Most of us have felt some tension when reading the Sermon on the Mount. This famous teaching of Jesus is full of comfort, beauty, and wisdom—but it is full of sayings that startle us when we slow down enough to hear them.

Near the beginning of this sermon, Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets” (Matthew 5:17, NIV). That seems clear enough. Jesus is not doing away with the Old Testament. He is not setting Himself against Moses. He has not come to abolish but to fulfill.

Yet almost immediately after saying this, Jesus gives six examples that can sound as though He is changing the Law. Each begins with some form of the phrase, “You have heard that it was said.” He addresses murder, adultery, divorce, oaths, “an eye for an eye,” and love of neighbor (Matthew 5:21–48, NIV). In each case, Jesus presses His listeners beyond a surface-level reading of the command and toward the heart of what God had always intended.

Many of these are familiar. Most Christians have heard that Jesus deepens the command against murder by addressing anger and the command against adultery by addressing lust. Difficult teachings, to be sure—but we can follow the basic, rhetorical move He is making.

The final two examples, however, feel more jarring. When Jesus says not to retaliate against the evil person and then commands His followers to love their enemies, it can sound as though He is directly contradicting the Old Testament. These are the cases where the supposed divide feels sharpest: Moses sounds like judgment; Jesus sounds like mercy. A closer look, though, suggests otherwise.

“An Eye for an Eye” Wasn’t a License for Revenge

You have likely heard Gandhi’s famous phrase, “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.”¹ The sentiment is certainly true. A world given over to revenge will destroy itself. Yet as a reading of the Old Testament, the phrase actually misses the point of the command.

The command “eye for eye, tooth for tooth” is often called lex talionis, the law of retaliation, and we find it in Exodus 21:23–25, Leviticus 24:19–20, and Deuteronomy 19:21. To modern readers, this can sound primitive or even cruel. We hear it as a call for revenge: Someone hurts you, so you hurt them back. They take from you, so you take from them.

Yet in its original context, “an eye for an eye” was not meant to unleash violence. It was meant to restrain it.

The point was never that Israel could retaliate as much as it wanted but that justice could not exceed the offense. A wound could not become an excuse for murder. A personal injury could not become permission for generational violence. Justice had to be measured, limited, and proportional to the wrong that had been done.

God was not handing Israel an excuse for violence; He was putting boundaries around human anger.

In this sense, “an eye for an eye” is closer to the foundation of a just legal system than a permission slip for revenge. Modern legal systems still depend on some form of this principle. Punishment should fit the crime. Petty theft should not receive the same sentence as murder. Of course, the details of Israel’s law are not simply copied into our own context nor should they be. But the underlying principle still makes sense: Justice must be ordered, restrained, and proportionate.

This means that “an eye for an eye” was already a move toward mercy. It limited what vengeance could do. It said, in effect, “This far, and no farther.” Justice mattered, but justice could not become an excuse for cruelty.

So when we come to Matthew 5, we should not imagine Jesus standing against a Law that loved violence. The Law had been restraining vengeance all along. Jesus presses that same movement further.

Why Jesus Tells You to Turn the Other Cheek

Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person” (Matthew 5:38–39, NIV). He then gives several examples. If someone slaps you on the right cheek, turn the other also. If someone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles (Matthew 5:39–41, NIV).

Jesus is not telling anyone to stay in harm’s way or to accept abuse. Scripture also commands the protection of the vulnerable, and enduring a private insult as Jesus describes here is not the same as tolerating ongoing harm. Still, these words are startling, and they are meant to be. He is speaking to the heart of personal retaliation—to what rises in us when we are wronged, insulted, or embarrassed. Most of us want to defend ourselves. We want the other person to feel some of what we felt, to answer insult with insult, contempt with contempt.

