심판에 대한 경고로서의 '소금'(마 5:13)

The Salt of the Earth -A Reconsideration

The "salt" saying in Matthew 5:13 has been widely understood as a positive command or exhortation to "become salt" or "to act like salt." Here "salt" is typically taken in terms of its function as a preservative or seasoning ingredient. This long-standing and widely spread understanding, however, reveals a few intractable problems in that 1) it explains only the beginning part of the verse, while leaving aside the rest which is far longer than the verse 13a; 2) taken in itself, salt remains an ambiguous metaphor open to diserse interpretations; 3) it turns an indicative ("is") statement into an imperative ("should"), thereby turning a metaphor into a command or exhortation. With these problems in mind, the study suggests that verse 13, rather than being a juxtaposition of a positive command and a negative warning, should be taken as a whole a single statement in which a metaphor is first presented and then its meaning is duly explained. If so, this verse should be taken as the first case of the eschatological warning of judgment to those who fail to respond adequately to the call to follow Jesus.