NOTES for Mat 5:17-32
In conversations with the disciples and in sermons, Jesus often speaks about the Torah and its proper understanding. In the Synodal text the Torah is usually called the "Law," but, though such a translation is formally correct, it still does not fully convey the meaning of the corresponding Hebrew word. Torah is more than simply law in the sense in which we usually use that word, more than only legislation or the legal order defined by it. Torah also implies a way of life corresponding to the law, including the inner, spiritual state of a person that corresponds to such a way of life. In Gospel times, in the rabbinic environment and in the Synagogue in general, the concept of the "living Torah" had spread rather widely, and ideally every believing Jew was to become such a Torah. What was meant was a person's spiritual state in which the Torah becomes something inwardly inherent to him, defining the whole of his life in all its manifestations. This understanding was very close to Jesus; it is no accident that He Himself says that He came not at all to destroy or change the Torah, but to bring it to fullness (v. 17; in the Synodal translation this thought is conveyed by the word "fulfill").
And the first thing to which He draws His listeners' attention is their intentions, or, as psychologists say today, their intentionalities. If you hate, consider yourself a murderer (vv. 21-22); if you lust, consider yourself an adulterer (vv. 27-28). Otherwise, according to Jesus' word, our righteousness does not go beyond ordinary religiosity, it "does not exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees" (v. 20), who, being deeply religious people, outwardly, on the behavioral level, of course kept all the commandments of the Decalogue.
But it turns out that for the Kingdom this is not enough. And this is not about requirements raised especially high in order to be "holier than everyone else." It is simply that in this world our spiritual quality and state determine our actions, while in the Kingdom our intentions do. One might say that in our fallen world we are what we do, while in the Kingdom we will become what we desire. And if, while hating someone, we refrain from murder for God's sake, this is a serious spiritual achievement for our fallen world. But for the Kingdom it is a failure. And the spiritual bar raised so high by Jesus is needed in order to protect us from such a failure.