David lusts after Bathsheba and sends her husband Uriah into the front lines of battle, an almost certain way to get him killed, so that he can take Bathsheba as his wife. Yet God favors David above all men.And we find a judgmental God who destroys all of mankind except for Noah and family because people have not been good enough. He destroys Sodom and Gomorrah because the people have been wicked—though he also promises to spare them if one good man can be found. This judgmental God rains misery after misery upon Job as a way of testing his faith and only at the last moment releases Abraham from his promise to sacrifice his son Isaac.

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.

Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.

Ye have heard that it was said of them of old time,
Thou shalt not kill;
and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:

But I say unto you,
That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause
shall be in danger of the judgment:

Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time,
Thou shalt not commit adultery:

But I say unto you,
That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her
hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.

 

Ye have heard that it hath been said,
An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:

But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil:
but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

And if any man will sue thee at the law,
and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.

And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.

Give to him that asketh thee,
and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.

Ye have heard that it hath been said,
Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.

But I say unto you,
Love your enemies, bless them that curse you,
do good to them that hate you,
and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven:
for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good,
and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

        The implication here is that one should not presume to treat people  differently  when God Himself does not: if God sends the sun for both the evil and the good,  what gives us the right to harm the first and not the second?

        

For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye?
do not even the publicans the same?

Here we see the "pacifist" Jesus, the Jesus who revokes the Old Testament rule of "an eye for an eye."

And if ye salute your brethren only,
what do ye more than others?
do not even the publicans so?

Be ye therefore perfect,
even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.

Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth,
where moth and rust doth corrupt,
and where thieves break through and steal:

But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven,
where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt,
and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

No man can serve two masters:
for either he will hate the one, and love the other;
or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other.
Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

    Here we see a Jesus who seems to condemn capitalism and all ways of life devoted to becoming wealthy (or even comfortable)

Therefore I say unto you,
Take no thought for your life,
what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink;
nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.
Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?

Here we see a dramatic shift away from the Old Testament:Solomon, Ecc 3:22: "I saw that there is nothing better for a man than to enjoy his work." "I realized that it is good and proper for a man to eat and drink, and to find satisfaction in his labors during the days of life which God has given him ...when God gives any man wealth and possessions and enables him to enjoy them, to accept his lot and be content, this is a gift from God."

And from: Aristotle’s belief that this life counts and should be as flourishing and successful as possible, that bodily needs are not shameful and should be satisfied, that wealth is not bad unless one is obsessed with it and so on. The Sermon on the Mount downplays the importance of happiness in this world, to the point of urging that we be unhappy in this world (be poor of spirit) in order to gain happiness in another more important world to come. See Aristotle’s

Judge not, that ye be not judged.

For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged:
and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye,
but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

Or how wilt thou say to thy brother,
Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye;
and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?

Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye;
and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.

This is one Jesus. Many Christians seem to find other messages; intolerance of homosexuality, of abortion, of sexuality outside of marriage; the Jesus of Mel Gibson who believes that everyone who does not believe exactly what he believes is going to Hell, and this apparently includes his wife. So we have

• a loving nonjudgmental Jesus and
• a judgmental intolerant Jesus

So according to different respectable interpretations of the Bible we have:

• an ethics of wrath and vengeance:an eye for an eye
• an ethics of do no harm
• an ethics of social justice
• an ethics of peace
• an ethics of intolerance
• a "socialist" ethics
• an ethics of "love thy neighbor"