“Truly I affirm to you, to the sons of men all their sins shall be forgiven, and their blasphemies in whatever way they shall blaspheme, but whoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.” Because they said “He has an unclean spirit”.
There is no more dread statement than this. They have seen the Holy Spirit at work in undeniable power, and because of their closed minds and their prejudice they impute it to an unholy, an unclean spirit. And yet they claimed to be teachers and responsible for the beliefs of others. Thus by their hypocrisy they were leading others astray. They must therefore beware. This put them in danger of having closed hearts and minds for ever. And should that happen there would then be no way back, there would be no way of forgiveness, the Spirit would never act in their hearts. Their sin would have eternal consequences.
All other sins could be forgiven. All blasphemies of whatever kind against God can be forgiven (what an assurance is this), but not this. To face the testimony of the Spirit of God, revealed in a revelation of His power, and to deliberately twist it so as not to have to face up to it is to put oneself in danger. To impute to Satan the clear work of the Holy Spirit, and to go on doing so against testimony of mind and conscience, and to teach others so is the greatest of follies. For at length such a mind would become hardened, such a conscience would cease to work, and such a man would then become unreachable by God - through his own ill doing.
‘Truly I affirm.' (Amen lego). A solemn guarantee of the words that follow, sworn in His own name.
‘To the sons of men all their sins shall be forgiven, and their blasphemies in whatever way they shall blaspheme.' Forgiveness is available to all, if, of course, they repent and believe. But what an amazing assurance this is on the honour of Jesus Himself. He is confirming that there is no sin so evil or so blasphemous that it cannot be forgiven through the blood of Christ. That no one can have sinned so badly that he cannot be forgiven. Unless, that is, he has finally hardened his heart against God to such an extent that he is unable to repent. But then he will never know of his sin until the judgment. He will walk unconscious of it because his heart is hardened and unreachable. (It is not those who fear that they have blasphemed against the Holy Spirit who have done so. Those who are in danger of it are those who laugh at the very idea). So Jesus was seeking to jolt the Scribes into reconsidering their position before it was too late.
‘An eternal sin.' That is, one from which there is no recovery and which will result therefore in eternal punishment.
Because they said “He has an unclean spirit”. This connecting word irrevocably connects the final statements with what has gone before. (Mark is short on connecting links therefore this is the more significant here). Their crowning sin is that they call the Spirit of God Himself ‘unclean', and say that His power over Satan is imputed to one cut off from God by uncleanness. By this they deny the holiness of Jesus and of the Spirit Who is at work through Him. If we sometimes feel the Scribes and Pharisees hard done by we need to remember what it was that they saw and rejected. They saw the holy power of God and dismissed it as of the Devil.
Note that it is the Teachers from Jerusalem who are primarily seen as being in danger of this situation. Jerusalem in its religious piety is already revealing itself as the enemy of Jesus and of the truth. We are already being prepared for what will later follow in Jerusalem, even though at present it is a distant menace.