I’ve been working with Dave Andrews on the production of resources associated with Plan Be, a book focusing on the beatitudes, from Jesus’ sermon on the mount. The most controversial of the eight statements on blessings, in my opinion, is the first one.
Translated literally into English from the Greek version (the original spoken version would have been Aramic) in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 5, verse 3: we get “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” That’s the translation provided by the King James Standard, American Standard, New Revised Standard Version, and New International Version.
Who are the poor?
What does it meant to be ‘in spirit’?
The Kingdom of Heaven – is that now and yet to come, or it about life after death?
Many Protestant and Pentecostal interpretations of this verse have viewed this beatitude through the ‘spiritual’ lense, suggesting that it’s not about the people who are below the poverty line, but about people who recognize their spiritual need for God. I’ve talked to a number of people who see this as a commentary on “getting into heaven”. It’s not surprising that we have these approaches, when we look at the popular English dynamic and paraphrased translations of the verse as follows:
- Happy are those who know they are spiritually poor; the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to them! (Good News Bible)
- They are blessed who realize their spiritual poverty, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them. (New Century Version)
- You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule. (The Message)
- Blessed (happy, to be envied, and spiritually prosperous – with life – joy and satisfaction in God’s favor and salvation, regardless of their outward conditions) are the poor in spirit (the humble, who rate themselves insignificant), for theirs is the kingdom of heaven! (The Amplified Version)
- God blesses those who are poor and realize their need for him, for the Kingdom of Heaven is theirs. (New Living Translation)
- God blesses those people who depend only on him. They belong to the kingdom of heaven! (Contemporary English Version)
While it is crucial to be humble enough to receive God’s help, there’s a danger that teaching around spiritual humility can focus on a concept of self-abasement, making ourselves low so that God can be high. The Calvinist doctrine of total depravity fits right into this framework, contrasting God’s complete sovereignty with our utter powerlessness over sin. When taken to extremes these doctrines have encouraged cultures of humiliation, self-induced and leadership-imposed, that have made the church the place to escape for the sake of mental health.
And what if we’re actually missing the actual poor in this process? Concern for the welfare of the poor was one of the highest shared values in a recent survey of Catholic young adults in the United States. Why is that? Perhaps it’s because the Jerusalem Bible translation does not spiritualize the first beatitude. “How blessed are the poor in spirit: the kingdom of Heaven is theirs.”
There’s a downside to this approach as well. Over 2000 years we’ve had more than a few wealthy Christians who have used the first beatitude as a way of justifying the existence of dehumanizing poverty. “Why should we do anything about it, when these people are going to be recompensed when they die?”
In his sermon on the mount Jesus indicates that everything is tipped upside down in the way God operates in the world. Those who do not rely on wealth or status for their sense of being have a chance to ‘get it’ – to be part of the common wealth Jesus was talking about. Jesus invites all his followers, no matter what their financial status, to be with the poor in the way they live their lives. That means moving beyond ideological debate to actually listen to and respond to the stories of the poor.