despised both by God and man; and he that shall humble him self, in doing the meanest offices of love to his brethren, shall be Exalted unto an high degree of the digine favour.

The above discourse against the Scribes and Pharisees, was pronounced in the hearing of many of the order. They were therefore greatly incensed, and watched for an opportunity to destroy Jesus. But it was not a time for him now to be afraid of them. This being the last sermon he was ever to preach in public, it was necessary to use violent remedies, especially as gentle medicines had hitherto proved ineffectual. Wherefore, with a kind severity, he threatened them in the most awful and solemn manner, denouncing dreadful woes against them, not on account of the personal injuries they had done to him, (see Luke xvii. 4. § 97.) although they were many, but on account of their excessive wickedness. They were public teachers of religion, who abused every mark and character of goodness to all the purposes of villany, than which a more atrocious sin in the sight of God cannot be perpetrated. Under the grimace of a severe sanctified air, they were malicious, implacable, lewd, covetous, and rapaci ous. In a word, instead of being reformers,, they were corrup ters of mankind; so that their wickedness being of the very worst sort, it deserved the sharpest rebuke that could be given. The woes were denounced against the Scribes for the following reasons: 1. Because they shut up the kingdom of heaven from men, by taking away," the key of knowledge," as it is called in the parallel passage, Luke xi. 52. § 87. or the right interpretation of the ancient prophecies concerning Messiah, by their example and authority; for they both rejected Jesus themselves, and excommunicated those who did; in short, by doing all they could to hinder the people from repenting of their sins, and be lieving the gospel. Matt. xxii. 13. But voe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, meither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. #2. Because they committed the grossest iniquities, being covetous and rapacious, under a cloak of religion; they devoured widows houses, and at the same time made long prayers, in order to hide their villany. This, says Calvin, was as if pretending to kiss the feet of God, one should rise up and audaciously spit in his face; see on Mark xii. 40. $122. 14. Wee unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye devour widows heuses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive greater damnation. 3. Because they expressed the greatest zeal imaginable in making proselytes, compassing sea and land, that is, making long journies and voyages, and leaving no art unpractised for that end, while at the same time their intention in all this, is, not that the Gentiles might become better men through the knowledge of true reli

gion, but more friendly to them, yielding them the direction of their purses as well as of their consciences. Accordingly, in the heathen countries, these worldlings accommodated religion to the humours of men, placing it not on the eternal and immutable rules of righteousness, but in ceremonial observances; the effect of which was either that their proselytes became more superstiti ous, more immoral, and more presumptuous than their teachers; or that, taking them for impostors, they relapsed again into their old state of heathenism, and in both cases became twofold more the children of hell than even the Pharisees themselves, that is, more openly and unlimitedly wicked than they. 15. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell (see on John xvii. 12. § 133.) than yourselves. The zeal of the Jews in making proselytes was so remarkable that it was taken notice of by the heathens, and turned into a proverb, Hor. lib. i. sat. 4. ver. ult.

-4. For their false doctrine. He mentioned particularly their doctrine concerning oaths, and declared in opposition to their execrable tenets, that every oath is obligatory, the matter of which is lawful; because when men swear by the creature, if their oath has any meaning, it is an appeal to the Creator himself. In any other light, an oath by the creature is absolutely ridiculous, because the creature neither has knowledge with respect to the matter of the oath, nor power to punish the perjury; see on Matt. v. 33. § 26. Matt. xxiii. 16. Woe unto you, ye blind guides, which say, Whosoever shall savear by the temple, it is nothing, it constitutes no obligation to tell the truth, or to perform one's vow; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor; he is bound by his oath to speak the truth, or to perform his vow. 17. Ye fools, and blind; for whether is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifieth the gold? The apostle's words, Heb. vi. 16. are a fit comment upon this passage, For men verily swear by the greater." 18. And whosoever shall swear by the altar, it is nothing, but whosoever sweareth by the gift that is upon it, he is guilty, see on ver. 16. 19. Le fools, and blind; for whether is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifieth the gift? see on ver. 17. 20. Whoso therefore shall swear by the altar, sweareth by it, and by all things thereon: consequently the oath is an invocation of his wrath, to whom the altar and the gifts on the altar are sacred, in case of falsehood, or breach of vows. The particular species of wrath invoked in this oath, is God's rejecting the swearer's sacrifices, and denying him the pardon of sin. 21. And avhoso shall swear by the tem

