After looking back at the Gospel of Matthew and considering its likely source in an early community of Christians that still followed Jewish law, I was struck by a series of statements in the book that seemingly contradict the notion that Jesus's death was considered a necessity for salvation. For example, in Matth 19:16-22 16 Then someone came to him and said, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” 17 And he said to him, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” 18 He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; 19 Honor your father and mother; also, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 20 The young man said to him, “I have kept all these; what do I still lack?” 21 Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” In general, whenever the topic of salvation is brought up by Jesus in the book, it almost always seems to involve following a code of ethics. I think this point is illustrated in the difference between the longer ending of Mark and the ending of Matthew. In Mark, Jesus, when bringing up the issue of salvation before ascending, says that those who believe and are baptized will be saved, and those who don't believe will be condemned. In the same scene in Matthew, Jesus instead calls for the disciples to make disciples of the nations and teach them to obey all that he has taught, with not a word about belief and baptism being necessary for salvation. With this in mind, one might think that the author of Matthew doesn't think that Jesus's death has anything to do with salvation, but at the same time, in Matthew 20:28 that Jesus says that he came to give his life as a ransom for many. I'm trying to figure out how how to fit these facts together, and I'm pondering whether or not the author Matthew thought that Jesus's death brought salvation or if he did think it did, it had a different meaning from Paul, who thought Jesus's death freed believers from the control of the cosmic forces of sin and death by uniting them with Jesus. Has there been any scholars who looked at this question, or do any of you have any thoughts on this?