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Salt in Scripture can indicate either God’s blessing or His curse. How do we ascertain whether salt is used with respect to divine salvation or judgment? The answer is found partly in paying attention to the quantity and intent. This is parallel, for instance, to water in the Bible. Water flowing in a riverbed or drawn from a well is life-giving, whereas water in the form of a flood and deluge is lethal.
Thus, when Abimelech fights with Shechem in Judges 9, his sowing the city with salt (v. 45) is done as an act of warfare, thus sealing the defeat of the city. Salt in this case conveys the reality of destruction and marks out the razed locale as a veritable wasteland.
The heavenly wrath poured out against Sodom and Gomorrah is also associated with the salt of judgment: Lot’s wife, on account of her disobedience to God’s command in looking back to the city from which she and her family were rescued, is turned into a pillar of salt (Gen. 19:26). It is very likely that these twin cities of wickedness were located in what is now the bottom of the Dead Sea, called in Scripture “the Salt Sea” (Num. 34:3; Josh. 15:2).
When the Lord warns Israel about walking in the way of infidelity that leads to the triggering of the “curses of the covenant written in this Book of the Law” (Deut. 29:21), one of the ways that the land is described after the nation’s disobedience is that of a sickness in the soil: “The whole land burned out with brimstone and salt, nothing sown and nothing growing, where no plant can sprout” (v. 23, emphasis added). Our Lord Jesus also connects salt to God’s wrath when, having spoken of the reality of hell, He sternly warns, “For everyone will be salted with fire” (Mark 9:49).
It is instructive that when salt is applied to land (as in the cases above), it often means that the territory or domain is under God’s condemnation. Salt may be used to draw the borders of the land outside of God’s beneficent reign.
In contrast, salt can also serve as a vehicle of God’s benediction and restoration. For example, Elisha treats the toxic water supply of Jericho with salt: “Then he went to the spring of water and threw salt in it and said, ‘Thus says the Lord, I have healed this water; from now on neither death nor miscarriage shall come from it’” (2 Kings 2:21). Salt here means a fresh start for the city, the first to have been brought to ruin in the conquest of Canaan (see Josh 6).
In the tabernacle worship, God stipulated that salt be added to the grain offering (Lev. 2:13). Salt here is an emblem of the fellowship that is enjoyed between the Lord and His priestly people. In fact, with regard to the Levitical priests, God establishes what is called a “covenant of salt” (Num. 18:19), since communion with God belongs to the heart of being brought into a covenant bond with Him. Old Testament scholar L. Michael Morales writes, “Atonement is a means to an end, a means to Israel’s fellowship and communion with YHWH God.”
Now we come to Jesus’ identification of His disciples in the Sermon on the Mount: “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet” (Matt. 5:13). How are we to understand the meaning of the “salt” image in this verse?
Here I respectfully diverge from many commentators on this verse who suggest that salt is to be taken as believers’ preserving or influencing wider human culture. For one, God in His common-grace covenant with all creation has already promised to uphold the basic order of society until the final day, especially through legal justice (Gen. 9:5–7). But more significantly, this line of interpretation stretches the use of salt past its purpose, for it asks salt to do what it normally cannot: take what is dead and rotten (i.e., the world in sin) and enliven and sustain it.
One of the unhappy conclusions that follows from the preservationist/seasoning interpretation is that in effect, the salt stands in need of the earth (i.e., as a receptacle or object for seasoning). Yet the teaching of Matthew 5:13 in its context directs us to the very opposite conclusion: it is the earth that stands in need of the salt. That is, the earth (unbelieving world) is “adrift in a sea of blandness” (to borrow a phrase from chef James Beard) and is to find the flavor of life outside itself in the kingdom of heaven.
This is the way that John Calvin renders it: “Men have nothing in them but what is tasteless, till they have been seasoned with the salt of heavenly doctrine.” “Salt” and “the earth” in Matthew 5:13 therefore do not so much exist in a complementary relationship (as do the salt and roast beef on the dinner table). Rather, salt stands for the feast of the heavenly kingdom as opposed to the famine of the earthly domain; it points to the fullness and abundance of life in Christ (see John 10:10) in contrast to the “food desert” of this unbelieving world.
The call for believers’ “saltiness” in Matthew 5:13, then, is not referring to the permeating force that believers bring to the wider community, as leaven works in a dough. It’s rather to be taken as signifying the beginnings of the heavenly banquet whose foretaste is found in the church of Christ. Like the pomegranates, figs, and grapes brought back to Israel in the wilderness by the spies (Num. 13:23, 26), believers’ communion in life as the “salt of the earth” is a witness and preview of the fullness of the age to come.
To put it differently, “salt” here in Jesus’ identification is an image of invitation rather than influence. The salt represents the savor of the culture of heaven, and the presence of the disciples in walking in the ways of the kingdom of God is calling those from the kingdom of this world to leave the bitter course of the place of darkness (see Matt. 4:15–16). Thus, an implicit summons is contained in the “salt of the earth” image: as the nations are being discipled (28:19), they share in the “salt life” of the new order inaugurated in Christ. But there is a warning of the danger of losing flavor and becoming foolish: “Let me hear what God the Lord will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, to his saints; but let them not turn back to folly” (Ps. 85:8). Folly in this case would mean walking in a way that contradicts the attributes of kingdom citizens outlined in the Beatitudes (Matt. 5:1–12).
Immediately after the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus speaks of the nations’ reclining at table with the patriarchs (Matt. 8:11). Later in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus teaches in parables and likens the kingdom of heaven to a “king who gave a wedding feast for his son, and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come” (22:2–3). But though the original parties reject the invitation, the wedding feast will still be held:
“‘The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy. Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.” (vv. 8–10)
The salt—which stands for the flavor and fullness of the kingdom of God—will be tasted by many who are far off (see Rom. 15:20–21; Eph. 2:17).
It is worth noting that in a parallel passage in Mark, Jesus teaches: “Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, how will you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another” (Mark 9:50). In this verse, the salt is a communal and corporate agent of vitality and flavor. Salt is an emblem of peace (shalom); to partake in salt with another is similar to what we refer to as “breaking bread together”—that is, enjoying friendship and closeness one with another. One way to do this is to “let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt” (Col. 4:6).
Jesus has already in Matthew 5 introduced the image of appetite and provision: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (v. 6). Salt, therefore, according to the terms of this discourse, is not found in the cupboard or in the shaker, waiting to be dispensed; instead, it belongs to the flavor already to be tasted on the chef’s table—that is, already present in the life of the new-creation reign of God in Christ. We as God’s “royal priesthood” (1 Peter 2:9) are heirs of the “covenant of salt.”
The joy of this flavorful life can be found now in the holy catholic (universal) church and the communion of saints, founded upon Christ the Rock: “For there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore” (Ps. 133:3).