NOTES for Mt 6:5-6

Jesus Christ firmly rejects any manifestations of “spirituality for show” in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus rebukes the Pharisees exactly for this, and particularly the aspiration to expose spiritual life before men appears to be Pharisees’ most typical symptoms. The Lord tells the disciples that whatever, even the most serious things – like prayer and alms – lose sense if they are not fulfill for God’s sake. We should pay attention to our own hearts when reading these words: We should resist Pharisaism first of all in ourselves.

God opposes pharisaic ostentatious piety with such prayer that testimonies only God alone. Praying secretly, communicating with God not for “show “, we find God Himself in such unbelievable closeness, which nobody would have ever imagine himself. To be in private with God is a new covenant astonishing gift and Christian astonishing vocation. It is necessary to remember this invitation to pray the Father in secret when we read these words of Jesus about almsgiving, loving your neighbors, serving people. God calls exactly this communication with Him in private the rock on which all Christian life is based.

Besides it is necessary to notice that late versions of Byzantine Gospel add superfluous word: “render to you plainly”. There is not this word in ancient manuscripts; this means requital consists most likely not in obvious prosperity (what Pharisees thought obligatory). It is remarkable and very important that Jesus Christ doesn’t speak at all about what God’s answer consists of; because it has no value for love; the meaning of the answer in love is inside the answer itself.