Woe to you, blind guides, who say, Whosoever shall swear by the temple, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple, he is a debtor.
The third "woe" in this chapter turns from what the religious leaders did to what they taught. Jesus gives them a name that sticks: blind guides. Their rule about oaths sounds like careful religious detail. He treats it as proof that they could no longer tell what mattered from what did not.
The name is a verdict, and it settles the fate of everyone walking behind them.
What could they be but blind guides at best, as the Lord said to them (Matt. 23:16-17, 26)? And if the blind led the blind, what could they do but both fall into the ditch (Matt. 15:14)? And that sad result is just what happened when the chief priests persuaded the people to ask for Barabbas and crucify Jesus.
Swearing by the temple was ordinary speech back then. The teachers had built a ranking system around which phrases counted, and an oath on the temple itself ranked as nothing.
The Jews loved to swear on every possible occasion to stress their words. They used all kinds of impressive phrases for it. They swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, by the temple, and so on. The scribes clearly thought that only an oath that named God out loud was a "real" oath. Only that kind bound the person who swore it. On top of that they made further distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, the altar and the gift on the altar (Matt. 23:16-22). The Jews hardly counted it a sin to swear careless oaths, vows and promises and then break them, as long as no one named God.
Their ranking put the gold above the temple. That choice showed what they valued.
It was clear that in the eyes of these proud and foolish men the gold was worth more than the house in which God dwelt. The gold that decorated the temple had a value beyond its market price for one reason only: it formed part of the house God was pleased to own as His.
Their distinction had a practical use. It handed people a way out of their own words.
The third woe again shows how their reversal of the true proportion of holy things darkened the light in them. They rated the gold of the temple above the temple itself, and the gift above the altar that sanctified it. Then they used this hair-splitting to teach men how to swear empty oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility the Lord affirms in every case.
The Lord's argument rests on a principle they had lost. The smaller thing gets its worth from the greater thing it belongs to. One writer follows that principle to the altar and the gift laid on it.
They degraded the basic truth of the altar, while treating the gift on it as too sacred to swear by. Yet the altar speaks of the person of Christ, who sanctifies the gift, and the gift speaks of His sacrifice. His sacrifice is certainly precious, but He Himself is greater than His sacrifice.
To people who are not thinking, teaching like this looks like depth.
They drew distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift on it. People who did not think might look at them in awe, as men with very superior minds. In reality their distinctions were made up. They only proved their own blindness and folly... They were blind indeed, and that type of blindness is all too common today.
A bad leader does not excuse the one who chose to follow him.
The "blind" here are the Jewish leaders first of all, no doubt. But the follower will not escape the ditch just by being a follower. The truth speaks for itself to anyone who has ears to hear. Anyone who hands himself over completely to another man's leadership has his conscience before man, not before God.
- Blind — the Lord's own name for these guides. What they taught came straight out of their blindness.
- Blind to value — they rated the gold above the temple. The gold was only worth anything because it belonged to God's house.
- Blind to Christ — the altar sanctifies the gift. The altar speaks of Christ Himself, and He is greater than His sacrifice.
- Blind by design — their system taught men how to swear empty oaths and dodge responsibility, but the Lord holds them to every oath.
- Blindness spreads — leader and led fall into the same ditch. The follower has no excuse: truth speaks for itself to anyone with ears to hear.
Fools and blind, for which is greater, the gold, or the temple which sanctifies the gold?
The leaders taught that an oath sworn on the temple meant nothing, while an oath sworn on its gold was binding. In this third woe, Jesus asks which of the two gives the other its worth.
This chapter runs through a list of woes, each naming a different fault. One writer measures how serious they are and comes to the third:
Nothing could exceed the solemnity of this denunciation... In general, these woes declare the blindness, hypocrisy and unrelenting hatred of men who posed as the religious models and leaders of the people... First: For shutting up the Kingdom (v. 13). Second: For false proselyting (v. 15). Third: For unholy trickery about sacred things (vv. 16-22).
The Lord's question runs one way only. The temple makes the gold sacred; the gold never makes the temple sacred. The gold was ordinary gold until it belonged to the place God claimed as His own.
