This is a transcription of a series of 4chan posts/screencaps commenting on the Bible verse Matthew 5.29 (“But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also”). You can find the screenshots on Know Your Meme here and here. There’s a third one I have on my desktop that wasn’t uploaded to KYM with more comments. I couldn’t find the first (blue board) posts through any archive (I can’t tell the board), but I did find the second posts (the ones with sources) and third posts (the Aquinas commentary) archived here and here respectively.
DISCLAIMER: Note that since these posters aren’t me, their opinions are not necessarily my own! Also since this is from 4chan, do be warned that the language is sometimes rather offensive and coarse.
I will post the screencaps along with each text transcription. Without firther ado, here is the text.
>But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other too.
What did he mean by this?
I’ve posted before about this but it’s better translated as “do not diametrically oppose an evildoer” and the reason you were supposed to turn the other cheek is because
- In antiquity, you only hit someone with your right hand (the clean one)”
- Backhands were to insult, a frontal slap showed equality and challenge.”
- By turning the other cheek the aggressor was forced to stop hitting you or acknowledge you as an equal; that was quite a statement to a Roman by a conquered Jew.”
So, Jesus was telling us to fight back smartly, using public shame as a weapon, not just attack head on like a moron.
Matthew 5:39
ἐγὼ δὲ λέγω ὑμῖν μὴ ἀντιστῆναι τῷ πονηρῷ· ἀλλ᾽ ὅστις σε ῥαπίσει ἐπί τὴν δεξιὰν σου σιαγόνα στρέψον αὐτῷ καὶ τὴν ἄλλην·
First off, what you are translating as “do not resist” is “ἀντιστῆναι.” ἀντιστῆναι has more to it than resist, Strong’s Concordance at 436 notes “to take a -complete- stand against” and it derived from a -military- term to diametrically oppose one’s foes. Thayer’s notes “to set oneself against”
“Resist” here is passive, but the term ἀντιστῆναι clearly denotes an aggressive posture. Better might be “but I say unto you, do not square off against an evil doer”
Especially in the context of the examples all being examples of how to engage in intelligent resistance –
“Turn the other cheek” I already explained.
“Give him your cloak too” is Christ referencing Exodus 22:26 to shame your opponent. Exodus 22:26 compels creditors to return the cloak at night so the poor can sleep in it. By giving your cloak you shame the creditor who is willing to sue for your tunic – and God will hear the cry of the debtor, Exodus promises this.
As for walking the extra mile, that’s a reference to the Roman law of impressment which allowed a Roman soldier to compel a person of a conquered state to carry his pack for one mile but no further. By carrying it the 2nd mile, the soldier will be forced to comically beg you to put it down lest his commanding officer see and he get in trouble.
So, it clearly does not mean fight back – it means to fight back smartly. This is what happens when people try to read scripture with no reference for the history or culture it was written in, not to mention a bad rendering of the Greek in order to keep the poor in their place.
Remember Christians, Christ taught us to fight back smartly, not to noght fight. Of course a Christian fights against evil! How could we not?
Onto part 2
Some have complained that there is no citation for the backhanded slap but that it is just a theory. The reason why scholars do not readily provide a citation is it comes from the Talmud. There are a number of references to various to traditions in the Talmud that are found in the gospels, because of Jesus’ debates with Pharisees and St. Paul who was one himself. This is what scholars have when they do have a citation. I add this to anon’s (thank you anon) original work as request from some atheists.
Originally to use a backhand slap against a superior was a serious offense since was meant for the slave class, or those goyim that did not bathe, since the back of the hand was used so to touch an unclean person as little as possible while still striking them. Touching something unclean with the palm of the hand made that hand generally unusable. So the Jews Jesus is speaking to would see this not just as dishonorable but also a baseless insult. To turn the other cheek would force the ones backhanding them to recognize that Jews indeed bathe just as the civilized Romans and Greeks did by slapping them with front. So if a goy were to turn his cheek to a Jew that is backhanding him, then the goy would be forcing the Jew to recognize that he is clean as he is. In a personal argument, to force a Jew to recognize that he is your equal is more effective than just punching him. If he does not recognize his equality with you, then observers would have been redpilled on kikery.
