In | Workbook: Triadic Structure in Matthew

Grab your Workbook Journal!

[Record your answers in the workbook provided at the beginning of this course.]

The Sermon on the Mount, given to a crowd on a hillside, is Jesus’ longest teaching recorded in the New Testament. Without recording devices or even scribes to write it down, it needed to be memorable. 

One of the more common mnemonic devices in ancient times (and still today) involves assembling ideas or sayings in groups of three, called triadic structures. This device to make things memorable and easier to grasp is used in widely diverse works, from children’s stories (for example, “The Three Little Pigs”) to philosophical works (for example, Immanuel Kant’s The Critique of Pure Reason). 

Because of its usefulness for packaging long or complicated ideas or teachings Jesus mapped the Sermon on the Mount in triadic structures in both its general outline and the different individual components. 

6. Carefully read Matthew 5:17-48 and record in your workbook any groups of three you notice.

Source: Dale C. Allison, Jr., Studies in Matthew: Interpretation past and present, 2005, pp. 200-207.

In the image above, you can see that triad structures are used throughout the Sermon on the Mount. They’re used not only in portions of the “body” of the sermon, but in the overall structure of the sermon.

Identifying these structures can be difficult, especially if you haven’t done it before. The more you learn to look for them the easier they become to find.

7. Which sub-group of three in the graphic above do you find most striking or interesting, and why?