands and teaches others to do the same- will be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven.

But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven for I tell you.

Unless you're righteousness succeeds out of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

So Jesus is kind of extending his discussion of what he's been talking about earlier.

So he he didn't, come to kataluo to abolish the law and the prophets, and so he says to his disciples, including all of us.

Well, don't you don't you either? So don't you be luo I didn't come to katilu I didn't come to abolish, so don't you luo, don't you to soften or loose or ignore one of these Commandments teach the scriptures, because if you don't, if you, if you luo, if you, if you saw fun or if you nullify one of the least of these Commandments well, then you're going to be least in the Kingdom of Heaven, so he's he's giving a strict warning to those who are teachers not to set aside the scriptures he didn't come to set aside the scriptures, and so neither should those who are his disciples and those who teach others.

Now you might be asking what's: what's the difference between like a small command and a great command? Well, the rabbis later rabbis would have used the language of light and heavy Commandments, and we don't know for sure what Jesus had in mind.

But let me just give you an example of what later Rabbi is referred to as a as a light commandment, and that would be Deuteronomy 22, verse 6., where you read that if you come across a bird's nest in any tree you're on the ground with young ones or eggs and the mother's sitting on the young or on the eggs, you shall not take the mother with the young.

You shall let the mother go, but the young you may take for yourself that it may go well with you and that you may live long, so that just one example of what might have been kind of in the back of Jesus mind when he's talking about light commandments.

So there's some Commandments, which are weightier more significant, such as the Ten Commandments and there's other Commandments, which were considered important, but not as important as these weightier aspects of the of the Torah.

Now he wraps everything up with what might, on the surface, seemed to be uh, really a startling, a startling declaration.

With regard to righteousness.

He says that unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.

Now, for those of you who, those of you who know David Goggins uh, it would be like saying unless you're athleticism, unless your workout routine exceeds that of David Goggins, you will by no means enter the kingdom of the fit and the athletic.

So it's it's kind of the same comparison here, because the scribes and the Pharisees were the the religious David Goggins of the day, that is to say they were.

They were extremely committed to the minutia of the law, to the punctilius observation and keeping of all of these commandments.

So when Jesus says, unless you're righteousness succeeds, that of these super religious people you're not going to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, that's been a startling, a startling declaration to hear by these earliest disciples.

Now we have Clarity, we begin to realize that what Jesus is teaching here must be a different kind of righteousness, because you just simply can't out righteousness the scribes and the Pharisees.

If you're talking about a righteousness of the law, it, it simply is Unthinkable that you're to be a better Keeper of the law than the scribes and the Pharisees, because the scribes and the Pharisees were held up to be the religious best.

The cream of the crop, so Jesus must be talking here about a very different sort of righteousness and I would argue.

The righteousness he's talking about is the very righteousness that he that he discussed with John the Baptist.

When John didn't want to baptize Jesus, he says: wait, I need to be baptized by you and you're coming to be baptized by me and Jesus says.

Permit it to be so now.

For in this way, it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.

Jesus comes to fulfill.

There's that verb play Rao again, he comes to fulfill all righteousness.

Jesus is doing the things necessary to make sure that righteousness gets filled to the full and it's that righteousness and that righteousness of Christ Alone that exceeds what the scribes and the Pharisees could ever dream of.

Having because it's the righteousness of the Messiah himself, the righteousness that he came to to acquire and the righteousness that he comes then to give to us.

So we don't, we don't need a righteousness that we've worked up.

We need a righteousness that we have received from the hand of a good and gracious father and that's what we have in Jesus Christ.

So the righteousness that exceeds out of the scribes and Pharisees is a very different.

It's not a legal righteousness.

It's not a righteousness! It's based upon this punctilious commandment, keeping it's a righteousness based upon the saving work of Jesus Christ and that doesn't just exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees it's on a whole new level, because it is the righteousness that makes us right with our heavenly father and it's that righteousness that we need and that righteousness which we receive from the hand of our good and gracious father through Jesus Christ in the work of his holy spirit.

So that's a quick run through through Matthew 5, 13-20 salt to the earth.

A lot of the world Jesus did not come to abolish the Old Testament, but to fulfill it.

That's what he teaches in these scriptures hope that you're all doing well, we'll pick up more from The Sermon on the Mount in next week's video.

So we'll see you then.