Matthew 14:13

The Feeding of the Five Thousand

14:13 Now when Jesus heard this he went away from there privately in a boat to an isolated place. But when the crowd heard about it, ¹  they followed him on foot from the towns. ² 

Matthew 22:13

22:13 Then the king said to his attendants, ‘Tie him up hand and foot and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’

Matthew 18:8

18:8 If ³  your hand or your foot causes you to sin, ⁴  cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than to have ⁵  two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire.

Matthew 4:6

4:6 and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down. For it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you’ ⁶  and ‘with their hands they will lift you up, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’” ⁷ 

Matthew 5:13

Salt and Light

5:13 “You are the salt ⁸  of the earth. But if salt loses its flavor, ⁹  how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled on by people.

Matthew 7:6

7:6 Do not give what is holy to dogs or throw your pearls before pigs; otherwise they will trample them under their feet and turn around and tear you to pieces. ¹⁰ 

Matthew 17:14

The Disciples’ Failure to Heal

17:14 When ¹¹  they came to the crowd, a man came to him, knelt before him,

Matthew 5:35

5:35 not by earth, because it is his footstool, and not by Jerusalem, ¹²  because it is the city of the great King.

Matthew 21:12

Cleansing the Temple

21:12 Then ¹³  Jesus entered the temple area ¹⁴  and drove out all those who were selling and buying in the temple courts, ¹⁵  and turned over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves.

¹ tn The word “it” is not in the Greek text but is implied. Direct objects were often omitted in Greek when clear from the context.

² tn Or “cities.”

³ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

⁴ sn In Greek there is a wordplay that is difficult to reproduce in English here. The verb translated “causes…to sin” (σκανδαλίζω, skandalizw) comes from the same root as the word translated “stumbling blocks” (σκάνδαλον, skandalon) in the previous verse.

⁵ tn Grk “than having.”

⁵ sn A quotation from Ps 91:11. This was not so much an incorrect citation as a use in a wrong context (a misapplication of the passage).

⁶ sn A quotation from Ps 91:12.

⁷ sn Salt was used as seasoning or fertilizer (BDAG 41 s.v. ἅλας a), or as a preservative. If salt ceased to be useful, it was thrown away. With this illustration Jesus warned about a disciple who ceased to follow him.

⁸ sn The difficulty of this saying is understanding how salt could lose its flavor since its chemical properties cannot change. It is thus often assumed that Jesus was referring to chemically impure salt, perhaps a natural salt which, when exposed to the elements, had all the genuine salt leached out, leaving only the sediment or impurities behind. Others have suggested that the background of the saying is the use of salt blocks by Arab bakers to line the floor of their ovens; under the intense heat these blocks would eventually crystallize and undergo a change in chemical composition, finally being thrown out as unserviceable. A saying in the Talmud (b. Bekhorot 8b) attributed to R. Joshua ben Chananja (ca. a.d. 90), when asked the question “When salt loses its flavor, how can it be made salty again?” is said to have replied, “By salting it with the afterbirth of a mule.” He was then asked, “Then does the mule (being sterile) bear young?” to which he replied: “Can salt lose its flavor?” The point appears to be that both are impossible. The saying, while admittedly late, suggests that culturally the loss of flavor by salt was regarded as an impossibility. Genuine salt can never lose its flavor. In this case the saying by Jesus here may be similar to Matt 19:24, where it is likewise impossible for the camel to go through the eye of a sewing needle.

⁹ tn Or “otherwise the latter will trample them under their feet and the former will turn around and tear you to pieces.” This verse is sometimes understood as a chiasm of the pattern a-b-b-a, in which the first and last clauses belong together (“dogs…turn around and tear you to pieces”) and the second and third clauses belong together (“pigs…trample them under their feet”).

¹¹ tn Here καί (kai) has not been translated.

¹³ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹⁵ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.

¹⁶ tn Grk “the temple.”

¹⁷ tn Grk “the temple.”