These proud and foolish men clearly valued the gold more than the house where God lived. The gold that decorated the temple had a worth beyond its market price for one reason: it was part of the house that God was pleased to own as His. It was the same with the gift on the altar. The real value before God of what was offered came from the altar that set it apart for Him.
One commentator sees Christ pictured in the altar and its gift:
The temple sanctified the gold: the gold got its importance from its link with the temple... the altar speaks of the person of Christ, which sanctifies the gift, which speaks of His sacrifice. Certainly His sacrifice is precious, but He Himself is greater than His sacrifice.
Fine distinctions like these can look like deep learning. The Lord's verdict falls on the teachers themselves, not only on what they taught.
In verses 16-22, the Lord condemns their fanciful teachings. They drew distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift on it. Such distinctions might make thoughtless people look on them with awe as men of very superior minds. In reality the distinctions were imaginary. They only proved the blindness and folly of the men who made them.
Their scale was not a harmless mistake in judgment. Ranking the gold above the house served the men who handled the gold.
Empty hair-splitting set aside all righteous principles. They could arrange the "Corban Oath" (see Mark 7) so that they made their own gain out of the temple gold. To fill up the Corban treasure, they taught men to break the fifth commandment.
The scheme had a purpose. It let a man swear and still walk away from his word. The Lord shuts that door.
The third woe again shows the light in them turned to darkness. They had turned the true order of holy things upside down. They valued the gold of the temple above the temple itself, and the gift above the altar that sanctified it. Then they used this hair-splitting to teach men how to swear empty oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility the Lord affirms in every case.
"You blind fools" sounds harsh coming from Jesus. One writer asks whether such words were fair, and answers that they were.
John the Baptist counted himself unworthy to untie His sandal-strap. Yet He pronounced woe after woe on these scribes and Pharisees, though they stood highest in Jewish esteem. He called them blind guides, fools, hypocrites and serpents. How should they escape the judgment of hell? His words were overwhelming, but was the blessed Lord not fully right to speak them? It was not enmity to tell an evil-doer the truth, so that he might repent. Flesh hates faithfulness.
- Inversion. They flipped the scale of value. They rated the gold above the temple and the gift above the altar — the lesser thing over the greater that gave it meaning.
- Source. The gold was worth more than its market price for one reason: it belonged to the house God owned as His.
- Blindness. The fine distinctions looked like deep insight. They were imaginary, and they proved the teachers blind.
- Profit. The flipped scale paid off. It let the leaders turn temple gold to their own gain, and teach men to break a commandment.
- Responsibility. The system ended in an oath a man need not keep. The Lord answers by holding every oath binding, whatever a man swears by.
And, Whosoever shall swear by the altar, it is nothing; but whosoever shall swear by the gift that is upon it is a debtor.
The Lord is in the middle of a series of woes against the religious teachers. Here He repeats one of their own rules about oaths, and the question behind it is simple: which counts for more, the altar or the gift on it?
Their teaching turned the true order of value upside down. The thing they treated as small was the very thing that made the rest matter.
The third woe calls them blind guides. It deals with the way they twisted the truth to suit their own whims. They let men swear by the temple, but forbade swearing by the gold of the temple. Yet the temple was the dwelling of God. The temple sanctified the gold: the gold got its importance from being connected with the temple. In the same way they cheapened the basic truth of the altar, while they treated the gift on it as too sacred to swear by.
The distinction had a practical use. It let a man swear and then walk away.
They valued the gold of the temple above the temple itself, and the gift above the altar that sanctified it. Then they used this hair-splitting to teach men how to swear empty oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility the Lord affirms in every case.
Swearing ran right through their daily speech, and one assumption decided when an oath counted.
The Jews loved to swear on every possible occasion to give weight to their words, and they used all kinds of impressive phrases. They swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, by the temple, and so on. The scribes clearly thought that only oaths that named God out loud were "real" oaths, and so binding on the man who swore. The Jews barely counted it as sin when men carelessly swore oaths, vows and promises and never kept them, as long as God's name was not mentioned.
