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Matthew 5:6

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” (ESV)

I read Matthew 5 and wanted to meditate on verse 6. Meditating is when I set time aside to reflect on the words and imagery presented in the text. I allow that imager to pour over me, and this results in a calm, restful experience with God and His Word.

To do this, I read the verse in Greek. Reading the New Testament in Greek is a challenging but wonderful experience. Ancient Greek is not my native language (obviously), so it requires me to slow down and pay careful attention to the words and sentence structure. Doing so often results in something standing out to me in a way that I might not have noticed in English. This verse is one of those situations.

The Greek verb for “they shall be satisfied” is χορτασθήσονται (chortasthēsontai). The Greeks used this word in two primary ways. First, it can refer to either animals or humans being filled with food (i.e. being fed). Second, it can mean “to experience inward satisfaction in something.”¹ It is the second usage that is being used in Matthew 5:6.

In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus teaches that “those who hunger and thirst for righteousness” (that is, those who long to be fed and filled by righteousness) will be satisfied. They will be filled to the degree to which they hunger. Those who long for righteousness, who want to experience it, who want to live in a reality in which it governs society, who want to implement righteousness in their dealings with others, will find that desire satisfied in God. God responds to our hunger and thirst for righteousness by giving us inward satisfaction, an experience that is difficult to describe in words.

I encourage you to meditate on this verse this week, and ask yourself how much you hunger and thirst for righteousness.

Footnotes

1. BDAG, s.v. “χορτάζω,” 1087. ↩︎