What Does Matthew 5:28-31 Mean? Are We to Cut Off Our Offending Body Members?
1) Direct answer
Matthew 5:28–31 lifts the commandment to the heart level. Jesus says lust itself is adultery in the heart, and He tells us to deal ruthlessly with whatever causes us to stumble. He is not commanding literal mutilation, but a radical cutting off of the things and paths that feed sin. And in verse 31 He corrects the loose practice of divorce: marriage is holy; to put away a spouse without the one scriptural cause leads to adultery.
2) Scriptural explanation
- “Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart” (v.28). The Bible also says, “Out of the heart proceed… adulteries” (Matthew 15:19). So the root is inside.
- “If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out… If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off” (vv.29–30). This is strong language showing the costliness of true repentance. Elsewhere the same warning is repeated (Mark 9:43–47).
- “It hath been said, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement” (v.31). In the very next verse Jesus tightens this to God’s standard: “Whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery…” (v.32). He points back to God’s original intention—one flesh, not to be broken at will.
3) Simple clarifying logic
- Now notice: it isn’t the ball of the eye that sins; it’s the desire in the heart directing the eye. Pluck out one eye, can the other still lust? Cut off a hand, does that remove the thought that drives the hand? You see, the body is the instrument; the heart is the master. So Jesus calls us to “cut off” the causes and the channels—habits, places, screens, relationships, clothing, conversations, any path that feeds the fire. It’s better to lose a thing than to lose your soul.
- The true cure is an inside work: repent, believe the Gospel, and let God cleanse the heart. “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Proverbs 4:23). Make a covenant with your eyes like Job did (Job 31:1), and walk in the Spirit so the flesh doesn’t rule you.
4) Reinforcing statement
Jesus magnified the law to the inward man. Not three steps of self-mutilation, but one decisive surrender: cut off the stumbling blocks, and let God change the heart. Guard the marriage covenant as God does, and treat sin so seriously that nothing is too costly to lay aside to keep your soul.
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What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
The mark of the beast
56-0715 §12
Now, sometimes in speaking in a mixed audience as we have today, both men and women... Sometimes using parables to get the point in, it would seem like that maybe I might say something that wouldn't be just appropriate among a mixed group of people. But, if you were sitting in a doctor's office, you would listen to him no matter if you're teenage girl or boy or whoever it was. And we're in the house of God, where we're to have clean minds and clean hearts. And if we haven't, it's our place at the altar. That's righ...
Questions and Answers
61-1015M §97
Yes, the body of Christ. See, the body of Christ was broken for our sins and by one Spirit we're all baptized into that body and become members. And where did the body... ? Where did my wife, symbolically speaking... ? Where did Eve come from? The body of Adam. She was taken out of his side. Eve was taken from Adam's side. The Christ... And she was part of his body. He said, "She's flesh of my flesh and bone of my bones. And I'll call her woman," see. Now, and the body of Christ was taken out of the body of Jesus,...
The Seal of God and the Mark of the Beast, part 1
61-0216 §59
...re always talking on our women, about our women." All right, men. I'll comb you down once then. Let me tell you something. Any man that'll let his wife smoke cigarettes and wear shorts, I got little respect of him even being a man. He's so sissified he don't even know what he belongs to. He ain't a man! That's right. Oh, hallelujah! That's right. He's a poor excuse for a man. Oh, he may be six foot tall, weigh 200 pounds, but that don't look like a man to me. It shows who's boss around your house. She just stomp he...
Abraham
56-1208 §44
Let me show you something just how simple it is. Watch. For instance, I'd cut my hand tonight. I'd use this illustration. I cut my hand. Now, there isn't a medicine in the world that can heal that cut, not a one. Now, that's true. Any medicine that'd heal a cut in my hand would heal a cut in my coat. It would heal a cut in this desk, see. It would heal a cut on the floor. Why, you say, "Brother Branham, medicine wasn't made to heal your coat, and your desk, and so forth. It was made to heal your body." All right. N...
From that time
61-0520 §61
I was speaking this morning of this woman, immoral woman, washing Jesus' dirty feet, wiping them with her hair. Some of our Pentecostal sisters would have to stand on their head to get enough hair to wash their feet---cut it all off. That's right. It used to be wrong for you to do it. It's still wrong for you to do it. The Bible plainly teaches that if a woman cuts her hair, her husband has a right to divorce her, put her away. Said if she cuts her hair she dishonors her head (her husband), and a dishonorable woman...