The words without a cause are absent from several important early witnesses. The Textus Receptus keeps the Greek adverb εἰκῇ. Modern critical editions omit it. The difference is ancient; some early Christian writers argued over the moral rigor of the two forms.
“Whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.” — Matthew 5:22
The shorter text sounds absolute: whoever is angry with his brother is liable to judgment. Critics can say that scribes added “without a cause” to soften a hard command and excuse anger.
That danger is real. The received phrase cannot become a pocket permit for resentment. Fallen people are quick to call wounded pride righteous.
Yet Scripture does not treat every anger as sin. Jesus looks on hard hearts with anger. God is angry with the wicked. Paul writes, “Be ye angry, and sin not.” The moral line therefore exists whether Matthew states it in this adverb or the wider canon supplies it.
The received wording names the line at the point of warning. Anger without cause is groundless, vain, rash, or empty. Righteous anger must answer a true wrong, seek God’s honor and the neighbor’s good, remain proportionate, and refuse private revenge.
The omission may reflect ascetic rigor, but motive cannot be assigned to a copyist we cannot question. The short adverb can fall mechanically, and the sentence becomes more memorable rather than less grammatical. The long reading has overwhelming Greek support and ancient versional and patristic use of its own.
Christ is exposing the murderous root beneath insults and contempt. “Without a cause” does not shrink that exposure. It prevents the command from condemning the holy anger Christ himself displays, while leaving ordinary human wrath under judgment.
The received word belongs. It is not a loophole but a measure, and the measure is far stricter than self-defense: truth, justice, love, and a heart ready for reconciliation.
The rest of the verse confirms that Christ is distinguishing kinds and degrees of sinful speech. Anger moves to “Raca,” then to “Thou fool,” with judgment, council, and hell fire before the hearer. The exact relation among those clauses has its own interpretive difficulties, but the moral descent is clear: inward contempt seeks a mouth and then a sentence against the neighbor.
Righteous anger moves in the opposite direction. It grieves evil, protects the wronged, and remains willing to be reconciled when truth and repentance meet. It does not feed itself by rehearsing insult. The sacrifice interrupted in verses 23–24 shows how quickly Christ turns from inward emotion to concrete peace.
Ancient rigorists who preferred the shorter reading remind us that the longer word can be abused. Their moral concern deserves respect even when their textual judgment does not. A church that prints “without a cause” must preach the cause as God defines it, not as an angry person feels it.
Sources and further reading
- Psalm 7:11; Matthew 5:21–26; Mark 3:5; Ephesians 4:26–32; James 1:19–20.
- Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, note on Matthew 5:22.
- John Cassian, Conferences, on the ancient debate over the phrase.