Matthew 5:13

Have lost his savour (μωρανθῇ) The kindred noun (μωρός) means dull, sluggish; applied to the mind, stupid or silly; applied to the taste, insipid, flat. The verb here used of salt, to become insipid, also means to play the fool. Our Lord refers here to the familiar fact of salt losing its pungency and becoming useless. Dr. Thompson ("The Land and the Book") cites the following case: "A merchant of Sidon, having farmed of the government the revenue from the importation of salt, brought over a great quantity from the marshes of Cyprus - enough, in fact, to supply the whole province for many years. This he had transferred to the mountains, to cheat the government out of some small percentage of duty. Sixty-five houses were rented and filled with salt. Such houses have merely earthen floors, and the salt next the ground was in a few years entirely spoiled. I saw large quantities of it literally thrown into the road to be trodden under foot of men and beasts. It was 'good for nothing.'"

(2) Their responsibility, Matthew 5:13-16 . 13 . Ye are the salt of the earth ] Here the disciples and primarily the Apostles are addressed. Those who fulfil the condition of discipleship have a responsibility laid upon them. have lost his savour ] i. e. become tasteless. Salt is essential to all organized life, it is also the great preservative from corruption. If these virtues pass from it, it is worse than useless. It cannot even be thrown on the fields, it must be cast into the street to be trodden under foot. (See a very interesting illustration of this in Land and Book , pp. 381, 382.) So to the apostles who hold the highest and most necessary places in the kingdom of God, there is no middle course, either they must be the salt of the earth, be its very life, or fall utterly. If not Peter, then Judas.

Ye {2} are the salt of the {d} earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be {e} salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. (2) The ministers of the word especially (unless they will be the most cowardly of all) must lead others both by word and deed to this greatest joy and happiness. (d) Your doctrine must be very sound and good, for if it is not so, it will be not regarded and cast away as a thing unsavoury and vain. (e) What will you have to salt with? And so are fools in the Latin tongue called saltless, as you would say, men that have no salt or savour and taste in them.

Matthew 5:13 . Ye — Not the apostles, not ministers only; but all who possess and manifest the graces spoken of in the preceding verses, and are truly holy and righteous; are the salt of the earth — Appointed to be the means of preventing or curing the growth of that corruption which prevails in the world, and of seasoning men’s minds with wisdom and grace. But if the salt have lost its savour — Or, be grown insipid, and therefore want seasoning itself, wherewith shall it be salted — By what means can its lost virtue be restored? The word μωρανθη , rendered have lost its savour, has peculiar strength and beauty, and is literally, be infatuated, or, grown foolish, “alluding,” says Dr. Doddridge, “to the common figure, in which sense and spirit are expressed by salt.” It is thenceforth good for nothing — It is wholly useless, and left to be thrown out of doors, and trampled on by men as the common dirt in the streets: “thus worthless and contemptible will you, my disciples, be, even in the most eminent stations, if you lose your character for real and vital religion.” The following passage of Mr. Maundrell, quoted by Dr. Macknight, illustrates our Lord’s supposition of salt’s losing its savour.

In the valley of Salt, near Gebul, and about four hours’ journey from Aleppo, there is a small precipice, occasioned by the continual taking away of the salt. “In this,” says he, “you may see how the veins of it lie; I brake a piece off it, of which the part that was exposed to the rain, sun, and air, though it had the sparks and particles of salt, yet it had perfectly lost its savour. The innermost part, which had been connected to the rock, retained its savour, as I found by proof.”

Matthew 5:13-16 . Disciple functions . It is quite credible that these sentences formed part of the Teaching on the Hill. Jesus might say these things at a comparatively early period to the men to whom He had already said: I will make you fishers of men. The functions assigned to disciples here are not more ambitious than that alluded to at the time of their call. The new section rests on what goes before, and postulates possession of the attributes named in the Beatitudes. With these the disciples will be indeed the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Vitally important functions are indicated by the two figures. Nil sole et sale utilius was a Roman proverb (Pliny, H. N., 31, 9). Both harmonise with, the latter points expressly to, a universal destination of the new religion. The sun lightens all lands. Both also show how alien it was from the aims of Christ to be the teacher of an esoteric faith.

