You Will Always Have the Poor

In theory, the Gospel authors were not free to make stuff up.I think the issue here is that Jesus saw through the disciples pretense to be caring about the poor. The disciples complaint could be applied to any expenditure. What the complaining disciples were really disturbed by was Jesus relationship with the woman.In actuality, was Jesus going to take the woman's oil and give it to the poor? Could the disciples do that? Was there any indication that the woman had taken away any money earmarked for the poor? Did the disciples not have resources that they could have spent on the poor? The poor were not at the top of the list of priorities. What gave you that idea?

The very top priority for Jesus was how we treated each other, and our relationship to God. Not necessarily in that order. Treatment of the poor, and the imprisoned and the downtroden was one aspect of that.

My theory is that there was no purpose. Each person told his version of the story, and it is not as though Jesus had a stenographer following him everywhere. I suspect that absent some belief that there was something nefarious about the missing line, the comment did not make any particular impression on Matthew.

From the site.

quote:

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esus is not telling them not to worry about the poor because they are an intractable social ill. What he is saying is that he himself is not going to be around much longer. (We call this foreshadowing or a prediction of his crucifixion.) This woman is anointing him as he will be anointed at his death. Jesus is making a statement of comparison: she is doing this now because I won’t be around much longer.

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In fact, the Catholic Church is urging that we not interpret Jesus words in exactly the way that you are doing in the OP.

Clearly there are shared sources between the Gospels of Mark and Matthew. One thing that is clear is that the Gospel of Matthew describes different aspects of Jesus from Mark even when they describe the exact same event.But absent Jesus passing out copies of his speech, it is not difficult to imagine multiple accounts of what Jesus said where different statements are remembered as the most important.

It provides an excuse for people who need such a thing. However a person would equate his own situation with that of Jesus impending death on the cross surely misses the entire point, if indeed that person is not a complete ass.And while you claim to have no favored interpretation, the one you are using for this thread is one that none of the posters here who claim to be Christians accept as correct. It is certainly possible to read the truth from Matthew's words. Why are you insisting that the writer actually meant something else?It is, in fact, the Gospel according to Matthew, that is of the most assistance when chiding dispensationalists and no works people who claim to have faith about their duty to serve the poor. There is no reason to assume that in this one instance Matthew offers an excuse to those same lay abouts.

No. I am confusing your dismissal of alternative explanations fairly close to out of hand as you liking your position best. No, Jon. As I have expressed many times in these forums, what I find strange is attempts to parse the words in the Bible in a way that creates an issue where none exists. It is completely unlikely that Matthew's omission has anything like the meaning you suggest.As I read Matthew, I find the meaning quite clear, but twistable. I don't find the twisting profitable.

As a group, Christian philanthropy is well known. There is no doubt that Jesus actually requires that of us. However, individual counter examples abound and it is foolish to pretend that Christians on the whole observe this teaching any better than they observe the lessons to turn the other cheek or to not cast the first stone.

Perhaps the issue is that he simply did not have you as an editor. Further, it is not clear that Matthew removed anything. But maybe you can resolve that. Why don't you trace through the sources that Matthew and Mark used and show us what Matthew missed?

Wrong again. I'm confusing you not addressing counter arguments as not having a discussion, but instead being fixed on your position. I am also taking your loading of questions, "Why did Matthew omit this", as having already decided that Matthew did not report accurately what happened.The fact that people get the Gospel wrong, without more, is not a failing of the Bible. Nobody can prevent a motivated reader from reading in accordance with his motivation.

I think you've made some good points here. I'll also add that the above statement could also be used as an excuse not to help the poor. But that does not mean that the we should avoid making the statement or that the conclusion not to help the poor is what the speaker intends.

Nonsense.The question of what the author of Matthew read and what he actually wrote are important to the question, because you are imputing motives to the author. Can we verify that what we read today is an accurate version of what was written?What did Jesus actually say? Was anything of importance omitted by the various Gospel writers and was something unsaid added?

That's fine. But I'll note that you ducked a bunch of other questions I posed. The fact is that you have little to no basis for assuming that Matthew omitted anything.

You are Jon. When you speak of omissions and a confusing message, those are questions involve accuracy of Matthew's message. This is particularly true because we all seem to agree that Jesus was not saying to ignore the poor.

Actually, those questions were completely germane and answerable. The problem is that you've declared them to be off topic so that you can continue to make assertions that you cannot back up.