The Law had already limited revenge. Jesus now calls His people to refuse revenge altogether. This is not a contradiction of the Law but the fulfillment of its deepest aim. The movement is not from “the Old Testament permits violence” to “Jesus teaches love.” The movement is from “God restrains vengeance” to “God’s people, formed by mercy, no longer need vengeance to define their response.”

Christians have long differed on how much of the Law carries forward, but on this point the traditions converge: Jesus is not correcting Moses. He is revealing what the Law of Moses was always for.

Does the Bible Really Command You to Hate Your Enemies?

The next saying makes the point even more clearly. Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:43–44, NIV).

At first, this sounds like the clearest possible contradiction. The Old Testament says hate your enemy; Jesus says love your enemy.

There is, however, a significant problem with that reading: The Old Testament never commands God’s people to hate their enemies. When we read verses like Psalm 139:21, “Do I not hate those who hate you?” (NIV), we recognize these as prayers, not commands.

The first half, “love your neighbor,” comes directly from Leviticus 19:18. The second half, “hate your enemy,” is not a command from Moses. It seems instead to be a common assumption or interpretation that had grown up around the command: If love is owed to my people, maybe hatred is allowed toward my enemies.

Jesus refuses that move.

The Torah already points in this direction. Leviticus 19 does not command love for fellow Israelites only. A few verses later, Israel is told to love the foreigner as themselves, for they were once foreigners in Egypt (Leviticus 19:33–34). Exodus even commands Israel to return the wandering ox of an enemy and to help the donkey of someone who hates them (Exodus 23:4–5).

Jesus does not reject Moses; He reveals the mercy toward which the Law was always pointing. He is correcting the human tendency to shrink the circle of love until it only includes people who are easy to love.

We still do this. We may not say “hate your enemy” out loud, but we find ways to justify contempt. We decide who deserves patience, who deserves mercy, who deserves the benefit of the doubt. We love the people who love us back and call that righteousness.

Jesus says even tax collectors do that.

Instead, He points us to the Father, who “causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45, NIV). God’s kindness is not limited to those who honor Him. His patience is not reserved for those who obey. The Father gives daily mercies even to His enemies.

And in Jesus, He does even more. Jesus does not merely teach enemy-love; He embodies it. At the cross, the truly righteous One suffers at the hands of sinners and prays, “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34, NIV). He does not love His enemies from a safe distance. He gives Himself for them.

The Same God, More Clearly Seen in Jesus

Matthew 5:17–20 is not a throwaway introduction to the Sermon on the Mount. It teaches us how to read everything that follows: Jesus has not come to abolish the Law or the Prophets, but to fulfill them.

When Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek, He is not showing us a softer God than the God of Moses. He is showing us the heart of the same God who had already been limiting revenge and restraining violence.

When Jesus tells us to love our enemies, He is not replacing the Old Testament command to love our neighbor. He is showing us how far that love was always meant to go.

Jesus fulfills the Law, not by doing away with it but by revealing its goal in Himself. In Him, we see the justice, mercy, holiness, and enemy-loving grace of God. And by His Spirit, we are formed into people who begin to look like Him.²

If you liked this article, check out the related resources linked below!

Notes:

1. This is widely attributed to Mahatma Gandhi, although the attribution is disputed.

2. For further reading, see Paul T. Sloan. Jesus and the Law of Moses: The Gospels and the Restoration of Israel within First-Century Judaism. Baker Academic, 2025.

---

Author Bio

Jared Dodson is a Ph.D. student at the University of St. Andrews and teaches biblical studies and theology at Bushnell University. He has been published in Christianity Today and is a contributor at The Daily Grace Co. You can follow his work on Substack where he writes about Scripture, theology, and culture at Walking alongside Scripture (jndodson.substack.com).

Related Resources:

On Earth as It Is in Heaven | Sermon On The Mount Bible Study		Jesus Is Better | Hebrews Bible Study		Christ in All of Scripture | Volume 1
Loading price…		Loading price…		Loading price…
Add to Cart		Add to Cart		Add to Cart