For from within, out of the heart of man,.... The inside of man is very bad, his inward part is not only wicked, but wickedness itself, yea, very wickedness, Psalms 5:9, in him dwells no good thing naturally, his heart is wicked, and desperately so; it is full of evil; and out of the abundance of it, proceed the evil things hereafter mentioned; all its powers and faculties are vitiated, there is no place clean; the understanding and judgment are dreadfully corrupted; the mind and conscience are defiled; the affections are inordinate; not only the thought, but every imagination of the thought of the heart is evil, and that continually: what good thing therefore, can come out of such a Nazareth as this? Nothing, but what follows: for from hence
proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders; which several things are related in Mt. 15:19 see the note on "Mt 15:19"; only the order here is a little different; "murders", which are here mentioned last, are there put after "evil thoughts".