Charles Ellicott Commentary Matthew 6

From the protest against the casuistry that tampered with and distorted the great primary commandments, the Sermon on the Mount passes to the defects of character and action that corrupted the religion of Pharisaism even at its best. Its excellence had been that it stressed—as the religion of Islam did later—the three great duties of the religious life: almsgiving, fasting, and prayer, rather than sacrifices and offerings. Verbally, Pharisaism accepted the widest and most spiritual teaching of the prophets on this point. Consequently, its home was in the synagogue rather than the temple, and it gained a hold on the minds of the people that the priests never did.

But a subtle evil found its way even here. The love of praise and power, rather than spontaneous love, self-denial, and adoration, was the driving force of their actions. As a result, the very essence of religion was absent even from the acts in which the purest and highest form of religion naturally shows itself.

Your alms—The better manuscripts give righteousness, and obviously with a far truer meaning, as it is the wider word that later branches into the three categories of alms, fasting, and prayer. In Rabbinic language, the whole was often used for the part; “righteousness” was identified with “mercifulness,” and that, in turn, with giving money. The Greek version of the Septuagint often renders the Hebrew word for righteousness as “alms.” In the New Testament, however, there is no such narrowing of its meaning, and here the full significance of the word is established by its use in Matthew 5:20. The reading “alms” probably arose from a misunderstanding of the passage’s real meaning and the resulting assumption that it simply introduced the rule given in Matthew 6:2-3.

To be seen of them—It is the motive, not the fact of publicity, that corrupts the action. The high ideal for a disciple of Christ is to let his light shine before men (the very same words are used here as in Matthew 5:16), and yet to be indifferent to their praise or even their opinion. In most religious people, there is probably a mixture of the two motives, and we dare not say at what precise stage the lower one overpowers the higher. It is enough to remember that this is the small impurity that can taint the whole character until it loses all its life.

Of your Father which is in heaven—More accurately, with your Father, meaning “in His estimation.” The act is not done to and for Him, and therefore (speaking in human terms) He views it as having no claim to reward.

Alms — The history of this word is uniquely interesting. In its original Greek meaning, it referred to the quality of mercy, or more precisely, “mercifulness,” which implies a more complete quality. The practice of the Hellenistic Jews limited the word (eleemosyna) to monetary gifts. With this meaning, the word passed untranslated into the language of Latin Christendom and then into various European languages, taking forms such as “aumone” and “almose.” Eventually, this word, once six syllables and full of rich meaning, contracted and collapsed into our modern English “alms.”

Do not sound a trumpet before thee — Two interpretations have been suggested for these words:

1. Some believe wealthy Pharisees had a trumpet literally blown before them to notify the poor in the area that they were distributing alms.
2. Others suggest the words refer to the clang of money falling into the metal, trumpet-shaped collection boxes in the synagogue—a sound that was like sweet music to the ears of the prideful giver.

However, regarding the first view, top scholars find no evidence of such a practice in Jewish literature, and it is difficult to believe this would have occurred in the synagogues. The second view seems insufficient to explain the active sense of the verb.

There is no need, however, to take these words so literally. The figure of speech describing a vain person as “his own trumpeter” or making a “flourish of trumpets” about his actions is common in any culture familiar with trumpets. The point is that whether giving was done during the synagogue offerings or to beggars in the streets, it was a display of benevolence that effectively called on people to look on and admire.

As the hypocrites do — This word also has its own unique history. Derived from a Greek verb meaning to answer, take part in a dialogue, or act in a play, the noun in classical Greek simply meant an actor—someone playing a role. In only one passage of the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Old Testament, does it appear in its figurative sense: one who pretends to have a virtue he does not possess (Job 36:13).

The word was therefore ready for the broader use given to it by the Evangelists (it is used in the New Testament only by Matthew, Mark, and Luke). With this new meaning, it passed, almost unchanged in form, first into Latin and then into most modern European languages.

The streets — More precisely, this refers to the lanes or alleys of a city, as distinct from the wider, main streets mentioned in passages like Matthew 6:5 and Matthew 12:19.

They have their reward — The Greek is more expressive, meaning: They have their reward in full and so have exhausted it. There is nothing more for them to look for. They bargained for the praise of men, and they receive it. But because they did not seek the honor that comes from God alone, He gives them none.

Let not your left hand know — The phrase was probably proverbial, indicating extreme secrecy in the form of a free hyperbole. It is possible that there may be a reference to the practice of using the right hand when offering gifts at the altar.

The symbolic application, though an afterthought, is still suggestive. The “right hand” is the higher spiritual element in us that leads to acts of true charity; the “left” is the baser, self-seeking nature. We ought, as it were, to set a barrier between the two as far as possible—that is, to exclude that mingling of motives, which is at least the beginning of evil.

That your alms may be in secret — Here again we have a principle rather than a rule. Publicity may be a duty, especially in public work. But this—gifts for schools, hospitals, and the like—is hardly contemplated in the word “alms,” which refers rather to acts of mercy for cases of individual suffering. Ostentation in those acts is what our Lord especially condemns.

Your Father who sees in secret — The attribute which we call the Omniscience of God is commonly dwelt on as calculated to inspire a just fear of the All-seeing One. He sees, we say, the evil deeds that are done in secret. Here it is brought before us as an encouragement and ground of hope. Do we feel isolated, not understood, not appreciated? He sees in secret and will reward.

Shall reward you openly — This is a curious instance of an early attempt to improve on our Lord’s teaching. The adverb “openly” is not found in the best manuscripts, and is now omitted by most editors. It would seem either that a false rhetorical taste desired a more complete antithesis, or that the craving for public acknowledgment in the presence of men and angels asserted itself even here, leading people to add to the words of the divine Teacher. It need hardly be said that the addition weakens and lowers the force of the truth asserted. It is not necessarily in this way, “openly,” that God rewards His servants, nor do the words point only to the reward of the last great day. The reward is at once immediate and, it may be, secret—the hidden manna, the joy with which a stranger doth not intermeddle, and which no man taketh from us.

Standing in the synagogues — The Jewish custom, more or less prevalent throughout the East and retained for a time at certain seasons in the Christian Church, was to pray standing with outstretched, uplifted hands. There was nothing in the posture itself that made it an act of ostentatious devotion, nor would it have been ostentatious to join in the common prayer of the congregation in the synagogue. What our Lord’s words point to is the custom of going into the synagogue for private devotion (as, for example, in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican) and doing so to attract notice. The worshipper would stand apart as if absorbed in prayer, while secretly glancing around to watch the impression he might be making on others who were watching.

In the corners of the streets — This does not use the same word as in Matthew 6:3, but instead refers to the broad, open places of the city. There, too, the Pharisees could be seen reciting their appointed prayers—likely the well-known eighteen acts of devotion prescribed for devout Israelites—with the tallith, or prayer veil, over their heads.