Our anger might create big, big trouble.

Matthew 5.21-22.

Here’s the first of the “Ye have heard… but I say unto you” parts of the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus gets into them right after he says he has no intention whatsoever of undoing or undermining the Law of Moses, so if you ever get the idea he’s trying to do that with his teachings, no he’s not; he just said he’s not. He’s trying to clarify the intent of the Law: Here’s how we were always meant to follow it. And it’s not the way the scribes and Pharisees claim. Mt 7.28-29

Jesus begins with anger. ’Cause people get angry. Even Jesus got angry. Mk 10.14 And unless we know how to practice self-control, we’re gonna act on that anger, and do something regrettable. Oh, we might justify it by claiming we had “righteous” anger, but don’t fool yourself; Jesus’s brother James stated “human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.” Jm 1.20 NIV Anger’s a work of the flesh, and we always need to be on our guard against it. Hence Jesus’s teachings.

Matthew 5.21-22 KWL

21“You hear the oldtimers say,

‘You will not murder, Ex 20.13, Dt 5.17

and whoever might murder will be found guilty’?

22I tell you:

Everyone who’s been made angry by their sibling,

{for no good reason,} will be found guilty.

Anyone who might tell their sibling, ‘You waste of space,’

will be guilty under the Judean senate.

Anyone who might say, ‘You moron,’

will be guilty in fiery Gehenna.”

Other bibles tend to translate aorist-tense Greek verbs as past tense. I don’t; aorist verbs are neither past, present, nor future. They happen, but we only know when they happen by the context of other verbs or actions—and since Jesus is largely speaking in present tense, that’s how we’re meant to translate ’em. So when Jesus says “You hear the oldtimers say,” he’s not talking about something his listeners heard a long, long time ago, or read in the bible; he’s talking about what oldtimers say all the time, whether in synagogue, at home, or on the streets.

“You will not murder.” It’s in the Ten Commandments. It needs repeating, because murder still happens a lot. And in ancient times, it happened far, far more often than it does now—because people could get away with it. No cops, no detectives who worked for the state, and no science so you could do actual detection. Nobody had the attitude murder is a crime against God and the state (which it is); in fact the state, in the form of Roman soldiers and governors, murdered people all the time. Even righteous King David murdered a guy to steal his wife, and got away with it. People figured murder was only a crime against the victim’s family—and if nobody would miss the victim, nor mind that they’re dead, what’s the big deal?

Yep, throughout biblical times, including in Jesus’s day, murders and lynchings and fights that turned deadly happened all the time. And what’s the origin of most of these deaths? Anger.

Too often, anger for no good reason—which is why somebody inserted the word εἰκῆ/eikí, “in vain,” into a third-century copy of the text, and it wound up in the Sinaiticus, the Peshitta, the Textus Receptus, and the KJV. But Jesus probably didn’t say it—and didn’t need to. After all, people would try to use it as a loophole: “I didn’t kill him in vain anger, but righteous anger, so it’s a righteous kill.”

Nope; murder is murder. Don’t.

Mental murder.

Naïvely, most Christians nowadays assume Jesus can’t possibly be talking about actual murder. Why, he lived in a civilized country; why, we live in a civilized country. People don’t just murder like that. (Except, y’know, they do. Got any friends and family members who’ve been murdered? I do. We all do.)

And in some cases, preachers wanna tighten the screws of what Jesus means here, and apply it to as many people as possible. So they claim this passage isn’t about literal murder; it’s gotta be about metaphorical murder. Spiritual murder.

What on earth is a spiritual murder? Well, y’know, hating somebody so much they’re dead to you. They’re not literally dead, but they may as well be. You’ve killed them in your mind.

Now, are we talking about people who’ve disowned certain family members, and have nothing more to do with them? Believe it or not, we’re not. Because plenty of conservative Christians do this. When you’ve got a family member who’s sinning and unrepentant, plenty of Christians simply push ’em out of their lives. Got a kid who’s promiscuous and selfish and otherwise indulges in carnal behavior? Cut ’em off. Got a cousin who’s a member of the other political party, and won’t stop backing candidates who offend you? Block ’em on social media and never speak to them. Now, I can understand this behavior if these people are criminal or abusive, and letting them in your life puts you in danger. (I’d even encourage it.) But plenty of American Christians have people in their family who are now “dead” to them—and often over petty things; the very things the Greek word eikí represents.

And weirdly, most conservative preachers don’t rebuke this behavior. Even though this should fall right into the stuff they’re talking about whenever they claim Jesus is speaking of “spiritual murder.” But y’know, it’s likely because they’re doing it too. It’s rare you’ll find a preacher who hasn’t blocked people from their lives because they’re just so offended by their sins. Heck, some of them will proudly say so! Which is a shame, because it’s entirely unlike Jesus’s behavior. Our Lord ate with sinners—and sinners he wasn’t even related to.

Nope, when preachers talk about spiritually murdering someone, they usually describe it thisaway: “They’re dead to you; you imagined them dead.” Maybe even imagined you murdered ’em. For extra fun, maybe you pictured it as gruesome, painful, slow, grim torture. In any event the usual Christian teaching is, “That was bad, and you should feel bad for feeling that way.”

Okay, I confess, I have imagined killing people. I haven’t in a mighty long time, but in the past, I certainly have. Thought, “I’d be so easy to shove him in front of a train right now.” But I didn’t act on it, because I wouldn’t act on it, because murder is wrong. And it’s actually not sin to have those thoughts cross your mind—it’s temptation. It’s sin to act upon them, but not sin to be tempted. Everybody gets tempted. Jesus included, remember? But do as Jesus does, and resist temptation, and you’re good.