>Since the famous edition of the New Testament by Johann Jakob Wettstein at least, New testament scholars have been aware that in some rabbinic texts a backhanded slap was considered particularly blameworthy. (1) The commentary on the New Testament by Hermann Strack and Paul Billerbeck advanced Wettstein’s research. (2) The key text is m. B. Qam. 8.6: “If one cuff his fellow, he must pay him a sela.” R. Yehuda in the name of R. Jose the Galilean says, “A maneh . If he slapped him, he must pay him two hundred zuz; [if he hit him] with the back of his hand [לאחר ידו] he must pay him four hundred zuz”. (3) Samuel Greengus has shown that the offense in a number of different Babylonian laws including the Laws of Hammurapi. In the Laws of Hammurapi (§ § 202-205) a social inferior who struck the side of a superior’s face was flogged, and a slave who did the same to a free person who lost an ear. (4) He thinks that talion is naturally associated with the slapping of a face, since m. B. Qam. 8.6 and the Hammurapi Laws (§ § 202-205) are in sections dealing with “serious bodily injuries”. If talion was the “ancient literary and legal setting for a discussion of dignitory torts”, then the similarity between the Mishnaic passage and Matthew is explained. (5)
>R. Yehuda ha Nasi (fourth generation Tannaitic teacher who died 217 AD and who redacted the Mishnah) took his view from R. Jose the Galilean (2nd generation Tannaitic teacher) concerning the fine for slapping one’s friend. (6) One can assume that the Mishnaic teaching may well have it’s origins in the 1st century AD or before. The commentator Yom-Tove Lippman Heller (17th century AD) calls such a strike “extreme humiliation” (קלון יותר). (7) t. B. Qam. 9.31 requires the same payment for a similar transgression: “If one has struck another with one’s backhand [באחר ידו], with a paper, with a pinaz, with untanned hides, or with a role of documents that are in one’s hands, then one pays 400 zuz. Not because it is a blow of pain, but because it is a blow of [public] shame (בויון).” (8) Greengus interprets this to mean that the fine is not so high because of the pain, but because of the public dishonor. (9) The Mishnaic text on the “backhanded slap” appears in the Palestinian and Babylonian Talmuds. (10)
>Good men undertake wars, when they find themselves in such a position as regards the conduct of human affairs, that right conduct requires them to act, or to make others act in this way. Otherwise John, when the soldiers who came to be baptized asked, What shall we do? Would have replied, Throw away your arms; give up the service; never strike, or wound, or disable any one. But knowing that such actions in battle were not murderous but authorized by law, and that the soldiers did not thus avenge themselves, but defend the public safety, he replied, “Do not extort (shake ‘em up/διασείω/CONCVTERE), accuse no man falsely, and be content with your wages.” Luke 3:14 But as the Manichæans are in the habit of speaking evil of John, let them hear the Lord Jesus Christ Himself ordering this money to be given to Cæsar, which John tells the soldiers to be content with. “Give,” He says, “to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s.” Matthew 22:21 For tribute-money is given on purpose to pay the soldiers for war. Again, in the case of the centurion who said, “I am a man under authority, and have soldiers under me: and I say to one, Go, and he goes; and to another, Come, and he comes; and to my servant, Do this, and he does it,” Christ gave due praise to his faith; Matthew 8:9-10 He did not tell him to leave the service. But there is no need here to enter on the long discussion of just and unjust ways. [Unlike the woman caught in adultery who he told to “go and sin no more” John 8:11]
St. Augustine Against Faustas 22.74
This entire passage (Matthew 5:38-42) is not about bloodshed but personal retaliation. The “Eye for an Eye” was wrongly taught to extend beyond court ruling (what Torah puts) and into personal private quarrels by Pharisees.
To sum it all up Jesus’ words are: When one is in a dispute with a neighbor it is better to strike a man by revealing his own nature and thereby condemning him publicly, than to strike him back with a slap to dishonor him and the matter escalates into violence and that you are condemned with him.
- J. J. Wettstein (ed.), Novum Testamentum Graecum cum variis lectionibus et commentario duobus tomis (2 vols.; Amsterdam: Dommer, 1751-52), I, p.309
- Str-B, I, p. 342.
- P. Blackman (ed), Mishnayoth (trans. P. Blackman; 7 vols.; New York: Judaica, 1963), IV, p. 66. According to Blackman, p.67 apparatus, a maneh = 100 zuz = 25 selah.
- S. Greengus, ‘Filling Gaps: Laws Found in Babylonia and in the Mishna but Absent in the Hebrew Bible’, Maarav 7 (1991), pp. 149-71 (152-55). Cf. Laws of Eshnunna §42.
- Greengus, ‘Filling Gaps’, pp.154-44.
- Scholars take this as a reference to the generations of the Tannaim from H.L. Strack and G. Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996), pp. 73, 76.
