Matthew 5:33-48

And we continue through the Sermon on the Mount and at this point Yeshua has said, you have heard it has been said, but I say several times. He does it again at verse 33 saying,

14 Matthew 5:33-48

April 12th 2026

Matthew 5:33 Again, ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, ‘Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths’

The law respecting oaths is found in Leviticus 19:12 and Deuteronomy 23:23.

Swearing oaths of honor even in God’s name was permissible.

By these oaths men were forbid to perjure themselves, or to forswear, that is, swear falsely but were to literally perform whatever is promised in an oath.

Back then, as it is even today when people say “I swear to God,”it was an oath of solemn affirmation (or declaration) that appeals to God and said “if the truth of what I am affirming is false, the oath swearer would imprecate God’s vengeance upon himself.”

We call it perjury today, here it was called “foreswearing” thyself.

In other words, if you swear to God, make sure you do it.

Now some believe that this teaching says to make no oaths. Not so.

When Yeshua was before the High Priest He testified and gave an oath or promise.

When Paul was hauled into court, or in his writings, he often called God to witness his sincerity, which is all that is meant by an oath or giving a witness.

Romans 1:9

“For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers.”

Romans 9:1

I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost,

Galatians 1:20

Now the things which I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not.

Yeshua is NOT, I repeat, NOT against testifying in a court of law or against testifying of the truth before men in His name or using God as a witness.

From the ancient writings of the Jewish Rabbins, who professedly adhered to the law, that they had also introduced a number of oaths into their common conversation and these oaths they by no means considered as binding because they were not made in the sight or purview of God.

For example, they would swear by the temple, by the head, by heaven, by the earth.

As long as they kept from swearing by the name YAHAVAH and so long as they observed the oaths publicly taken, they seemed to consider all these other oaths as not only allowable, and breakable.

We hear this occurring too, right?

“I swear on my mother’s grave!”

What’s so big about this – you might not like your mother and her grave has no meaning, right?

“I promise! I swear!” right?

This is the abuse Christ was correcting.

The practice of swearing in common conversation, and from the following verses it appears He especially was talking about the common practice of swearing by “sacred created things.”

Notice what Yeshua uses as an example of what not to swear by including,

Heaven

Earth

Jerusalem and ending with their own head!

All of these things were created BY God, exist because of God, and to swear on them was as if you were swearing by God Himself.

See, the practice was to swear on something as close to God as you could get without swearing on Him Himself – but Yeshua was saying don’t do it because it is all His in the first place, and if you are not going to fulfill your oath with these words you are breaking your oath to God in the end.

In other words, to trifle with these things was to trifle with God.

So,again, “it has been said of Old if you make an oath, keep it, don’t perjure yourself . . .”

(verse 34)

34 But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God's throne:

Knock of your common and repetitive swearing by things, whether these things be “By Heaven?” Don’t do it – for it is God's throne. He sits there – it is sacred because it is HIS!

(verse 35)

35 Nor by the earth; for it is his footstool:

HE stands there!

“neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King.”

It is His City!

36 Neither shalt thou swear by thy head, because thou canst not make one hair white or black.

Look at the descending hierarchy Yeshua employs here to teach them the logic against the cultural practices around them – what a Master Teacher.

I love this because Yeshua must have heard all of this swearing and talking and jibber-jabber as He walked about on earth and osn’t that interesting that our God and King rubbed shoulders with the world, heard its ways with His own ears, saw the evil with His own eyes, and then, having God’s eternal righteous perspective, taught truth relative to that perspective. Blows me away.

Yeshua ends with a very common oath of the day by the most religious and the gentiles – to swear by the head was the same as to swear by the life, or to say, “I will forfeit my life if what I say is not true.”

But God is the Author of the life, and to swear by that, therefore, is the same as to swear by him and to put Him on the executioners block.

Yeshua brings it down to even the color of a lifeless part of our body – the hair on our head.

Did you ever consider the fact that we do not even control that outside of products but if our hair goes gray we do not do it – God does.

All things – all things – Yeshua is saying, are His. So don’t play word games. Whatever you swear by you better keep it. And he adds,

37 But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil.

Affirm things to be true or not. The more words we use the more of a chance we are including some sort of lie, some sort of deception, some sort of trickery.

Remember . . . Yeshua is teaching what righteousness is before God AND leading all who hear to Him to the only solution to measure up.

He moves on (verse 38)

38 Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:

This command is found in Exodus 21:24, Leviticus 24:20, and Deuteronomy 19:21.

In those places this rule was given as a way to regulate the decisions of judges or magistrates.

If an eye or a tooth was lost in a fight or an accident, an eye or a tooth was taken.

If someone was burned or maimed or killed or lost a cow the person responsible was burned, of killed or lost their cow.

Was or is there anything wrong with this practice in terms of it being fair?

Not at all.

Judicially speaking, this rule is perfectly just and the author of it was . . . Yeshua Himself.

In fact, the Mosaic Law still works and finds application in our judicial system and it is not wrong in terms of fairness..