Nothing there had worth on its own. The gold and the gift took their value from what they belonged to.
What gave the gold in the temple a value beyond its market price was that it was part of the house God was pleased to own as His. It was the same with the gift on the altar. What was offered had real value before God because the altar set it apart for Him.
Some writers read the altar as a picture of Christ. Taken that way, the man who swore by it bound himself to far more than he knew.
Distinctions this careful can look like depth. The Lord's verdict on them runs the other way, and the pattern outlives the men who invented it.
The distinctions they draw between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift on it, might make thoughtless people look at them with awe, as men of very superior minds. In reality their distinctions were pure invention, and only proof of their own blindness and folly. It was the same in other matters: great fuss over small things, great carelessness about great things. Blind they were indeed, and that type of blindness is all too common today.
- Upside down. They rated the gift above the altar and the gold above the temple. That cheapened the very thing that gave the rest its worth.
- Escape. They turned that upside-down scale into a system for swearing oaths and dodging responsibility — a responsibility the Lord affirms in every case.
- Loophole. They assumed an oath only bound you if you said God's name out loud, so a broken promise barely counted as sin.
- Source. Nothing had value before God in itself. The gift mattered because the altar set it apart for Him.
- Person. Read as a picture, the altar is Christ Himself. His sacrifice is precious because the One who offered it is greater still. To swear by the altar was to swear by everything on it.
[Fools and] blind ones, for which is greater, the gift, or the altar which sanctifies the gift?
Jesus is partway through a series of "woes" against the religious teachers of Israel. Here He turns their own rule against them. They had said that an oath sworn by the gift on the altar was binding, while an oath sworn by the altar itself counted for nothing. His question exposes a scale of values turned upside down. It also tells us something about Christ Himself.
Jesus calls them "blind men." They knew holy things well enough. Their fault was the order they put them in: they prized what sat on the altar above the altar that gave it its standing.
The third woe again shows how the light in them had turned to darkness: they reversed the true proportion of holy things. They valued the gold of the temple more than the temple itself, and the gift more than the altar that sanctified it. And then this hair-splitting served to teach men how they could swear empty oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility which the Lord affirms in every case.
The distinctions were not idle theory. They were a working system for saying words you never meant to keep.
The Jews loved to swear on every possible occasion to add weight to their words, and they used all kinds of impressive phrases. They swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, by the temple, and so on. Clearly the scribes thought that only oaths which named God were "real" oaths, and so binding on the one who swore. On top of that they made further distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, the altar and the gift on the altar. The Jews hardly counted careless oaths, vows and broken promises as sin at all, as long as no one mentioned the name of God.
The altar "makes the gift sacred," as the ESV puts it. Older translations say it "sanctifies the gift." Both mean the altar sets the gift apart for God. That is what raised the temple gold and the offering above their ordinary worth.
In the eyes of these proud and foolish men, the gold clearly counted for more than the house where God lived. Yet the gold that decorated the temple had a value beyond its market price for one reason: it formed part of the house God was pleased to own as His. The gift on the altar was the same. Its real value before God lay in the altar setting it apart for Him.
Commentators read the altar and its offering as a picture: the altar stands for who Christ is, the gift for what He did.
In the same way, they degraded the basic truth of the altar, while treating the gift on it as too sacred to swear by. Yet the altar speaks of the person of Christ, which sanctifies the gift, and the gift speaks of His sacrifice. His sacrifice is certainly precious, but He Himself is greater than His sacrifice. So the one who swore by the altar was thereby swearing by it and by whatever was offered upon it. He was in effect swearing by Christ and by everything connected with Him.
If the sacrifice pictures the work of Christ, where does its worth come from?
"The altar sanctifies the gift." If the sacrifice stands for the work of the Lord Jesus, then nothing outside it could make it holy. The person of the Offerer alone could give value to His offering. The character of the altar brings this out and develops it.
The same order governs what we bring to God today.
