Jesus Christ · The Sermon on the Mount
Lust and Adultery of the Heart
Right after tracing murder to the anger behind it, Jesus does the same to the seventh commandment: “whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.” The look He names is not an involuntary glance — it is a deliberate gaze aimed at desire. And He follows the claim with two hard sayings about an eye and a hand, read by the church for two thousand years as pointed hyperbole, not surgery.
The Text
— Matthew 5:27–30You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.The seventh commandment, traced to the heart that looks.
If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to depart into hell.The eye and the hand — how seriously the occasion of sin must be dealt with.
This is the second of the sermon's six “ye have heard… but I say unto you” contrasts, immediately after anger and murder (5:21–26). The pattern is the same: Jesus does not relax the law, He drives it to its root. The commandment that governed the act now governs the gaze.
The Heart and the Act
— one commandment, one fractureKEPT OUTWARDLY
“Thou shalt not commit adultery”
The seventh commandment as the Pharisees had explained it — a rule about the external act, satisfied so long as the hand never moved.
BROKEN INWARDLY
“hath committed adultery with her already in his heart”
Jesus names the deliberate, cultivated gaze itself as the same act, judged in the same court — the heart is not a lesser tribunal.
THE SURGERY SAYING — MATTHEW 5:29–30 · DELIBERATE HYPERBOLE
“if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out… if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off” — not a command to maim, as the church has read it for two thousand years, but the plainest possible way to say one thing: nothing is worth losing the whole man.
What He Is Saying
— the deliberate gaze, and two hard sayingsAs with anger, Jesus traces the seventh commandment to its root: the deliberate, cultivated gaze aimed at desire is already, morally, the same act as adultery itself. Then, having named the sin at its root, He tells His hearers how seriously to deal with whatever leads them into it — an eye, a hand, whatever it takes.
Where the Greek mattersa present participle, a purpose clause
“Looketh… to lust after” translates a present participle plus a purpose clause — literally “looking with a view to desiring her.” That grammar marks the deliberate gaze, not an involuntary glance; a look that catches the eye is not what Jesus condemns. The verb for “lust” here is the same root used for “covet” in the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:17, LXX) — tying this saying to the tenth commandment as well as the seventh. Augustine draws the same line below, from the Catena Aurea.
Does He mean the eye and hand literally?hyperbole across the spectrum
The eye and hand sayings (5:29–30) are read, across the interpretive spectrum, as hyperbole in the style of rabbinic and Semitic rhetoric — not a command to self-mutilation. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown say so plainly below: there “have been fanatical ascetics who have both advocated and practiced this,” and the church has always named that a misapprehension. The point is not the bodily organ but the occasion of sin — how far a person should go to remove whatever leads them into it.
The Voices on the Look
— the church hears Matthew 5:27–28The lesser righteousness, therefore, is not to commit adultery by carnal connection; but the greater righteousness of the kingdom of God is not to commit adultery in the heart. Now, the man who does not commit adultery in the heart, much more easily guards against committing adultery in actual fact. Hence He who gave the later precept confirmed the earlier; for He came not to destroy the law, but to fulfil it.
Augustine of Hippo· Our Lord's Sermon on the Mount 1.12.33 (430), on Matt 5:27
In fact, how does the Lord demonstrate Himself as adding a superstructure to the Law, except by interdicting sins of the will as well (as other sins); while He defines not only the man who had actually invaded another's wedlock to be an adulterer, but likewise him who had contaminated (a woman) by the concupiscence of his gaze? Accordingly it is dangerous enough for the mind to set before itself what it is forbidden to perform, and rashly through the will to perfect its execution.
Tertullian· On Repentance (220), on Matt 5:27
Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery - See the notes at Mat 5:21. Our Saviour in these verses explains the seventh commandment. It is probable that the Pharisees had explained this commandment, as they had the sixth, as extending only to the external act; and that they regarded evil thoughts and a wanton imagination as of little consequence, or as not forbidden by the law.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, Matt 5:27
(Verse 28.) Whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Between passion and pre-passion, that is, between feeling and intense feeling, there is a difference: passion is considered a vice, while pre-passion, although it carries the fault of initiation, is not held accountable in the crime. Therefore, whoever looks at a woman and his soul is tickled, he is struck by pre-passion.