- C. Albeck (ed.), Shisha Sedre Mishnah (Hebrew) (3. vols.; Jerusalem: Eshkol, 1955), II, p. 20 (m. B. Qam.).
- t. B. Qam. 9.31 (see Liberman [ed.], Tosefta [5 vols.; New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1955-73], IV, p. 49 [Nezikin]). Cf. Sifra Emor 14 to Lev 24.19-20 for a similar tradition. Cf. The texts in P. Fiebig, Jesu Bergpredigt: Rabbinische Texte zum Verständnis der Bergpredigt, ins ihren Ursprachen dargeboten und mit Erläuterungen und Lesarten versehen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 1924), Teil I, pp. 95-96 (German), Teil II, pp 44-45 (Hebrew).
- Greengus, ‘Filling Gaps’, p.155.
- b. B. Qam. 90a, y. B. Qam. 7, 7a (Venice ed.). Cf. P. Schäfer and H.-J. Becker (eds.), Synopse zum Talmud Yerushalmi. IV. Ordnung Nezikin Ordnung Toharot: Nidda (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1995), p. 48. J. Weismann believes the tradition in b. B. Qam. 90a goes back to the time of Jesus (‘Zur Erklärung einer Stelle der Bergpredigt’, ZNW 14 [1913], pp. 175-76).
Lastly, onto part 3
St Thomas Aquinas’ Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew. Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5.
543
>And it should be good that to love (“diligere” = to value/esteem) someone is to will him good. But there are two kinds of good: eternal life, and charity intends this, because I am bound to love my neighbor as myself for eternal life; the other is temporal, and in this I am not bound to love my neighbor except insofar as these things lead to eternal life. Hence while preserving charity I can wish some temporal evil on my neighbor to the extent that it would give him the occasion of doing good and attaining eternal life. Hence Gregory says in his Morals that the sign that you do not love your neighbor is when you rejoice in his ruin; but I can rejoice in his temporal ruin to the extent that it is ordered to his good or that of others or of the multitude. [He is not talking about taking matters into his own hands, but rather hoping they learn their lesson.]
483
>Second there is an error of certain men who said: “You shall not kill” means men; hence they call it homicide when secular judges sentence people according to the laws.
-To paraphrase the rest of 483, St Thomas Aquinas then concludes that with judges it is something that is something God understands as being done on His behalf and the judge is essentially His proxy. This is called “Divine Right”.
533
>”Give to him who asks of you.” Here he says that we should do good to evildoers in two ways: by mode of simple giving and of loaning. As to the first, he says “who asks”: “If you have much, give abundantly” (Tobit 4:9); “If I have denied to the poor what they desired (Job 31:16). But it is objected that the poor cannot do this. Likewise, if the rich were always giving, nothing would remain of them. Augustine resolves this in two ways. The first, thus, because you should not give everything that someone asks, for not something indecent or unjust or irrational or something that you need more; but when someone asks rightly, you should give: and this is a precept if you are bound, a counsel if you are not bound. Jerome, though, says that it is understood as referring to a spiritual good because that can be harmful to no one.
531
>Mystically however, it should be known that the man who strikes you in the face insults you in your sight: “If a man is lifted up, if a man strike you on the face.” (2 Cor. 11:20)
He also mentions that “striking” is an issue of personal revenge which can refer to physical assault, taking things, and personal restriction. Matt 5:39-42 i.e. personal retribution is prohibited.
529
>But it should be seen how these sentences of the Lord may be understood. For two kinds of objections are made, according to two errors. One as Augustine says in his letter against Marcellinus, IS THE ERROR OF THE GENTILES, who argued that without retribution no state could be preserved. It is how a stand is made against enemies, and thieves are punished; which measures must be done thoroughly, or the state would perish. On the other hand, heretics say that the Gospels support revenge and do not wish to take away those things that pertain to society by abolishing it. Hence it should be said that THOSE PROCEED FROM A FALSE UNDERSTANDING.
>For someone can resist evil in two ways: out of love for a public good or for a private one. But the Lord did not intend to prohibit us from resisting evil for the good of the community, but rather that no one should burn with revenge for his own private good. For nothing preserves the society of men more than that a man not have the power of doing evil for his own private ends.
-Here the church fathers and saints literally state that people who assert “Love your enemies and turn the other cheek” means to be a pacifist and a cuck are “stupid goyim.”
My reason for posting this transcript is because 1) I thought these posts, especially the sources in part 2, were well-researched, and because 2) these screencaps are relatively well-circulated and I wanted them in one spot.
Whether anon’s reading of scripture is accurate or not, I will leave up to the reader to decide.
Nikaea 325 