My third and final presupposition for reading the Sermon on the Mount:

Matthew writes in such a way to parallel Jesus with Moses / Israel.

It seems that Matthew is interested in communicating a story that parallels the history of Israel and the story of Moses in particular. Look at the way Matthew begins his Gospel and the way it relates to Exodus:

• In the Gospel, Jesus’ birth is threatened by an evil monarch, Herod; in Exodus, the Moses’ birth is threatened by an evil monarch, Pharaoh.
• Jesus is born in a time of Roman oppression; Moses in a time of Egyptian oppression.
• Following his birth, Jesus journeys to Egypt before returning home; Moses journeys to Egypt to liberate his people and take them “home” to the land of promise.
• Each man performs mighty wonders that demonstrated the power of God; each man passes through the waters (Moses / Red Sea; Jesus / Jordan River); each one experiences temptation in the wilderness; and as Fred Craddock and Eugene Boring put it, both men “gave their authoritative teaching on the will of God from a mountain (Moses / the Law from Sinai; Jesus / Sermon on the Mount).”

If this is true, what are the implications for understanding the Sermon on the Mount? I would suggest that we understand the SOM as the ultimate fulfillment of God’s will / God’s Law. I’m afraid we too often have an improper understanding of the function of the Mosaic Law. The OT Law was intended to be life-giving for Israel. We might be tempted to think of the 613 OT laws as a bunch of rules and regulations that Israel was strapped with. But for Israel, the Law was their treasured possession, proof of their “chosen” status among the nations. Take the command to observe the Sabbath and keep it holy. Moderns hear this as a restriction of what you can and can’t do over the course of a given 24-hour period. But for a nation coming out of the extreme conditions of slavery in Egypt, the command to take one day off per week was certainly a life-giving commandment. We should restore a proper understanding of how the Law functioned in the life of Israel; Scripture affirms that the Law was good (Psalm 119:39; Romans 7; 1 Timothy 1:8).

However, we might also affirm that the Law was not the complete revelation of the will of God. As we’ve seen from Paul, Christ is the complete revelation of God because in Him the fullness of God dwells bodily (Colossians 1). In the SOM, we find a new Torah, a new teaching, one that fulfills the previous one. Fulfillment is an important theme for Matthew. Matthew quotes the Hebrew Scriptures more than any other Gospel writer and he seems to be interested in demonstrating that the life of Christ brought about fulfillment to these ancient texts. To say it another way, Matthew sees all of the OT as pointing to fulfillment in Christ. The conviction that Jesus is the Christ seems to be the primary lens through which Matthew understands Scripture. This also seems to be Christ’s own self-identity. In the SOM, Jesus says things like, “You have heard it said…But I say unto you.” Jesus understands that His own teaching brings fulfillment of the Law. “Do not think I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them (5.17).”

In the words of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is offering new words for life, words that bring the Kingdom of God into the current sphere of human existence. Since the previous Law (or “words” as Israel referred to them) were good and intended to bring life, we can affirm that Christ stands as the fulfillment of the commands given by Moses to Israel. But His word usurps the Mosaic Law, for in the Sermon on the Mount, we have the guidance of the long-anticipated prophet who was even greater than Moses (Deuteronomy 18:15-22). His words bring true life.