Why did Jesus reference Chorazin and Bethsaida in Matthew 11:21?

The Lord singled out three cities upon which He pronounced a most solemn sentence. Chorazin and Bethsaida had seen His great works of power, including healing the sick and casting out demons, yet their hardened consciences were insensible to the repentance this ought to have awakened. He affirmed that the Gentile cities, Tyre and Sidon would have long before repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes, if they had been given a similar testimony. This is an indication that, while Israel refused their Messiah, He would soon be received among the Gentiles and Israel's cities would lie waste. Capernaum is spoken of as having been exalted to heaven, evidently a proud, prosperous city, but was doomed to be brought down to hades, consigned to desolation.

The works of His grace had been most marked in the cities on the shares of Galilee, yet they had been no more receptive than Jerusalem. His censure of these cities is most solemn because they did not repent. He affirms that if Tyre and Sidon (Gentile cities) had witnessed there the mighty works He had done in Chorazin and Bethsaide, the Gentiles would have repeated in sackcloth and ashes long before. Why then did He not do these works there? Because He was sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and would give them every opportunity to repent. Tyre and Sidon's judgment therefore would be more tolerable then theirs.

144 The rejection of His testimony is now definitely entered on, and the true character of what was taking place. He shews the state of the people as to the reception of John and Himself (v. 17-19). Warnings and grace were alike rejected. But a remnant, wisdom's children, justified God's ways in both. Such was the state of things. Then the Lord comes especially to His own testimony and the mighty works by which it had been confirmed. It was not merely moral warning closing the old warning, the list of prophets owning Israel and doing no miracles, but the manifestation of power and one working miracles claiming attention by divine power, not reckoning on any present acknowledgment of Jehovah on which the word as of the prophets could be based. It was a Person present, Himself the subject, source, and power of testimony, its object, and that from which it flowed. But Israel would not repent. His works left them without excuse, His grace made the sin the greater. It would be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon, Sodom and Gomorrha in their day of judgment, than for these cities; such was the testimony they had rejected.

The Lord recalled the memory of Tyre and Sidon (Matt. 11), but it was only to show the far greater guilt of the cities wherein most of His mighty works were done. "Woe to thee, Chorazin! woe to thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say to you, It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you." But there was another city still more favoured (elsewhere called His own city, Matt. 9:1), because it was where He then usually dwelt; and, therefore, was its case so aggravated in guilt. "And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted to heaven, shalt be brought down to hell; for if the mighty works which were done in thee had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say to you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee." In other words, the measure of privilege is ever the measure of responsibility.

Solemn are the words which follow now. The Judge speaks. He who speaks here will take His place upon the throne and preside in that judgment day of which He speaks, "Then began He to reproach the cities in which most of His works of power had taken place, because they had not repented. Woe to thee, Chorazin! Woe to thee, Bethsaida ! for if the works of power which have taken place in you, had taken place in Tyre and Sidon , they had long ago repented in sackcloth and ashes. But I say to you, that it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in judgment day than for you. And thou, Capernaum , who hast been raised up to heaven, shall be brought down even to Hades. For if the works of power which have taken place in thee, had taken place in Sodom , it had remained until this day. But I say to you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in judgment day than for thee." His divine patience is now seen as almost exhausted and for the first time in this Gospel He speaks the "Woe," which He repeats later a number of times. And oh! the word "woe" coming from such lips! Chorazin and Bethsaida had been greatly privileged. Works of power, works which manifested Jehovah's presence had been shown in their midst, yet they repented not. Tyre and Sidon never witnessed such manifestations. The responsibility of Chorazin and Bethsaida is therefore greater than the responsibility of Tyre and Sidon . There will be in that day different degrees of punishment. Capernaum , His own city, had come nearest to heaven and still there was no response. Sodom with all their awful fruits of the flesh will fare better in judgment day than Capernaum . The measure of relationship is always the measure of responsibility. Tyre , Sidon and Sodom had no such privileges and stood in no such relationship to the Lord as the cities which our Lord mentions here. It is so with Christendom today. It shall be more tolerable in that day to the nations of darkest Africa than to the so-called "Christian nations," with light and privileges offered and wilfully rejected.

At this point we find the Lord accepting the fact that the cities of Galilee, where most of His mighty works had been done, had definitely refused Him. There had been rendered to them such a testimony as Tyre and Sidon, and the land of Sodom, had never had. Now, the greater the privilege, the greater the responsibility, and the severer the judgment, when the privilege is despised and the responsibility broken. A sad fate lay in store for Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum. Their inhabitants at that time have to face the day of judgment, and the very cities themselves have been so obliterated, that their sites have been a matter of argument until today. They had rejected "Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham" (Matt. 1:1), and consequently the kingdom as vested in Him.

