sermon on the mount

I'm reading Stanley Hauerwas's commentary on Matthew and he has a really interesting interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount:

"The sermon is not a heroic ethic. It is the constitution of a people. You cannot live by the demands of the sermon on your own, but that is the point. The demands of the sermon are designed to make us depend on God and one another (Hauerwas 1993, 63-72)" (61).

I suppose he's quoting himself in this section. :)

"The sermon, therefore, is not a list of requirements, but rather a description of the life of a people gathered by and around Jesus. To be saved is to be so gathered. That is why the Beautitudes are the interpretive key to the whole sermon--precisely because they are not recommendations. No one is asked to go out and try to be poor in spirit or to mourn or to be meek. Rather, Jesus is indicating that given the reality of the kingdom we should not be surprised to find among those who follow him those who are poor in spirit, those who mourn, those who are meek" (61).