Matthew 23:16

“You Jewish leaders, your punishment will be terrible! You are like people who are blind [MET] who are trying to lead others. You say, ‘ In the case of those who promise to do something and then ask the Temple to affirm what they have promised, it means nothing if they do not do what they have promised. But if they ask the gold that is in the Temple to affirm what they have promised, they must do what they promised.’

Translation for Translators

In The King James Version

Woe unto you, ye blind guides, which say, Whosoever shall swear by the temple, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor!

In Context

15“You are hypocrites, you men who teach the Jewish laws and you Pharisees! Your punishment will be terrible, because you exert yourselves very much to get even one person to believe what you teach. For instance, you travel across seas and lands to distant places in order to do that. And as a result, when one person believes what you teach, you make that person much more deserving to go to hell than you yourselves deserve to.”

17You are fools, and you are like people who are blind [MET]! The gold that is in the Temple is important, but the Temple is even more important [RHQ], because it is the Temple that the gold is in that sets the gold apart for a special use for God.

Read all of Matthew 23

Cross References

Isaiah 56:10The Israeli leaders should be like watchdogs to protect the people, but it is as though they are blind. They are stupid. They are all like [MET] dogs that cannot bark. Good watchdogs bark when strangers approach, but the Israeli leaders do not warn the people that their enemies are coming. Instead, they just want to lie down and sleep and dream.

Matthew 15:5But you tell people, ‘You can say to your father or mother, “What I was going to give to you to help provide for you, I have now promised to give to God.”’

Matthew 23:17You are fools, and you are like people who are blind [MET]! The gold that is in the Temple is important, but the Temple is even more important [RHQ], because it is the Temple that the gold is in that sets the gold apart for a special use for God.

Matthew 23:24You leaders are like blind people who are trying to lead others. According to your laws you say that touching gnats and camels makes you unacceptable to God. What you are doing is like straining a gnat out of a jar of water so that you do not swallow it and thereby become unacceptable to God, and at the same time swallowing a camel with the water [MET]!”

Mark 7:10For example, our ancestor Moses wrote God’s command, ‘Honor your fathers and your mothers’. He also wrote, ‘ The authorities must execute a person who speaks evil about his father or mother.’

Galatians 5:3Instead, I solemnly declare again to every man who is circumcised {has someone circumcise him} in order for God to accept him, that you must perfectly obey all of the laws that God gave Moses, in order for God to save you.

Matthew Henry on Matthew 23:14-34

The Crimes of the Pharisees. 13 But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. 14 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. 15 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make… Read the whole commentary →

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Study Matthew 23:16