Under the law the worshipper could bring his offering to the door of the tabernacle, but there the priest's work began. The priest had to lay it on the altar, and only there could the Lord accept it... But now it is by the offering of Jesus Himself, once for all, that we are sanctified as worshippers... Whatever comes up to God through Him has the value of His own offering attached to it, and is a sweet-smelling aroma too. In this way God keeps showing His own estimate of the offering of Jesus: through Him He accepts as precious everything done or offered in His name. What a comfort, then! Our persons, our prayers, our thanksgivings and our services all carry before God the sweet aroma of the name of Jesus.
- Inversion. The teachers rated the gold above the temple and the gift above the altar. They had the order of holy things backwards, and their light turned to darkness.
- Evasion. That backwards order paid off: it let men swear oaths they never meant to keep. The Lord says the responsibility holds every time.
- Derivation. Nothing on the altar had worth of its own; the gift was valuable because the altar set it apart for God.
- Person. The altar pictures Christ Himself; the gift pictures His sacrifice. That sacrifice is precious, but He is greater, and His person gives His offering its value.
- Acceptance. The same order still governs worship. Our prayers, thanks and service reach God carrying the value of His offering, not their own.
He therefore that swears by the altar swears by it and by all things that are upon it.
Jesus is exposing teachers who had made oaths that sounded binding but were not. Here He shuts the escape route: name the altar in an oath, and you have named all that lies on it.
The system worked by sorting oaths into two piles. Only one pile counted.
The Jews loved to swear on all possible occasions to give weight to their words. They used all kinds of impressive phrases for it. They swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, by the temple, and so on. The scribes clearly thought that only oaths naming God outright were "real" oaths. Only those bound the man who swore. They also drew further distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, the altar and the gift on the altar (Matt. 23:16-22). The Jews hardly counted it as sin to swear oaths, vows and promises carelessly and then not keep them, as long as God's name was not mentioned.
The distinctions were not accidents of scholarship. One writer traces them to what the teachers stood to gain:
They have an evil purpose in making these distinctions. And we see how the Lord openly exposes them. Greed was at the bottom of it — the desire to make money.
Their whole scheme rested on ranking small things above great ones. Jesus reverses the ranking and, with it, the loophole.
The third woe again shows how the light in them was darkened. They turned true proportion upside down about the holy things. To them the gold of the temple counted for more than the temple itself, and the gift for more than the altar that sanctified it. Then this clever reasoning taught men how to swear worthless oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility that the Lord affirms in every case.
The altar was the lesser thing in their system. One writer shows whom it pictures.
They let men swear by the temple, but forbade them to swear by the gold of the temple. Yet the temple was the dwelling of God, and the gold got its importance from its link with the temple. The altar speaks of the person of Christ, which sanctifies the gift, which speaks of His sacrifice. Certainly His sacrifice is precious, but He Himself is greater than His sacrifice. So the man who swore by the altar was by that act swearing by it and by whatever was offered on it. He was in effect swearing by Christ and by everything connected with Him.
The altar makes the gift holy. One writer asks what that means for the sacrifice of Christ.
"The altar sanctifies the gift." If, then, the sacrifice stands for the work of the Lord Jesus, it could not be made holy by anything outside itself. The person of the Offerer alone could give value to His offering. The character of the altar brings this out and develops it.
The teachers looked deep. The verse shows they were only clever.
In verses 16-22, the Lord condemns their fanciful teachings. They drew distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift on it. The unthinking might look at them with awe, as men of very superior minds. In reality their distinctions were imaginary, and only proof of their own blindness and folly. So with other matters: much fussiness over small things, much carelessness about great things. Blind they were indeed, and that kind of blindness is all too common today.
An oath binds. So is there any place left for oaths at all? One writer draws a line between swearing by choice and being put on oath by a court.
But we must carefully remember that our Lord in no way forbids an oath before the magistrate or judge. This is not evil but good, being of divine authority. For men swear by a greater, and the oath puts an end to all dispute by making matters sure. To refuse it is to deny God's authority in those who represent Him in earthly things. They are called by His name, which is translated "judges," as in Ex. 21:6, Ex. 22:8-9, 28. See also Ps. 82:1, 6. The principle is stated in Lev. 5:1, and far from setting it aside on the mount, the Lord bowed to it when the high priest put Him on oath (Matt. 26:63-64), though He had been silent before.