Accordingly the Lord shows how wisdom was justified, positively and negatively. "He began to upbraid the cities wherein most of His mighty works were done, because they repented not: Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! … And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell: for if the mighty works," etc. (vers. 20-24). What more solemn! They refuse the voice of heavenly wisdom; and the result must be in judgment more unsparing than that which had of old made Sodom the monument of God's vengeance. Was there one place or city in the land more favoured than another? It was Capernaum, where most of His miracles were wrought: and yet this very city should be brought down to hell. Even the notoriously depraved Sodom had not come under so fearful a sentence. The Lord only visits in judgment when means and calls for repentance are exhausted; but when He does judge, who shall be able to stand? Thus should wisdom be justified, may I say, by those that are not her children.

At the close of this chapter we have the Lord's loving invitation, and, in the beginning of the chapter which gives that magnificent description of Wisdom (Proverbs 8), you get her crying at the gates "Unto you, O men, I call." But here is a better invitation, "Come unto Me!" and here we get His rejection, the rejection of His Galilean ministry. This fits in with Isaiah 49. Most of the Lord's mighty works were done round the sea of Galilee, and He says there, "I have laboured in vain, and spent my strength for nought and in vain." That is just what we get here. So He upbraids the cities because they repented not, He upbraids His own because they believed not. This is the only place where Chorazin is named. Philip, Andrew, and Peter all belonged to Bethsaida. These verses are very solemn; we need to weigh them well. Repentance is real submission of soul to what God says in His word about me. There is a lot of subtle teaching about, about another chance deduced from that we have here. Let it be clear; everything about eternity is settled in this life. Nobody will be judged to see if they are saved or lost; the dead will be judged for their works. Condemned already (John 3:18), they are condemned then.

Matthew 11 begins by telling us that when the Lord had thus given them this commission, He Himself in like manner departed "to teach and to preach in their cities." But that chapter does not close until we listen to Him, in all the grace of ill-requited and as it were disappointed love, upbraiding those cities "because they repented not." "Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes" (ver. 21). But sad to His soul as this view of the unbelief of Israel must have been, He finds His relief in the consciousness of the stability of the Father's purpose; in this, as St. Paul did afterwards, that the foundation of God still stood sure, and that therefore there would be still a gathering to Him of all those whom the Father foreknew, and who should hear His voice as the good Shepherd, saying, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden."

"I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for Sodom in that day than for that city. Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the works of power which have taken place in you had taken place in Tyre and Sidon, they had long ago repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the judgment than for you. And thou, Capernaum, which hast been raised up to heaven, shalt be brought down† even to Hades." This is a solemn principle much too easily and too often forgotten. People are apt to pity the heathen and to think of distant lands; but while it is well for those who are thoroughly rejoicing in the Lord to feel for those who want Him, there cannot be a greater delusion than to suppose that when the judgment comes, men as such will be better off, e.g., in England than they are in Tartary. No doubt, wherever there is faith in a rejected Christ, it will bring into heavenly glory; but the rejection of Christ when He was on earth, or now that He is in heaven, is fatal. More particularly the rejection of a heavenly Christ is ruinous; even then the Lord could say, "It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you." Not that Israel was not privileged; but privileges despised or misused bring only a deeper perdition upon those who reject or pervert them. Before "I say," Tisch. adds "But," with ℵEΞ, etc., Memph., which W. H. and others omit, after BCL. †"Who hast been raised up": so Weiss and Blass (ὑφώθης), after A, most later uncials, and most cursives (33, 69), all having ὑψωθεῖσα, with Amiat. Other recent Edd. adopt "shalt thou indeed be exalted (ὑφωθήσῃ)," after ℵBDLΞ, Syrcu. Old Lat. Memph.; of these, BD give καταβήσῃ (Treg. Marg., W. H., text, and Weiss), instead of καταβιβασθήσῃ (Revv. and Blass).

Therefore it is that these cities rise up before the Lord. It was bad enough for the cities Chorazin and Bethsaida inasmuch as there had been mighty works done in them and they had not listened, and the Lord said, "If the works of power which have taken place in you had taken place in Tyre and Sidon, they had long ago repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes." Israel were more guilty than the heathen, and the Israel of Christ's day peculiarly so. No heathen had ever listened to such a testimony. To refuse the Word of God is to expose to the judgment of God. "It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the judgment than for you." And if there was one city that had even greater advantages than these, it was Capernaum, which is called His own city, (Matt. 9:1) where He was pleased to live and labour. And what as to it? "And thou, Capernaum, which hast been raised up to heaven, shalt be brought down even to Hades" — a still more awful judgment.