This week we are looking at the second Beatitude, where Jesus said: “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted”.
Who are the mourners? To my amazement commentators are not agreed. Some think that Jesus was referring to grieving for a friend or loved one; others think that Jesus was referring to grieving for the state of the world; while others that Jesus was referring to grieving for our sin.
My own interpretation of this second Beatitude is that Jesus was referring to grieving for a friend or loved one. At first sight this is a shocking statement. How can we be “happy” (Good News Bible) when we have lost a friend or loved one. Or as Eugene Peterson paraphrased it: “You are blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you” (The Message). Imagine meeting a friend whose face is covered with a huge smile. “Hello there”, he says. “You’ll be delighted to know that my wife died yesterday. Come along to the funeral next week and have a really wonderful time!” What utter nonsense. Death is not an enjoyable experience. For those of us who have truly loved, death is a very painful experience. We mourn with real tears the one who has left us. However we need to focus on the second part of this Beatitude. Jesus did not just say “Blessed are those who mourn”, rather he went on to say, “they will be comforted”. Here we have a divine passive. So the Good News Bible rightly translates this as “God will comfort them”. In other words, the happiness of which Jesus spoke is not the happiness of those who mourn; rather it is the happiness of those who are comforted. Tears will not have the last word. For we have hope which is sure and certain. In the words of John, “God himself will be with them [including our friends and loved ones], he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more” (Revelation 21.3b,4).
If we are not to understand Jesus talking of people mourning for a friend or loved one, how then are to understand this second Beatitude? It has been suggested that Jesus is here talking of people grieving for the world. A.M. Hunter commented: “The mourners are those ‘to whom the evil that is in the world is continual grief’, those who mourn this apparent eclipse of God’s people, and long for a Saviour to arise upon the earth”. Douglas Hare puts it slightly he differently when he wrote:
There were many… who mourned the injustice of a system rigged in favour of the rich and powerful. In this Beatitude the one anointed with the Spirit at the Jordan fulfils his God-appointed task of assuring the mourners that the God of justice is not asleep. The devastations wrought by human avarice and thirst for power will be remedied.
John Stott wrote:
Jesus wept over the sins of others, over their bitter consequences in judgement and death, and over the impenitent city which would not receive him. We too should weep over the evil in the world.
As the Psalmist said: “My eyes shed streams of tears because your law is not kept” (Psalm 119.136). Similarly, Donald Hagner commented:
Those who mourn do so because of the seeming slowness of God’s justice. But they are now to rejoice, even in their troubled circumstances, because their salvation has found its beginning. The time draws near when they shall be comforted (see Revelation 7.17; 21.4).
Another interpretation of this second Beatitude is that Jesus was referring who grieve for their own sin. In other words Jesus was saying, “Blessed is the man or woman who is moved to bitter sorrow at their realisation of his or her own sin”. This would accord well with the first Beatitude: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, those who know not only that they are poor but also realise that they need entrust themselves to God. “Blessed are those who mourn” are those who have faced up to their sin, to their failure to be what God intended them to be. For it is only at this point that the way opens up to the Kingdom of God. Frederic Dale Bruner commented:
The participial form of the verb heightens the state of those who mourn and, even more specifically… those who are now mourning, who are now heart-broken, who have this blessing. On Jesus’ authority in deep sadness human beings are in God’s hands more than at any other time.
Whatever interpretation we opt for, the promise of Jesus is that those who mourn will be comforted.
I fear some of the commentators are straining at gnats here in an attempt to attribute a personal spiritual significance to what is surely intended as one of a series of prophecies. Let’s stick to Lord Denning’s principle that “words should be given their ordinary everyday meaning wherever possible” and not stretch the sense of “mourn” (unless, of course, the Greek justifies it).
The vital point about the Beatitudes and much of the rest of the Sermon on the Mount is that they ran contrary to the popular religious theories taught in the synagogues. In Jesus’s teaching, wealth, popularity and success did not necessarily reflect God’s approval, but, in many cases, were “their own reward” (ch. 6.5).
The word “happy” once meant “fortunate”, but now misrepresents that idea. The word has nothing to do with sentiment. What Jesus is saying is that notwithstanding the suffering of mourners, “there will nevertheless be a reason to be thankful” – as is clear from ch. 5.11 – because God is saying that there have been too many things wrong for too long, but now He is going to put things right.
A lot of what follows is about the kind of values that will flourish in God’s kingdom, including those that provide comfort for mourners – compassion, dignity, respect, practical help and so on. And despite all the evils that seem to beset the world, there is still plenty of evidence of those values if you look for it!