Coming now to chapter 23: we are not surprised to find that it is in three parts:

(1) Criticisms and exhortations addressed to the mixed multitude and the disciples.

(2) Seven woes addressed to the Rabbis and Pharisees. (3) Judgments on the nation and

upon Jerusalem.  We now come to a crisis point in the relationship of the Lord and the

religious leaders. It is a situation of open hostility. They continue in their determination

to destroy Him and He publicly denounces them in terribly solemn words (23: 13-33).

Verse 3 needs care. Omit the word `that' in the A.V. as it is not in the Greek and it is

better to treat the verb as indicative rather than imperative. The Lord Jesus is unlikely to

command the disciples to obey the scribes and Pharisees, when He so severely criticizes

them, calling them hypocrites. Verse 3 then reads, "all therefore whatever they bid you,

you observe and do, but do not after their works . . . . .". They do not practice what they

preach, but go in for just outward show and the praise of men (5-7).  They wore

phylacteries (which were boxes containing verses of the O.T. on the forehead and arm).

They even believed God wore them! They came to be regarded as nothing more than

The disciples were warned that they must not use exalted titles like Rabbi (master), or

Father (a title that was kept for Rabbis). They had one Father in heaven and one teacher,

Christ Himself, and they must learn to keep humble, because only such would be owned

and exalted by God (8-12).

The Lord goes on to denounce their hindering of those who were keen to enter the

kingdom, and the fact that they themselves refused to do so (13). Verse 14 is omitted by

some of the principal texts and put in the margin in some translations. The truth is

repeated in Mark 12: 40 and Luke 20: 47 where they prey on widows and for a show

make lengthy prayers. In their fanaticism they go to any length to make converts to their

empty traditions (15). They made false differences in vows (16-22). They stressed tiny

unessentials, like tithing herbs, but the weighty matters, justice, mercy and faithfulness,

they neglected (23). They "strained out a gnat and swallowed a camel" (an unclean

animal), not "strained at a gnat" as in the A.V.: a mistake made in all editions of the

A.V. All the former translations had "out". Their ceremonial cleanliness merely related

to externals. Inside, said the Lord, they were full of greed, self-indulgence (25). They

were like whitewashed tombs, beautiful on the outside, but full of foulness within (27,

28). (It was the custom to whiten tombs a month before Passover, so that people might

not touch them and become ceremonially unclean).

They decorated the tombs of the prophets and said they would not have associated

themselves with the forefathers who killed them (29, 30). Yet they were plotting to

murder the greatest Prophet! No wonder the Lord Jesus called them hypocrites.