- Motive. The graded oath system was not honest confusion. Writers point to greed behind it. Their teaching let men swear worthless oaths and walk away from responsibility.
- Proportion. Their light was darkened by inverting proportion — gold above the temple, gift above the altar that sanctified it.
- Reach. An oath cannot be shrunk to fit convenience: swear by the altar, and everything resting on it is included.
- Person. The altar stands for Christ Himself, and since nothing outside could give His offering its value, He is greater than the sacrifice He made.
- Responsibility. The Lord affirms responsibility in every case. He honoured a lawful oath Himself, answering the high priest who put Him on oath.
And he that swears by the temple swears by it and by him that dwells in it.
The Lord is answering the religious teachers' own rulebook on oaths, and He follows each oath through to its end. They counted an oath "by the temple" as costing nothing; He says it reaches the God who lives in that house.
Oaths were everywhere in daily speech. A system had grown up for deciding which ones a person had to keep.
The Jews loved to swear on every possible occasion to give weight to their words. They used all kinds of impressive phrases for it. They swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, by the temple, and so on. Clearly the scribes thought that only oaths which named God out loud were "real" oaths, and so binding on the person swearing. The Jews barely counted it as sin to swear careless oaths, vows and promises and then break them, as long as no one mentioned the name of God.
The Lord's answer removes the gap between the building and God. Naming the temple names Him, and naming heaven names the One on the throne.
If someone swore by the temple, he was really swearing by the living God who dwelt in the temple. Men also treat swearing by heaven as a light thing. Many use the word "heavens" as an exclamation. But heaven is God's throne, so such swearing means swearing by Him who sits on the throne. All of these things show a lack of recognition of the supreme honour God is entitled to.
Their scale was upside down: the gold mattered more to them than the house. Value, though, runs the other way — from the Owner outward.
It was obvious that in the eyes of these proud and foolish men the gold was worth more than the house in which God dwelt. The gold that decorated the temple had a value beyond its market price for one reason: it formed part of the house God was pleased to own as His. It was the same with the gift on the altar (Matt. 23:18-19): the real value before God of the gift came from the altar it lay on, which set it apart for Him.
Commentators also read the pairing of altar and gift as a picture. On that reading, the man swearing takes far more onto his lips than he realises.
They degraded the basic truth of the altar, while they treated the gift on it as too sacred to swear by. Yet the altar speaks of the person of Christ, which sanctifies the gift, and the gift speaks of His sacrifice. His sacrifice is certainly precious, but He Himself is greater than His sacrifice. So the one who swore by the altar was swearing by it and by whatever was offered on it. He was in effect swearing by Christ and by everything connected with Him.
The fine-sounding rules looked like expertise. They were the opposite, and the Lord refuses to let any of them stand.
The third woe again shows how the light in them had gone dark, because they turned the true proportion of holy things upside down. They valued the gold of the temple more than the temple itself, and the gift more than the altar that sanctified it. Then they used this hair-splitting to teach men how to swear empty oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility the Lord affirms in every case.
One writer adds that this blindness did not end with them.
In verses 16-22 the Lord condemns their invented teachings. They drew distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift on it. People who did not think might look at them in awe, as men with superior minds. In reality their distinctions were pure invention. They only proved their own blindness and folly... Blind they were indeed, and that kind of blindness is all too common today.
One writer separates answering an oath put to you from choosing to swear one.
The Lord answered when the high priest put Him under oath. There we have solid proof to guide us. But choosing to swear is another thing: "Anything more than this comes from evil." ... In each case you will find an evil motive behind all these distinctions the Lord is exposing.
- Loophole. They counted an oath binding only when it named God out loud, so "by the temple" felt free of cost.
- Occupant. The Lord traces the oath home: the temple means the God who lives there, just as heaven means the One on the throne.
