Blessed are the meek. In this Beatitude our Lord still quotes Old Testament expressions. The phrase, "shah inherit the earth," comes even in Isaiah 60:21, only two verses before Isaiah 61:1, Isaiah 61:2, to which he has already referred.
In the present copies of the LXX. it is found also in Isaiah 61:7, but there it is evidently a corruption. It occurs also in Psalms 37:9, Psalms 37:11, Psalms 37:22, Psalms 37:29, Psalms 37:34; and since in the eleventh verse of the psalm it is directly said of the meek: "But the meek shall inherit the land (LXX.
, οἱδὲ πραεῖς κληρονομήσουσιν γῆν)," it is, doubtless, from this latter passage that our Lord borrows the phrase. The meaning attributed by our Lord to the word meek is not clear. The ordinary use of the words πραΰ́ς, πραΰ́της, in the New Testament refers solely to the relation of men to men, and this is the sense in which οἱπραεῖς is taken by most commentators here.
But with this sense, taken barely and solely, there seems to be no satisfactory explanation of the position of the Beatitude. Psalms 37:3 and Psalms 37:4 refer to men in their relation to God; Psalms 37:6, to say the least, includes the relation of men to God; what has Psalms 37:5 to do here if it refers solely to the relation of men to men?
It would have come very naturally either before or after Psalms 37:9 ("the peacemakers"); but why here? The reason, however, for the position of the Beatitude lies in the true conception of meekness.
While the thought is here primarily that of meekness exhibited towards men (as is evident from the implied contrast in they shall inherit the earth), yet meekness towards men is closely connected with, and is the result of, meekness towards God.
This is not exactly humility ( ταπεινοφροσύνη, which, as regards God, is equivalent to a sense of creatureliness or dependence; cf. Trench, 'Syn.,' § 42.). Meekness is rather the attitude of the soul towards another when that other is in a state of activity towards it.
It is the attitude of the disciple to the teacher when teaching; of the son to the father when exercising his paternal authority; of the servant to the master when giving him orders. It is therefore essentially as applicable to the relation of man to God as to that of man to man.
It is for this reason that we find ונעהונעvery frequently used of man's relation to God, in fact, more often than of man's relation to man; and this common meaning of ונעmust be specially remembered here, where the phrase is taken directly from the Old Testament.
Weiss ('Matthaus-ev.') objects to Tholuck adducing the evidence of the Hebrew words, on the ground that the Greek terms are used solely of the relation to man, and that this usage is kept to throughout the New Testament.
But the latter statement is hardly true. For, not to mention Matthew 11:29, in which the reference is doubtful, James 1:21 certainly refers to the meekness shown towards God in receiving his word. "The Scriptural πραότης," says Trench, loc.
cit.," is not in a man's outward behaviour only; nor yet in his relations to his fellow-men; as little in his mere natural disposition. Rather is it an inwrought grace of the soul; and the exercises of it are first and chiefly towards God (Matthew 11:29; James 1:21).
It is that temper of spirit in which we accept his dealings with us as good, and therefore without disputing or resisting; and it is closely linked with the ταπεωοφροσύνη, and follows directly upon it (Ephesians 4:2; Colossians 3:12; of.
Zephaniah 3:12), because it is only the humble heart which is also the meek; and which, as such, does not fight against God, and more or less struggle and contend with him." Yet, as this meekness must be felt towards God not only in his direct dealings with the soul, but also in his indirect dealings (i.
e. by secondary means and agents), it must also be exhibited towards men. Meekness towards God necessarily issues in meekness towards men. Our Lord's concise teaching seizes, therefore, on this furthest expression of meekness.
Thus it is not meekness in the relation of man to man barely staled, of which Christ here speaks, but meekness in the relation of man to man, with its prior and presupposed fact of meekness in the relation of man to God.
Shall inherit the earth. In the Psalm this is equivalent to the land of Palestine, and the psalmist means that, though the wicked may have temporary power, yet God's true servants shall really and finally have dominion in the land.
But what is intended here? Probably our Lord's audience understood the phrase on his lips as a Messianic adaptation of the original meaning, and as therefore implying that those who manifested a meek reception of his will would obtain that full possession of the land of Palestine which was now denied to the Israelites through the conquest of the Romans.
But to our Lord, and to the evangelist who, years after, recorded them, the meaning of the words must have been much fuller, corresponding, in fact, to the true meaning of the "kingdom of heaven," viz.
that the meek shall inherit—shall receive, as their rightful possession from their Father, the whole earth; renewed, it may be (Isaiah 11:6-9; Isaiah 65:25; Revelation 21:1), but still the earth (Romans 8:21), with all the powers of nature therein implied.
Of this the conquest of nature already gained through the civilization produced under Christianity is at once the promise and, though but in a small degree, the firstfruits.