<p>5:37&nbsp;<em>But let your Yes mean Yes, and your No, No. For whatever is more than these comes from evil- </em>The AV and some manuscripts add &quot;Let your communication be...&quot;. The word&nbsp;<em>logos </em>is used. The contrast is between 'swearing' in words, and having an internal&nbsp;<em>logos</em>, a thought behind the words, which is clear and honest. This continues the theme of 5:32 about the<em> logos</em>&nbsp;of fornication. We are to pay attention to our&nbsp;<em>logos</em>&nbsp;rather than merely the external word and action.</p>
<p><em>Yes, yes</em>- People had the idea that there was normal language, and then oaths, which ensured that what you were saying was really true. The Lord is teaching that we should operate on only one level of language- absolute truth. We should not think that some areas of our language use can be less honest than others. The demand is for a total influence of God's truth into every aspect of human life and thinking.</p>
<p>Wrong words come&nbsp;<em>ek</em>, 'out of', evil or &quot;the evil one&quot;. Yet the thrust of the Lord's teaching so far in the Sermon has been that wrong words and behaviour come&nbsp;<em>ek</em>, out of, the human heart and motivations. This, then, is 'the evil', personified as 'the evil one'. In using this term the Lord was radically redefining the popular conceptions of an external 'evil one' as an external being, teaching that it is the evil<em> logos&nbsp;</em>within the human heart which is the real 'evil one'. We note how deeply the Lord's teaching is concerned with internal thought processes. Whatever is more than a simple yes-no way of speaking involves something from 'the evil one'; and we weasel our way with words and meanings only when we are under temptation to be sinful. But that is a deeply internal, psychological situation, deep, deep within the human heart.</p>