Warning Against Hypocrisy of the Scribes and Pharisees

1. Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples,
2. saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in Moses’ chair.
3. Therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do.
4. For they bind heavy burdens and hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are unwilling to move them with one of their fingers.
5. But all their works they do to be seen by men; for they make their phylacteries broad, and their fringes long.
6. And they love the place of honour at feasts, and the front seats in the synagogues,
7. and greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called Rabbi by men.
8. But you, do not be called Rabbi, for one is your Teacher, and all you are brothers.
9. And call no man father on the earth, for one is your Father, He who is in heaven.
10. Neither be called instructors, for one is your Instructor, the Christ.
11. But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant.
12. And whoever exalts himself shall be humbled, and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.

Woes to the Scribes and Pharisees

13. But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. For you neither enter yourselves, nor allow those who are entering to enter.
14. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, even while for a pretense, you make long prayers: therefore you shall receive greater condemnation.
15. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel over sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.
16. Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it is nothing; but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound.’
17. You fools and blind, for which is greater, the gold, or the temple that sanctifies the gold?
18. And, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it is nothing; but if anyone swears by the gift on it, he is bound.’
19. You fools and blind, for which is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifies the gift?
20. Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it.
21. And he who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it.
22. And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God, and by Him who sits upon it.
23. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice, mercy, and faith; but these you ought to have done, and not to leave the other undone.
24. Blind guides, who strain out a gnat, and swallow a camel.
25. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of extortion and excess.
26. Blind Pharisee! Clean first the inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside may also be clean.
27. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.
28. Even so, you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
29. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous,
30. and say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’
31. Therefore you bear witness against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.
32. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers.
33. Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the judgment of hell?
34. Therefore, behold, I send to you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city,
35. that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of Abel the righteous to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.
36. Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

Jesus Laments over Jerusalem

37. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing! 

38. See, your house is left to you desolate; 

39. for I tell you, you will not see Me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”