Bible Synapse
Did Jesus preach his great sermon on a mountain or on a plain?
Hard question · The life of Jesus · raised by 4 of the lists sceptics circulate
See the passages joined in the interactive mapThe passages
Seeing the crowds, Jesus goes up a mountain, sits down, and teaches his disciples.
And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his disciples came unto him: And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,
After a night of prayer on a mountain and the choosing of the Twelve, Jesus comes down, stands on a level place, heals many and begins to teach.
And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God. And when it was day, he called unto him his disciples: and of them he chose twelve, whom also he named apostles; Simon, (whom he also named Peter,) and Andrew his brother, James and John, Philip and Bartholomew, Matthew and Thomas, James the son of Alpheus, and Simon called Zelotes, And Judas the brother of James, and Judas Iscariot, which also was the traitor. And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases; …
The objection
Matthew says Jesus “went up into a mountain” and sat down to teach. Luke says he “came down with them, and stood in the plain” before giving what looks like the same sermon, with the same opening blessings. One writer puts the sermon on a mountain, the other on flat ground.
The answer
Luke’s word for the place, topos pedinos, means a level place, and modern versions say he “stood on a level place” (WEB, BSB), not necessarily on a plain at the foot of the hills. Luke has just said that Jesus went “into a mountain to pray” and spent the night there (Luke 6:12). In the morning he chose the Twelve, came down with them to a level spot where a great crowd could gather, and healed the sick (6:13–19). Hill country has many such flat shoulders and terraces, and Matthew says simply that Jesus went up the mountain to teach (Matthew 5:1). Coming down from the summit to a level place on the slope, and going up to that same place from below, can both be true; John Gill read the passages this way. Adam Clarke, citing Joseph Priestley, put it a little differently: Jesus stood on the level ground to heal the sick, then went back up the mountain and sat down to teach. On either reading Matthew’s ‘sat down’ and Luke’s ‘stood’ belong to different moments.
Neither Gospel calls this Jesus’ first sermon, as some forms of the objection say; both show him preaching and healing before it (Matthew 4:17, 23; Luke 4:14–44).
Other answers Christians give
Two sermons
Some, including Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, think these were two different sermons. Luke’s is about a quarter of the length of Matthew’s, has woes as well as blessings, and comes after the choosing of the Twelve, while Matthew places his sermon earlier. A travelling preacher would naturally give the same teaching more than once.
Still open
Christians are divided over whether Matthew and Luke report one sermon or two. On either view the places they describe do not conflict.
From the classic commentators
and stood in the plain; in a lower part of the mountain, in a plain place on it; which was large, and capable of holding a great number of peopleJohn Gill, Exposition on Luke 6:17 (1746–1763)
as we know that our Lord delivered some of His weightiest sayings more than once, there is no difficulty in supposing this to be one of His more extended repetitionsJamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary on Luke 6:17 (1871)
Sources
- John Gill, Exposition of the Bible: Luke 6, at Bible Hub
- Adam Clarke, Commentary on Luke 6, at Bible Hub
- Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary on Luke 6, at Bible Hub