i am going to start going through the beatitudes on sunday nights with my youth. i sat down today to start taking notes and such. here is what i wrote in my journal concerning chapter 5, verse 1.
Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain, and when he sat down, his disciples came to him.
“…and when he sat down…”
why did jesus sit? i learned as a communication major that you can project more when you are standing up. there were crowds, why would he sit? jesus would have to really project. did he sit to get down on their level? it had to be really really quiet. how could they hear? how big was the crowd? i wonder if jesus was a spitter? i wonder if the front row was soaked. i wonder if jesus yelled when he taught or was he just simple and soft spoken. the disciples could not just pull out the sound board, speakers and lapel mic. so he probably had to yell. i wonder if that was out of his character?
thats what i have been doing for the past hour. its good sometimes to get in the office and to shut the door, open your journal, open your bible, and start writing.


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March 10, 2008 at 3:02 pm
tODD
Seems to me he was mainly speaking to his disciples, since they were the ones who came to him when he sat down. It’s obvious from a later chapter that (some of) the crowd heard him, but from its context and content, I think the Sermon on the Mount was given to his followers, not the crowd at large.
March 10, 2008 at 3:08 pm
joelgutowsky
ahh. yup. good point todd. i never looked at it that way. then i wonder if jesus changed the way he was speaking to the disciples when the crowd started to arrive.