Matthew 5:28 Meaning: Jesus on Lust and 'Adultery in the Heart'

The Short Answer

Looking in order to desire is adultery of the heart.

In Matthew 5:28, Jesus teaches that adultery starts in the heart: looking at someone in order to desire them sexually is already unfaithfulness before God, even if nothing physical happens. He is not condemning noticing that someone is attractive, or an unwanted thought, but the look that is kept and fed.

Key Points

• Matthew 5:28 means adultery starts in the heart: looking at someone in order to desire them sexually is already unfaithfulness before God.
• The Greek describes a look with a purpose (pros to epithymēsai, "in order to desire"). Noticing that someone is attractive, or an unwanted thought, is temptation, not the sin Jesus names.
• "Gouge it out" (verses 29–30) is hyperbole calling for radical action, never self-harm. Cut off the access, not the body part.
• Lust and adultery carry the same guilt before God but are not the same act. Christians disagree on whether porn use is grounds for divorce.
• The sermon opens with "Blessed are the poor in spirit" (Matthew 5:3), and its answer to this verse is grace: "no condemnation" in Christ (Romans 8:1).

What is the context of Matthew 5:28?

Matthew 5:28 is the second of six sayings in Matthew 5:21–48 built on the pattern "You have heard… But I tell you." Each takes a commandment Jesus' hearers knew and traces it back to the heart: anger behind murder, desire behind adultery. Jesus is fulfilling the Law (5:17), not lowering or replacing it.

Righteousness measured only by actions can look clean, so Jesus says his hearers' righteousness must surpass "that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law" (Matthew 5:20). He ends the series with "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (5:48). That standard leaves nobody standing on their own record, which is where the sermon began.

What does 'looks at a woman lustfully' mean in the Greek?

The Greek behind "lustfully" is pros to epithymēsai autēn, "in order to desire her." It describes a look with a purpose: seeing someone so as to want them. The verb epithymeō means to desire, long for or covet, the same verb the Greek Old Testament uses in "You shall not covet your neighbor's wife."

1. 1

   "Anyone who looks"

   Pas ho blepōn, the ordinary word for seeing. Eyes are not the problem, and "anyone" leaves no one exempt.

2. 2

   "At a woman"

   Gynē can mean a woman or a wife (Thayer's lexicon). Either way, she is a person with her own life, not a picture.

3. 3

   "Lustfully"

   Pros to with an infinitive normally marks purpose; Matthew uses the same construction for righteousness done "to be seen by them" (6:1). Some grammarians, such as Maximilian Zerwick, suspect an Aramaic idiom behind it meaning simply "with desire" (discussed here). On either reading, this is a look that wants.

4. 4

   "Already committed adultery… in his heart"

   The heart is the center of thought, will and desire: "out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality" (Matthew 15:19). The act has not happened; the unfaithfulness has.

In the Septuagint, the Greek Old Testament widely read in Jesus' day, this verse says ouk epithymēseis tēn gynaika tou plēsion sou (LXX text). Matthew 5:28 uses the same verb (lexicon) and noun, tying the seventh commandment to the tenth. Proverbs had already warned, "Do not lust in your heart after her beauty" (Proverbs 6:25).

Is it a sin to notice that someone is attractive?

No. Noticing that someone is attractive, or a sexual thought arriving uninvited, is temptation, not the sin Jesus names. Jesus himself "has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin" (Hebrews 4:15). The line is crossed when the look is kept for the sake of desire: the second look, the replay, the fantasy.

A first glance happens to you; the next few seconds are a choice. David "saw a woman bathing" (2 Samuel 11:2–3), and it became sin as he moved from seeing to pursuing: he "sent someone to find out about her." Where attraction ends and lust begins is worked through in Is Lust a Sin?

If you're a teenager, a parent, youth pastor or school counselor is a good person to talk this over with.

What does 'If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out' mean?

Matthew 5:29–30 is deliberate hyperbole calling for radical action against whatever leads you into sin. It is not a command to injure yourself: removing an eye would not remove lust, which comes from the heart. The point is to cut off access and occasions decisively, at real cost, instead of negotiating with them.

"Causes you to stumble" is skandalizō, putting an obstacle in someone's path so they fall (Thayer's lexicon). Jesus repeats the image (Matthew 18:8–9; Mark 9:43–47), so he means it seriously, but as a figure of speech. Paul adds that "harsh treatment of the body" lacks "any value in restraining sensual indulgence" (Colossians 2:23).

• Delete the app that keeps leading you there.
• Turn on iPhone's adult-website limit (step-by-step; what blockers can't do).
• Charge the phone outside the bedroom (the nighttime playbook).
• Tell someone who will keep asking.

Is lust the same as adultery in the Bible?

In guilt before God, Jesus puts them together: the purposeful look is adultery "in his heart," so nobody is innocent just because nothing physical happened. But they are not the same act, and the consequences differ: physical adultery breaks a marriage bodily and wounds more people. Both need grace, and neither excuses the other.

Peter likewise speaks of "eyes full of adultery" (2 Peter 2:14). Beware the opposite misreading: I've already sinned in my heart, so I might as well act. Jesus exposes the heart so sin can be stopped earlier, and his next words demand drastic action to prevent the act, not surrender to it.

Is watching porn adultery or cheating?

By Matthew 5:28's standard, watching porn is looking in order to desire, so it is adultery of the heart, and for a married person a real breach of faithfulness. Whether it is biblical grounds for divorce is a separate question that Christians answer differently, though most agree divorce is a last resort.

