Matthew 5:23,24

"If therefore you are carrying your gift toward the altar, and there you remember that your family member has something against you, Let your gift go from yourself, before the altar, and go your way.  First be reconciled to your family member and then come and offer your gift."

In the contest of religious ritual vs. human relationships, Jesus taught the priority of the latter. Even in the very act of carrying your gift toward the altar, the resolution of a perceived problem (with anyone close to us, a family member) takes precedence. In fact, we need to allow the gift that we had been bearing to the altar, to "go from yourself" and then seek out that family member.  In Holy Wind Living Breath New Testament one can see the various ways that the Greek word often translated "forgive" is used.  In this case we let the very essence of our religious worship, our gift for the altar,  "go from ourselves" as we seek the higher priority of positive human relationships. And then we will find the need to forgive or, as HWLB has it, "let go from ourselves" the debts that we feel others owe us.

Matthew 5:21,22

"You have heard that it was said to the ancients, You will not kill, but whoever may kill, will be accountable to the judgment, but I say to you, that everyone who is angry with a family member will be accountable to judgment.  And whoever may be saying to a family member, Empty, will be accountable to the council, and whoever may continually say, Fool, will be accountable to the fire of Hinnom Ravine's garbage dump."  Murderous anger.  Whether I actually fulfill that rage or not, is no longer the issue. The judgment comes when I harbor and nurse this wrath toward my neighbor, my family member. In Authentic Teaching of Jesus, italics are used for words not literally present, but which are implied by the original text. One way to emphasize the present, linear sense of a verb is by translating as "be saying" rather than as "say."  Another method is to render the verb, "may continually say."  Both translations are used in this passage. This makes clear that the ongoing act is in view.  Whoever keeps on demeaning a fellow human being will end up in the garbage dump, so to speak.  Most translations have "hell" for the word GEHENNA. Holy Wind Living Breath New Testament is very literal with "Hinnom Ravine."  In italics the phrase "garbage dump" follows to let the reader know what this Ravine, southwest of Jerusalem, was used for.  With its continually smoldering fires, it was a well known location to the Jewish listeners.  In Jesus' teaching, to belittle others is to destroy one's own life.

Matthew 5:20

"For I say to you, that unless your justice should exceed that of the writers and expounders, you should in no way be entering into the realm of upward vision."  Holy Wind Living Breath New Testament very consistently translates "Pharisee" as "expounder."  The word is an Aramaic one whose etymology is from the word to expand or expound.  Throughout Authentic Teaching of Jesus, one will read of these expounders who had so much to say about the correct meaning of scripture and tradition.  So, today, there are many self-appointed defenders of orthodoxy who expound so eloquently (or not) on the one, correct interpretation of theology.  Jesus' challenge to those wanting to learn more of life: your commitment to justice must exceed that of the leaders of the religious establishment.  After all the expounding is finished, where has our sense of justice taken us?  If our justice does not exceed that of the noisy religious leaders, then we are not really entering into this new realm of a higher, upward vision of life.