(13) Ye are the salt of the earth. —The words are spoken to the disciples in their ideal character, as the germ of a new Israel, called to a prophetic work, preserving the earth from moral putrescence and decay. The general reference to this antiseptic action of salt is (as in Colossians 4:6 , and possibly in the symbolic act of Elisha, 2Kings 2:21 ) enough to give an adequate meaning to the words, but the special reference to the sacrificial use of salt in Mark 9:49 (see Note there) makes it probable enough that there was some allusion to that thought also here. If the salt have lost his savour.—The salt commonly used by the Jews of old, as now, came from Jebel-Usdum, on the shores of the Dead Sea, and was known as the Salt of Sodom. Maundrell, the Eastern traveller (circ. A.D. 1690), reports that he found lumps of rock-salt there which had become partially flavourless, but I am not aware that this has been confirmed by recent travellers. Common salt, as is well known, will melt if exposed to moisture, but does not lose its saltness. The question is more curious than important, and does not affect the ideal case represented in our Lord’s words. Wherewith shall it be salted?—The words imply a relative if not an absolute impossibility. If gifts, graces, blessings, a high calling, and a high work fail, what remains? The parable finds its interpretation in Hebrews 6:1-6.

To be trodden under foot of men.—The Talmud shows (Schottgen in loc.) that the salt which had become unfit for sacrificial use in the store-house was sprinkled in wet weather upon the slopes and steps of the temple to prevent the feet of the priests from slipping, and we may accordingly see in our Lord’s words a possible reference to this practice.

13-16. We have here the practical application of the foregoing principles to those disciples who sat listening to them, and to their successors in all time. Our Lord, though He began by pronouncing certain characters to be blessed—without express reference to any of His hearers—does not close the beatitudes without intimating that such characters were in existence, and that already they were before Him. Accordingly, from characters He comes to persons possessing them, saying, "Blessed are ye when men shall revile you," &c. (Mt 5:11). And now, continuing this mode of direct personal address, He startles those humble, unknown men by pronouncing them the exalted benefactors of their whole species. Ye are the salt of the earth—to preserve it from corruption, to season its insipidity, to freshen and sweeten it. The value of salt for these purposes is abundantly referred to by classical writers as well as in Scripture; and hence its symbolical significance in the religious offerings as well of those without as of those within the pale of revealed religion. In Scripture, mankind, under the unrestrained workings of their own evil nature, are represented as entirely corrupt. Thus, before the flood (Ge 6:11, 12); after the flood (Ge 8:21); in the days of David (Ps 14:2, 3); in the days of Isaiah (Isa 1:5, 6); and in the days of Paul (Eph 2:1-3; see also Job 14:4; 15:15, 16; Joh 3:6; compared with Ro 8:8; Tit 3:2, 3).

The remedy for this, says our Lord here, is the active presence of His disciples among their fellows. The character and principles of Christians, brought into close contact with it, are designed to arrest the festering corruption of humanity and season its insipidity. But how, it may be asked, are Christians to do this office for their fellow men, if their righteousness only exasperate them, and recoil, in every form of persecution, upon themselves? The answer is: That is but the first and partial effect of their Christianity upon the world: though the great proportion would dislike and reject the truth, a small but noble band would receive and hold it fast; and in the struggle that would ensue, one and another even of the opposing party would come over to His ranks, and at length the Gospel would carry all before it. but if the salt have lost his savour—"become unsavory" or "insipid"; losing its saline or salting property. The meaning is: If that Christianity on which the health of the world depends, does in any age, region, or individual, exist only in name, or if it contain not those saving elements for want of which the world languishes, wherewith shall it be salted?—How shall the salting qualities be restored to it? (Compare Mr 9:50). Whether salt ever does lose its saline property—about which there is a difference of opinion—is a question of no moment here.

Matthew 5:13-14 . Ὑμεῖς , you ) sc. the first disciples and hearers of the Messiah. Salt and light are, in nature, things essential, and of widest use. Frequently in Scripture the same thing is first declared by metaphorical expressions, that our attention may be excited: and then, when we have not understood it as we ought, and in the meanwhile have perceived our blindness, it is disclosed in plain words.— τῆς γῆς , of the earth ).— τοῦ κόσμου , of the world ) The earth of itself is without salt, the world without light.— ἐαν , κ . τ . λ ., if , etc.) It is not affirmed in this passage, that salt does lose its savour; but it is shown what, in such a case, would be the lot of the Salt of the earth.— μωρανθῇ , should lose its savour ) Galen,[178] in his observations on Hippocrates, explains ΜΕΜΩΡΩΜΈΝΑ (the perf. pass. part. of this verb) by ΤᾺ ἈΝΑΊΣΘΗΤΑ , i.e., which have no feeling; in Mark 9:50 , we find ἄναλον γένηται , become saltless . It is the nature of salt to have and to give savour; and to this savour are opposed saltlessness, want of taste, value lost.— ἁλισθήσεται , shall it be salted ) Impersonal.