Many spouses experience discovering it as genuine betrayal, and that response deserves to be taken seriously rather than argued down. The people on the screen are real people too, made in God's image. On divorce, two serious views:

• Heart adultery, but not grounds on its own. This view reads Jesus' "except for sexual immorality" (Matthew 5:32) as physical unfaithfulness: "since adultery and abandonment are the only explicitly biblical grounds for divorce, porn use does not qualify" (GotQuestions, which also presents the other view).
• Habitual, unrepentant use can count as porneia. Thomas Schreiner holds that porneia covers sexual sin in general, though not every use of pornography justifies divorce (9Marks, 2018). Wayne Grudem suggests "incorrigible addiction to pornography" could qualify (CBMW, 2020).

Walk through it with a pastor and a Christian counselor, not alone. See What Is Sexual Immorality in the Bible? and, if your husband is the one struggling, these prayers.

Does Matthew 5:28 apply to women and to married people?

Yes. Jesus speaks to men about looking at a woman, but the principle concerns the heart, so it applies to anyone who looks at another person in order to desire them, women included. It applies to married people most directly, because lusting after someone other than your spouse is the very case the verse names.

Jesus puts the responsibility on the one looking: he tells him to deal with his own eye, not to make the woman hide. For women, lust may be less visual, a replayed scenario or a fantasy about someone else's husband, but it is the same heart and the same grace.

Desire for your own spouse is not what the verse forbids. Scripture celebrates it: "may you rejoice in the wife of your youth" (Proverbs 5:18; see also 1 Corinthians 7:3).

How do you stop lusting in your heart?

Fight the second look, not the first. When you notice the pull, look away on purpose, name the temptation honestly to God, and change what is in front of you. Job made "a covenant with my eyes" (Job 31:1), deciding before the moment came, and Matthew 5:29–30 adds cutting off whatever keeps feeding it.

1. 1

   Decide before the moment

   Job's covenant came first. Settle now what you'll do with your eyes at the beach or in the feed.

2. 2

   Turn away within seconds

   The fight is the deliberate second look, not the first glance.

3. 3

   Name it to God

   "Lord, I'm being pulled. Turn my eyes and my heart." For more words, see prayers against lust or ten battlefield prayers.

4. 4

   See the person

   Treat "younger women as sisters, with absolute purity" (1 Timothy 5:2): someone with a life, not content.

5. 5

   Change what's in front of you

   Leave the room, put the phone down. If an urge is already running, do this now; the longer plan is How to Stop Lustful Thoughts.

Is there forgiveness if I've already lusted in my heart?

Yes. The Sermon on the Mount begins with "Blessed are the poor in spirit" (Matthew 5:3), and Matthew 5:28 shows why we all need to be. The verse convicts so that we run to Christ, and "there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1). Confess it, receive forgiveness, and keep fighting.

Jesus preached this verse as the one who would go to the cross for these very sins. The same sermon promises, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God" (Matthew 5:8). A pure heart is something God gives and grows, not a price of admission.

Conviction says come back; condemnation says hide (how to tell them apart). Confess (1 John 1:9) and get up. If you keep falling, read Does God Forgive Porn and Lust?, pray a prayer for forgiveness after lust, and keep Bible verses about lust close.

Frequently Asked Questions

Sources & Further Reading

• Scripture quoted (NIV): Matthew 5:3, 5:8, 5:20, 5:27–30, 5:32, 5:48; Matthew 6:1; Matthew 15:19; Exodus 20:17; Proverbs 5:18; Proverbs 6:25; Job 31:1; 2 Samuel 11:2–3; Hebrews 4:15; Colossians 2:23; 2 Peter 2:14; 1 Timothy 5:2; Romans 8:1. Referenced: Matthew 5:17, 18:8–9; Mark 9:43–47; 1 Corinthians 7:3; 1 John 1:9
• Greek text of Matthew 5:28 with word-by-word parsing (πρὸς τὸ ἐπιθυμῆσαι: preposition, article, aorist infinitive) — Bible Hub
• Greek text of Matthew 6:1, the same πρὸς τὸ + infinitive construction ("to be seen by them") — Bible Hub
• Strong's G1937 epithymeō, Thayer's: "to have a desire for, long for; to lust after, covet" — Blue Letter Bible
• Strong's G1135 gynē, "woman" or "wife" (Thayer's) — Blue Letter Bible
• Strong's G4624 skandalizō, "to put a stumbling-block or impediment in the way" (Thayer's) — Blue Letter Bible
• Septuagint (LXX) Exodus 20; verse 17 reads "οὐκ ἐπιθυμήσεις τὴν γυναῖκα τοῦ πλησίον σου" — Blue Letter Bible
• Mark Giszczak, "Does Lust Need a Purpose?" (Catholic Bible Student, 2014): πρὸς τὸ + infinitive as purpose in Matthew 5:28, with Zerwick's note on a possible Aramaic background
• International OCD Foundation, "What is OCD & Scrupulosity?": scrupulosity as a subtype of OCD; CBT with exposure and response prevention (ERP) as the primary psychological treatment
• GotQuestions, "Is pornography addiction an acceptable reason for divorce?" (presents both views)
• Thomas R. Schreiner, "Is Pornography Use Ever Grounds for Divorce?" (9Marks, October 29, 2018)
• Wayne Grudem, "Grounds for Divorce: Why I Now Believe There Are More Than Two" (CBMW, June 10, 2020)

The next urge is coming.

PrayBreak is built for the moment that decides everything — press and hold, then LOOK, PRAY, MOVE. This time, have a weapon in your hand.

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