Matthew Chapter 23 verse 13 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerses 13-32. - Eight woes pronounced on the Pharisees for their conduct and teaching. (Comp. Luke 11:42-52.) Verse 13. - Some authorities transpose vers. 13 and 14 - a variation attributable to the circumstance that the commencing clauses are the same. As Christ inaugurated his public teaching by pronouncing eight benedictions in the sermon on the mount, so here he closes his ministry by imprecating or prophesying eight woes on the perverse and unbelieving Pharisees. In Lange's commentary there is proposed a scheme of antithesis between the benedictions and the woes, but it is not very successful, being often forced and unnatural; and it is better to regard the contrast in a general view, and not to attempt to press it in particulars. Jesus here pours forth his righteous anger on those whose obstinate infidelity was about to bring ruin on the Jewish city and nation. Woe unto you! (Matthew 11:21). These terrible "woes" are not only evoked by indignation, and pronounced as a solemn judgment, they are also expressive of the profoundest pity, and are prophetic of the future. They have, indeed, a twofold reference - they refer first to temporal judgments and visitations, now ready to fall; and secondly to the retribution in the eternal world. That the meek and lowly Jesus should utter such awful denunciations shows how greatly he was moved how he left nothing untried to turn these hard hearts to introspection and repentance. Scribes and Pharisees (see on ver. 2), hypocrites (Matthew 6:2). Christ uses this word seven times in these denunciations. It is applied to the Pharisees as deceiving themselves and others, under the mask of godliness hiding polluted hearts, persuading themselves that formal externalism was real piety and devotion, and practically teaching this fatal delusion. Ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ἀνθρώπων: before men; ante homines (Vulgate. This is the first woe - against perverse obstructiveness. They prevent men from accepting Christ, and so entering God's kingdom, by their false interpretation of Scripture, by not allowing that it testified of Christ, and by making the path impassable for the poor and ignorant. And this is done "in the face of men," when they are, as it were, thronging round and wishing to enter. "Ye have taken away the key of knowledge," he says, in another place (Luke 11:52). Neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. The kingdom of heaven is here metaphorically regarded as a banqueting hall, where are celebrated the espousals of Christ and his Church. The Pharisees watched the access thereto. They stood at the door to bar all entrance. If any showed signs of yielding to honest conviction, they sternly forbade them to proceed; they repelled them with violence, as by excommunication (John 9:22, 34), or by calumniating the Teacher (Matthew 9:34, etc.). There was many a time when 34, people were ready to acknowledge Christ and to follow him as Messiah. A word from their authorized leaders would have turned the scale in his favour; but that word was never spoken. The weight of authority was always placed on the opposite side, and naught but prejudice, animosity, and slander befell the cause of Jesus.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(13) Woe unto you.--We enter in these verses on the sternest words of condemnation that ever came from our Lord's lips; but it may be questioned whether our English "Woe unto you" does not exclude too entirely the element of sorrow, as well as indignation, of which the Greek interjection (as in Mark 13:17) is at least capable. Woe for you is, perhaps, a better rendering.Hypocrites.--See Note on Matthew 6:2.Ye shut up the kingdom . . .--The words reproduce what had been said before as to "the key of knowledge" (Luke 11:52), the symbol which was given to each scribe on his admission to his office. Our Lord's charge against them is that the only use they made of the key was to lock the door. They did not enter into the inner meaning of Law or Prophets; they excluded (with a possible reference to their putting out of the synagogue those who believed in Jesus, John 9:22; John 12:42) those who were so entering into the higher life and the higher teaching of the Kingdom. (Comp. Galatians 4:17.) . . .