But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites.
The sins of the scribes and Pharisees
I. That they shut up the kingdom of heaven against men. “Neither suffer ye them that are entering in.”
1. They did this by their extraordinary strictness and outward purity. By such austerities they made religion repulsive. This accusation has often been preferred against the pure ministers of a pure religion. Compare this text with the parallel passage in Luke 11:52. They shut the kingdom of heaven against themselves and others by taking away the key of knowledge. The same sin is committed by any church that imposes the traditions of men in that province in which only the commandment of God is of authority. The kingdom of heaven is opened by knowledge. It is important to recognize this. Ministers of the Church have in a certain sense the power of shutting up the kingdom of heaven against men.
(1) Let us learn to read the Bible and listen to its truths, in the assurance that our eternal destiny depends upon the knowledge of them.
(2) Let ministers learn their proper vocation as porters to the kingdom of heaven, and let them beware of handling the Word of God deceitfully.
2. The second charge against the scribes and Pharisees. They devoured the houses of widows. They were robbers of the defenceless. Those who lie under this woe are:
(1) Those ministers who enter upon and continue in their office for a piece of bread.
3. The third charge against the scribes and Pharisees-“Ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte.” The apostles of deceit and falsehood have often manifested a zeal in the propagation of their principles which is fitted to minister a severe reproof to those who know and believe the truth. It is not the fact of making proselytes against which the woe is directed; this is the duty of the Church. But they did not care to make their councils holier.
(1) They made proselytes by reviling and scorn;
(2) by misrepresentation and calumny;
(3) by force. (W. Wilson.)
In the description of the scribes and Pharisees in this chapter we have a full-length portrait of the hypocrite
I. They shut up the kingdom of heaven against others (verse 13).
II. They committed the grossest iniquity under a cloak of religion (verse 14).
III. They showed great zeal in making proselytes, yet did it only for gain, and made them more wicked (verse 15).
IV. They taught false doctrine, artful contrivances to destroy the force of oaths, and shut out the Creator from their view (verses 16-22).
V. They were superstitious (verse 23).
VI. They were openly hypocritical (verses 25-28).
VII. They professed great veneration for the memory of the pious dead, while at the same time they were conscious that they really approved the conduct of those who killed them (verses 29-31). Never, perhaps, was there a combination of more wicked feelings and hypocritical actions than among them; and never was there more profound knowledge of the human heart and more faithfulness than in Him who tore off the mask, and showed them what they were. (A. Barnes, D. D.)
The woes
I. Spiritual ambition; petitioners changed into beggars. The long prayers of the hypocrites, and the long sentence of judgment.
II. Those who shut the kingdom of heaven.
III. Proselytism. Soul-winners and soul-ruiners.
IV. The work of man up, the work of God down; the inward nothing, the outward everything. The true oath always by the living and true God. The blindest ignorance connected with a conceit of keenest insight into the laws of the kingdom of God.
V. Legality in little things; lawlessness in great.
VI. The outside and the inside of the cup and the platter, or the feast of the religious and moral hypocrite.
1. In the outward form, consecrated or adorned.
2. In the inner character, abominable and reprobate.
VII. The whited sepulchres: like pleasant abodes outwardly; caves of bones, diffusing death, within-spiritual death, in the guise of spiritual bloom.
VIII. The murderers of the prophets. To persecute Christ in His saints is to persecute Christ himself. (J. P. Lange, D. D.)
Folly of hypocrisy
If the devil ever laughs, it must be at hypocrites; they are the greatest dupes he has. They serve him better than any others, and receive no wages; nay, what is still more extraordinary, they submit to greater mortifications to go to hell, than the sincerest Christian to go to heaven. (Colton.)