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MATTHEW 5:12 — KING JAMES VERSION 0
Matt 5:11Matt 5:13
“Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.”
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. The commanded response to persecution is not endurance but joy — rejoice and be glad. The joy is grounded in two realities: the reward that is great in heaven and the identification with the prophets. The prophets who were persecuted before the disciples were persecuted for the same reason — speaking the word of God in a world that does not want to hear it. The prophetic tradition is both the disciples' context (we are in the line of the prophets) and their comfort (the prophets were persecuted too, and God vindicated them). Hebrews 11:36–38 describes the suffering of the prophets as the context for the faith they maintained; the disciples are called to the same faith in the same God who vindicates.

Church Fathers on Matthew 5:12

The preceding blessings were general; He now begins to address His discourse to them that were present, foretelling them the persecutions which they should suffer for His name.

Rabanus Maurus · 9th century

It may be asked, what difference there is between 'they shall revile you,' and 'shall speak all manner of evil of you;' to revile, it may be said, being but to speak evil of. But a reproach thrown with insult in the face of one present is a different thing from a slander cast on the character of the absent. To persecute includes both open violence and secret snares.

Augustine · 4th century

But if it be true that he who offers a cup of water does not lose his reward, consequently he who has been wronged but by a single word of calumny, shall not be without a reward. But that the reviled may have a claim to this blessing, two things are necessary, it must be false, and it must be for God’s sake; otherwise he has not the reward of this blessing; therefore He adds, 'falsely for my sake.'

Pseudo-Chrysostom · 5th century
Read all 14 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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