BECNT Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament BHGNT Baylor Handbook on the Greek New Testament BT The Bible Translator. This dissertation is the completion of a journey spanning fifteen years and three states. I am indebted to my wife, Katrina, who kept my eyes on the horizon every step of the way, through every late night, every disappointment and every.
I am incredibly grateful for the patience and support of Briggs Road Baptist Church, for whom I have been blessed to serve as pastor for the past five years. I am grateful for the trust invested in me by The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and the support I have received from its administration and faculty.
INTRODUCTION
The apparent absence of a treatment of the Sermon on the Mount from the perspective of discourse analysis is a gap in the field of New Testament research. I will show that these features cluster together in the most prominent pericopes of the Sermon. This chapter has examined the genre, macrostructure and discourse features of the Sermon on the Mount as a whole.
The coherence of the Lord's Prayer within the Sermon on the Mount is evident from several factors.
The shift in structure, verbal forms, and subject matter, which I addressed earlier, adds to the overall prominence of this section in the context of the Sermon. Commonly called "The Golden Rule,"87 7:12 functions as an inclusio with 5:17 to conclude the main part of the sermon. The inclusio distinguishes this body of Jesus' teaching as his summary of the demands of the Law and the Prophets.
Therefore” (οὖν) is a loose conjunction that presents the golden rule as a summary of the preceding material. Stanton says "Matthew intends to indicate to the reader that 7.12 is a summary and a conclusion of all the material in the central part of the Sermon beginning at 5.17." 93 Luz notes that the conclusion of the Two Ways has rhetorical precedent in Jewish literature: "In a manner similar to the end of the Holiness Code (Lev 26), Deuteronomy the final redaction of the Book of Enoch (1 Enoch 108), and the Ascension of Moses, the readers are once again confronted with the great choice.".
95 The fact that the final characteristic of the obedient disciples is a "wise man". grounds the sermon in wisdom tradition. While the Beatitudes speak of the promises belonging to µακάριοι, The Two Ways warn of the destruction that awaits the many who do not find the way to life. The apparent ambiguity between the "will of the Father" and the words of Jesus further strengthens this Christological connection and supports Jesus' authoritative interpretation of the law in 5:21-48.
Those who do the will of the Father are those who hear and obey the words of Jesus.100 The authority attributed to Jesus here is reminiscent of Jesus' words in 5:17–20. This chapter has provided a brief analysis of the five sections of the Sermon on the Mount and the relationships and characteristics of the pericopes that comprise them. Before a detailed analysis of the coherence a detailed analysis of 7:6–11 is necessary to provide support for the unity of the pericope.
This pericope demarcation is critical to the analysis of the third part of the Sermon on the Mount and the overall argument of this dissertation. Grant Osborne summarizes the awkwardness of the evangelical view: “This 7:6 is a difficult passage to apply. Guelich treats 7:6 as an independent statement related to apostasy, or “failure to take discipleship seriously.”21 Guelich follows Günther Bornkamm in interpreting 6:19–7:11 as a series of expositions of the Lord's Prayer.
Baasland draws on Greco-Roman texts and Jewish tradition to place 7:6–12 in the context of the charitable institution. The Golden Rule in 7:12 shows how we should be appropriately generous to others for their benefit.36 Along with the statement on the judged in 7:1–5,.
However, combining 7:6 with 7:7–11 results in a negative/positive statement that fits the pattern of the earlier pericopes. Pennington writes, “We can face the problem of cultural distance; what may not seem coherent to us is probably something the original writer and readers may not have stumbled upon.”52 Betz is convinced that “the original listeners or readers of the SM knew what the terms meant.”53. Although there are Jews who speak of the loyalty of the dog, it is generally regarded as 'the most contemptible, insolent and miserable creature' (Str.-B., I, 722)."67.
69 Quarles notes, “The LXX frequently used the plural form ta agia to refer to sacrificial meat. Joseph and Asenath," in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, vol 2, Expansions of the "Old Testament" and Legends, Wisdom, and Philosophical Literature, Prayers, Psalms and Odes, Fragments of Lost Judeo-Hellenistic Works, ed. Strecker notes: "The profane meaning is attested by numerous texts for the New Testament environment that contain almost parallels to the first two lines.
Jesus obviously adapted a typical expression and applied it to his own sense of the saint.73. The proverbial nature of the saying, combined with its chiastic structure, strongly suggests that the saying has a single meaning expressed by the two images. The problem with this interpretation is not only the allegorical tendency, but also that it does not take the literary structure seriously — The parallel sentences are actually parallel.
Images are never arbitrary, and aspects of the images must often be conveyed in the interpretation. Charles Fox Burney, The Poetry of Our Lord: An Examination of the Formal Elements of Hebrew Poetry in the Discourses of Jesus Christ (Oxford: Clarendon Press. 95. Baasland understands 7:6 as a deliberate exaggeration of absurd behavior, “The exaggeration is obvious: no one he doesn't tend to throw pearls to swine, only idiots do that.
Chapter Four contained an analysis of the microstructures of the Sermon on the Mount, including a brief analysis of the coherence of 6:19–7:11 within the larger context of the Sermon on the Mount. Here I provide an argument for the section's unity, which builds on the work of others, yet draws on principles of discourse analysis to highlight features that are often neglected. The key to the structure of the section is the pattern of using µή-negative imperatives with a corresponding.
I have shown that 6:19–24 functions as a heading for the third section of the Sermon on the Mount and has coherent links with the subsequent pericopes. Διὰ τοῦτο stands out as a marked use of a connective, and it is the only occurrence of the phrase in the Sermon. Jesus had referred to Gentiles twice before in the most prominent pericope of each section of the Sermon.
The command to seek the kingdom is followed by another assurance of the Father's care. For these reasons I have summarized this portion of the Sermon on the Mount with the phrase, "desire the kingdom". This will be elaborated and confirmed in 7:6–11, the penultimate pericope in the body of the Sermon.
As the final statement in the third part of the body of the Sermon, 7:6–11 resumes the theme of 6:25–34 to elaborate on the command to seek the kingdom. Allison, “The Pauline Epistles and the Synoptic Gospels: The Pattern of the Parallels,” NTS 28, no. The third section of the Sermon on the Mount is linked by several cohesive features and forms a purposeful unit consisting of four pericopes.
However, Kuruvilla takes the heart of the sermon beyond the simple idea of meaning and deals with the function of the text. Conscientious expositors may feel compelled to repeat the structure of the text in the homiletic outline of the sermon. The sermon transforms the written form of the text into the oral form of the sermon.
Thus, the format of the sermon will not necessarily be the same as the format of the text. I have argued that sermon form must be more than just repeating the structure of the text. The discourse can be an entire book of the Bible or an embedded discourse to a book such as the Sermon on the Mount.
This thesis has argued that the Father's grace is a central theme in the Sermon on the Mount.
