⭐WEB · Matthew 18:8
What does Matthew 18:8 mean?
"If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from you. It is better for you to enter into life maimed or crippled, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into the eternal fire."
— Matthew 18:8 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
Whoever receives one such little child in my name receives me,
but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him that a huge millstone should be hung around his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depths of the sea.
“Woe to the world because of occasions of stumbling! For it must be that the occasions come, but woe to that person through whom the occasion comes!
If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from you. It is better for you to enter into life maimed or crippled, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into the eternal fire.
If your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out, and cast it from you. It is better for you to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into the Gehenna of fire.
See that you don’t despise one of these little ones, for I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.
For the Son of Man came to save that which was lost.
Explanation
Matthew 18:8 records Jesus speaking in vivid, deliberately shocking language about the seriousness of sin and the value of eternal life. In plain terms, he says that if some part of your life—here symbolized by a hand or foot—is leading you into sin, it would be better to lose that part entirely than to let it drag your whole life into ruin. He is not giving a literal command to self-mutilate; he is using hyperbole, a common rhetorical device in Jewish teaching, to drive home how radically serious sin's danger is and how much better it is to lose something valuable now than to lose everything eternally.
The context matters a great deal. This statement comes in Matthew 18, a chapter devoted to how the community of Jesus's followers should treat one another, especially "little ones"—vulnerable or young believers whose faith could be shaken or destroyed by the bad example or influence of others. Just before this verse (Matthew 18:6-7), Jesus warns of severe judgment on anyone who causes a little one to stumble, saying it would be better for such a person to have a millstone hung around their neck and be drowned. Verse 8 extends that warning inward: it's not only about how you affect others, but about examining your own life for whatever causes you or others to stumble, and dealing with it decisively, no matter how dear or seemingly essential it is to you (Mark 9:43-47 records a nearly identical saying, showing this was a repeated theme in Jesus's teaching).
Theologically, the verse teaches several things at once. First, it affirms that sin is not a
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