Sermon on the Mount
My body, as amazing as it is… is flawed… and getting…”flaweder”. For my whole life, I have had heightened senses.. more so than most.
I have been able to hear higher frequencies than most cannot – able to detect from across the house when the old crt television was on by hearing the very high frequency pitch from the technology. I had an inner pride that my senses kind of gave me a kind of super-power. That heightened sense is beginning to fade.. and I find myself having turn my head and ask people to repeat what they’ve said when speaking directly to me.
I also used to have better than 20/20 vision, able to see further and more clearly than most. That sense has been diminishing over the past few years and now I have to wear glasses in order to see clearly. I often feel like a cyclops as I get used to the constant single frame around my visual scene.
As I look around the congregation, I see I am in good company with fellow glasses wearers… I hate that my senses are becoming more dull, but I’m glad that the rest of my body is still working fairly well.
My eyesight began diminishing about 2 years ago – very slowly. Because I had some heightened acuity I noticed that something was not right… but because the diminishing sight was gradual it was not an easy thing to notice… but over time I began to be aware that one eye was not as clear as the other. I would try closing one eye and testing myself. Since one eye was still mostly good I just got along..but finally I decided to go and get tested and sure enough I needed glasses.
While the optometrist was testing my eyes and flipping between my regular sight and what my eyes could best see, it was like a blurry veil had been taken from my view and everything was in high definition. Or, in other words, it was like switching from an old low-quality television to an HD TV.
If you’re like me, you find yourself having a similar experience spiritually in life.
At baptism and conversion, we are perfect. The excitement and clarity of the gospel makes us see everything clearly. But then, as time goes on, we can,sometimes, if we’re not careful, feel a diminishing of spirituality, or closeness to God. We sometimes get complacent in living the gospel. Maybe our Sabbath day observance gets lax, maybe we watch movies that are not what they should be…it could be that we skip some church meetings that could help us grow or fellowship with good people or… maybe we do only the bare minimum in our callings.
This, surely, is a recipe for reducing our happiness. If you notice that happening to yourself, maybe it’s time to review the Saviour’s teachings during his Sermon on the Mount.
The Sermon on the Mount is the longest piece of teaching from Jesus in the New Testament, occupying chapters 5, 6, 7 of the Gospel of Matthew. These chapters contain many of the most widely quoted elements of the 4 gospels and to most Christians, contains the central tenets of Christian Discipleship.
So central to the Saviour’s teachings, Jesus repeated many of these same teachings when visiting the America’s as recorded in the Book of Mormon in 3 Nephi 12-14.
The sermon on the Mount outlines many of Jesus’ teachings including the Beatitudes, the Lord’s Prayer and a charge for us to become perfect. Essentially, it’s a pattern for us, that, when studied and applied, will help us come unto, and be like, Christ.
Also interesting to note is that Joseph Smith, when under the direction of the Lord, did an Inspired Translation of the Bible, revised 84 of the 111 verses in the sermon on the mount (a full 76%), including the addition of 5 new verses. A few of these inspired changes are in the footnotes of the LDS edition of the Bible, but to see all of them, you’ll need to refer to the JST appendix.
Before the Sermon on the Mount, the Saviour had been “all about Galilee” preaching and “great crowds followed him” from all around the area. The setting for this sermon is in Matthew 5: 1-2. Jesus sees the multitudes and goes up into the mountain, is followed by his disciples and begins to preach. The audience of the sermon is the 12 apostles and the Saviour’s disciples… that’s us. No introductory fluff here… it’s hard-core gospel teachings.
It begins with the Beatitudes.
The beatitudes are 8-10 blessings pronounced by Jesus (depending on how literal you interpret each statement in the teaching), each one precise, specific. Each consists of a condition and a result, such as “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God”.
If taken only at face value, they are just quaint, cryptic proverbs, devoid of actual applicability. But, to a student of the scriptures and the Saviour’s teachings, they are deep chasms of meaning and mentorship.
Before getting into a few of the details, I want to first correct an issue I had as a youth.
As a youth, I had a hard time letting the beatitudes into my heart, because my mind kept blocking them… and for a silly reason. My reason for difficulty in understanding came from not grasping exactly what does the word “beatitudes” mean? I always read it as something like beautiful, which sounded like of like a girly thing… and never really latched on to the BE-ATTITUDES play on words… having studied a few foreign languages, plays on English words don’t hold a lot of weight for me.
