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Jesus' Plan for a New World: The Sermon on the Mount
When politicians today talk about a "new world order" they are actually referring to the "old world order" --the heart of the New Testament. Rohr and Feister explore the Gospel According to Matthew and delve into the Sermon on the Mount, considered the blueprint of the Christian lifestyle. They emerge with a clearer understanding of the Gospel writers, especially Matthew, who passed the sermon on to us.
194 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 1, 1996
About the author
Richard Rohr
245 books2,071 followersFr. Richard Rohr is a globally recognized ecumenical teacher bearing witness to the universal awakening within Christian mysticism and the Perennial Tradition. He is a Franciscan priest of the New Mexico Province and founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation (CAC) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Fr. Richard's teaching is grounded in the Franciscan alternative orthodoxy—practices of contemplation and expressing itself in radical compassion, particularly for the socially marginalized.
Fr. Richard is author of numerous books, including Everything Belongs, Adam’s Return, The Naked Now, Breathing Under Water, Falling Upward, Immortal Diamond, Eager to Love, and The Divine Dance: The Trinity and Your Transformation (with Mike Morrell).
Fr. Richard is academic Dean of the Living School for Action and Contemplation. Drawing upon Christianity's place within the Perennial Tradition, the mission of the Living School is to produce compassionate and powerfully learned individuals who will work for positive change in the world based on awareness of our common union with God and all beings. Visit cac.org for more information.
Fr. Richard is author of numerous books, including Everything Belongs, Adam’s Return, The Naked Now, Breathing Under Water, Falling Upward, Immortal Diamond, Eager to Love, and The Divine Dance: The Trinity and Your Transformation (with Mike Morrell).
Fr. Richard is academic Dean of the Living School for Action and Contemplation. Drawing upon Christianity's place within the Perennial Tradition, the mission of the Living School is to produce compassionate and powerfully learned individuals who will work for positive change in the world based on awareness of our common union with God and all beings. Visit cac.org for more information.
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Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
August 29, 2020
I’m a new fan of Richard Rohr after finishing this one. He brings a lot of clarity to the context behind Jesus’s most prominent teachings. He also really makes it clear that there are different points in one’s faith journey and that different understandings of teachings are possible at different stages along the faith journey. After reading this and digesting these teachings, you will feel like God really does love you, in a very real way.
January 6, 2013
After I finished Rohr's "Hidden Treasures: Scripture as Spirituality" I bought this book as it tends to be almost a sequel to that book. I was easier to read but some of the new principles learned there are augmented in this book.
The first thing I highlighted in the book was something that offended me, "He’s God of our saved Church, which means that our Church—and we—are right. If we are honest enough to admit that bias, we may have a chance of letting go of it for a richer understanding of the gospel." But I trust Rohr's teaching and presentation so I kept going and discovered what he was really explaining.
Conversion is not a learning as much as it is an unlearning.
Why would the “first be last” (one of his most common one-liners) unless there is something essentially mistaken about the system that we are all trying to be first in, especially if we have tried really hard?
One of the major weaknesses of the Christian understanding of Jesus is that we really do not understand what it was that made Jesus worth killing. It was not because he walked around saying “I am God.”
The outcasts have to leave the Temple and go out to the river Jordan for the forgiveness of sin. For Jesus to join in John’s baptism at that location outside of town was a symbolic critique of the whole Temple system and its lend-lease brokerage system. For a religion that had clear controls on how sin could be forgiven, we have John pouring it out like free river water.
we can’t say, “Thy Kingdom come” unless we’re willing to say, “My kingdom go.”
No one possesses the Kingdom; it possesses you. You know you are merely a participant in a much larger mystery. So Kingdom and Church are not the same thing. The Church is a means of pointing to the Kingdom of God,
We think of Jesus’ teaching as a set of prescriptions for getting to heaven (even though we haven’t followed them). No, the Sermon on the Mount and especially the Beatitudes are a set of descriptions of a free life.
The first thing I highlighted in the book was something that offended me, "He’s God of our saved Church, which means that our Church—and we—are right. If we are honest enough to admit that bias, we may have a chance of letting go of it for a richer understanding of the gospel." But I trust Rohr's teaching and presentation so I kept going and discovered what he was really explaining.
Conversion is not a learning as much as it is an unlearning.
Why would the “first be last” (one of his most common one-liners) unless there is something essentially mistaken about the system that we are all trying to be first in, especially if we have tried really hard?
One of the major weaknesses of the Christian understanding of Jesus is that we really do not understand what it was that made Jesus worth killing. It was not because he walked around saying “I am God.”