ple,

ple, sweareth by it, and by him that dwelleth therein; consequently the oath is a solemn wishing, that he who dwelleth in the temple may hinder him from ever worshipping there, if he is telling a falsehood, or neglects his vow. Matt. xxiii. 22. And he that shall swear by heaven, sweareth by the throne of God, and by him that sitteth thereon: and therefore his oath is a solemn wishing, that God, who dwells in heaven, may exclude him out of that blessed place for ever, if he falsifies his oath. 5. For their superstition. They observed the ceremonial precepts of the law with all possible exactness, while they utterly neglected the eternal, immutable, and indispensable rules of righteousness. 23. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment (justice), mercy, (charity), and faith (piety); these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone. But besides this reproof of their superstition in the performance of positive duties, he condemned it also in the obedience which they gave to the negative precepts of the law; for there likewise this evil root shewed itself. 24. Ye, blind guides, which strain at a gnat, or rather, which strain out a gnat, namely, from your drink, and swallow a camel. The expression is proverbial, and was made use of by our Lord on this occasion, to signify that the Pharisees pretended to be exceedingly afraid of the smallest faults, as if sin had been bitter to them like death, while they indulged themselves secretly in the unrestrained commission of the grossest immoralities. 6. For their hypocrisy. They were at great pains to appear virtuous, and to have a de cent external conduct, while they neglected to beautify their inward man with goodness, which in the sight of God is an ornament of great price, and renders men dear and valuable to all who know them. 25. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the plat ter, (Mark vii. 8. § 65.) but within they (i. e. the cup and platter) are full of extortion and excess, which ye swallow down without the least scruple. 26. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also. Take care that what is within the cup, and not so much exposed to view, be clean; and then thou mayest with propriety bestow pains in cleansing the outside of the cup. But though in this clause our Lord still makes use of the meta phor, he reasons according to the thing intended by it; thus, cleanse first thy mind, thy inward man, from evil dispositions and affections, and of course thy outward behaviour will be virtuous and good. 7. For the success of their hypocrisy. By their care of external appearances, the Pharisees and Scribes made a fair shew, and deceived the simple. Like fine whited sepulchres (see on Luke xi. 44. § 87.) they looked very beautiful without, but

within were full of all uncleanness, and defiled every one that touched them. This was a sore rebuke to men who would not keep company with publicans and sinners, for fear they should have been polluted by them. The truth is, these hypocrites were publicly decent, but privately dissolute; they put on a saint-like look, but in reality were the very worst of men. Matt. xxiii. 27. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead mens bones, and of all uncleanness. 28. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. 8. Because by the pains they took in adorning the sepulchres of the prophets, they pretended a great veneration for their memory; and as often as they happened to be mentioned, condemned their fathers who had killed them, declaring that if they had lived in the days of their fathers, they would have opposed their wicked-ness; while, in the mean time, they still cherished the spirit of their fathers, persecuting the messengers of God, particularly his only Son, on whose destruction they were resolutely bent. 29. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righ teous. 30. 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. 31. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets; see on Luke xi. 48. § 87. By affirming, that if ye had lived in the days of your fathers, you would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets, ye acknowledge that ye are children of them who murdered the prophets. But I must be so free as to tell you, that you are their children otherwise than by natural generation; for though you pretend to be more holy than they were, you are like them in all respects, particularly you possess. their wicked persecuting spirit, and testify it by all your actions. 32. Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers sin; the measure fixed upon by God for punishment. This expression implies, that there is a certain measure fixed for every nation, to which its iniquity is allowed to rise; and that before punishment is inflicted on nations, the measure of their iniquity, determined by God, must be filled up by the succeeding generations adding to the iniquity of the preceding, till the measure is full. According to Glassus, and other critics, xa λngwoare, is here the imperative for the future, Ye will fill up. But it may have been ironically spoken, as our translators understood it. 33. Te ser pents, ye generation of vipers, (see on Luke iii. 7. § 14.) how can ye escape the damnation of hell? 34. Wherefore (dia 7870, for this, Men of warm tempers are apt to mistake this part of Christ's dis

course.

172

ye

this cause that ye are serpents and a brood of vipers, who will fill up the measure of your fathers iniquity) behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes, in order if possible to convert you; and some of them ye shall kill and crucify, and some of them shall Scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city: Matth. xxiii. 35. That upon you may come all the righteous blood (i. e. the temporal punishment of the murders of righteous men; because in the life to come men shall not be punished for the sins of others, to which they were not accessory) shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel, unto the blood of Zacharias, the son of Barachias (see Tillotson'sSermons, vol. ii. pag. 197.) whom ye slew between the temple and the altar (see the note, f 122. in which is given a description of the temple). 36. Verily I say unto you, all these things, the temporal punishment of all these murders, shall come upon this generation. His meaning was not that he would send them prophets to be killed, that they might not escape the damnation of hell, but that every possible method might be tried for their conversion; though he well knew that they would make light of all, and by so doing, pull down upon themselves such terrible vengeance, as should be a standing monument of the Divine displeasure against all the murders committed on the face of the earth, from the beginning of time. For " even as Sodom and Gomorrah," anciently," and the cities about them, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire;" just so the Jewish nation was singled out, and that generation of the nation pitched upon to be the subjects of God's revenge against murder, and to be an example of punishment to all generations, because they were the most atrocious body of murderers that ever lived.

Having thus laid before the Pharisees, and the nation, their hei nous guilt and grievous punishment, the thought of the calami- ties

course. They fancy that his giving the Pharisees names expressive of their characters, and his denouncing woes against them, justify those censorious judgments, which without reason, or it may be contrary to reason, they pass on persons who happen to be at variance with them. It is very true that Jesus pronounced the Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, fools, blind guides, serpents, a generation of vipers, and declared that they could not es. cape the damnation of hell. But it is equally true, that they were hypocrites and fools as wicked as he has painted them, and that he knew them certainly to be such. Wherefore, till we can make it evident that we have the faculty of knowing mens hearts, which Christ possessed, we have no title to imitate him in an action not designed for our imitation, being done by him as a prophet, and by virtue of his prophetical gifts, and not as an ordinary man. Instead of making free with the characters of others, as many do, it is far safer, and in every respect better, both for ourselves and for society, that we keep close to the precept, forbidding rash judg ments, evil surmisings, and all backbitings, Matth. vii. 1,—5.