Jesus didn’t give in to those temptations to kill. We know the LORD certainly felt like smiting the Hebrews more than once. Ex 32.10 We know Jesus shares this nature; he never give up his divine nature to become human. Cl 2.9 When stubborn Pharisees made him angry, Mk 3.5 or his doubt-filled students frustrated him, Mk 9.19 no doubt Jesus was tempted to smite ’em in one way or another. No doubt the devil tried to capitalize on Jesus’s emotions: “Elijah called down fire. So can you, y’know.” But no matter how Jesus felt, he was in total self-control. Temptations don’t faze him. He 4.15 They don’t have to faze us either.

I know; a number of Christians are gonna insist, “But he’s Jesus! He’s an exception.” No he’s not an exception. That was the whole point of him becoming human: He lived an authentic human life. Went through the very same experiences we do. But he did it right, so he could demonstrate how we should behave. 1Jn 2.6 Sometimes we’re gonna be tempted to smite people. We’re gonna want to imagine them dying in nasty ways. That’s life. Not sin.

Now, this doesn’t give us license to let our imaginations run amok, and plot the violent destruction of everyone who annoys us, on the grounds if we never act on any of it, it’s all good. There’s a vast difference between our minds wandering thataway, and us directing our minds thataway. Fantasize about murder long enough, and the moment we lose control of our faculties for any reason—we’re drunk, stoned, medicated, senile, sleepwalking, out of our minds with fear or rage—we’re gonna murder. Happens all the time. It’s why God hates when we plot evil. Pr 6.18, Zc 8.17 This sort of stuff overflows into the rest of our lives in all sorts of ways. Mk 7.20-23 So don’t go there when you can help it!

Don’t indulge temptation, and you’ll be fine. When your mind wanders there, rein it in. Pull it back. Resist. And relax; you didn’t sin. Yet.

Guilty guilty guilty.

Jesus’s next bit, in which he talks about anyone who’s merely angry with a sibling getting found guilty, is also regularly interpreted as hyperbole. Again, missing the point of what was going on in his culture at the time.

The people of Israel lived under Roman occupation. Yes, they had their own town councils; yes, the Judeans even had their own senate. Those folks handled most civic matters. But supervising them were Roman governors and puppet kings. Roman soldiers were everywhere. Taxes were collected, by force, and they went to Rome, not the local government. And if you ran afoul of any Roman, over even small matters, they could put a machete right through you—and suffer no consequences, because they were Roman and you weren’t.

This was the case for most of human history. Human rights weren’t recognized as a valid thing until the new states of the United States started putting ’em in our constitutions. And even then, blacks didn’t receive them for the longest time; Jim Crow laws either took them away outright, or looked the other way as whites murdered people. Other countries still won’t guarantee rights to their citizens… and even in countries which have rights, their governments frequently think of them as government-given instead of God-given. We Americans live in very unique circumstances. But if the fascists have their way, that’ll be over soon, and you’ll get to experience firsthand how fleeting your rights to live freely can be.

The Roman Empire was also an extremely corrupt empire. If you wanted to make trouble for another person, you easily could. In many parts of the world, it’s still way too easy to get your enemies killed. All you gotta do is bribe the right ruler. Or make a paranoid ruler think your enemy might be a problem.

So if you got angry, and you got angry with the wrong people, or got angry in front of the wrong people, it very well could get you killed. Like calling your sibling a ܪܰܩܰܐ/raqá (Greek ῥακά/raká)—it literally means “empty,” but I translated it “waste of space” because it’s meant as an insult, so I had to use an insult. Or calling your sibling a μωρέ/moré, “moron.” Preachers tend to overdramatize these words—“This was a serious insult back in Jesus’s day”—but there’s no evidence that’s true. In fact it’s more likely these were trivial insults. But Jesus was pointing out—and his audience knew it was true—that trivial, careless words like these could easily get escalated into a great big deal. Next thing you know, you’re in court, fighting for your life. And you might lose it.

So you really didn’t wanna step on anyone’s toes back then. Your anger could get you killed. And no, Jesus isn’t speaking in hyperbole: Literally killed. His listeners needed to clamp down on their own anger, and they needed to make absolutely certain nobody else had anything against them. ’Cause if they did, it’d be trouble. It can still be trouble for us nowadays, if our enemies wanna strive hard enough against us.

Angry Christians who ignore this teaching.

As you’re well aware, there are such creatures as angry Christians who figure it’s okay to be angry, and live a lifestyle of anger towards sinners… and really anyone else who offends them. They figure it’s righteous anger, so it’s okay. They have no intention of murdering anyone… ’cause if you can get laws passed against such people, and get ’em sent to prison, and maybe executed as perverts, it’s not technically murder, is it? In any event they ignore Jesus’s teaching as something which doesn’t really apply to them.

Except it does. Y’notice Jesus points out our anger might also get us in trouble with “fiery Gehenna” (KJV “hell fire”).

Christians tend to think of Gehenna as the lake of fire, but it’s not; it’s the landfill outside Jerusalem where they burned trash. Pharisees used it as a euphemism for the bad part of the afterlife—the place of torment for those who wanted nothing to do with God, his Law, his kingdom, his Messiah, and other such God-things.

If you likewise want nothing to do with God and his kingdom, and prefer a life of rage and vengeance and strife and other bad fruit, you mustn’t expect to inherit God’s kingdom regardless. Yes God is gracious, but living your life as you please doesn’t mean you’re taking advantage of his grace; it actually means you’re resisting it. You don’t wanna do that!

So here’s one of many warnings against indulging in Pharisee-like “righteous anger” against sinners, pagans, fellow believers, people who slight us, people who mock us, anyone. Like James said, anger doesn’t produce righteousness, and we need to be wary of it when we feel it.

And we need to be reconciled with others who are angry at us. That’s in the next passage.