The outcasts have to leave the Temple and go out to the river Jordan for the forgiveness of sin. For Jesus to join in John’s baptism at that location outside of town was a symbolic critique of the whole Temple system and its lend-lease brokerage system. For a religion that had clear controls on how sin could be forgiven, we have John pouring it out like free river water.
we can’t say, “Thy Kingdom come” unless we’re willing to say, “My kingdom go.”
No one possesses the Kingdom; it possesses you. You know you are merely a participant in a much larger mystery. So Kingdom and Church are not the same thing. The Church is a means of pointing to the Kingdom of God,
We think of Jesus’ teaching as a set of prescriptions for getting to heaven (even though we haven’t followed them). No, the Sermon on the Mount and especially the Beatitudes are a set of descriptions of a free life.
April 14, 2010
Rohr calls himself a mediator between scholarship and the average educated readers of Scripture. He does an excellent job transposing the diligent work of commentary and historical studies into accessable but not "dumbed down" language. The result is not remarkably unexpected, Matthew and the Sermon on the Mount come alive and relevant to many more readers than those in the academe. If anything we need more mediators if we want to retrieve the Scripture from hands of literalists or liberals wanting to wrap the text in ideology. Such mediation would ensure that adult students of Scriptures in faith communities might have a more mature and informed reading of the Bible than what they are usually exposed to.
Most of the audio tapes, and the book, do not deal directly with Matthew 5-7 but the issues of text and context in the Matthean community. In the end, the sermon is read from a deeply grace oriented perspective as opposed either from legalism which makes the sermon the requirements for Kingdom admission or covenantal nomism that secures admission to the kingdom once entered through faith. Matthew teaches his readers how to imitate the disciples in their following of Jesus and how to communicate this radical new world in flesh and blood ways that surpass the mere written word. Rohr's enthusiastic style comes along side Matthew's Gospel and motivates us to take up the yoke of the law "written in our hearts"; to fundamentally be who we are as members of a new humanity, a vision of personhood surpassing current church or societal expectations.
Most of the audio tapes, and the book, do not deal directly with Matthew 5-7 but the issues of text and context in the Matthean community. In the end, the sermon is read from a deeply grace oriented perspective as opposed either from legalism which makes the sermon the requirements for Kingdom admission or covenantal nomism that secures admission to the kingdom once entered through faith. Matthew teaches his readers how to imitate the disciples in their following of Jesus and how to communicate this radical new world in flesh and blood ways that surpass the mere written word. Rohr's enthusiastic style comes along side Matthew's Gospel and motivates us to take up the yoke of the law "written in our hearts"; to fundamentally be who we are as members of a new humanity, a vision of personhood surpassing current church or societal expectations.
March 22, 2019
For such a slim volume of words this book is a hard chew. It took me almost a year to work my way through Richard’s in-depth study of what is called The Sermon on the Mount. So much to ponder and meditate on in this book. I could only take small bites and then would have to chew and chew before I could swallow. Lots of profound wisdom. Lots of pointing to God and his love, mercy and forgiveness. I’m glad I finished. I think this is a necessary book for Christians to read. It will provoke, unsettle and challenge. It will peel back the blinders. It won’t necessarily leave you feeling good but it should give you hope and a relaxed and patient trust that God has got you—got this whole world—and his purposes will be achieved.
August 17, 2019
No book has explained the Gospels so simply and pointed to Jesus rather than religion so profoundly. Written by a Catholic priest, but very understandable by an evangelical Christian. Builds upon the premise of Rene Girard. Excellent read. I am just beginning his book on contemplative prayer, Everything Belongs. What I have read so far is just as simple, but profound.
April 30, 2018
This book was very thought provoking. It answers several questions I have about what was happening in the world that Jesus lived. It tries to describe what was going on, who the people that heard the sermon were and how they were living. It tries to explain the why an establishment would want to kill him. It also tries to explain what he meant in his teachings. The Sermon on the Mount is one of the most important passages in the Bible that help us live a better life. To give us something to strive for. To remind us that turning the world upside down is sometimes the best thing. This was very interesting and enjoyable to read. I felt like I was shown new ways to view the gospels and the Words I try to live by, though I know I am a lot more selective about those words than I should be. Either way, this is a good book for people that have some questions about the life and history of Jesus and what he may have meant.
November 15, 2021
I respect that Rohr finally confronts Nietzsche in the final pages of this book, asking what alternative we have to the gospel.
What alternative indeed! Should we not prefer Rohr's ineffectual center-left progressive dealism to the realpolitik of descriptive and empirical social reform? I think the dialog isn't so clear nor luminous as Rohr makes it out to be.
