Matthew chapter 23

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Matthew

Chapter 23

Woe to you. Jerusalem, Jerusalem

39 verses

Key verse — Matthew 23:37

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.”

Moses’ seat

¹ Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to his disciples,

² saying, “The scribes and the Pharisees have sat on Moses’ seat.

³ Therefore all things whatever they tell you to observe, observe and do; but do not do according to their works, for they say and do not do.

⁴ For they bind heavy and hard-to-bear burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves will not move them with their finger.

⁵ And they do all their works to be seen by men. They broaden their phylacteries and enlarge the tassels of their garments.

⁶ And they love the first couch at the feasts and the first seats in the synagogues,

⁷ and the greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, Rabbi, Rabbi.

⁸ But you, do not be called Rabbi; for one is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brothers.

⁹ And do not call anyone on earth your father; for one is your Father, he who is in heaven.

¹⁰ Nor be called leaders; for one is your Leader, the Christ.

¹¹ But the greatest among you shall be your servant.

¹² And whoever will exalt himself will be humbled, and whoever will humble himself will be exalted.

Woe to you

¹³ But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut the kingdom of heaven before men; for you do not enter, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.

¹⁴ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers; therefore you will receive greater condemnation.

¹⁵ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel sea and land to make one convert, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of gehenna as yourselves.

¹⁶ Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple is obligated.’

¹⁷ Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifies the gold?

¹⁸ And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift on it is obligated.’

¹⁹ Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifies the gift?

²⁰ Therefore he who swears by the altar swears by it and by all things on it.

²¹ And he who swears by the temple swears by it and by him who dwells in it.

²² And he who swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him who sits on it.

²³ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the Law: judgment and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.

²⁴ Blind guides, who strain out the gnat and swallow the camel.

²⁵ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside they are full of plunder and self-indulgence.

²⁶ Blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and the dish, so that the outside of them may become clean also.

²⁷ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and of all uncleanness.

²⁸ So you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

²⁹ Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous,

³⁰ and say, ‘If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them in the blood of the prophets.’

³¹ So you testify against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.

³² And you, fill up the measure of your fathers.

³³ Serpents, brood of vipers, how will you escape from the judgment of gehenna?

³⁴ Therefore, behold, I send you prophets and wise men and scribes. Some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from city to city,

³⁵ so that on you may come all the righteous blood poured out on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.

³⁶ Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

Jerusalem, Jerusalem

³⁷ Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.

³⁸ Behold, your house is left to you desolate.

³⁹ For I say to you, you will not see me from now on until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”

1 Note — v. 8, the Christ. TR: εἷς γάρ ἐστιν ὑμῶν ὁ καθηγητής, ὁ Χριστός. One Teacher, the Christ. The title is not trimmed off.

2 Note — v. 14. The whole woe is TR: widows’ houses, long prayers for a pretense, greater condemnation. Critical texts omit the verse.

3 Note — v. 4, hard-to-bear. TR: βαρέα καὶ δυσβάστακτα. Heavy, and hard to bear. Both adjectives stay.

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