Q: the Synoptic Sayings Source (Red Letter Edition)

Matt 5:38-41 Luke 6:29 Didache 1

³⁸ "As you know,

we once were told,

'An eye for an eye' and

'A tooth for a tooth.'

³⁹ But I tell you,

don't react violently ⁴ Abstain from fleshly

against one who is evil; and bodily lusts.

when someone ²⁹ "When someone If anyone

slaps you strikes you gives you a slap

on the right cheek, on the cheek, on the right cheek,

turn the other as well. offer the other as well. turn the other as well.

[see Matt 5:41 below]
If anyone

conscripts you

for one mile,

go along an extra mile.

⁴⁰ If someone If someone If anyone

is determined

to sue you for your shirt, takes away your coat, takes away your coat,

let him don't prevent him give him

have your coat from taking your shirt your shirt

along with it. along with it.

⁴¹ Further, [see Did 1:4c above]

when anyone

conscripts you

for one mile,

go along an extra mile."

Unusual consensus

These three injunctions are so contrary to the usual impulses of people in situations of conflict that the Jesus Seminar was practically unanimous in accepting them as genuine Jesus sayings. There was, in fact, greater consensus that the first two reflect Jesus' voice than on any other saying. The Fellows cast no black and few gray votes on the synoptic version of all three. The Didache was rated lower only because it looks like a paraphrase of Matthew. In short, there is little doubt that this advice opens a window into Jesus' way of thinking.

Other cheek % Red Pink Grey Black WA Print

Matt 5:38-39a
Matt 5:39b
Luke 6:29a
Did 1:4b 0
82
82
27 0
12
12
27 20
6
6
27 80
0
0
18 07
92
92
55 black
red
red
pink

Coat & shirt

Matt 5:40
Luke 6:29b
Did 1:4d 82
76
55 12
18
9 6
6
18 0
0
18 92
90
67 red
red
pink

Second mile

Matt 5:41
Did 1:4c 76
36 18
27 6
18 0
18 90
61 red
pink

Form

Jesus' instructions treat threats in such a novel way that each situation seems to border on the ridiculous. Just imagine the reaction if you asked to be slapped, or stripped in public, or insisted on going twice as far as ordered! Potentially tragic moments can be given a comic twist, if only one has the nerve. Such advice is parody, stretching real scenes to the limit of possibility. But like other parodies, these sayings have a serious purpose. By exaggerating aspects of a traditional type of discourse they make conventional social attitudes appear absurd.

Jesus' advice parodies the form of case law. Unlike unconditional commands such as "You must not kill" (Exod 20:13//Deut 5:17) and "Love your enemies" (Matt 5:44//Luke 6:27), which establish social norms without regard to changing conditions, case law prescribes a pattern of behavior to be followed in a specific situation: "When this happens, then do this." Hebrew scripture established several rules that applied in cases such as personal injury, property damage or economic transactions. Two that are relevant for analysis of the advice in these Jesus sayings are:

When a slave owner strikes a male or female slave in the eye and blinds it,
the owner shall free the slave to compensate for the eye.
-- Exod 21:26

If you take your neighbor's coat as collateral, give it back before sunset.
For that coat is the only blanket to cover your neighbor's body.
How else can your neighbor sleep?
-- Exod 22:26-27

These are not court rules but personal guidelines designed to preserve standards of justice in disputes between social unequals: landlords and slaves, creditors and debtors. Notice that in both cases the precept restrains the social superior from victimizing the inferior.

Jesus' aphorisms turn this pattern topsy-turvy. For they treat the victim as the agent who must rectify the aggression. By prompting victims to react abnormally, these sayings produce the liberating insight that aggressors cannot control people.

Tactical details

Different details in Matthew and Luke show varied interpretations of the tactics proposed in Q. Yet, setting Jesus' advice in the context of ancient Mediterranean customs corrects the initial impression that either form advocated submission to aggression.

Cheek: A slap to the cheek has been the reaction to an offense from ancient times. It warns someone that certain behavior is not acceptable. The offender's social status determined whether one slapped forehand or backhand. But, in either case, age old social etiquette dictated that the right hand be used to slap, since the left was generally considered unclean. In antiquity those who hit someone with the left hand disgraced themselves. A backhand slap to the right cheek is how those of lower social status---slaves, women, children and peasants---were reprimanded by their superiors. This is the situation presupposed by Matthew and the Didache. Peers, on the other hand, challenged one another by striking the opponent's left cheek with their right palm. Luke leaves the social setting of Jesus' advice ambiguous, perhaps on purpose, by not specifying which side of the face was hit first. If someone who was slapped on the right cheek (a social inferior) turned the left, it would be a clever act of defiance. For it invited the opponent to strike with the palm and thereby abandon all pretense of superiority. Such a tactic was designed to embarrass and disarm anyone who suppressed others. Luke, of course, would not stress this detail in writing to a member of the social elite whom he addressed as "your Excellency" (Luke 1:4).

Clothing: Stripping oneself is, in effect, the tactic Jesus recommended when someone tries to confiscate a garment. For in the ancient Mediterranean world the only clothes an ordinary person wore were a tunic and cloak (which Scholars Version respectively translates as "shirt" and "coat"). To be stripped of both would leave one naked and exposed to the elements. In Matthew, the advice presupposes lawsuits in which paupers are in danger of loosing their underclothes to settle debts. To offer their coats as well would be a clever defense. For it put Jewish creditors in a socially embarrassing position. Since the biblical case law quoted above forbid confiscating a neighbor's outer garment (Exod 22:26-27), any Jew who accepted the offer would suffer public shame. Luke and the Didache, on the other hand, apply Jesus' advice to more general settings involving theft. A thief who grabbed someone's outer garment might not be too ashamed to accept the victim's underclothes. But the offer would be spectacle unexpected by any aggressor.

Service: The tactic of going twice as far as told is a subtle form of civil disobedience. Involuntary service was common in ancient Mediterranean society, particularly in occupied territories. Roman soldiers, or aristocrats collaborating with them, could draft peasant civilians to perform menial tasks almost at whim. By voluntarily exceeding an order a draftee could declare independence of the oppressor without suffering the fate of those who openly resisted. Luke omits this advice, probably out of concern not to offend the Roman audience for whom Luke-Acts was written.

Coherent viewpoint

The uncommon viewpoint of this trio of case parodies is coherent with two genuine Jesus sayings already quoted in Q's sermon: "Congratulations, you poor!" and "Love your enemies!" All offer poor people a way of avoiding submission to oppressors without the consequences of violent resistance. The order of the last two differs in Matthew and the Didache, and Luke omits the third. But, unlike Jesus' congratulations, these sayings are not quoted separately elsewhere. So they are probably all from Q.

Sermon setting

The location of this cluster in Q's sermon is one disputed question that the Jesus Seminar did not address. The setting adopted here (after the sayings about loving enemies) is based on Luke and the Didache. In Matthew these clusters are reversed. But, as we have already seen, Matthew's comparison of Jesus' views with more traditional Judaic principles led him to rearrange many Q sayings. The Jesus Seminar overwhelmingly agreed that the formula in Matt 5:43 quoting Lev. 24:20 was probably neither from Jesus nor from Q.