- Order. Holiness flows from the Owner outward. The house sanctifies its gold, and the altar sanctifies the gift — never the reverse.
- Person. Read as a picture, the altar is Christ and the gift His sacrifice; the sacrifice is precious, but He is greater than it.
- Responsibility. Clever distinctions cancel nothing. The Lord holds every oath binding, and He calls the men who invented the escape routes blind.
And he that swears by heaven swears by the throne of God and by him that sits upon it.
Jesus is taking apart a whole system of oath-taking. It let people sound solemn while leaving them free to break their word. His last stroke removes the safest-looking dodge of all: naming heaven instead of God.
The teachers of the day had built a sliding scale of oaths, and the scale had one purpose — to leave a way out. One writer describes how the vocabulary worked:
The Jews loved to swear on every possible occasion to stress their words. They used all kinds of impressive phrases for this. They swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, by the temple, and so on. Clearly the scribes thought that only oaths naming God directly were "real" oaths. Only those bound the person who swore them. They also drew further distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift on the altar (Matt. 23:16-22). The Jews barely treated it as sin to swear thoughtless oaths, vows and promises and then not keep them, as long as no one mentioned God's name.
The word "heaven" sounds impersonal and safe. The Lord answers that heaven is a throne, and the throne has an occupant.
If one were to swear by the temple, he was actually swearing by the living God who dwelt in the temple. Men think little of swearing by heaven too, and many use the word "heavens" as an exclamation. But heaven is God's throne, so such swearing means swearing by Him who sits upon the throne. All of these things show too little regard for the supreme honour that God is due.
The fine distinctions were not harmless scholarship. They were a working method for escaping what you had promised — and the Lord cancels the escape without exception.
The third woe again shows how the light in them turned to darkness: they turned true proportion upside down when it came to holy things. They valued the gold of the temple above the temple itself, and the gift above the altar that made it holy. And then they used this hair-splitting to teach men how they could swear empty oaths and escape responsibility — a responsibility which the Lord affirms in every case.
Two things sat underneath the system: money, and the look of deep thinking.
They have an evil purpose in making these distinctions. And we see how the Lord openly exposes them. Greed was at the bottom of it, the desire to make money.
The reputation mattered too. One writer says the blindness behind these rulings is still with us:
In verses 16-22, the Lord condemns their fanciful teachings. They draw distinctions between the temple and the gold of the temple, and between the altar and the gift upon it. Thoughtless people might look at them with awe, as men of very superior minds. In reality their distinctions were made up, and only proved their own blindness and folly... Blind they were indeed, and that type of blindness is all too common today.
If no oath can be aimed away from God, the graded oath is useless. One writer traces where such swearing comes from, and what the Lord does with it:
All this strong swearing, which the Lord illustrates from Jewish habit, grew out of men's constant experience of deceiving or dodging. So they turned to such means of guaranteeing the truth. But these efforts defeated themselves... The Lord took it for granted that those He spoke to were poor in spirit and pure in heart. So He forbade all such swearing outright. It offends God, and it does not fit the place of His sons.
The same writer limits this to ordinary speech, not the courtroom. He points to the Lord's own answer at His trial:
The question here (as in James) is not in the least a judicial oath. The Lord is dealing with how His disciples behave as individuals, not with how they relate to the governing powers. It is a matter of ordinary conversation, not an oath before the magistrate. Heaven, earth, Jerusalem, and a man's own head, were ways of swearing in the everyday talk of Jews... So the Lord Himself, though silent before, answered when the high priest put Him under oath by the living God. (Matt. 26:62-64.)
- The dodge. The scribes graded oaths so that only ones naming God counted, leaving the rest safe to break.
- The throne. Naming heaven does not avoid God; heaven is His throne, and the oath lands on the One seated there.
- The reach. No oath can be aimed away from Him, so the responsibility the system tried to dodge stands in every case.
- The motive. Greed lay at the bottom, dressed up in distinctions that looked clever and were only blindness — a blindness still common.
- The remedy. People reach for guarantees because people evade. The Lord bans such swearing for hearts poor in spirit and pure — an oath before a magistrate is another matter.