Matthew 5:20

Here is another type still, that of the scribes and Pharisees. We have had two degrees of worth, the little and the great. This new type gives us the moral zero. λέγω γὰρ. The γὰρ is somewhat puzzling. We expect δὲ, taking our attention off two types described in the previous sentence and fixing it on a distinct one. Yet there is a hidden logic latent in the γὰρ. It explains the ἐλάχιστος of the previous verse. The earnest reformer is a small character compared with the sweet wholesome performer, but he is not a moral nullity. That place is reserved for another class. I call him least, not nothing, for the scribe is the zero. πλεῖον τῶν γρ. κ. φ., a compendious comparison, τῆς δικαιοσύνης being understood after πλεῖον. Christ's statements concerning these classes of the Jewish community, elsewhere recorded, enable us to understand the verdict He pronounces here. They differed from the two classes named in Matthew 5:18, thus: Class 1 set aside the least commandments for the sake of the great; class 2 conscientiously did all, great and small; class 3 set aside the great for the sake of the little, the ethical for the sake of the ritual, the divine for the sake of the traditional. That threw them outside the Kingdom, where only the moral has value. And the second is greater, higher, than the first, because, while zeal for the ethical is good, spirit, temper, disposition has supreme value in the Kingdom. These valuations of Jesus are of great importance as a contribution towards defining the nature of the Kingdom as He conceived it.

Nothing, little, great: there is a higher grade still, the highest. It belongs to Christ Himself, the Fulfiller, who is neither a sophistical scribe, nor an impatient reformer, nor a strict performer of all laws great and small, walking humbly with God in the old ways, without thought, dream or purpose of change, but one who lives above the past and the present in the ideal, knows that a change is impending, but wishes it to come gently, and so as to do full justice to all that is divine, venerable, and of good tendency in the past. His is the unique greatness of the reverently conservative yet free, bold inaugurator of a new time.