MAP DETAILS - The Audience

28/02/24 05:51
We've all been here, a person snaps at us and we may think, even possibly say, "Don't talk to me like I'm your child!"

In life, we communicate differently with those who we are talking to. We talk to our children differently than our spouse, which is different than our boss (or it better be). Our friends have a different type of communication from us. We don't communicate the same way to each person in our lives. We must understand that the Bible is doing the same thing.

Each book of the Bible is a communication to someone else, not us. We must understand who it's communicating with and then rightly transfer that information to see how it applies to our lives.

The entirety of the Old Testament is communication to the children of Israel. We need to understand how that communication is happening within their context. The fact is, even today, Jews communicate differently than Americans, or even Europeans, Asians, etc.

The Gospels, Acts, and Hebrews are also communicating with the Jews; yet much of the New Testament is communication with gentile or individuals. For example, Romans is communicating with the church in Rome, Corinthians with the church in Corinth. Revelation is communicating with the churches in Asia minor. But Timothy and Titus are communicating directly to individuals.

On top of who the complete writing is communicating with, we need to see who the characters in the narratives are communicating with. For example, Y'shua communicated differently to His disciples than He did with the Pharisees. He also communicated differently with the lost and even differently within those aspects. The lost who wanted Him for Him was communicated differently than the lost who just wanted what they could get from Him.

In all these situations, we need to notice who the audience is and view the text with understanding of the audience. Let's look at an example through the Sermon on the Mount.

In Matthew 4:23-25 we see Matthew making sure to note who was gathering before the recording of the Sermon on the Mount. He could have easily said, “His fame spread throughout the land” but Matthew specifically noted Syria. Directly after this mention of Syria (north of upper Galilee), Matthew names Galilee (Religious people), Decapolis (Pagans on the other side of the lake), Jerusalem (Priests), Judea (Herodians and other religious people. Judea and Galilee despised each other. They would reference each other by spitting on the ground in a distain at Galilians being a redneck, fringe, charismatic fanatics. Judea was the trained, academic mindset), and beyond the Jordan (this is not “across the Jordan” which would be Decapolis but rather north of there. Everything north east of the Jordan would be “beyond the Jordan”.)

This list follows along with the agenda of Matthews writings. Matthew, being an outcast for turning to Rome and being a tax collector, wanted to point out Christ’s compassion toward the outcasts.

When we see this list we see this mismatch of people that many did not get along with the others. Matthew specifically wanted to point this out.

When we look at Matthew 5:1, we see Matthew stating, “Seeing the crowds…" After taking the time to point out the diversity of the crowds we see that Jesus noticed the crowds, and obviously the diversity. With new disciples close by, we know they noticed as well. They would have been fine with those from Galilee but pagans from Decapolis they would not have been thrilled with. The Judean’s showed up and they would not have been as thrilled as the Galilean’s but they can work with that but then we have beyond the Jordan as well; and even Syria mentioned earlier.

The disciples would have been uncomfortable with the situation and they gathered to their new Rabbi; and Jesus starts to speak. In verses 3-10 we see Blessed are those in various spots and then in verse 11 we see Blessed are YOU. The pronouns moved from them to you. This would indicate that Jesus was not talking to the crowd in this sermon but rather focused on His disciples. He was telling them that these people are ok. Gods favor is on those, or these, who do these things. He then turns to them and says, you'll be persecuted for these things as well, and especially in accepting these who you now have problems with.

Because of missing the audience, it's widely believed that Y'shua gave a speech to a multitude of people from all over the area who gathered; but everything in the context of Scripture is telling us He was merely teaching His disciples.