That on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth

 

 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one 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, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'"

 

- Matthew 23:27-39 

 

In yesterday's reading, Jesus continued His final sermon of His earthly life, preaching in the temple at Jerusalem:   "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers.  Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.  Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.'  Fools and blind!  For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold?  And, 'Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obliged to perform it.'  Fools and blind!  For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift?  Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it.  He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells on it.  And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law:  justice and mercy and faith.  These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.  Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence.  Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also." 

 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness."  Here Jesus continues the theme we read in yesterday's reading (above), as His sermon focused on the hypocrisy of the religious leaders.  In the beginning of His sermon, as we read on Monday, He said of them that "all their works they do to be seen by men" and so this comment that they appear beautiful outwardly applies in that sense.  They have external signs of holiness (and "cleanliness" in this sense of religious purification) but internally are anything but. 

 

"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation."  Here is Jesus' theme elaborated that these religious leaders "are full of dead men's bones and all unrighteousness" -- He says they are the same, the very sons of those who murdered the prophets, for they continue in the same behavior.  Jesus gives His own prophecy here of those whom He will send to them, some of whom they will kill and crucify, scourge in their synagogues, and persecute from city to city.  In Greek, the verb that is translated as "I send" is ἀποστέλλω/apostello, the root from which we derive the word "apostle."  So while even now He sends them out (present tense), He speaks of the future when His apostles (prophets, wise men, and scribes) will be crucified, scourged, and persecuted from city to city.  Jesus speaks of those from the beginning, righteous Abel (who was killed by his brother Cain in Genesis 4:1-15)  to Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  While some patristic commentary indicates this was the prophet at the time of Joash the king (2 Chronicles 24:20-22), others as well as modern scholars say it refers to the father of St. John the Baptist, making the contemporary "whom you murdered" make sense.  According to tradition, Zechariah the father of John the Baptist was also murdered in the temple.  In Luke's Gospel, he is referred to in the Greek version of his name, Zacharias (see Luke 1:5-25, 57-80).

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one 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, but you were not willing!  See!  Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, 'Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!'"  My study Bible comments that God's deepest desire is the reconciliation of God's people, yet most do not want God.  The house which is desolate refers both to the temple in Jerusalem and to the nation itself, for "house" can be used to mean also family or tribe (see Psalms 115:12, 135:19).  Both the temple and the nation will be without God's protective presence once Christ departs.

Of course, Christian tradition understands Christ's prophecy of the destruction of the temple (and of Jerusalem) as fulfilled in AD 70, when the temple was destroyed by the Romans at the Siege of Jerusalem.  The prophecy of Jesus is seen in this light.  So, we might ask ourselves, how is it possible for "all the righteous blood shed on the earth" to come to one generation?  For that, we must ask ourselves about spiritual awareness and knowledge and the weight they carry in human lives.  These men to whom Christ speaks in today's reading are the experts in the Scriptures, the keepers of Jewish spiritual and religious history and tradition.  Moreover, these men are the ones responsible for the instruction of Israel, the carrying forward of the spiritual tradition of Judaism, and they have failed, in Christ's eyes, through their hypocrisy and corruption.  Even so, we might ask, how can the full weight of all the righteous blood shed come upon one generation?  First we must understand the responsibility that spiritual knowledge and experience carries.  When one "knows better" there is far more responsibility involved than something done in ignorance.  Second, Jesus gives us a very close hint when He tells them (in yesterday's reading, above), "For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves."   Bad habits and practices become extended from one person to another, and from one generation to another, when they are successively taught through practices and ways of thinking and being.  Righteousness is a question of how we relate to the world and all beings and things in the world; therefore unrighteousness can be acquired and learned as well through the imitation of those who fail to live righteousness.  Indeed, in the Orthodox tradition, the world is in a "fallen" state primarily due to the fact that we inherit the conditions created and, in a sense, "descended" from the first sin.  We don't inherit guilt, but we do acquire the habits of the world around us, the conditions into which we're born.  So these religious leaders are responsible for their own behavior, as they know the teachings of righteousness and yet simply accept corruption and its practices, even extended to unrighteous bloodshed and violence.  Jesus speaks of their hypocrisy when He tells them that "you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'  Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.  Fill up, then, the measure of your father's guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?"   And He prophesies what they themselves will do, including His own crucifixion:   "Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes:  some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation."  Christ ties them in to an extended history of what they know to be blameworthy behavior ("you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets'"), and prophesies that they will continue to do the same nonetheless.   Therefore Jesus speaks of the power of spiritual reality at work in our world, which is not only the power of God which sanctifies and brings holiness, enables prophesy and all the varied fruit of the Spirit in our world.  But that same power of sanctification and righteousness is also at work when we fail to uphold what we know to be the good, when we know better, when holiness is standing before us and testifying.  Jesus indicates this when He sends out the apostles and tells them, "And whoever will not receive you nor hear your words, when you depart from that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city!" (Matthew 10:14-15).  Note also that what we might call this destructive spiritual power (in response to unrighteous denial or rejection of holiness) comes in time; it will be forty years before the fulfillment of this prophecy.  This is understood as merciful, for there is time for people to repent.  Therefore to those who would be blind to it, cause and effect are not necessarily understood; only those capable of repentance could see or sense the spiritual effects of their actions.  So we today who "know better," who are recipients of the spiritual teachings of Christ and the traditions of holiness that are handed to us, bear responsibility for the spiritual treasures and wisdom we have been given through prophets, wise men, and scribes.  For God's holy power is still at work.  Let us consider when we pray the power of holiness and the reality of Christ's words and teachings.  For righteousness and compassion always remain essential to our understanding of the people He calls us to be.