If someone takes a life we ought to find many believe that their life should be taken when administered by our courts.

There’s the key to this.

Instead of confining these teachings to magistrates, many Jews had extended it to private conduct, and made it the rule which allowed individuals to take “revenge.”

The Law of eye for an eye tooth for a tooth was not a personally applied law. It was set for the governance of the nation and was to help those in charge to keep order and to deal justly with offenders and those offended.

Because some Jews considered themselves justified, by this rule they would inflict the same injury on others that they had received.

Against this Yeshua rejects.

And this brings us to a huge discussion which we will address with only a few words.

God is just and God is righteous.

If we cannot even altar the color of a hair on our head do we think we are in a position to altar injustice?

Listen - are Christians against the Law doing what is necessary and right in exacting justice? Not in the least.

We support and endorse those in power over us and expect them to deal justly with those who have committed or been the victims of wrong doing.

But what is OUR opinion, attitude, approach, toward the individual who is wronged or who has done the wrong?

NOT eye for an eye.

NOT tooth for a tooth.

From our hearts we love, and forgive, and support all.

Sometimes these two positions of action get crossed in the Christian mind.

When they do, we have Christian Militia groups being formed, or believers standing outside prisons calling for others to “fry and die.”

This is NOT the heart of God for the believer.

I have had the opportunity to meet with quite a few perpetrators over the years of being in ministry.

I’ve sat on numerous occasions with three or four different child molesters, criminals of all sorts, and people who have, quite frankly, done some horrible things to God and man.

Years ago I sat with an individual who told me that they had plans to take a child and molest him.

This was a woman.

She said she had been hanging out in a park and scouted a certain child out and was waiting to spring her trap.

She also informed me that she had up till that point been successful in molesting at least eight other children over the years.

As I sat there listening to her, and hearing both her extreme desperation and extreme depravity pouring from her mouth and heart, the thought came to me as clear as any thought had ever come to me:

“Kill this woman.”

For a solid minute to ninety seconds, I was convinced that she needed to die and that maybe she had to die within the next few minutes before she took the next victim into her hands.

This is what Yeshua is saying here.

This law had no reference to private revenge. It was given only to regulate the magistrates and those in a position to meet out justice here on earth, but that the individual response MUST be one that is entirely different.

Individually, children of God are NOT to as reads in the Greek, “to set ourselves against an evil person who is injuring us or others.”

Now listen, God’s righteousness will always be and fairness and equality is a permanent characteristic of His.

We are not speaking of situations where someone is in immediate danger and our not getting involved.

The Law of God of loving a neighbor as ourselves absolutely permits such action.

We are not talking about whether it is right to stop a murder from being committee, or to fight against our family being murdered.

Justice is justice and always has been.

But Yeshua is saying, “Look, vengeance is the Lords. If it is a matter of law, the law will handle it – let them – you love and forgive.”

So, what was I to do with this woman who was bent on molesting a child?

I set my vigilante insanity aside and called the police. And I told her that this is what I was doing.

And told her I loved her. And took her to the police station myself, then made visits to her in the sanitorium while she was inside.

Yeshua is teaching here about our actions and reactions to injustice pointed toward our person.

In other words, in a day to day situation, where we come into all sorts of unjust events, how do we, as His followers, respond.

And what situations does Yeshua present us with. In verses 39-41 He gives us a few.

So in verse 38 He said:

“You have heard it said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth . . . ”

And in verses 39-41 He gives us three examples of how to respond to various levels of evil compunction. Ready?

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.

He starts off with a violent invasion on our person – a smack on the face.

Under the law of eye for eye, what would a smack in the face require?

A smack right back.

My mother used to say:

“If someone hits you Shawn, you hit them back twice as hard.”

I used to live by this law.

Yeshua says, “no. Turn the other cheek.”

And did He ever follow His own advice? All through His passion on the cross, friends.

Then he moves on to property. The first an evil action on our physical person, the second on our property.

40 And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also.

Only possible if our hearts are first set upon things that are NOT of this world.

Easy to do? No. Possible? Abolutely.

An eternal perspective helps all material possessions to matter less, and less, and less, which makes giving them up –even when under compulsion, easy.

First physical,

Then materially,

Now . . . of our time . . . which is really an assault on our will.

41 And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.

Earlier, we talked about God being the owner and manager of everything – heaven, earth, Jerusalem, even the hairs on our head.

Here Yeshua is taking the Law of eye for an eye and telling us, “look, rise above this in your lives to the point that you are returning good for evil, giving your other cheek, your coat, and your time, when they have been acted upon and treated unjustly by others.

The word translated “shall compel,” here in this teaching is of Persian origin.

This is the background of His teaching.

Post-offices were unknown in Yeshua day.

In order that the royal commands could be delivered safely and dispatched out to different parts of the empire, Cyrus stationed horsemen at intervals on all the great public highways.

One horseman would deliver the message to another, and in this way intelligence was rapidly and safely passed on.

Well these horsemen were permitted to “compel” any person (or horse, boat, ship, or other vehicle that they might need) to be used in transmitting the king's orders forward.

