Friday:10^th Week of the year – A

I Reading: 2Corinthians 3:15-4:7-15: He who raised Jesus to life will raise us with Jesus in our turn, and put us by his side and you with us.

Gospel: Mathew 5:27-32: If a man looks at a woman lustfully, he has already committed adultery.

The Real Meaning of Adultery, Mt 5:27-30

Immorality and adultery cause great destruction and hurt and pain-both within and without a person. There at least three reasons why a person commits an immoral act.

a. The ego: the sense of conquering, taking, capturing, controlling, knowing, seeing, experiencing, enjoying and on and on-a person’s ego is boosted and inflated.

b. The inner need for attention and sharing.

c. The raw lust of the sinful nature or flesh.

But Jesus clearly warns: lustful looking, touching and behaviour will cause the whole body to be cast into hell.

1. The law against immorality is the seventh commandment (Ex 20:14; Dt 5:18). God’s law is given for three reasons:

a. To assure the respect and protection of all families and neighbours.

b. To protect a person from judgement, the judgement of perishing in hell (v.30).

c. To protect a person from sinning against his/her body (1Cor 6:18).

2. The real meaning (v.28)

a. A deliberate look

b. A desire: lust, passion

c. An act of adultery

3. The two guilty culprits: the eyes and hands (v.29)

4. The danger

a. Sinning or stumbling

b. Being condemned to hell

5. The answer (v.29)

a. Surgery: cut out the sinful body member

b. Death: let the sinful body member perish

c. Repentance: turn from being cast into hell

The Meaning of Divorce, Mt 5:31-32

Throughout history there have always been two schools when interpreting the laws of society-the strict, conservative interpreters (the school of Shammai) and the broad, liberal interpreters (the school of Hillel). Shammai said the words “something indecent” found in Dt 24:1 allowed for divorce, but the words meant adultery only. Hillel said “something indecent” meant that anything that destroyed unity was a justified reason for divorce; that perfect unity had to be maintained in the marriage state. Such allowance had disintegrated into the position that anything displeasing to a man was reason enough to divorce. (Mt 19:1-12)

Divorced had become so common that society itself was threatened. All a man had to do to divorce his wife was to have a Rabbi write out a bill of divorcement and hand it to his wife in the presence of two witnesses. The divorce was immediate and final (Dt 24:1-4).

Thought:

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