one of the four canonical gospels
The four canonical gospels are Mathew, Mark, Luke, and John; they are canonical in that they are accepted as part of the New Testament; not all of the gospels made it into the canon.
one of the three synoptic gospels (along with Mark and Luke)
the synoptic (meaning “seen together”) gospels are the main sources for the historical narrative of Jesus life; they are all written from the same point of view and are clearly interdependent
author unknown
this gospel is named after Matthew because his name appears most often in it.
Date of writing: 85-90 A.D.
Original Language: Greek
Cf. Sermon in the Plain in Luke 6
One of the Five Discourses of Matthew (sermons of Jesus in the book of Matthew)
Longest sermon by Jesus in the NT
Takes place shortly after Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist and the gathering of his first disciples
Includes the Beatitudes and the Lord’s Prayer
The Absolutist View: This reading rejects all compromise and believes that, if obeying the scripture costs the welfare of the believer, then that is a reasonable sacrifice for salvation. All the precepts in the sermon must be taken literally and applied universally. Proponents of this view include Francis of Assisi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer and in later life Leo Tolstoy.
Unconditional Divine Will View: states that the ethics behind the sermon are absolute and unbending, but the current fallen state of the world makes it impossible to live up to them. This will change when the Kingdom of Heaven is proclaimed and all will be able to live in a godly manner.
General Principles View: Argues that Jesus was not giving specific instructions, but general principles of how one should behave.
The Hyperbole View: This view argues that portions of what Jesus states in the Sermon are hyperbole, and that if one is to apply the teaching to the real world, they need to be "toned down."
Double Standard View: This is the official position of the Roman Catholic Church. It divides the teachings of the sermon into “general precepts” and “specific counsels.” Obedience to the general precepts is essential for salvation, but obedience to the counsels is only necessary for perfection. The great mass of the population need only concern themselves with the precepts; the counsels must be followed by only a pious few such as the clergy and monks. Adherents of this theory include St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Geoffrey Chaucer.
Two Realms View: Martin Luther divided the world into the religious and secular realms and argued that the Sermon only applied to the spiritual. In the temporal world, obligations to family, employers, and country force believers to compromise. Thus a judge should follow his secular obligations to sentence a criminal, but inwardly, he should mourn for the fate of the criminal.
Spirit not Acts View: This view states that Jesus is not saying how a good Christian should behave, only what his attitude should be. The spirit lying behind the act is more important than the act itself.
Interim Ethic View: This view sees Jesus as being convinced that the world was going to end in the very near future. As such, survival in the world did not matter as in the end times material well-being would be irrelevant. Albert Schweitzer popularized this view.
Repentance View: Jesus intended for the precepts in his Sermon to be unattainable, and through our certain failure to live up to them, we will learn to repent.
St. Augustine’s commentary on the “Sermon on the Mount”
The Catholic Encyclopedia entry on Matthew
[1] "Sermon on the Mount." Wikipedia. Web. 13 Sep 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sermon_on_the_Mount>.