Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.
| 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 compass | περιάγετε periagete | G4013 | to take around (as a companion) · verb — present active indicative, 2nd person plural |
| sea | θάλασσαν thalassan | G2281 | the sea (genitive case or specially) · noun — accusative singular feminine |
| and | καὶ kai | G2532 | and · conjunction |
| land | ξηρὰν xēran | G3584 | arid · adjective — accusative singular feminine |
| to make | ποιῆσαι poiēsai | G4160 | to make or do (in a very wide application · verb — aorist active infinitive |
| one | ἕνα hena | G1520 | one · adjective — accusative singular masculine |
| proselyte | προσήλυτον, prosēluton | G4339 | an arriver from a foreign region · noun — accusative singular masculine |
| and | καὶ kai | G2532 | and · conjunction |
| when | ὅταν hotan | G3752 | whenever (implying hypothesis or more or less uncertain… · conjunction |
| he is made | γένηται, genētai | G1096 | to cause to be ("gen"-erate) · verb — second aorist middle deponent subjunctive, 3rd person singular |
| ye make | ποιεῖτε poieite | G4160 | to make or do (in a very wide application · verb — present active indicative, 2nd person plural |
| him | αὐτὸν auton | G846 | the reflexive pronoun self · personal pronoun — accusative singular masculine |
| twofold more | διπλότερον diploteron | G1362 | two-fold · adjective — accusative singular masculine, comparative |
| the child | υἱὸν huion | G5207 | a "son" (sometimes of animals) · noun — accusative singular masculine |
| of hell | γεέννης geennēs | G1067 | valley of (the son of) Hinnom · noun — genitive singular feminine, a title |
| than yourselves | ὑμῶν hymōn | G5216 | of (from or concerning) you |
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).
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte--from heathenism. We have evidence of this in JOSEPHUS. and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves--condemned, for the hypocrisy he would learn to practice, both by the religion he left and that he embraced.
Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,.... The same character, and woe, are still continued, and a new reason added, confirming the justness of them, in order to awaken and convince them, or, however, to caution the people against them: for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte; that is, to the Jewish religion, and their particular sect. There were two sorts of proselytes among them; one was called , "a proselyte of the gate", one that might dwell in any of their towns, and cities, and who is thus described (a); "Who is a proselyte of the gate? whosoever takes upon him, before three neighbours, that he will not commit idolatry. R. Meir and the wise men say, whosoever takes…
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 consoleA convert (proselyte) made a full conversion to Judaism, performing such observances as baptism, sacrifice, and circumcision (see Acts 13:43). A convert was thus distinct from a “God-fearer,” who adopted certain Jewish beliefs, most notably monotheism, without fully converting to Judaism (see Luke 7:4-5; Acts 10:2). It is likely that to make one convert means to persuade God-fearers to become full converts to Judaism by undergoing circumcision (cp. Gal 2:3, 14; 5:2-12; 6:12-13). • of hell: Greek of Gehenna; see study note on 5:29.
From this place we learn that there will be a difference of torment in hell, seeing one is here said to be singly a child of hell, another twofold. And we ought to consider here whether it is possible that a man should be generally a child of hell, as a Jew, suppose, or a Gentile, or whether specially so in consequence of some particular sins; that as a righteous man is increased in glory by the abundance of his righteousnesses, so a sinner's punishment is increased manifold by the number of his sins.
(Mor. xxxi. 9.) But forasmuch as hypocrites though they do ever crooked things, yet cease not to speak right things, and thus by their good instructions beget sons, but are not able to bring them up by good life, but the more they give themselves up to worldly works, the more willingly do they suffer those whom they have begotten to work the same. And because their hearts are hardened, these very sons whom they have begotten they do not own by any sign of the affection due. Wherefore it is here said of the hypocrites, And when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.
That they compass sea and land signifies that throughout the whole world they shall be enemies of Christ's Gospel, and shall bring men under the yoke of the Law against the justification of faith. There were proselytes made into the Synagogue from among the Gentiles, the small number of whom is here denoted by what is said one proselyte. For after the preaching of Christ there was no faith left in their doctrine, but whoever was gained to the faith of the Jews became a child of hell. And he becomes the child of a twofold punishment, because he has not obtained remission of his Gentile sins, and because he has joined the society of those who persecuted Christ.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
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).