Well, it’s actually quite simple. Each of the Beatitudes begins with the phrase “Blessed are the”… such as “Blessed are the meek, for ey they will inherit the earth”.
This “Blessed are the” is the translation of the latin “Beatus”, meaning “to be fortunate” or “to be happy”, or “to be blessed”. In the 15th Century, the Catholic church standardized a translation of the bible which labelled this section of Matthew, “Beatitudines”, which later became anglicized as “beatitudes”. If we skipped that whole latin history, the beatitudes would probably be called the “Blessed be’s”. I find it easier to think of the word “Beatitudes” as meaning “Happiness”, which is why I’m suggesting some brushing up on this teaching if you’re find some diminished spirituality in your life.
Let’s listen to these beatitudes once over. We often see them delivered on video in a slight English accent because, we often connote a clear English accent with intelligence and so the filmmakers want to portray Jesus as a superb teacher, which He of course was… Originally, of course, these words would have been spoken by Jesus in Aramaic.
Here we go:
Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven. (5:3)
Blessed are those who mourn: for they will be comforted. (5:4)
Blessed are the meek: for they will inherit the earth. (5:5)
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness: for they will be filled. (5:6)
Blessed are the merciful: for they will be shown mercy. (5:7)
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they will see God. (5:8)
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they will be called children of God. (5:9)
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (5:10)
Probably it would not be hard to spend the entire direction of a talk review a single one of these beatitudes, so I’ll not go into any one in detail…. but I’d like to point out that receiving any of these blessings are not based on you being tall or thin, black or white, male or female, young or old… the conditions of these blessing are states of mind or circumstances for which each of us can be personally responsible for… behaviors we can all adopt and chose as our character. (except perhaps being persecuted… but if we share the gospel enough, that’s bound to happen some time).
The beatitudes present a new set of ideals that focus on love and humility rather than the Old Testament force and exaction. They echo the highest ideals of Jesus’ teachings on spirituality and compassion.
Following the beatitudes, Jesus compares us as the Salt of the Earth and the Light of the World. In this part of the teaching Jesus explains that we, people who understand the gospel and are seeking to become like Christ, must season the earth by spreading our knowledge and passion. We must help illuminate the understanding of humanity’s purpose by shedding forth our light. In short, having first become disciples, we must now become missionary minded disciples.
After the salt and light metaphors, we come to the longest portion, sometimes referred to as the Antitheses. In this section, Jesus fulfills and reinterprets the Old Testament and, in particular, the 10 commandments by contrasting what “Ye have heard…” from others and upgrading old doctrines and societal norms.
38 Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:
39 But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.
40 And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also. (Matthew 5:38-40)
Following these antitheses, Jesus teaches that doing “good works” simply for praise and recognition is not the higher way, but we must do things from the heart. He condemns materialism and its superficiality, calling his disciples to not worry about such things, and instead emphasizes that we must “Seek first the kingdom of God”.
Christ then teaches us a pattern for prayer, now called “The Lord’s Prayer”.
Second to last, Jesus teaches that we should forgive and not judge others.
And finally, Jesus spends some time warning us against false prophets and emphasizes that we cannot do right without God.
As you can see, each of these parts of Jesus’ teachings in the Sermon on the Mount are rich in doctrinal understanding and applicability. Easily we could spend more than an hour on a minuscule part of these teachings to more deeply appreciate and apply what the Saviour intended for us.
Amid these teachings we are commanded to be perfect. Note the small difference in the Saviour’s teaching while in Jerusalem and then after to the Nephites in America. When in Jerusalem, Jesus taught that “Ye are therefore commanded to be perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” (Matt 5:48)… then when appearing the America’s and teaching the same things, he changed it slightly by saying,” Therefore I would that ye should be perfect even as I, or your Father who is in heaven is perfect. (3 N 12:48). After being resurrected, the Saviour was now perfect. So the commandment for us to be perfect, oft cited as impossible in this life, is actually a commandment to be eligible for perfection at judgement and the resurrection by keeping and obeying the commandments and coming unto Christ. Hopefully you can see how comparing sources can shed additional light on what may initially appear to be cryptic or impossible-to-obey commandments.
Studying these teaching in some details can deepen your understanding and help you improve.
If you are looking for a way in 2016 to study the scriptures rather than simply read them, may I suggest beginning with a systematic study of the sermon on the mount from all its angles and sources and particularly how you put these teachings of the Saviour into action in your life.
Sure this is a way to greater happiness, spiritual fulfillment and a way for us to better quality for perfection as we come until Christ.
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