Tuesday in the Tenth Week of Ordinary Time

Matthew 5:13-16

Jesus said to his disciples: “You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned? It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot. You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lamp stand, where it gives light to all in the house. Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.”

Jesus continues his Sermon on the Mount with these words, having just taught the beatitudes, an epitome of how they are to live, by telling his disciples that they are salt.  Jesus does not use a simile here.  He says, “You are the salt”, not You are like salt.  That is, “salt” is a figure that has its fulfillment in the disciples of the Lord.

Throughout history we find people using it to prepare as well as preserve food, to cleanse wounds, and to melt ice, among other things.  There is also a story in the Holy Scriptures that tells how the Prophet Elijah healed the waters of Jericho: “And the men of the city said to Elijah: ‘Behold the situation of this city is very good, as you, my lord, sees: but the waters are very bad, and the ground barren.’ And he said: ‘Bring me a new vessel, and put salt into it.’ And when they had brought it, he went out to the spring of the waters, and cast the salt into it, and said: ‘Thus says the Lord: I have healed these waters, and there shall be no more in them death or barrenness.’  And the waters were healed unto this day, according to the word of Elijah, which he spoke” (2 Kings 19-22).  It seems to me that the Lord Jesus was referring to the salt in these verses when he spoke to his disciples.  We can understand the “new vessel” here as signifying the Church of the new covenant made in the Blood of Christ.  The salt, that is, the disciples, are contained in the Church.  The members of the Church are then cast into the deadly “water”, and by the grace of God they make it healthful.  The deadly water is the souls of worldly people which are dead without grace, and which cause death by luring others to their way of life.

We can also understand the “salt” as the believer strengthened by the Lord’s teaching and preserving the souls of sinners by aiding in their conversion.  The “salt” also cleanses the wounds caused by sin, as the Good Samaritan cleansed the wounds of the man who was attacked by robbers.  And “salt”, the compassionate believer, melts the heart of the obstinate sinner with his or her examples of kindness.  We see in this last a way to understand the light on the lamp stand and the city set on the mountain.  Faith is given to us that we might render it to others so that they might come alive, be healed, preserved, enlightened, and defended against the assaults of the devil.