If Rohr sponsored a community of Franciscans I might be reassured that he takes the message to live as his Jesus does. That he has skin in the game.
But he does not as far as I know. And despite his populist zeal and erudition, I am not convinced his Jesus is THE Jesus, however.
What alternative indeed! Should we not prefer Rohr's ineffectual center-left progressive dealism to the realpolitik of descriptive and empirical social reform? I think the dialog isn't so clear nor luminous as Rohr makes it out to be.
If Rohr sponsored a community of Franciscans I might be reassured that he takes the message to live as his Jesus does. That he has skin in the game.
But he does not as far as I know. And despite his populist zeal and erudition, I am not convinced his Jesus is THE Jesus, however.
November 11, 2022
The first two thirds is a very good preamble to The Sermon on the Mount giving the social context, the speaker’s background and vision and explaining just how subversive he is. Much of what Rohr says here regarding tribalism, tensions between progressives and conservatives, and economics and politics is even more relevant than in 1996 when this was written.
There are no magic formulas to living the teachings of the Sermon—darn it! Rohr posits that Jesus presents it as an ideal that we live towards as we come to live out our union with God more and more. He covers the Beatitudes more thoroughly than the rest of the Sermon. A helpful book.
There are no magic formulas to living the teachings of the Sermon—darn it! Rohr posits that Jesus presents it as an ideal that we live towards as we come to live out our union with God more and more. He covers the Beatitudes more thoroughly than the rest of the Sermon. A helpful book.
February 25, 2021
Might be my favorite of Richard Rohr’s! Such an incredible examination fo the Sermon on the Mount (and thus, Jesus’ purpose in this work to bring about the Kingdom of God. So timely, as Jesus rails against the conventional wisdom of his day (so very similar to what’s being called “Christianity” today) in favor of a New world order founded on Kingdom principles such as non-violence, generosity, utter humility, powerlessness... If you haven’t read anything by Rohr- start here ...and then tell me what you think.
March 17, 2019
Rohr's prose can often ramble, but in general I enjoyed reading his interpretations and discussing them with my book group. Particularly, I had never though about "wide path" as following cultural norms and group think, vs. countercultural thinking (narrow path).
June 28, 2021
The book has two parts. In the first part the reader is familiarized with the perspective from which Jesus speaks and teaches. The second par applies that understanding to the Sermon on the Mount. But, the second part was far too short and not deep enough for my liking.
September 8, 2019
Great read. Much needed in today’s world
I enjoyed the clarity and simplicity of the message. Richard brings new hope to a challenged world. I hope u enjoy this
I enjoyed the clarity and simplicity of the message. Richard brings new hope to a challenged world. I hope u enjoy this
July 21, 2021
I liked it, but whenever I saw " Jesus' " it bothered me because Jesus is singular, so even though it ends in an "s," it should still be " Jesus's " according to what I know -- or think I know :)
April 9, 2022
One of the greatest pieces of theology I have ever read.
January 15, 2023
Very helpful.
September 9, 2023
Big fan of Richard Rohr.
July 29, 2012
Richard’s Rohr’s book is supposed to be about the Sermon on the Mount. In fact, it’s about his theology of who Jesus is and what he did on Earth, with an analysis of the Sermon on the Mount at the end. Due to my incorrect expectations, I found the book’s structure to be confusing. It would have been helpful if he had more clearly explained his overarching goals from the beginning.
As far as content, I felt the book was generally good. I disagreed with some of the what Rohr said (usually when he was trying to lean on Borg or Crossan for Biblical interpretation), but the directions in which I felt he erred were the opposite of how the church usually errs, and most of the time he was saying things that Christians today need to hear. Unfortunately, this content was muddled in poor organization and mediocre historical analysis, and so I didn’t feel that many people would come away with a lot from the book.
As far as content, I felt the book was generally good. I disagreed with some of the what Rohr said (usually when he was trying to lean on Borg or Crossan for Biblical interpretation), but the directions in which I felt he erred were the opposite of how the church usually errs, and most of the time he was saying things that Christians today need to hear. Unfortunately, this content was muddled in poor organization and mediocre historical analysis, and so I didn’t feel that many people would come away with a lot from the book.
August 20, 2010
This book takes me back to memories of the "Jesus People Movement"
in the '70s. After being released from the military and going back to college, I was searching for an answer to the question: why am I here?
