Commentary on the Teachings of Rabbi Yeshua IX - Mt. 5:9-12

אַשְׁרֵי רוֹדְפֵי שָׁלוֹם שְׁבְנֵי אֱלֹקִים יִקְרְאוּ׃ 9

אַשְׁרֵי הַנִרְדָפִים לְצֶדֶק שְׁלָהֶם מַלְכוּת שָמָיִם׃ 10

אַשְׁרֵיכֶם כַּאֲשֶׁר יִרְדְפוּ וְיִגְדְפוּ אֶתְכֶם וְיִאְמְרוּ אֲלֵיכֶם כָּל רָע בְּעֵדִי וְטִכְזְבוּ׃ 11

שִׂישׂוּ וְשִׂמְחוּ שְׁשְׂכַרְכֶם רַב מְאֹד בַּשָׁמָיִם שְׁכֵן רָדְפוּ הַנְבִִיאִים׃ 12

Above we have Mt. 5:9-12 According to Shem-Tob's Hebrew Matthew. These verses should be considered as a unit, because they are all connected by a single catchword, but THIS IS TRUE ONLY IN HEBREW, NOT IN GREEK OR LATIN.

Here is the translation of these verses:

9 Happy are those who pursue peace, for they shall be called sons of God.

10 Happy are those who are persecuted for righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11 Happy are you when they persecute and revile you and say against you all kinds of evil for my sake, but speak falsely.

12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is very great in heaven, for thus they persecuted the prophets.

To clarify, the catchword connection "persecute" occurs in verses 10, 11, and 12, and that could work as well in any language. But the connection between verse 9 and the other three verses depends upon the double meaning in Hebrew of the verb "רדף," which means both "to persecute" and "to pursue." But in most other languages one talks about "peacemakers" or "peace-doers," terms that are not idiomatic in Biblical Hebrew, where "peace pursuers" or "those who pursue peace" is the idiomatic usage. Thus, in languages other than Hebrew, the catchword connection between verse 9 and the other three verses is lost. This is extremely strong evidence for the Semitic substratum in Matthew.

Such catchword connections, by the way, are usually considered to be characteristic of oral transmission. In this case, as in several others, the Gospel of Matthew, especially in its Hebrew form, takes us back to a very early stage in the Sayings tradition.

Matthew 5 verses 11 and 12 are rather loosely paralleled in Luke 6:22-23 where, however, the word "persecute" does not even appear. Clearly, the catchword, no longer needed as a mnemonic in the written tradition, was not recognized. This is further evidence for Matthaean priority among the Synoptic Gospels.

Text © 2020 by Donald Jacobson Traxler.