“Ye have heard,” etc., “but I say unto you . . . it is better for thee to lose one of thy members, than that thy whole body should be cast into Gehenna.”

Here again the operation of God’s Law under the New Covenant is contrasted with its operation under the Old or Jewish Covenant, and the lesson of self control is urged by the statement that it is far more profitable that men should refuse to gratify depraved desires (though they be dear to them as a right eye, and apparently indispensable as a right hand) than that they should gratify these, and lose, in the Second death, the future life provided through the atonement for all who will  return to perfection, holiness and God.

These expressions of our Lord not only serve to show us the perfection (Rom. 7:12) of God’s Law, and how fully it will be defined and enforced in the Millennium, but they served as a lesson to the Jews also, who previously saw through Moses’ commands only the crude exterior of the Law of God. Since they found it difficult in their fallen state to keep inviolate even the surface significance of the Law, they must now see the impossibility of their keeping the finer meaning of the Law revealed by Christ. Had they understood and received his teaching  fully, they would have cried out, Alas! if God judges us thus, by the very thoughts and intents of the heart, we are all unclean, all undone, and can hope for naught but condemnation to Gehenna (to utter destruction, as brute beasts). They would have cried, “Show us a greater Priesthood than that of Aaron, a High Priest and Teacher able fully to appreciate the Law and able fully to appreciate and sympathize with our fallen state and inherited weaknesses, and let him offer for us ‘better sacrifices,’ and apply to us the needed greater forgiveness of sin, and let him as a Great Physician heal us and restore us, so that we can obey the perfect Law of God from our hearts.” Then they would have found Christ.

But this lesson they did not learn, for the ears of their understanding were “dull of hearing” (Matt. 13:15); hence they knew not that God had already prepared the very priest and sacrifice and teacher and physician they needed, who in due time redeemed those under the typical Law, as well as all not under it, and who also “in due time” (1 Tim. 2:6), shortly, will begin his restoring work — restoring sight to the blind eyes of their understanding, and hearing to their deaf ears. Then the “vail shall be taken away” (2 Cor. 3:16) — the vail of ignorance, pride and human wisdom, which Satan now uses to blind the world to God’s true law and true plan of salvation in Christ.

And not only did our Lord’s teaching here show the Law of the New Covenant, and teach the Jew a lesson, but it is of benefit to the Gospel Church also. In proportion as we learn the exactness of God’s Law, and what would constitute the perfection under its requirements, we see that our Redeemer was perfect, and that we, totally unable to commend ourselves to God as keepers of that Law, can find acceptance with the Father only in the merit of our Redeemer, while none can be of that “Body” (Col. 1:18), covered by the robe of his righteousness, except the consecrated who endeavor to do only those things well pleasing to God, which include the avoidance of sin to the extent of ability. Yet their acceptability with God rests not in their perfection, but upon the perfection of Christ so long as they abide in him. These, nevertheless, are benefited by a clear insight into the perfect Law of God, even though they are not dependent on the perfect keeping of it. They delight to do God’s will to the extent of their ability, and the better they know His perfect Law, the better they are able to rule themselves and to conform to it. So, then, to us also the Lord’s words have a lesson of value.

The point, however, to be specially noticed here is that Gehenna, which the Jews knew, and of which our Lord spoke to them, was not a lake of fire to be kept burning to all eternity, into which all would be cast who get “angry with a brother” and call him a “fool.” No; the Jews gathered no such extreme idea from the Lord’s words. The eternal torment theory was unknown to them. It had no place in their theology, as will be shown. It is a comparatively modern invention, coming down, as we have shown, from Papacy — the great apostasy.

The point is that Gehenna symbolizes the Second death — utter, complete and everlasting destruction. This is clearly shown by its being contrasted with life as its opposite. “It is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, than otherwise to be cast into Gehenna” (Matt. 18:8). It is better that you should deny yourselves sinful gratifications than that you should lose all future life, and perish in the Second death.