The work of the Holy Spirit - pagina 611

LOVE He

IN

THE OLD COVENANT

571

does not oppose His Gospel as a superior code of morals to the it is His aim, by oppo-

antiquated and inferior Mosaic code, but that

by the

sing the false hiterJ)rctalions of Moses schools, to restore the Mosaic "

Think not that I not merely in a general says

:

law

am come

liberal,

rabbinical

He

to its legitimate position.

to destroy the law, but to fulfil

sense, as tho the valuable

germ which

;

it

contain needed, for its development, only to be divested from outward covering, but to fulfil it to its very jot or tittle. For whosoever shall do and teach them shall be called great in the

may its

Kingdom

of heaven."

From

verse 20

it

is

clear that

He

not the righteousness of Moses, but the false interpretation of

opposes, it

by the

liberal rabbis.

And

after this introduction

He

continues

was said to them of old time. Thou hate thy enemy." Did you ever find it

:

"

Ye have heard

that

and Old Testament?

shalt love thy neighbor this in the

Indeed not; on the contrary, in Prov. xxv.

21

it

reads: "If thine

enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat and if he be thirsty, give him water to drink " and in Exod. xxiii. 3, 4, Israel was taught " If ;

:

;

thou meet thine enemy's ox or ass going astray, thou shalt surely bring it back to him again. If thou see the ass of him that hateth thee lying under his burden, and wouldest forbear to help him, thou shalt surely help with him."

Hence it is unfair to say that the Old Testament teaches a low and unholy morality, for it inculcates the very opposite. The words disapproved by Jesus are found not in the Old Testament, but in the writings of the liberal rabbis.

many

"

Liberal,"

of the rabbis did not support this interpretation.

that a

man

actually lowers himself

when he

lays

we

say, for

This shows

upon the

lips of

Jesus a charge against the Old Testament which can be preferred

only against the liberal rabbis.

Without going into the details of Matt. v. 21 ^., there is another why " nezu commandment" can not be interpreted by making to oppose the law of Christian love to the Mosaic commandment

reason it

If Matt. v. 43, " Ye have heard that it has been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy," had been the old commandment of Moses, Jesus could have opposed it by this new commandment " But I say unto you, Love thy neighbor and thine enemy." That would have had sense. But of the "new commandment " He speaks, fiot in this passage, but in John xiii. 34,

of hatred.

:

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