As as a side note, the Roman mile was a thousand paces.

Finally, Yeshua summarizes the heart of such a person who has refused the eye for an eye law by extending it out and forward, saying in verse 42:

42 Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.

What does this mean? And what does scripture say?

You see, this is the key to true Christian living – Yeshua is asking us to have the heart to always do good, to act on His behalf relative to others – as so directed by His Word and Holy Spirit.

We live in an age of opportunism to which giving to those who ask is NOT always the loving thing to do . . . nor is it in harmony with scripture.

That being said, we cannot allow ourselves to refuse any and everyone who ask of us merely because we have a rule, or because we give at church, or whatever.

Personally, I used to give to any and all who asked.

I took these words and this attitude of Yeshua literally. And He showed me always giving is NOT always Godly.

Today I will often give to those who ask, but I seek to use discernment, obtained by taking the time to talk with the person, rather than just following the rule.

I don’t take these measures to “get out” of giving, but so I can give as God wants me to give, and not to give like my flesh tells me to give . . . in order to help make me feel good.

For example, we live in an age where drug and alcohol abuse is endemic and where scam artists proliferate our cities.

The head of the Salt Lake rescue mission told me flat out he would never give money to someone asking on the street – it he is a Christian man running a Christian ministry to the desperate.

Why does he take this stance?

Does he have a heart for the lost and less-fortunate? Absolutely. But he refuses out of love.

Love?

Any homeless person today has at their disposal an entire cornucopia of services freely offered through the government.

And most are aware of them.

When funds or goods are given on the street some of these types will use your offerings to do evil and not what is requisite to survive.

Even buying a man who asks for a meal may contribute to their evil lives because they use the money they would have spent on the food on sexual favors, drugs and alcohol.

Such help is actually lending to their death and not their physical or eternal life.

Additionally, if a believer is not in a position to give, how do they give to any or all who ask?

And do we help all and any who ask or only those who are believers?

Listen to Galatians 6:10:

As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.

Those are two great rules of thumb aren’t they?

Listen to these words from Paul which are intriguing when it comes to giving:

2nd Timothy 3:1-5 This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come.

2 For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,

3 Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,

4 Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;

5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.

The Word in the Greek for turn away is APOTREPO and it means to “deflect them,” “avoid them.”

May the Holy Spirit guide.

In Second Thessalonians 3:10 we read:

2nd Thessalonians 3:10 For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat.

11 For we hear that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies.

12 Now them that are such we command and exhort by our Lord Yeshua Christ, that with quietness they work, and eat their own bread.

13 But ye, brethren, be not weary in well doing.

What is the heart of the deficient? What is their intension? Who are they and why are they where they are?

If you find this too calculated on your part remember God must do the very same thing with those who are lost or suffering.

Remember, in the parable of the Prodigal Son, the boy was allowed to suffer, go hungry , and even wind up eating the slop of the pigs, and that the story Yeshua tells:

“And when he (the prodgal) came to himself . . . “ “. . . when he came to his senses by virtue of his suffering.”

Is it always loving to always give or do we better facilitate God’s word by allowing some to suffer, to be without, so they turn to God?

These are NOT easy questions, and while we have some really good directives here, are all subjective, individually discerned, and in my opinion, the exceptions to what Yeshua is talking about here.

The real question I think Yeshua is asking is “what are our hearts relative to helping people who are truly in need?”

And He teaches that in situations such as these, “give to him that asketh thee.”

Not because they deserve it, but because they need it. Get the difference?

Children. Orphans.

True widows.

Men of misfortune.

The disabled or sick

The mentally impaired.

Where there was a true brother or sister in want, without expectation, without usury, without conditions, give – for this is how the Father relates to us.

I think in this final teaching here Yeshua is summarizing all we have talked about. Let’s read verse 43 through 47 and leave the final verse for next week.

Verse 43-47, Yeshua wraps it all up saying:

43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.

44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?

47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?

The command to love our neighbor was a law of God stated in Leviticus 19:18.

The inference, “to hate our enemy,” was something the Jews introduced as a means of being a peculiar and separate people, and did not come from God.

They supposed that if we loved the one – those who lived in close proximity or were family – then they must, of course, hate the other who were not Jews, not neighbors, and not family.

When Yeshua commends the disciples to “love” their enemies as well as their neighbors he is telling them to love them as God loves all – with agapo love.

This is the word used.

Does God love those who are His enemies? Certainly.

Those who hate Him? Abolsutely.

Those who despitefully use Him, abuse Him, and whatever else?

Sure.

Does He love what they do?

Not in the least. And neither should we love what our enemies do or say or believe or act upon that is evil.

But we are to love them as people, and to let this love reign unconditional of their merits or actions or lifestyles or choices.

Does God speak truth to those who hate Him and His ways?

Relentlessly.

So love is not the absence of truth – QUITE the contrary, LOVE is the relentless presence of truth.

Love is a verb that is willing to say or do whatever is necessary to bring about true spiritual growth in ourselves or another.

And Yeshua carries this truth out, saying

bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?

47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?

Let’s pray.