SOURCES:
Brown, S. Kent. “The Rich Young Ruler and the Parable of the Unjust Steward.” The Testimony of Luke. https://www.byunewtestamentcommentary.com/the-rich-young-ruler-and-the-parable-of-the-unjust-steward/#more-1336
Brown, S. Kent. “The Twelve.” The Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ: From Bethlehem through the Sermon on the Mount. Richard Neitzel Holzapfel and Thomas Wayment
Chadwick, Jeffrey R. “What Jesus Taught the Jews about the Law of Moses.” The Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ: From Bethlehem through the Sermon on the Mount. Richard Neitzel Holzapfel and Thomas Wayment
“Disagreements for the Sake of Heaven.” Video. The Padres Center for Judaism and Conflict Resolution. January 7, 2015.
Eubank, Sharon. “A Letter to a Single Sister (and anyone else who is longing to belong).” Ensign Magazine. October 2019. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/2019/10/a-letter-to-a-single-sister?lang=eng
Faulconer, James. The New Testament Made Harder. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1085&context=mi
Smith, Julie M. The Gospel According to Mark. https://www.byunewtestamentcommentary.com/jesus-teaches-about-wealth-mark-1017-31/
Wayment, Thomas A. The New Testament: A Translation for Latter-day Saints.
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Jesus Teaches about Marriage and Divorce
Matthew 19:3-12
Mark 10:2-12
Footnote, pg. 204: “The KJV use of the word “tempting” in Matthew 19:3 fails to accurately represent the event. The Greek verb in this passage (pierazo) is more properly rendered as “test, try, or prove.” The Pharisees in Matthew 19 had not come to tempt or entrap Jesus. They had come with a legitimate question and wished to assess His position. His immediate, respectful, and detailed response indicates that He took their inquiry seriously.”
Kent Brown.
"Fitting into a Church focused on family can also be challenging. But the reality is that a majority of Church members do not live in perfect family situations. I’m not sure anyone lives in that perfect, ideal family. So why keep the emphasis? Because family is our destiny, and we are on this earth to learn the skills of strong family relationships, no matter what our own situation is.”
Sharon Eubank.
Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai were two early Jewish schools of thought, or "houses" (beit, from Hebrew bayit, means "house of"), named after Hillel and Shammai, leading sages of Jerusalem in the latter half of the first century bce and in the early first-century ce.
“On this issue, too, Jewish opinion was divided. Among the Pharisees, according to the Mishnah (record of the oral tradition), the strict academy of Shammai felt that marriage was so important that a man could utilize the law’s divorce passage only if his wife was guilty of “a matter of sexual impurity”—meaning adultery or other unfaithful acts of physical sexuality. But the more pragmatic academy of Hillel took the usually loose view that a man might divorce his wife for any cause at all, even if she ruined food in cooking it.”
“On this occasion, to the astonishment of His own disciples (since His positions more often paralleled those of Hillel), Jesus’ ruling was nearly identical to the earlier position of Shammai: “Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall
marry another, committeth adultery” (19:9). In His interpretation of the law of Moses on this matter, the Master deliberately emphasized the primary importance of marriage over any pragmatic benefits of a divorce obtained too easily.”
Jeffery R. Chadwick
Wayment footnote: Matthew 19:10-12 Jesus may have been referring to the Essenes when he said that some have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom.
Essenes (Escenes) is a member of an ancient Jewish ascetic sect of the 2nd century BC–2nd century AD in Palestine, who lived in highly organized groups and held property in common. The Essenes are widely regarded as the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Ascetic - practice of severe self-discipline and abstention from all forms of indulgence, typically for religious reasons.
The Rich Young Ruler
Matthew 19:16-22 -
Mark 10:17-31 - 10:21 Mark alone adds that Jesus loved him.
Luke 18:18-30 - Different points of emphasis, such as the connection between perfection and obedience and the departure of the man. Luke records only that the man became sad, but he does not depart from Jesus.
In the economic reality of Jesus’ time, there was no path to wealth except to defraud others: “In the localized zero-sum economy of agrarian Palestine, there was little chance one could become rich without having defrauded people along the way.” It would have been nearly impossible to become wealthy without collaborating with Rome, so Jesus is inviting this man to focus on a different kingdom. Without saying a word, the man’s face falls, and he walks away. His reaction contrasts with Jesus, who looked at him and loved him; he shows his lack of love for Jesus by being unwilling to follow him. He is . . . a wealthy man who attempts to engage in mutual flattery.
Julie M. Smith
Footnote: John A. Tvedtnes debunked the explanation that the “eye of the needle” was a gate to Jerusalem through which a camel could enter, but only on its knees, by explaining that a camel’s anatomy would not permit this. He suggested one of two possibilities for understanding this verse: either that the word originally used was “rope” or that this was “deliberate hyperbole,” which, he notes, was characteristic of Jesus’ speaking style specifically and of his environment in general. He concludes that “all three possible explanations of Matthew 19:24—the gate, the rope, and the Jewish figure of speech—have been mentioned by prominent Latter-day Saint leaders. In any event, the idea is clear—riches can become a serious stumbling block to a person seeking eternal life.” John A. Tvedtnes, “I Have a Question,” Ensign 15 (March 1985): 29.
Julie M. Smith
Matthew 19:24 - “Many stories have been told to indicate that the “eye of the needle” is a small postern gate that was opened at night when the city gate had been shut and that a camel could get through it provided it had been fully unloaded. It is a nice story but not true in biblical terms. The eye of a needle refers to a surgeon’s needle. In both Matthew 19 and Matthew 23, the point was that the camel was the largest animal with which people of the day were familiar. Jesus was using the term much as we would use the word elephant as the largest creature in our experience. Jesus may also have used the camel as an illustration because it was ritually unclean.”
James Faulconer
The Persistent Widow and the Unjust Judge
Luke 18:1–8 - This parable is unique to Luke
Wayment: Footnote - The parable and comments on it treat the topic of endurance in prayer. Jesus indirectly confronts the issue of praying without receiving an answer. This parable is unique to Luke. Compare the interpretation of this parable in Doctrine and Covenants 101:81-92.
“Persistence stood as a chief attribute in Jesus’ teachings on prayer. For example, in a series of lessons on praying, Luke drew the obvious conclusion when he wrote that Jesus “spake a parable unto them . . . that men ought always to pray, and not to faint.” Luke 18:1 In the parable that followed, a widow persistently, relentlessly sought proper redress from a judge. She so wearied him with her endless pleadings that he finally took action on her behalf, an illustration of the virtue of persistence (Luke 18:2-7). In addition, in Jesus’ eyes, humility joined persistence as an attribute that moves heaven.
Kent Brown
