Source
Boomfish•

nonsense

8
Kubaker1•

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Extra_Mile_(disambiguation)

3
drcyclops•

From the wikipedia article:

The verse is a reference to the practice of "impressment" which, among other things, allowed a Roman soldier to conscript a Jewish native to carry his equipment for one Roman mile (milion = 1,000 paces, about 1,611 yards or 1,473 metres) -- no easy task considering a Roman soldier's backpack could weigh upwards of 100 pounds (45.4 kg).

From the submission:

This is a reference to the practice of "impressment" which, among other things, allowed a Roman soldier to conscript a Jewish native to carry his equipment for one Roman mile (milion = 1,000 paces/app. 1,611 yards) - no easy task considering a Roman soldier's backpack could weigh upwards of one-hundred pounds.

The wikipedia passage's source? The site in the submission. We've gone full circle on this supposed origin story.

2
reveeOP•

You know, to be completely honest, I learned about this from a textbook of Roman law (I am in 1st year of law school in my country), the textbook was written by an atheist and a Roman law expert living in one of the most atheistic countries in the world (Czech Republic). Anyway I couldn't for the life of me google a source in English that wasn't based on the Bible....

One way or the other, this is where the heavily used idiom comes from. I found it fairly interesting.

3
HaricotNoir•

An alternative interpretation of this verse from the sermon on the mount I learned in Catholic Sunday school (not that I wanted to be there) was that Jesus was attempting to convey not-so-subtle messages to his followers through humor and tongue-in-cheek wit.

In this case, he tells his followers to carry a Roman centurion's gear 2 miles instead of 1. The actual outcome of this could be that if a commanding officer noticed this, the soldier could be punished, since the law was only to carry said pack 1 mile and no further, at which point you're supposed to find some other poor sod to carry it (or resume carrying it yourself). So Jesus was essentially advocating that Christians become trolls under a guise of Christian kindness.

A similar alternate interpretation of another verse is the whole "mustard seed" thing, which supposedly grows into a giant tree even though it comes from the tiniest of seeds. Anyone listening to Jesus say this in the first century would have chuckled and realized he was being sarcastic, since a mustard plant is actually this thorny, annoying weed that in no way becomes a tree. The symbolism being that Christianity is a small but persistent nuisance to the ruling Romans, that gradually spreads/creeps up on an unsuspecting world.

I'm too lazy to look up any sources that corroborate this, but I make no claim that they are even remotely correct, either.

-1
madagent•

They literally took the bible verse and just made up something not related to it at all. It had nothing to do with Jesus.

1
Thry•

Did the article seriously just quote a bible verse as evidence ?

-2
TsoiLives•

What's wrong with citing the Bible as the origin of a phrase?

8