And if your right hand causes you to offend, cut it off, and cast it from you: for it is better for you that one of your members should perish, and not that your whole body should be cast into hell.
All Commentaries on Matthew 5:30 Go To Matthew 5
Glossa Ordinaria
AD 1480
Non occ.: Because we ought not only to avoid actual sin, but even put away every occasion of sin, therefore having taught that adultery is to be avoided not in deed only, but in heart, He next teaches us to cut off the occasions ofsin.Is it then possible to understand this of the bodily eye or hand? As the whole man when he is turned to God is dead tosin, so likewise the eye when it has ceased to look evil is cut off from sin. But this explanation will not suit the whole; for when He says, “thy right eye offends thee,” what does the left eye? Does it contradict the right eye, and itis preserved innocent?.
ord.: Or, the “right eye” is the contemplative life which offends by being the cause of indolence or self-conceit, or in our weakness that we are not able to support it unmixed. The “right hand” is good works, or the active life, which offends us when we are ensnared by society and the business of life. If then any one is unable to sustain the contemplative life, let him not slothfully rest from all action; or on the other hand while he is taken up with action, dry up the fountain of sweet contemplation.
