And so, instead of our understanding these clear and simple words as they were said, and in the sense that the whole doctrine of Christ confirms, an obscure interpretation is given to us, which introduces inconsistency where there is none, and thus destroys the true sense of the doctrine, leaving nothing but words, and in reality re-establishing the Mosaic teaching with all its barbarous cruelty.
According to the commentaries of the Church, and those of the fifth century in particular, Christ did not destroy the written law, but confirmed it. But we are not told how He confirmed it, or how the law of Christ and the Mosaic Law can be supposed to be united into one. We find nothing in these commentaries but a play upon words. We are told that Christ kept the Mosaic Law by the prophecies concerning Himself being fulfilled; and that Christ fulfilled the law through us, through the faith of men in Him. No effort is made to solve the only question that is of essential importance to every believer: how these two contradictory laws, referring to life, can be united into one. The inconsistency of the text, which says that Christ does not destroy the law, with the one in which we read, ‘It has been said…but I say to you,’ (indeed the contradiction between the whole spirit of the Mosaic Law and the doctrine of Christ) remains in all its force.
Let everyone who is interested in this question examine for himself the commentaries on this passage given to us by the Church, beginning from John Chrysostom to the present time. It is only after having read these that he will see clearly not only that no explanation of the contradiction is given, but also that a contradiction has been skillfully inserted where there was none before. The impossible attempts at uniting what cannot be united are clear proof that this was not an involuntary mental error, but was effected with some definite purpose in view; that it was found necessary; and the cause of its having been found necessary is obvious.
Let us see what John Chrysostom says in answer to those who reject the Mosaic Law (Commentary of the gospel according to St. Matthew, vol. 1, pp. 320, 321).
‘On examining the ancient law that enjoins us to take an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, the objection is raised, ‘How can He who speaks thus be righteous? What answer can we give?’ Why, that it is, on the contrary, the best token of God’s love toward man. It was not that we should really take an eye for an eye that He gave us this law, but that we should avoid wronging others for fear of suffering the same at their hands.
As, for instance, when threatening the Ninevites with destruction, His desire was not to destroy them (had He indeed decreed their destruction He would not have spoken of it); His purpose was only, by His menaces, to induce them to amend their lives and, by so doing, turn His wrath aside. Thus likewise the hot-tempered, who are ready to put out their neighbors’ eyes, are threatened with punishment for the sole purpose of making their fears of punishment restrain them from injuring their fellow-creatures. If this is cruelty, there is cruelty likewise in the commandment that forbids murder, or the one that interdicts adultery. But such an argument would only prove a man to have reached the last stage of madness. And I so dread calling these commandments cruel, that I should rather be inclined to consider a contrary law as wrong, according to plain common sense. You call God cruel because He has enjoined taking an eye for an eye; but I say that many would have had a greater right to call Him cruel, as you do, had He not given this commandment.’
John Chrysostom plainly acknowledges the law of a tooth for a tooth to be the divine law, and the reverse of that law – i.e. Christ’s doctrine of non-resistance – to be wrong.
Pages 322, 323: ‘Let us suppose that the law is entirely cast aside,’ says John Chrysostom further, ‘that all fear of promised punishment is done away with, that the wicked are left to live according to their inclinations, without fear of punishment – adulterers, murderers, thieves, and perjurers. Wouldn’t all be overthrown; wouldn’t houses, marketplaces, cities, lands, seas, and the whole universe be full of iniquity? This is obvious.
For if even the existence of laws, fear and threats of punishment, can hardly keep the evil intentioned with bounds, what would there then be to restrain men from evil deeds, if all obstacles were removed? What disasters would then rush in torrents into the lives of men! Cruelty does not lie in leaving the wicked free to act as they please, but in letting the innocent man suffer without defending him. If a man were to collect a crowd of miscreants around him, and having furnished them with weapons, were to send them forth into the town to kill all those they met in the streets, could anything be more barbarous? And if another were to bind these armed men and imprison them, releasing the victims these miscreants had threatened with death, could anything be more humane?’
But John Chrysostom does not tell us by what the other is to be guided in his definition of the wicked. May he not himself be a wicked man, and imprison the good?
‘Now apply this example to the law. He who gave the commandment, “an eye for an eye” has bound the minds of the wicked in chains of fear, and may be compared to the man who bound the miscreants; but if no punishment were appointed for criminals, would it not be arming them with the weapons of fearlessness, and acting like him who gave weapons to the miscreants, and sent them forth into the town?’
If John Chrysostom does acknowledge the doctrine of Christ, he ought to have told us who is to take an ‘eye for an eye,’ or a ‘tooth for a tooth,’ and cast into prison. If He who gave the commandment, that is, God Himself, were to inflict the threatened punishment, there would be no inconsistency; but it must be done by men, the men who were forbidden to do so by the Son of God. God said, ‘An eye of an eye.’ The Son says, ‘Do not act thus.’ One of the two commandments must be acknowledged as just. John Chrysostom and the Church follow the commandments of the Father – i.e., the Mosaic Law – and reject the commandments of the Son, while ostensibly professing His doctrine.
Christ rejects the Mosaic Law, and gives His own in its stead. For him who believes in Christ there is no contradiction. He pays no heed to the Mosaic Law, believes in Christ’s doctrine, and fulfills it. Neither is there any contradiction for him who believes in the Mosaic Law. The Hebrews do not consider the words of Christ valid, and they believe in the Mosaic Law. There is a contradiction only for those who, while choosing to live according to the Mosaic Law, try to persuade themselves and others that they believe in the doctrine of the Christ; only for those whom Christ calls, ‘You hypocrites, you generation of vipers.’
Instead of acknowledging one of the two – either the Mosaic Law or the doctrine of Christ – we say that both are divine truths.
But no sooner does the question touch upon life itself, than the doctrine of Christ is straightway cast aside, and the Mosaic Law is acknowledged.
If we examine this false interpretation closely, we shall see in it one phase of the awful struggle between good and evil, light and darkness.
Christ appears amidst the Hebrews, who were entangled in countless minute rules, laid down by their Levites, and called by them the divine law, each of which was preceded by the words, ‘And God said to Moses.’
Not only the relations in which man stands to God, but the sacrifices, feast days, fasts, the relations between men – public, civil, and family relations – all the details of private life, circumcision, ablution of themselves and their cups, their clothes, all – even in the most trifling details – were encompassed by rules, and these were acknowledged as the commandments of God, the law of God. What could a prophet do – I do not say Christ-God – but what could a prophet, a teacher do, when teaching such a people, without first destroying the obligations of a law by which everything, down to the smallest detail of life, was thus regulated? Christ does what any other prophet would do. He takes from the old law, considered by the people as divine, what is truly the law of God. He takes the basic principles, setting all the rest aside, and He adds to it His own revelation of the eternal law.
Though all need not be cast aside, a law that is considered obligatory in all its minutest details must inevitably be violated. This is what Christ does, and He is accused of destroying the law of God; and He is crucified for this. But His teaching remains among His disciples, and passes on to other peoples. Yet, in the course of ages, and among the new peoples who receive Christ’s truth, the same human interpretations and explanations shoot up. Again the shallow precepts of man appear in place of the divine revelation. Instead of the words, ‘And God said to Moses,’
