Matthew 6 ˙
Commentary and Notes
SUMMARY OVERVIEW OF OBSERVATIONS FOR MATTHEW 6
Perfecting the very best lines of the teaching of the Pharisees, Yehoshua gives instruction concerning the intention of the heart in performance of the commandments of the Torah. Today the teaching that there is a need for kavunah, devotion of the heart, in the performance of the mitzvot is well established in Judaism. However, Yehoshua's teaching concerning the need for the singularity of the eye, of the heart, of a Godly mind in viewing the world, leads directly toward an understanding of the Torah that leads directly to faith in him and his death and resurrection for Israel.
If a child is born with a critical disease even great medical attention may not save it. So it is with the life of each mitzvah. It must be born from a pure heart. While an Israelite must always seek to obey the commandments of God, Yehoshua is teaching that no matter how perfect that obedience may be outwardly it must always, from the very beginning, be perfect inwardly also. For this to be so, one must come always first to true repentance. How is true obedience possible then, when the heart is truly its own worst enemy? For it is not possible to perfect repentance for one's own sake but only for all Israel's sake. And this must be done with understanding, so that it may be done for all Humanity's sake, or else it will not be done ultimately for God's sake. But because the heart has already become needy and self-centred through sin, even when one attempts to repent it becomes necessary to deal endlessly with the challenge of correcting and perfecting one's own self from beginning with self-interest.
There ends up being no way out of the trap of hypocrisy. The only escape is to call upon the name of the Lord, to cry out to him for salvation, to repent through faith in his rectification of Humanity and his kavunah, his pure heart intention of doing all for the sake of God. For his heart is not moved at all for the sake of his own need, nor even primarily on account of his compassion for the need of the human race, but is moved purely for the sake of his Father's will. This is the true meaning of our need for regeneration, it is our need to be attached to the Redeemer of Israel, as a branch is attached to the vine.
It is the nation of Israel, his nation which he will redeem with his own blood, that Yehoshua instructs to seek first the kingdom of God, to not be like the heathen, that is to say, all nations other than Israel. And how then will the heathen be saved? What salvation will they find? How clearly it should be seen that there is no other salvation to find than the salvation that is in the Vine of Israel, the Vine to which the branches must cling in order to find perfect repentance, and perfect purity of heart in the performance of the mitzvot of God. And if the heathen seek also to cling to this Vine and to the branches, how they will magnify this great salvation! But if they seek to push the branches of Israel aside and take their place, how they will seem to nullify and conceal the glorious salvation that God would openly display!