Jerome· Commentary on Matthew (420), on Matt 5:28
(cont. Faust. xix. 23.) He then goes on to correct the error of the Pharisees, declaring, Whoso looketh upon a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery already with her in his heart. For the commandment of the Law, Thou shall not lust after thy neighbour's wife, (Exod. 20:17.) the Jews understood of taking her away, not of committing adultery with her. (Serm. in Mont. i. 12.) For there are three things which make up a sin; suggestion either through the memory, or the present sense; if the thought of the pleasure of indulgence follows, that is an unlawful thought, and to be restrained; if you consent then, the sin is complete. For prior to the first consent, the pleasure is either none or very slight, the consenting to which makes the sin. But if consent proceeds on into overt act, then desire seems to be satiated and quenched. And when suggestion is again repeated, the contemplated pleasure is greater, which previous to habit formed was but small, but now more difficult to overcome.
Augustine of Hippo· Catena Aurea by Aquinas (430), on Matt 5:28
The Voices on the Eye and the Hand
— the church hears Matthew 5:29–30Of course, it is not the eye simply of which our Lord speaks--as if execution were to be done upon the bodily organ--though there have been fanatical ascetics who have both advocated and practiced this, showing a very low apprehension of spiritual things--but the offending eye, or the eye considered as the occasion of sin; and consequently, only the sinful exercise of the organ which is meant.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871), Matt 5:29
Thy right eye - The Hebrews, like others, were accustomed to represent the affections of the mind by the members or parts of the body, Rom 7:23; Rom 6:13. Thus, the bowels denoted compassion; the heart, affection or feeling; the reins, understanding, secret purpose. An evil eye denotes sometimes envy Mat 20:15, and sometimes an evil passion, or sin in general. Mar 7:21-22; out of the heart proceedeth an evil eye. In this place, as in 2Pe 2:14, the expression is used to denote strong adulterous passion, unlawful desire, or wicked inclination.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, Matt 5:29
Pluck it out - cut it off - We must shut our senses against dangerous objects, to avoid the occasions of sin, and deprive ourselves of all that is most dear and profitable to us, in order to save our souls, when we find that these dear and profitable things, however innocent in themselves, cause us to sin against God. It is profitable for thee that one of thy members - Men often part with some members of the body, at the discretion of a surgeon, that they may preserve the trunk, and die a little later; and yet they will not deprive themselves of a look, a touch, a small pleasure, which endanger the eternal death of the soul. It is not enough to shut the eye, or stop the hand; the one must be plucked out, and the other cut off. Neither is this enough, we must cast them both from us. Not one moments truce with an evil passion, or a sinful appetite. If you indulge them, they will gain strength, and you shall be ruined. The rabbins have a saying similar to this: It is better for thee to be scorched with a little fire in this world, than to be burned with a devouring fire in the world to come.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1832), Matt 5:29
And if thy right hand offend thee,.... Or "cause thee to offend"; that is, is the means of ensnaring thine heart; and of drawing thee into either mental, or actual adultery; for, as before, all unchaste looks, so here, all unchaste touches, embraces, &c. are condemned. As adultery may be committed in the heart, and by the eye, so with the hand: "says R. Eliezer (a) what is the meaning of that Scripture, "your hands are full of blood", Isa 1:15? It is replied, אלו המנאפים ביד, "these are they, that commit adultery with the hand".
John Gill· Exposition of the New Testament (1746–1748), Matt 5:30
And if thy right hand--the organ of action, to which the eye excites. offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee; for it is profitable, &c.--See on Mt 5:29.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871), Matt 5:30
A Note on Scope
— named without erasing the traditional readingThe traditional pastoral reading addresses male lust toward women, given the grammar and the original audience. A secondary observation many modern commentators add, without revising the text's plain historical address: the underlying principle — the heart's desire as morally equivalent to the deed — applies bidirectionally. No roster voice disputes the traditional reading; the principle simply reaches further than its first address.
Where It Points
— the same principle across Scripture“I have made a covenant with my eyes. How then could I gaze with desire at a virgin?“I made a covenant with mine eyes” — the same discipline, a millennium and a half earlier.
But each one is tempted when by his own evil desires he is lured away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.Desire conceived, then sin born, then death — the same progression Jesus interrupts at the look.
Scripture's clearest case study in this exact failure is 2 Samuel 11 — David watching from his roof, then sending, then taking. Job made his covenant with his eyes before the temptation ever arrived; David's story is the temptation followed all the way to the deed. Jesus's teaching sits between them: the discipline Job practiced, applied to the very moment David failed to practice it.
Closing
Jesus does not tell His hearers to manage adultery better. He tells them the court of the heart is not a lesser court — what is entertained in the gaze is already judged there, before any hand ever moves. The remedy He names is just as serious as the sin: whatever leads the eye there must be dealt with as decisively as Job dealt with his own — a covenant made before the door is ever opened.