Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows’ houses, and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.
| Word | Greek | Strong’s | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| Woe | Οὐαὶ Ouai | G3759 | "woe" · interjection |
| unto you | ὑμῖν hymîn | G5213 | to (with or by) you |
| scribes | γραμματεῖς grammateis | G1122 | scribe · noun — vocative plural masculine |
| and | καὶ kai | G2532 | and · conjunction |
| Pharisees | Φαρισαῖοι, Pharisaioi | G5330 | a separatist · noun — vocative plural masculine, a title |
| hypocrites | ὑποκριταί, hupokritai | G5273 | an actor under an assumed character (stage-player) · noun — vocative plural masculine |
| for | ὅτι hoti | G3754 | demonstrative · conjunction |
| ye devour | κατεσθίετε katesthiete | G2719 | to eat down · verb — present active indicative, 2nd person plural |
| widows’ | χηρῶν, chērōn | G5503 | a widow (as lacking a husband) · noun — genitive plural feminine |
| houses | οἰκίας oikias | G3614 | properly · noun — accusative plural feminine |
| and | καὶ kai | G2532 | and · conjunction |
| for a pretence | προφάσει prophasei | G4392 | an outward showing · noun — dative singular feminine |
| make | προσευχόμενοι· proseuchomenoi | G4336 | to pray to God · verb — present middle or passive deponent participle, nominative plural masculine |
| long | μακρός makrós | G3117 | long (in place (distant) or time (neuter plural)) |
| prayer | προσεύχομαι proseúchomai | G4336 | to pray to God |
| therefore | τοῦτο toûto | G5124 | that thing |
| ye shall receive | λήψεσθε lēpsesthe | G2983 | while G138 (αἱρέομαι) is more violent · verb — future middle deponent indicative, 2nd person plural |
| the greater | περισσός perissós | G4053 | superabundant (in quantity) or superior (in quality) |
| damnation | κρίμα. krima | G2917 | a decision (the function or the effect · noun — accusative singular neuter |
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses, &c.--Taking advantage of the helpless condition and confiding character of "widows," they contrived to obtain possession of their property, while by their "long prayers" they made them believe they were raised far above "filthy lucre." So much "the greater damnation" awaits them. What a lifelike description of the Romish clergy, the true successors of those scribes!
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,.... The same character is given as before, and the same woe denounced, and a fresh reason given of it: for ye devour widows' houses; that is, the goods in the houses of such as were left with fatherless children, and but little to support them; who being left alone, and none to advise them, and being weak, and prone to superstition; these greedy dogs, as Isaiah calls them, who could never have enough, easily imposed upon them, wormed them out of all their substance, stripped them bare of the necessaries of life, prevailed on them to sell their houses and goods, and bestow them on them; or got their little estates into their hands, pretending…
Read the whole note in the consoleMatthew 23:13-15 Matthew 23:13-15 Mark 12:40 Luke 11:52 13. But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you do not enter yourselves, and do not permit those who come to enter. 14. And woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you devour widows' houses, and that under the disguise of a long prayer; therefore you will be the more severely punished. 15. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you compass sea and land to make [93] one proselyte; and when he is made, [94] you make him twice as much the child of hell as yourselves. 40. Who devour widows' houses, and that under the disguise of a longprayer. These…
Read the whole note in the consoleOr, because their observance of the kingdom of heaven proceeds hence, that they may keep up their practice of going about to widows' houses, they shall therefore receive the heavier judgment, as having their own sin and the ignorance of others to answer for.
These are the poisoners of truth. They are reluctant to undertake the salvation of others. They bolt shut the kingdom of heaven. In their ambition they "devour widows' houses and for pretense make long prayers." By this acquaintance with heaven (achieved with those long prayers), they expect they will persevere in the merits of grace quietly, just as a rich person expects to receive the treasure stored up for him. However, they will receive ample judgment and punishment for their particular sins. They will be called to account for their strange and ignorant practices.
The female sex is imprudent, as not contemplating with reason all that it sees or hears; and weak, as being easily turned either from bad to good, or from good to bad. The male sex is more prudent and hardy. And therefore pretenders to holiness practise most upon women, who are unable to see their hypocrisy, and are easily inclined to love them on the ground of religion. But widows they chiefly choose to attempt; first, because a woman who has her husband to advise her is not so readily deceived; and secondly, she has not the means of giving, being in the power of her husband. The Lord then, whilst He confounds the Jewish Priests, instructs the Christian that they should not frequent widows rather than others, for though their purpose may not be bad, it gives occasion to suspicions. First, for that ye are wicked, and then because ye put on the cloak of sanctity. Your covetousness you dress up in the colour of religion, and use God's arms in the Devil's service, that iniquity may be loved while it is thought to be piety.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Matthew collected seven statements of what sorrow awaits you (literally woe to you), drawing upon similar Old Testament listings (Isa 5:8-23; Hab 2:6-20), and he arranged them to climax in the murder of the prophets. 23:13 What sorrow awaits you: A stark warning of judgment from God. • Hypocrites! In English, hypocrisy describes a contradiction between reality and appearance. But in biblical usage, hypocrisy is misperceiving God’s will, leading people astray, and thus incurring God’s judgment. Coupled with this is often a desire for prestige and power (23:5-12), abuse of teaching authority, false teachings on doctrine or practice (23:13-22), and preoccupation with ethical minutiae (23:23-28…
Henry, Jamieson-Fausset-Brown, Clarke, Gill, Calvin and Keil & Delitzsch are in the public domain; Tyndale Open Study Notes © Tyndale House Publishers, CC BY-SA 4.0 — all from the Free Use Bible API (bible.helloao.org). Rashi: the Rosenbaum & Silbermann Pentateuch (public domain) and the Judaica Press and Metsudah Tanakh (CC BY), via Sefaria. Spurgeon's Treasury of David: public domain (lyteword's markdown edition, CC0).
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
