The Setting of the Sermon on the Mount

by William David Davies

A work placing the Sermon on the Mount in the historical setting from which it emerged. Five settings are considered: Matthew and the "Church," the world of Messianic expectations and Judaism, Gnosticism and the Dead Sea Sect, movements within the Church such as Paulinism, and the relation of the Sermon to the teachings of Jesus.

564 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1961

About the author

William David Davies, often known as W. D. P. Davies, (18 January 1897 – 7 July 1969) was a Welsh Presbyterian minister and writer on theological topics. After becoming the first Welsh student to obtain a Bachelor of Divinity degree from the University of Oxford, he turned down an offer to become a theology tutor at Oxford, along with a college fellowship, preferring to become a Presbyterian minister. He wrote various theological works and was regarded as an excellent scholar as well as a powerful preacher.

Reviews

[Martin Rollins · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book at least twenty years ago, so, of course, I have forgotten much about this volume. It is quite a deep scholarly book, and my goodness, often dry as dust. However, there are many fascinating insights in it that I think are still of great value. For instance, Davies contends that the gospel of Matthew portrays Jesus of Nazareth as a kind of second Moses. Greater than Moses, to be sure, but I suppose, a Moses archetype. At any rate, the author likens five protracted portions of Jesus' teaching (Matthew 5-7, the Sermon on the Mount; Mat. 10, Jesus sending out the 12 disciples; Mat. 13, the Kingdom parables; more instructions somewhere in chps. 15-18; and 23-25, parables and eschatological discourse) to the Pentateuch, five works with Mosaic provenance. This author also wrote a book called, 'Paul and Rabbinic Judaism'; probably another interesting work that is fairly difficult slogging to get through. So this work I would recommend, but probably only to a pretty narrow audience.