I had become a hippie and anti-establishment proponent with revolutionary thoughts. I saw Jesus as a revolutionary figure and became one of His followers. Richard Rohr present Jesus in the same way in this book. Jesus' message was, "...the Kingdom of God is in your midst." Jesus is presenting a NEW WORLD ORDER.
It is a revolutionary book, but it is not for the weak hearted. Religion, politics, and social cultures will be impacted. Jesus warns His disciples to first "count the cost." Reader beware!
PS - I just began to re-read this book again..that's how heavy it is!
in the '70s. After being released from the military and going back to college, I was searching for an answer to the question: why am I here?
I had become a hippie and anti-establishment proponent with revolutionary thoughts. I saw Jesus as a revolutionary figure and became one of His followers. Richard Rohr present Jesus in the same way in this book. Jesus' message was, "...the Kingdom of God is in your midst." Jesus is presenting a NEW WORLD ORDER.
It is a revolutionary book, but it is not for the weak hearted. Religion, politics, and social cultures will be impacted. Jesus warns His disciples to first "count the cost." Reader beware!
PS - I just began to re-read this book again..that's how heavy it is!
September 13, 2014
I have read many Richard Rohr books, taken his online seminars, and organized book studies featuring his works. He is a prolific writer -- as my priest says, no thought goes unpublished. This book was a least favorite because I really was hoping for a blow by blow analysis of the Sermon on the Mount and its radical nature. I reread the Sermon on a regular basis for contemplation and inspiration. He really did not dive into the Sermon on the Mount until the last chapter. I know he was setting the stage for his discussion, but that's not what I was looking for.
I recommend Falling Upward or A Lever and a Place to Stand by him. Also Immortal Diamond and Everything Belongs are good introductory Richard Rohr.
I recommend Falling Upward or A Lever and a Place to Stand by him. Also Immortal Diamond and Everything Belongs are good introductory Richard Rohr.
April 23, 2015
Great message!
Answered many of the questions I have, because of my image of God, like the author's, is that God is the "PERFECT PARENT". It also validates that We Christians, like the rest of humankind, take ourselves to seriously and believe our beliefs are exactly the only TRUTH. As a parent, I have a real problem with that, because I can't think of anything that would make me completely turn my back on my children. Also, as a follower of Jesus Christ, He is teaching me to, like Him, see all mankind as His Children, which has given me a deep desire and yearning for their salvation. Why! Because "That is what Jesus would do." And, that is why He died!
Answered many of the questions I have, because of my image of God, like the author's, is that God is the "PERFECT PARENT". It also validates that We Christians, like the rest of humankind, take ourselves to seriously and believe our beliefs are exactly the only TRUTH. As a parent, I have a real problem with that, because I can't think of anything that would make me completely turn my back on my children. Also, as a follower of Jesus Christ, He is teaching me to, like Him, see all mankind as His Children, which has given me a deep desire and yearning for their salvation. Why! Because "That is what Jesus would do." And, that is why He died!
October 26, 2012
Rohr spends 4/5s of the book exploring all the ways Jesus was a countercultural subversive and 1/5 final execution of the Sermon on the Mount. If you ever doubt that Jesus' Sermon on the Mount is counter-cultural transformation from the ground up then read this book. Leading up to the Sermon is some excellent historical/cultural/social critique. I would have preferred a little more theological depth for the actual Sermon, but that's what the in-depth commentaries are for so my nit pick is just that, nitty.
February 26, 2013
There are so many good things in this book with enriching spiritual insight that are worth at least five stars, but I did find this book not as well-focused as I would like. The subtitle suggests a book length commentary on the Sermon on the Mount but we only get this, briefly, at the end of the book. Even so, highly recommended for its challenging insights into the kind of life Jesus would have us live.
March 10, 2015
Much of the early chapters is a re-hash of biblical scholarship on the Sermon on the Mount (which Rohr acknowledges). Where Rohr makes a real contribution is when he shares his interpretation of the Sermon itself.
June 2, 2008
Very good - but i need to read slow and probalby re-read often to get out of it what is said. Not a religious book
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September 17, 2013Not my style of writing somehow. Too?? something
January 19, 2013
Not certain I whole-heartedly agree with some of Father Rohr's conclusions, but he has to be one of the most quotable people I have read recently. A challenging, insightful read.
April 9, 2017
Full disclosure: I didn't finish the book, but can't bring myself to put it on my abandoned list (which I don't maintain on Goodreads if you are looking for it). His main points are excellent and helpful. I have great regard to the thought & writings of this Franciscan priest, but I'm ready to move on to Anne Lamott's latest book. I guess I relate better to a political activist Christian woman just a few years younger and I am than I do to a R.C. priest.
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews