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!"

 

 "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 fathers' 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 

 

We are currently in the middle of chapter 23 of St. Matthew's Gospel.  In this chapter we are given Christ's final public sermon.  In it we find a grand critique by Christ of the ways of the Pharisees and scribes.  Yesterday we read that Jesus said, "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, is it 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.  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.  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."  Jesus continues His condemnation of the murderous hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees.  Their outward piety, while nominally good in upholding the teachings of the Law, masks an inward faithlessness and even murderous greed.  Thus, inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.  As Jesus says, they outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.  Moreover, just as Jesus told in the parable of the Vineyard, the many servants sent by God (the prophets and righteous) were persecuted in the days of their fathers.  So while they may outwardly honor the martyrs of the past, they witness against themselves that they are "sons of those who murdered the prophets," meaning that despite their words, they follow in the same footsteps as those murderers, and are therefore their "sons."

 

"Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers' 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."  Jesus speaks here as the Son who was sent after all the servants (the prophets and righteous) who previously came calling the people back to God.  He prophesies of the persecutions to come from these men, and the resulting effect:  "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."  Regarding Zechariah, son of Berechiah, some patristic commentary teaches that this was the prophet at the time of Joash the king (2 Chronicles 24:20-22).  But others teach that Jesus is referring to the father of St. John the Baptist, who, according to tradition, was also murdered in the temple.  Indeed, according to commentary by Fr. Stephen De Young, the latter understanding is correct, that Jesus speaks here of the father of St. John the Baptist, for there is nothing in the Old Testament indicating that the prophet at the time of Joash was murdered, but on the contrary lived a long life.  

 

 "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, but most do not want God.  The desolate house refers both to the temple and to the nation itself, for this Greek word broadly meaning house can also be used to mean "family" or "tribe" (see Psalms 115:12, 135:19).  Both the temple and the nation, my study Bible says, will be without God's presence once Christ has departed.

 

 It's very easy to minimize the effects of hypocrisy in our lives.  It's such a commonplace thing, on a varying scale, that it's easy to excuse or pass off as simply the difficulty of living our lives authentically within our faith.  But the Church has its own ways of coming to terms with the ways in which we fall short of living the life of faith which Christ teaches us.  Repentance is a way of healing what is wrong in our lives, where we've made wrong turns, and forgiveness is held out by a loving God.  But when we are frozen in that repentance, for whatever reason, we unfortunately can become hardened in that place, even opposed to Christ, even despising and hating what is good.  The practices of the scribes and Pharisees described by Christ are such things as are the outcome of a refusal of repentance, of heeding the call back to God.  For God has called from the beginning for a righteousness not merely of outward practice, but of faith.  Outward practice is important, for we as human beings are physical beings; what we do with our bodies makes a great deal of difference, and our bodies are not separated from soul and spirit but we are of one creation by God.  It is the split itself, in these cases, that is the problem, and leads to evil.  And this is what Jesus condemns and is talking about.  When the outward practices of these religious leaders shield practices that defy the purposes of God, the corruption only results in a deepening problem.  Jesus describes greed and envy, murderous intention when authority or public position is threatened, and a whole history of such repeated through time, and culminating in the present moment in which He speaks these words in the temple during Holy Week.  He speaks as the Son, sent by the Father to call people back, the age of the prophets of the Old Testament period having culminated in St. John the Baptist.  But the refusal to repentance has consequences.  Jesus will hold out the possibility of forgiveness through repentance, and through all the practices of the Church, starting with Holy Baptism.  But a refusal will only leave things where they are, a constant refusal of God's grace and mercy.  Effectively, this refusal is itself a kind of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, and without repentance will not result in spiritual healing and salvation.  So, we find ourselves today asking what this has to do with us.  But, as my study Bible says, it has everything to do with us.  Hypocrisy hasn't left us, and neither has corruption.  In our Holy Bibles we read of Abraham whose faithfulness was counted to him as righteousness; St. Paul explains that this remained essential even after the Law came, for we find it in David (see Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3-8), and so it remains as well for us.  Without hearts drawn toward God, we miss the point of our faith, we miss the righteousness of Abraham, we run the risk of a hypocrisy that refuses God's call to change and repentance, healing and, effectively, salvation itself.  Let us take Jesus' words to heart, for He leaves His scathing testimony to us as the faithful Witness (Revelation 1:5).  

 

 

 

 

 

Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ

 

 Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying:  "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.  Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.  For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders, but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.  But all their works they do to be seen by men.  They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments.  They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'  But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren.  Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.  And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.  But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.  And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

 

- Matthew 23:1–12 

 

On Saturday we read that the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Jesus and asked Him, saying:  "Teacher, Moses said that if a man dies, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.  Now there were with us seven brothers.  The first died after he had married, and having no offspring, left his wife to his brother.  Likewise the second also, and the third, even to the seventh.  Last of all the woman died also.  Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife of the seven will she be?  For they all had her."  Jesus answered and said to them, "You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God.  For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.  But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'?  God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."  And when the multitudes heard this, they were astonished at His teaching.  But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.  Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?"  Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:  'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

 

Today the lectionary takes us to chapter 23 of St. Matthew's Gospel, which gives us Jesus' final public sermon.  This is a grand critique of the ways of the scribes and Pharisees.  My study Bible names several themes in the entirely of the chapter.  These include, first:  The Jewish leaders have God-given authority and they teach God's Law, but personally they are ungodly and cold-hearted.  In these first verses, Jesus teaches says that their teaching is to be honored, but they are not to be imitated.  In the themes that follow, Jesus established as well that God is our true Father and Teacher.  My study Bible explains that a true teacher or father on earth is therefore one who leads people to God.  But the scribes and the Pharisees do the opposite.  They place themselves in God's position.  The rest of the chapter includes an eightfold indictment of the scribes and Pharisees.  He charges them with inverting the values of God by being mean-spirited, judgmental, greedy, ambitious, absorbed in externals, and blindly self-righteous.  My study Bible adds that, while these charges were directed against the Jewish leaders of the day, every word applies equally to those in the Church who behave this way.  

 

 Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying:  "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.  Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do."   My study Bible notes that to sit in Moses' seat means to hold the succession of office down from Moses himself.  In the synagogue, it says, the teacher spoke while seated as a sign of this authority.  St. John Chrysostom, according to my study Bible, comments that the scribes were depraved in thought and in heart, but Jesus still upholds the dignity of their office.  This is because the words they speak are not their own words, but God's.  So likewise in the Church, the clergy are to be shown respect because they hold the apostolic office, even though they also are sinners.  Moreover, the sins of the clergy do not relieve the people from their responsibilities before God.  

 

"For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders, but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.  But all their works they do to be seen by men.  They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments."  My study Bible explains that phylacteries are small leather pouches which contain passages of Scripture.  They are worn on the arm or forehead.  This concept was to keep God's Law always in mind (see Exodus 13:9).  But the Pharisees had used them as a show of false piety, making the increasingly larger and more noticeable.  

 

"They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'  But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren.  Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.  And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.  But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.  And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."  My study Bible comments that Christ's warning against calling hypocrites father and teacher is not an absolute prohibition against using these terms, as some teach.  These terms are in fact applied to men many times in the New Testament, all of which usages are inspired by God.  "Teacher" is used in John 3:10; Acts 13:1; 1 Corinthians 12:28; Ephesians 4:11; and 2 Timothy 1:11.  "Father" is used in Luke 16:24; 1 Corinthians 4:15; and Colossians 3:21.  My study Bible adds that, since the very early days of the Church, bishops and presbyters have been called "father" not because they take God's place, but because in their fatherly care for their flocks, they lead people to God, and they exercise fatherly authority within the community. 

 

Today's reading and the commentary from my study Bible call us to think about what it is that makes a true father or a true teacher.  Is it someone who leads us astray out of use of his (or her, in the case of a female teacher or parent) authority?   Once again, we're called to consider what true authority means, and particularly in the context of the Church, and in serving God.  When we consider what it means to lead people to God, as my study Bible defines a correct father or teacher, we can understand that all authority, if it is to be proper, must point toward that which is good, true, and beautiful.  The ultimate Source of all of these is God, and the spiritual reality of the Kingdom is that reality in which these things originate.  We also know that God's nature is love.  In perfect harmony with Jesus' teaching about the greatest commandments in yesterday's reading (see above), St. John writes, "He who does not love does not know God, for God is love" (1 John 4:8).  So, if God is love, if Christ Incarnate is the embodiment of God the Father for us (John 14:9), then a true "father" or "teacher" must also convey love as part of leading us to God.  When the disciples began to dispute regarding who would be greatest in Christ's Kingdom, He began to teach them about the proper use of authority in His Church.  As if to emphasize this very point about being proper teachers and fathers in His Church, His very first act, in teaching on this subject of greatness or authority, was to bring a little child in front of the disciples.  He told them, "Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever receives one little child like this in My name receives Me"  (Matthew 18:3-5).  His next teaching was a dire warning against abuses in such positions:  "But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world because of offenses! For offenses must come, but woe to that man by whom the offense comes!" (Matthew 18:6-7).  What followed these words was a dramatic warning about cutting off impulses that lead to harm or abuse, with the threat of hell fire as consequence of failure to do so, comparing this need to the amputation of a diseased foot, hand, or eye in order to save the whole body (see Matthew 18:8-9).  So, in training these men to be proper "fathers" and "teachers" in His Church, Christ has set down for us what it means to carry such authority and act this part.  He has also defined the most extreme circumstances should one not only fail to do this job, but to do so with abuse of authority in such a position.  So, therefore, in reading Christ's words in today's reading regarding the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and the scribes, we are to understand the true power of authority.  In our Church, for example, as my study Bible notes, we are read the Gospel, the words of Christ, the inspired Scripture of the Evangelists.  These words come from God and they are authoritative and true.  So, regardless of the personal failings on the part of the priest or presbyter or any authority in the Church, nonetheless the office holds true in this teaching.  But to fail to uphold this ultimate office of leading people to God in some other way -- say by causing abuse, harm, or offense to those in their charge -- is to become like the greedy Pharisees and scribes, exploiting their positions for personal gain, and harming the flock whom they are to care for and steward to God.  One may daresay that the same applies to parents or other authority figures who do the same, who teach evil of any kind, leading to harm and exploitation, and real damage to the "little ones" in their care and under their stewardship.  So we are all invited to consider the roles we play in the lives of our families or all those with whom we share relationship in community of all kinds, but particularly, of course, in the context of our faith.  Do we seek to teach by living lives seeking God's way as a model for others who learn from us?  Do we seek to know God's love, and live it in communion with others?  How do we find proper authority?  Moreover, how do we discern what is improper, exploitative, and harmful?  Or even greater importance, are there ways in which our own behaviors or even teachings effectively draw people away from God, or separate the impressionable and vulnerable from the path to God and leading them astray to be lost?  So when we consider Christ's criticisms of these religious leaders (especially regarding their hypocrisy) let us take seriously our own roles in the salvation plan of Christ.  In other words, no matter who we are, as Christ's followers, we have our own role to play in being mentors, parents, elders, teachers, and it does truly depend upon taking His words to heart.  Let us remember that He has said repeatedly that He came to save the lost, and He wants to lose none of those who are given to Him (see, for example, John 6:39, "This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day").  Let us play our part in the light of what we understand proper authority to be, according to His teachings, and share with Him the goal of saving that which is lost, and losing none.  All of it calls for the humility to serve God in any role we play, and to help to lead others there.  For we all have our own part to play, to help to lead in one direction or another.

 

 

 

Your house is left to you desolate

 

 "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 fathers' 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 our current readings, it is Holy Week, and Jesus has been disputing in the temple with the religious leaders, who question His authority.  On Wednesday, the readings gave us the beginning of Christ's final public sermon, an eight-fold indictment of the practices of the scribes and Pharisees.  Yesterday, we read the next part of that sermon:  "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 in 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."  Jesus continues His sermon in the same theme from yesterday's reading (above), the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees.  Here He describes that state of their hypocrisy as being akin to whitewashed tombs.  In this context of hypocrisy and lawlessness we should remember that the earliest teachings of the apostles included the teaching of the two ways:  the way of life and the way of death (see the Didache).  This tradition was also found in Judaism, and so would be familiar to Christ's hearers in the temple.  Surely the association with tombs and dead men's bones and all uncleanness would indicate the way of death.

"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."  Again, here are more associations of their hypocrisy with death, but this time the accusation is one of continuation in the way of the murderers of God's servants, the prophets, those who bear the word of God into the world.   

 

 "Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers' 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."  Jesus speaks directly to the scribes and Pharisees as those who continue in the ways of the ones who killed the prophets, but this time it is  a prophecy of persecution of those who will come in the name of Christ, and also a prophecy of what is to come upon this generation.  Some teach that Zechariah, son of Berechiah was the prophet at the time of Joash the king (2 Chronicles 24:20-22), but others, including Fr. Stephen De Young, say it refers to the father of St. John the Baptist, who, according to tradition, was also murdered in the temple.  When Jesus uses the epithet, "Serpents, brood of vipers!"  He's using images of demons, and so is associating the behaviors of the scribes and Pharisees, and those whom He's calling their fathers, with the work of evil.

"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 here that God's deepest desire is the reconciliation of God's people, yet most do not want Him.  This desolate house Christ describes is a reference both to the temple and also to the nation itself.  My study Bible points out that "house" can be used to mean "family" or "tribe" (see Psalms 115:12, 135:19).  It says that both the temple and the nation will be without God's presence once Christ departs.

Jesus' words in today's reading are so serious that they should give everyone pause.  What He says is the depth to which we may hold responsibility for actions that may be politically motivated, but that in effect harm the prophets of God.  There is a powerful thread of bearing responsibility for our failure to recognize the consequences of what we do when we act against the power of God, against the Holy Spirit.  Prophets come into the world as those who do not fit easily into a social construct or way of thinking.  They are those who call those in authority, or the practices of a whole society, back to God when they have strayed and practice that which is not acceptable in the sight of God.  Of course, the responsibility for such practices also depends upon the extent to which such people should "know better," their spiritual understanding and education.  But in this case, in this great indictment of the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus is speaking to people who are steeped in the entirety of Jewish spiritual tradition and in the Scriptures.  He is speaking to those who not only know the prophets, but also claim, "If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets."  They are entirely familiar with the activity of the Holy Spirit throughout the spiritual history of Israel, and so, their rejection of Christ carries with it the responsibility for the denial of what they see in His ministry.  This is an extremely powerful example for ourselves today, because we have our own knowledge of the power of God, the Holy Spirit, the ministry of Christ, and of all the saints that have come in His name since.  We are aware of what our teachings tell us about compassion and faith in God, and about holiness itself.  These are things that this passage calls upon us to take seriously, especially in terms of our own blindness to them when they may be present to us in our own lives.  For we all bear not simply a responsibility for our spiritual capacity to hear and see such things, but also our lives are blighted by such blindness and deafness.  There are ways in which we are diminished and lessened, even when we are blind to spiritual truth.  For, possibly like these men to whom Jesus directs His criticism in Matthew's chapter 23, when we do feel the effects of our own rejection of holiness in our midst, it might be in a way that has eluded our awareness -- a course that may be too late to change.  Even the destruction of Jerusalem and its terrible violence would seem on material terms to simply be part of the force of Roman might and military.  But Christ here connects that outcome with the long line of rejection of God's work, and more to come that He foresees.  Let us be alert to what God seeks for us to see and to hear today.

Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers' guilt. Serpents, brood of vipers!

 

 "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 fathers' 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.

"Oh 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, we continued with Jesus' final public sermon (read the beginning in Wednesday's reading).  Jesus said, "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 in 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.  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 fathers' guilt.  Serpents, brood of vipers!  How can you escape the condemnation of hell?"  Earlier, Jesus told the parable of the Wicked Vinedressers, in which the vineyard owner (representing God) sent many servants to ask for the fruit of the harvest (the prophets sent to Israel).  Finally, the wicked vinedressers, who've leased the land, decide to kill the son of the owner (representing Christ) when he is sent to them.  Here in this part of Christ's final public sermon, Jesus links the leadership of His time with the leaders who murdered the prophets, declaring they are in the same lineage as those who were partakers in the blood of the prophets.  Their hypocrisy is condemned by Christ as it is covers staggering sins, which they are about to extend from the past murder of many servants/prophets into another terrible murder of the Son.  He says to them, in this context, that they take upon themselves the sin of the past by extending it into the present, "Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers' guilt." 

"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 Jesus clearly links the parable of the Wicked Vinedressers to the prophets, wise men, and scribes which are to come in His name, affirming their responsibility for the continued persecutions begun in acts against the murdered prophets of the past.  In Jesus' words, they are all linked from the same impulse and in the same lineage.  The murder of Abel was the first murder, and was done for spiritual envy (Genesis 4:1-15), the reference to precisely which Zechariah Jesus names is disputed in the tradition of the Church.  Some of the patristic teachers say this was the prophet at the time of Joash the king (2 Chronicles 24:20-22), and others say it refers to the father of St. John the Baptist, who according to tradition, was also murdered in the temple.  At any rate, we are to understand from Christ's words the whole chronicle of martyrs, from the first murder to the last prophet murdered, the guilt of which is cemented by future acts in which they will kill and crucify, scourge, and persecute those sent in Christ's name, so that all these things will come upon this generation.

"Oh 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 desolate house refers both to the temple and to the nation itself, for house can be used to mean "family or "tribe" (see Psalms 115:12, 135:19).   My study Bible adds that both the temple and the nation will be without God's presence once Christ departs.

There is an interesting concept which Jesus expresses in today's reading that should give us pause to think.  He refers to all the unjust murders of the past -- and specifically those martyred for reasons of faithfulness to God, especially servants of God such as the prophets and others -- as contained also within such acts going into the immediate future.  In other words, the continuation of such types of acts incurs the collective guilt of the precedents.  This is something we need to think about, as our faith does not nominally hold anyone responsible for the sins committed by others.  But at Jesus' words we need to think.  If we would collectively mourn and rue terrible acts of sin through the murder of innocent martyrs, servants of God, of the past, does that not give us a responsibility in terms of the things we ourselves do in life?  Should we mourn terrible injustices of the past, and yet move along to commit the same sorts of crimes?  Here, Christ is speaking of crimes committed precisely because a servant of God (such as a prophet) is sent with a message from God to the people, calling people back to God.  He extends that to the servants (I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes) whom they will also persecute and murder.  If they understand and mourn the terrible acts of the past, if they mourn the murder of the prophets of the past and claim they would not do such things as their ancestors have done, then what culpability will they have when the do the same?  Of course, it is Christ Himself who knows what is going to happen to Him at the end of this very week through which we're reading in the Gospels.  He knows they plot against Him, and that He will go to His crucifixion.  But here, He does not mention Himself.  Instead He refers to those whom He will send whom this leadership will also persecute, scourge, and murder.  It should, at the very least, give us pause to consider that when we do something similar to that which we have condemned in others of the past, we take the responsibility of that past crime upon ourselves.  It is the greatest act of hypocrisy to condemn an injustice of the past, especially one implying such serious understanding as committed against one who bears a message of God, but to engage in the same oneself.   Christ's words should teach us about our own acts of hypocrisy, to weigh our decisions in light of what exactly we would join in condemning of the past.  For the same temptations and evils, as Jesus Himself points out here, come in the future.  God will continue to attempt to reach us, and we will be faced with similar choices about message we don't like to hear, and the temptation to respond with hatred against the messenger, even the spiritual envy of Cain for one who was favored by God for his sacrifice.  Let us weigh the options of repentance and sin, and think about Christ's words, for sin continues, and our options remain the same. 

 

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

 

 "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 in 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."

 

- Matthew 23:13-26 

 

Yesterday we read the beginning of what is known as Christ's final public discourse, which continues in today's reading.  Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying:  "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.  Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.  For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.  But all their works they do to be seen by men.  They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments.  They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'  But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren.  Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.  And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.  But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.  And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."

 

 "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 in it.  And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it."  My study Bible comments that because the example of a leader can be so influential, leaders who do not love God can hinder others from finding God as well.  Therefore, leaders are held to a higher standard (see James 3:1).  Let us notice that the examples Jesus chooses here emphasize the centrality of God, whether we are speaking of holiness (sanctifies the gold) or power and authority (he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it).  When Christ speaks of the leaders who make their proselyte twice as much a son of hell as yourselves, He's speaking of the importance of correction, for whatever bad path we're on, the further it is traveled, the worse the condition becomes.  Above all, Christ's condemnation is for hypocrisy. He says they devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayers -- evidence of predatory behavior covered with appearances of piety.  The work of false teachers hinders and misleads those who truly seek God:  He says they "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 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."  My study Bible comments that these warnings are especially important to Orthodox Christians (and by extension they apply to the practice of all traditions in Christian churches).  It says that the Church has maintained the ancient practices of tithing, to which Jesus refers here when He says "These you ought to have done"; sacred vessels; holy rites; and following the tradition that we've inherited.  It says that these practices can be expressions of deep faith, lead a person to deeper commitment to God, and safeguard our life in Christ -- or they can be observed without ever taking them to heart and lead to condemnation.  In all ways, throughout this discourse, Jesus emphasizes the condition of the heart and the state of our love for God.  Note that when Jesus speaks of those who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel, He's referring to the practice of the Pharisees of attaching strainers to the mouths of decanters in order to avoid accidentally consuming a ritually unclean substance.  But we should take note of the value of the metaphor!

During His time being questioned in the Temple, in this final week of Christ's earthly life, Jesus has been quizzed by one of the experts in the Law as to which was the greatest commandment.  See Tuesday's reading and commentary.  Jesus' answer was to give two great commandments, in ranking order of first and second, but which go together.  His formula was simple but entirely profound:  "'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:  'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."  In today's reading, in which He criticizes from a long list of the failures of the religious leadership, He puts down the example of what it is to fail to live these two commandments.  Why is the love of God with all one's heart and soul and mind the first great commandment?  Because this act of love in the heart sets down the pattern for all of life and the rest of our relationships.  Without the depth of connection to God (Who is love) in our hearts, the rest of the practices will fail to be meaningful.  From that love of God, we are taught love and the correct relationship to creation, including our neighbor.  Hypocrisy comes from an outward appearance which seeks to convey an image, but couple with an emptiness in the heart.  Christ's focus is always with an emphasis on the heart and the state of the heart, the condition of the heart.  And this is particularly given in the context of relationship to God, the foundation of love and our understanding of love and good relationship.  So let us take this in the context in which it is given.  Jesus is not seeking to tear down the Temple nor the whole of Jewish spiritual tradition;  He is criticizing the corruption of these authorities and the practices that stem from that.  His byword here is hypocrisy, and this is therefore the thing we most need to note.  This is His greatest warning to us, His followers, and the things we also need to guard against in the practice of our faith and worship.  Let us note also that this is not simply a credal statement, a system of belief, or a philosophy, but what Jesus speaks about is the life He lives and teaches us through His Incarnation.  That is, it is a living, dynamic, mystical relationship of love. This is a reality of the heart that informs, empowers, and shapes our behavior as we live our faith and the trust we put in God, in Christ.  In short, it shapes us and our lives.  This is always the basis for Christ's emphasis on the state of the heart and its relationship to how we live our lives.  So let us do our part to guard against hypocrisy.  Let our worship and prayers be meaningful, and let the love of God in the heart -- that place where we know God's love -- inform the ways in which we live our faith and how we approach the world.  When Jesus teaches that one must first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also, it is a clear metaphor about us and about our lives.  He's not telling us to throw out beautiful or traditional worship practices, such as tithing or almsgiving, but that these you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.  

 

 

How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!

 "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 then 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 fathers' 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 our current readings, Jesus is in Jerusalem, and it is Holy Week.  He has made His Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, cleansed the temple, and engaged in confrontation, questioning, and testing by the various parties of the  leadership, with His own challenging responses.  (See the readings from Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.)  In Monday's reading, Jesus began His final public sermon, a great indictment of the practices of the leadership.  In yesterday's reading, He continued:   "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you shut up the kingdom 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."  Again, Jesus uses vivid imagery to express the idea -- and the true spiritual condition -- of their religious hypocrisy.  We would do well to remember that Jesus is the One who has come to give us life in abundance.  He is the light of the world, and that light is the life of the world.  It is evil that is death, and the internal darkness of tombs is full of death.

"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 then 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 fathers' 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 another measure of hypocrisy:  those who have harmed the servants who have come in the name of the Lord, calling God's people back to God, are their "fathers."  The present day leadership builds tombs to the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and declares they would not have responded as did their fathers.  But Jesus says they are identical and do the same, and thereby witness against themselves.  By doing what they do (and will do to him) they also inherit the guilt of the same acts.  See Jesus' parable of the Wicked Vinedressers in Wednesday's reading for a deliberate illustration of what He is alluding to here.

"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 says here that God's deepest desire is the reconciliation of His people, yet most do not want Him.  The house left desolate refers to the temple and also to the nation (of which the temple is great symbol and representative), as a house also has the meaning of "family" or "tribe" (Psalm 115:12, 135:19).

Jesus' repeated use of the word "woe" in this final public sermon is one that is important for us to understand in its context.  Hilary of Poitiers has commented that "woe" is a voice of sorrowing. For this reason Jesus says earlier in the sermon that the Pharisees and scribes close the kingdom of heaven, because they hide in the law the consolation of His truth.  They lost sight of the advent of the Messiah expected by the prophets.  St. Hilary writes, "Through deceptive teachings, they do not allow others to go to heaven either. They do not adorn the way of eternity" (On Matthew 24.3).  That woe is a voice of sorrowing is very pertinent and evident in today's reading, as we read Jesus' clear words of lamentation over Jerusalem.  Jesus' words give us this clear understanding, when He says, "How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!"   The maternal image of the hen gathering her chicks is the image of Christ as He pronounces woe, even as He calls Jerusalem "the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her."    All the images given here are maternal and caring.  He even calls Jerusalem "her," giving us not just the language of mother and home, but also of the Bride.  This final summing up of woes regarding the leadership isn't one of condemning anger, but of sorrowful lament.  There may be a kind of righteous anger or indignation at the practices that harm the people, especially the poorest and the helpless who are led astray and preyed upon, but there is sorrow in the lament of where it all leads, and the result these choices will produce.  All of the practices that Jesus condemns are those of turning astray from God and from the prophets and servants repeatedly sent to call them back to God and to God's ways.  The last and final one sent is Christ -- the Son Himself (see again the parable of the Wicked Vinedressers in Wednesday's reading).  Christ's great lament over His beloved, the Bride Jerusalem, becomes a teaching for all of us and for the whole world.  This isn't just about one people, but it is about all of us who call ourselves children by adoption, who desire also to be a part of God's people by following Christ.  The Church falls under the same "rule" that Jesus espouses here.  Hypocrisy that hides greed and exploitation will also bring woe and lamentation, a sad state.  It hides death and darkness inside of a whitewashed exterior, when we are called to come to the One who gives life to the world.  If we look around us in our world, we can see the effects of evil acts.  There is hypocrisy to go around.  Those who profess to love Christ cannot hide behind a false exterior kind of morality or "legality" while the things they do only bring more death and suffering into the world, especially to those who are powerless.  Let us remember His words of lamentation, and that they apply to us today as they did on that day when Jesus said them in the temple in Jerusalem a generation before its destruction in 70 A.D. at the siege of Jerusalem.  He is still the mother hen who wishes to gather her chicks under her wings, if we are but willing to come.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!

 "But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you shut up the kingdom 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."

- Matthew 23:13-26

In our current readings, Jesus is in Jerusalem, and it is Holy Week.  He has made His Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, cleansed the temple, and engaged in confrontation, questioning, and testing by the leadership, with His own challenging responses.  (See the readings from Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.)   In yesterday's reading, Jesus began what is known to be His last public sermon, in which He gives a sweeping indictment of the practices of the leadership, particularly the scribes and Pharisees.  Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying:  "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.  Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.  For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.  But all their works they do to be seen by men.  They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments.  They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'  But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren.  Do not call anyone on earth your father, for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.  And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.  But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.  And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." 

"But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you shut up the kingdom 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."  In this final public sermon, Jesus names the hypocrisy in the practices of the scribes and Pharisees.  We should read it like a final warning, a caution, an effort of mercy on Christ's part.  In these first verses, Jesus declares woe in response to the neglect of salvation -- the salvation of their followers and their flock.  True salvation and illumination happens in the love of God, but we can see where the focus is here:  the pretense of long prayers, the greed of "devouring" widows' houses.   Such leaders with this focus cannot lead their flock to the kingdom they fail to enter.   The widows are among the poor and powerless, the vulnerable.

"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."  How can those with the focus Jesus' names bring their proselytes to the kingdom?  My study bible says that because the example of a leader can be so influential, leaders who don't love God can hinder others from finding God as well.  They must be held to a higher standard (James 3:1).  Every word in Christ's final sermon must be equally applied to those in His Church.  His words here warn of a kind of slippery slope:  things don't stay the same but become worse with successive orders of bad leadership.  There is a parallel to His teaching in chapter 12, also contained in a passage criticizing the leadership -- in that case, for their demand from Him for a sign.  He taught, "When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says, 'I will return to my house from which I came.' And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order.  Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation" (12:43-45).

"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."  Jesus alludes to the practice developed of swearing by the gold of the temple and of the gifts on the altar.  But there is a failure to recognize who it is who gives value to the gold and the gifts.  There is a failure to understand God in the temple, God on the altar.  Their own blindness to the first great commandment to love God determines the rest of the mistaken practices here, the failure to know God and thereby that from which all value comes.   The lack of understanding of gifts and value is clearly tied spiritually and psychologically to the focus on greed and the failure to grasp the kingdom, the "pretense" of long prayer for show.  There is a lack of awareness of the presence of God, and this permeates all things.

"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!"  Jesus again refers to particular practices and the hypocritical ways in which they are done.  Tithing is an ancient practice still done in the Church (Jesus says, "These you ought to have done . . ."), but they have neglected what was more important at the same time.  Herbs like mint and anise and cummin would be weighed for a tithe, but the weightier matters of the law are justice and mercy and faith.  My study bible says that practices such as tithing "can be deep expressions of faith, lead a person to deeper commitment to God, and safeguard our life in Christ, or they can be observed without ever taking them to heart and lead to condemnation."  To "strain out a gnat and swallow a camel" references  the practice of attaching strainers to the mouth of vessels in order to avoid accidentally swallowing an unclean substance.  Camel here is (obviously) used for its figurative sense as something tremendously large, just as it is in the expression, "easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle" (19:24).  They are scrupulous about the gnat, and blind to the camel:   a good image of the weightier matters they have neglected and left undone.

"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."  Scrupulous attention to ceremonial cleanliness here is made an analogy to the care for appearances more than the heart.  To cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, so that the outside may be clean also, is to take care of the matters of the heart, of faith and righteousness, mercy and justice.  They are failing to cleanse the extortion and self-indulgence that keep them and those they would lead away from God.  See also this reading, in which the scribes and Pharisees criticized Jesus' disciples for failing to practice ceremonial washing, and Jesus' teaching response to them in a public sermon. 

Hypocrisy, in Jesus' teaching here (and we remember this is a public sermon, His final public discourse) is a certain failure to practice the weightier matters of God, the things that mustn't be neglected.  Hypocrite comes from an ancient word that means "actor."  It is literally "beneath the mask" such as actors in ancient plays would wear as keys to the character they portrayed.  When piety is only used as mask, we are neglecting real salvation, inviting trouble.  It is the things of the heart -- which Jesus always emphasizes -- that determine where our salvation is.  That's not to say that practices and traditions are wrong.  Jesus does not say that (for example, He says of tithing practices above, "these you ought to have done").  But when they are used to neglect the weightier matters of the heart, they become a mask.  This strikes to the core of true repentance, which is an affair of the heart, the innermost depth of who we are.  Interestingly, Origen writes a commentary on this passage in which he states that all of these "good practices" in and of themselves do not bring us salvation.  We may congratulate ourselves on our good deeds, our tithing, almsgiving, fasting, psalms and prayers, but merely of ourselves as achievements these things don't give salvation.  He likens the heart to the altar  of which Jesus speaks which confers the true measure and value of the gift.  Origen writes of a person whose heart is truly in his practice that "his heart is the altar that sanctifies his offering which is the heart of the world. The heart and the conscience of such a man 'do not feel remorse but have trust in God,' because his own heart has been rightly formed. He does not rely on his gifts as such or the words of his prayers or of his psalms—although they may seem well composed and chosen from the Scriptures—but on the heart rightly formed."  A heart consecrated and devoted in love of God produces the gifts of great value.  But without such a heart the gifts bear little worth, and do not confer the hope of heaven, wherein lies "throne of God" which Jesus names above.  In these practices, Jesus teaches us, it is where the heart is that conveys their true depth, and value, and meaning.  Hypocrisy prevents such an event of truth to pass, even when one practices the most "noble" or "holy" or traditions.  Why is it important that we love first God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength?  Because this is what confers value and wisdom in all the rest, and gives us insight and enlightenment into true works of love for others.  It is what prevents hypocrisy, living for show, with a focus on whether or not others approve of us, making such opinions weightier than the opinion of God.  That first love is what confers value upon all the rest, and gives us the tools to truly practice faith and help others with our love and with wisdom.  Let us not neglect the weightier matters of the heart in all things.

Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted

 Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying:  "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.  Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.  For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.  But all their works they do to be seen by men.  They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments.  They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'  But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren.  Do not call anyone on earth your father, for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.  And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.  But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.  And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." 

- Matthew 23:1-12

In our current readings, Jesus is in Jerusalem, and it is Holy Week.  He has made His Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, cleansed the temple, and engaged in confrontation, questioning, and testing by the leadership, with His own challenging responses.  (See the readings from Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.)   On Saturday we read that the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to Him and asked Him, saying:  "Teacher, Moses said that if a man dies, having no children, his brother shall marry his wife and raise up offspring for his brother.  Now there were with us seven brothers.  The first died after he had married, and having no offspring, left his wife to his brother.  Likewise the second also, and the third, even to the seventh.  Last of all the woman died also.  Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife of the seven will she be?  For they all had her."  Jesus answered and said to them, "You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God.  For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.  But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'?  God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."  And when the multitudes heard this, they were astonished at His teaching.  But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.  Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?"  Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'"  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it:  'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."   The lectionary skips over the end of chapter 22, in which Jesus confronts the leadership over the divine identity of the Messiah (22:41-46).

 Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying:  "The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat.  Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.  For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers."   This begins Jesus' final public sermon, which is a grand critique of the ways of the scribes and Pharisees.  There are several themes here, which will continue in the following readings as we read through the sermon.  In these verses above, Jesus teaches that the leaders have God-given authority and that they teach God's law.   But they are personally "ungodly and cold-hearted," as my study bible puts it.  Their teaching, which comes from the word of God through the Scripture, is to be honored, but they should not be personally imitated.  As the sermon continues, we will read an eight-fold indictment -- charging them with inverting the values of God, mean-spiritedness, greed, ambition, caring only for the external appearances, and blindly self-righteous.  My study bible says that while these charges were directed by Jesus against the Jewish leaders of His day, every single word applies equally today to those in Church who behave in this way.  Here, to sit in Moses' seat means to hold the succession of office down from Moses himself.  In the synagogue, the custom was for the teacher to speak while seated as a sign of this authority.  St. Chrysostom is cited by my study bible, who commented that the scribes were depraved in thought and heart, but Jesus still upholds the dignity of their office.  They speak not their own words, but God's.  So it is within the Church.  The clergy are shown respect as they hold apostolic office, even though they are sinners.  Moreover, the sins of the clergy do not relieve the people of their own responsibility before God.  This reflects another important theme of Jesus' sermon:  that there is one Teacher and one Father above all.  Any worldly father or teacher must lead people to God; Jesus' indictment here is of those who fail to do so, and instead place themselves in God's position.

"But all their works they do to be seen by men.  They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments.  They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, 'Rabbi, Rabbi.'"  Phylacteries are small leather pouches which contain passage of Scripture.  They are worn on the arm or forehead.   The practice emphasizes the understanding that God's Law must always be kept in mind (Exodus 13:9).  What Jesus is criticizing here is a false piety, done for show -- making them entirely conspicuous, with all emphasis entirely for appearance's sake.  The real intention is linked to what John's Gospel calls the praise of men.

"But you, do not be called 'Rabbi'; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren.  Do not call anyone on earth your father, for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.  And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.  But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.  And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."  My study bible says that Christ's warning against calling hypocrites father and teacher is not an absolute prohibition against using these terms.  The terms are used many times in the New Testament.  (For Father, see Luke 16:24; 1 Corinthians 4:15; Colossians 3:21.  For Teacher, see John 3:10; Acts 13:1; 1 Corinthians 12:28; Ephesians 4:11; 2 Timothy 1:11.)  This is not a literal prohibition.  From the earliest times of the Church, bishops and presbyters were called "father."  This is not because they take the place of God, but rather they lead people to God in fatherly care, which is in itself a fatherly authority within community.  Jesus is rather teaching here about humility, and the essential need for humility among His servants who will be the bishops and founding pillars of His Church.  The lesson is for all of us.  To fail to humble oneself is to fail in the gravest and grandest sense.

Jesus' words teach us a great deal about hypocrisy.  What can it lead to?  What is it about?  Here, in these men, hypocrisy plays the role of facilitating downfall and reckoning.  It enables the practice, in the "name of God," of what is detrimental to those who are to be led to God.  Jesus speaks of the emphasis on appearance, which is crucial to understanding where He is coming from, and is all-important and essential to these men as hypocrites.  The broad phylacteries, and enlarged borders of their garments shout out a testimony to faith and piety, but they also hide what is contradictory to faith in their hearts.  To be a teacher and a father is a great thing, but when the teachers fail to lead their students to God, when fathers fail to do the same, it is the students -- the flock -- and thereby the whole community, which suffers.  In keeping with this understanding and outcome, Jesus first decries their hardheartedness:  "They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers."  A father and a teacher must have the humility to teach and to lead, because he's not supposed to be working for himself.  In fact, that is one definition of a cult.  A true religious teacher is supposed to be working as a servant -- serving not only God but also the community, and especially the "little ones," the least powerful and most vulnerable.  Hypocrisy, with a focus on living for show, disables true service.  It is a violation of the mission to care for the community, and in particular the littlest ones, the least of these.  It is the way, in fact, that those whose "angels always behold the face of My Father in heaven" (18:10) may be exploited, abused, and led astray.   This is central to the traditional teaching in the Church of modesty and self-control, awareness of one's own desires and habits, with the primary focus on serving God.  It is consistent with the following of the two great commandments, as named by Christ in our previous reading:  loving God and loving neighbor.   These teachings apply to all of us, and particularly to those who would lead.  To exalt oneself, in this understanding, is to be in a position where one is certain to be humbled by judgment and failure; and to humble oneself is an act that will be exalted by God.  It is precisely in the midst of this seeming paradox that we find our faith and direction.  We, that is, who know who is the true Father and the real Teacher of us all.