Matthew 23:30

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous, WOE UNTO YOU ... HYPOCRITES! YE BUILD THE TOMBS OF THE PROPHETS ... AND SAY, IF WE HAD BEEN IN THE DAYS OF OUR FATHERS, WE WOULD NOT ... WHEREFORE YE BE WITNESSES UNTO YOURSELVES, THAT YE ARE THE CHILDREN OF THEM WHICH KILLED THE PROPHETS that is, 'ye be witnesses that ye have inherited, and voluntarily served yourselves heirs to, the truth-hating, prophet-killing, spirit of your fathers.' Out of pretended respect and honour, they repaired and beautified the graves of the prophets, and with whining hypocrisy said, "If we had been in their days, how differently should we have treated these prophets?" while all the time they were witnesses to themselves that they were the children of them that killed the prophets, convicting themselves daily of as exa...

30._If we had been in the days of our fathers. _Not without good reason did Christ introduce this sentiment; for though he does not blame them for the conduct of their fathers, and does not make it the chief ground of accusation that they are the children of murderers: yet he takes a passing glance of their foolish boasting, in being accustomed to glory in their ancestors, while they were descended from the bloody enemies of God. The appeal may be thus stated: “You look upon the veneration which you pay to the deceased _prophets _as some sort of expiation for the wickedness of your _fathers. _Now then I have this to urge, that it is in vain for you to boast of a sacred ancestry, since you are descended from wicked and ungodly parents. Go now, and screen your crimes by the piety of those whose hands, you acknowledge, were stained with innocent blood. But it is an additional and far more h...

13-33 The scribes and Pharisees were enemies to the gospel of Christ, and therefore to the salvation of the souls of men. It is bad to keep away from Christ ourselves, but worse also to keep others from him. Yet it is no new thing for the show and form of godliness to be made a cloak to the greatest enormities. But dissembled piety will be reckoned double iniquity. They were very busy to turn souls to be of their party. Not for the glory of God and the good of souls, but that they might have the credit and advantage of making converts. Gain being their godliness, by a thousand devices they made religion give way to their worldly interests. They were very strict and precise in smaller matters of the law, but careless and loose in weightier matters. It is not the scrupling a little sin that Christ here reproves; if it be a sin, though but a gnat, it must be strained out; but the doing tha...

Verse 30. _WE WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN PARTAKERS_] They imagined themselves much better than their ancestors; but our Lord, who knew what they would do, uncovers their hearts, and shows them that they are about to be more abundantly vile than all who had ever preceded them....

AND SAY ... - This they professed to say by rebuilding their tombs. They also, probably, publicly expressed their disapprobation of the conduct of their fathers. All this, in building and ornamenting tombs, was a profession of extraordinary piety. Our Lord showed them it was mere pretence....

EXPOSITION MATTHEW 23:1 _Denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees, and lamentation over Jerusalem which followed their guidance to her own destruction. _(Peculiar to St. Matthew.) MATTHEW 23:1 THEN SPAKE JESUS. Some small portion of this discourse, the close of our Lord's public teaching, is found in Mark 12:38 and Luke 20:45-42 (comp. also Luke 11:1., Luke 11:13.). It is here addres

AND SAY, IF WE HAD BEEN IN THE DAYS OF OUR FATHERS,.... Their ancestors and predecessors: signifying, that if they had lived in the times they did, or had been in the same post and office with them, they should have opposed, at least not consented to their measures: WE WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN PARTAKERS WITH THEM IN THE BLOOD OF THE PROPHETS; would not have joined them in persecuting the prophets, and in shedding their blood, and putting them to death; but would have received them as the prophets of the Lord, have hearkened to their advice and message, and have honoured and obeyed them as such; and this they thought they sufficiently declared, by building and adorning their tombs....

Matthew 23:29. _Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchers of the righteous, And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets._ They talk in the same conceited manner, and they claim self-righteousness, as their fathers did; and if their ancestors killed the prophets, these men garnish their sepulchers, and so are sharers in their forefathers' deeds. How often it happens that men say they would not have done such crimes as others have committed, whereas they do not know the vileness of their own hearts. If they were under the same conditions as others, they would act in the same way. It would have been a better sign if the sc

11. THE WOES OF THE KING AND HIS LAMENTATION OVER JERUSALEM. CHAPTER 23 _ 1. The Hypocrisy of the Pharisees.(Matthew 23:1 .) 2. The Woes of the King upon Them.(Matthew 23:13 .) 3. The Lamentation over Jerusalem. (Matthew 23:37 .)_ For the last time we have seen the Pharisees in the presence of the Lord in the previous chapter. What an important part these ecclesiastical leaders of the professing people of God play in this Gospel. They rejected Him; hated Him without a cause, and after they found they could not ensnare Him they resorted to that which Satan had put into their wicked hearts “that they might kill Him.” That which the Lord had foretold in His parable of the vineyard is now soo

SEVEN WOES. Seven is a sacred number and often used in Mt., as in OT (_cf._ especially Isaiah 5) and _Rev._ The first three treat of Pharisaic teaching, the last three of Pharisaic character, the fourth is transitional. i.-iii. The Scribes refused to accept the preaching of Jesus, and deterred others from accepting it (Matthew 23:13; _cf._ Luke 11:52). While they are thus eager to prevent Jews from becoming Christians, they are keen to make converts either from the Gentiles to Judaism, or, more probably, from Jews to Pharisaism, and such converts become excessively Pharisaical (Matthew 23:15); they make casuistical and perverse distinctions with regard to oaths which subvert men's notions of truthfulness and