So that your alms may be in secret, as Revised Standard Version indicates, is a continuation of the sentence begun in verse 3. Good News Translation begins a new sentence: “Then it will be a private matter.” Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch does not render this clause expressly in verse 4. However, the meaning is carried by the inclusion of “so inconspicuously that” in verse 3: “When you help someone, do it so inconspicuously that not even your best friend will know of it. Your Father, who sees even the most secret things, will reward you.”

The meaning of in secret (Good News Translation “a private matter”) is not altogether clear. It may refer to deeds that are known only to God and to the person who does them. Or it may refer to deeds that are done so naturally, without conscious effort, that only God knows them, since even the doer himself is unaware. The term apparently is repeated intentionally in verse 6, perhaps for emphasis, and the translator should take the expression there into account.

Translators will do well to work on verses 3 and 4 together so that the translation flows naturally. Some will construct verse 3 in such a way that the first phrase of verse 4, so that your alms may be in secret, does not need to be rendered explicitly. This is what Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, cited above, has done. Those languages that do express the phrase explicitly can follow Good News Translation or use a phrase like “then no one else will know about what you have given,” “then the fact that you gave will be a secret,” or “your giving won’t be something people know about.”

Father, as in 5.48, is God.

For comments on reward, see 5.12.

Although the text does not explicitly state when your Father … will reward you, it is best understood as a reference to the final judgment. Here again King James Version includes the word “openly” after will reward you; this inclusion, however, has no basis in the best Greek manuscripts.

Translators can express the last part of the verse in various ways: “And God your Father, who sees what you do in private, will give you a reward,” “God your Father sees these secret things and he will reward you,” or “It is God your Father who will reward you for the things you do in private.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .