Matthew 5:18

For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,

One jot or one tittle shall in no way pass away from the law,

Until all things be accomplished.”

Jesus then makes the strongest possible assertion of the permanence and almost divine status of ‘the Law' and all that it promised. He emphatically declares (‘truly I say to you') that rather than being destroyed it will certainly continue as authoritative until the destroying of the present Heaven and earth (2 Peter 3:7; 2 Peter 3:10; Revelation 20:11) and its replacement with the new Heaven and the new earth (2 Peter 3:13; Revelation 21:1 to Revelation 22:5, an extension of the idea in Isaiah 65:17), and will last to such an extent that not even the smallest part of it will ‘pass away', that is be removed from having authority. And in the end all of it will be accomplished, that is brought to its full realisation, to the last jot and tittle (to the smallest letter and the smallest symbol).

‘One jot' is, in the Greek, ‘one iota', the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet. This therefore represents the equivalent of either the yod or the waw in Hebrew, the one the smallest letter, the other looking very similar to an iota, either of which can often be removed from a Hebrew word without changing the sense. The point being made therefore is that even these semi-redundant letters are to be seen as a necessary part of the whole. God has caused them to be there and therefore they were permanent. A ‘tittle' is literally ‘a horn'. It is referring to either the small stroke added to some Hebrew letters in order to differentiate them from others, or even to some kind of mark placed in the text for added, but relatively unimportant, significance. Thus Jesus is affirming the infallibility of  the written  Law, as originally given, as it stood. He is declaring that it must be accomplished because it is part of God's word to man.

One distinction, however, that Jesus does make about the Law and the Prophets elsewhere, is that they continued to prophesy until John, that is until the coming of the Kingly Rule of Heaven began to bring about their fulfilment (Matthew 11:13; Luke 16:16). The assumption is that they then ceased because something better had come. But that does not mean that their fulfilment ceased, or that they ceased to have effect, only that more prophecy would be unnecessary because the fulfilment of what had been given had already commenced. He thus sees the Law and the Prophets as complete, and His own coming as beginning the fulfilment of the Law and the Prophets rather than as part of the build up towards it. The build up had ended with John. The ‘last days' were to be seen as here. What happens from that time on is therefore to be seen as the outworking of all that has been promised, the beginning of its fulfilment.

‘The Law.' This possibly indicates ‘the Law of Moses' as found in the Pentateuch, although it is more probablye that it covers both that and the prophets, on the basis of the recognised and stereotyped phrase ‘the Law and the Prophets' (Matthew 7:12; Matthew 22:40, compare Matthew 11:13). Indeed ‘the Law' in Jesus' eyes can also include the Psalms (John 10:34, compare Luke 24:44), thus having in mind the whole of the Old Testament Scriptures.

It is true that ‘until heaven and earth pass away' might theoretically be seen as simply indicating what was seen as impossible, and thus as emphasising that the Law is everlasting, (and its intrinsic significance can hardly be anything other than everlasting, for eternity will be the fullest revelation of the perfection for which the Law was striving). But there are clear enough indications that that is not so, for Jesus could say that at the resurrection men and women are to be as the angels (Matthew 22:30) so that the reproductive activity of creation will be no more, while He makes clear references to the fact that the future, and therefore the eternal future, will be ‘not of this world' (Matthew 7:21; Matthew 8:11; Luke 16:19; John 14:2). This therefore confirms that Jesus did in fact believe that Heaven (the material heavens) and earth would themselves one day pass away, as Peter confirms (2 Peter 3:10).

‘Truly (Amen) I say to you.' The use of the Hebrew/Aramaic ‘Amen', transliterated into Greek, and signifying a firm assurance, occurs over thirty times in Matthew, while ‘I say to you', signifying a unique authority, occurs over fifty times. His is thus the voice of certainty and authority. By this Jesus was declaring that He spoke with an authority shared by no other, that guaranteed what was spoken.

The word ‘amen' used in this way is found elsewhere only in a Jewish work of the late 1st century AD called the Testament of Abraham. There it is found in Matthew 8:7 (where God sends a message to Abraham saying ‘Amen I say to you that blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your seed, and I will give you all that you ask from me, for I am the Lord your God, and besides me there is no other') and in Matthew 20:2, (where Death says in response to a question from Abraham, ‘Amen, amen, I tell you in the truth of God that there are seventy-two deaths'). It will be noted that both are seen as affirmations from ‘another world'. The Testament of Abraham is a Jewish writing written probably in the late 1st century AD, but it may reflect previous usage. On the other hand the author may have picked up the idea from Christian usage, and thus ultimately from the teaching of Jesus. So the evidence either suggests that Jesus is using a term which would be seen by all as indicating His own ‘other-worldly' uniqueness, or has actually being introduced for the first time by Him for a similar reason. Either way it represents unique authority.

‘Amen.' This transliteration of the Hebrew occurs four times in LXX (1 Chronicles 16:36; Nehemiah 5:13; Nehemiah 8:6 (twice)) and also in the Apocrypha, but never as used here except as mentioned above.

Short Note on the Authority of the Bible.

Jesus' emphasis here was, of course, on the permanence and completeness of the whole Law (at least of the whole Pentateuch) as such, as something concerning which every word was valid and indisputable. But while that is so it also has wider implications. For if what Jesus says here is true it indicates that He put His authority behind every word in the original text of the Pentateuch as originally given (and saw the current text as giving a reasonable representation of it), declaring it to be indisputable and permanently valid. Those therefore who on the basis of this statement speak of the Pentateuch as ‘verbally inspired so that every word is seen as God-given', rate Jesus among their number. This is really indisputable.

The question of the full verbal authority of Scripture then boils down to the question of how we view Jesus. If we consider that Jesus brought us the whole truth from God without error, and that we enjoy the benefit of that truth in His words in Scripture (a value judgment we can make by considering and weighing up His words for ourselves) then we have no alternative but to believe that at least the Pentateuch as originally given is inerrant (every jot and tittle). If we do not believe that then we have to say ‘Goodbye' to an inerrant Jesus, and the Jesus of the Bible. We are simply left with a Jesus formed according to our own imaginations. Our faith ceases to be in Jesus but in ourselves, and in what we decide to accept. That is why belief in the inerrancy of Scripture finally comes, not from examining Scripture, although we have to do that, but from examining Jesus Christ, and making up our minds about Him, whether He really is the Son of God or not. Once we are sure of that everything else falls into place, for He constantly asserted the absolute reliability of Scripture. And we then recognise that any problems we have with inerrancy are due not to the Bible but to our own lack of knowledge, or our own lack of faith in Him. We can then be confident that if only we had full knowledge we would have the answer to every problem. Meanwhile we can trust Him and look to the Bible in confidence, even if we cannot ourselves find an answer to every difficulty that it raises. The ‘only' problem then is the interpretation of it. But that is another question.

End of note.