The Seven Woes / Part Two / RLM / June 2025

Note: This is a continuation from Round Four…

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In review, in this section of Matthew 23 we see Jesus pronouncing seven woes upon the scribes and Pharisees. These are brutal critiques. We should examine our own hearts by these things.

A woe is a pronouncement of judgement.

woe / ouai / expressing extreme displeasure and calling for retributive pain on someone or something (ANLEX). A state of intense hardship or distress — disaster, horror. (Louw-Nida).

Seven is the perfect number. Seven woes = complete and utter judgement. Here are woes 5-7.

Woe 5 / Shallowness over Substance: Cleaning the External, Ignoring the Real Problem    (23:25)

Matthew 23:25-26 / “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean.

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Greed / taking by force something that is not your own, seizure, plunder.

Self-indulgence / a lack of self-control, the opposite of the fruit of the Spirit.  Of the flesh.  Uncontrolled, without self-accountability.  

These are the qualities that Jesus says the Pharisee class is full of; greed and self-indulgence. Jesus, like in Revelation 2-3, gives a cure for the problem. Clean the inside of the cup. If we clean up the inside of who we are, the outside will be fine as well.

But why should we deal with spiritual realities when spiritual appearance will do? Because we should be real. We should be honest. We should have a sense of transparency not deception to who we are.

Woe 6 / Shallowness over Substance: External Beauty, Internal Blight (23:27)

Matthew 23:27-28 / “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

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When we focus only on the externals of life, it comes with a terrible cost or consequence.   The Lord’s words here are brutal.  This is one of the more common pieces of this passage that people are aware of; the idea of “whitewashed tombstones” stands in our language too.  It is a powerful image that can stick in our minds. 

These people look great on the outside, but inside they are morally compromised.  While this is something we all must consider and struggle with, there are some in our societies and churches for whom this is not an exaggeration.

A few words to consider.

What does the Greek word “appear” mean, does it give us any more hints?  The word means “to appear, to shine, to show, to reveal.”  Here both usages of the word are almost a visual lie.  They look like light, they look like gold, they are only fools’ gold.  

So, what is really there?  Outside of the “beauty” of their appearance, they are tombs full of dead men’s bones and uncleanliness.  The reality behind this imagery is hypocrisy and lawlessness.  We have talked in this article and the previously related article about hypocrisy at length.  Let’s focus on lawlessness.

Lawlessness.  While the Pharisees are “looking like” and “appearing” to love the Law, the reality is exactly the opposite.  Their lives are filled with “lawlessness.”  David and the Anointed of Israel “loved the law” and sang about it at length (Psalm 119). These people only give the appearance of this.

There is a bit of a paradox here.  These legalists are lawless.  That’s what Jesus is saying.  They miss the point of the law = justice, mercy, faithfulness.  Instead, they have traded it for simply the image of righteousness with no substance.  Tithing for cumin, sure, but avoiding justice along the way.  Like an atheist is the opposite of a theist (a-theist), these people are the opposite of lawkeepers (a-nomia). 

Louw-Nida gives this definition for lawlessness:  To behave with complete disregard for the laws or regulations of a society — or in this case, of God.  They have set up a new set of “laws” that doesn’t have much connection with God’s law.

Woe 7 / Conclusion: Killers of the Prophets, while speaking like supporters of God

Matthew 23:29-36 / “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 

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Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? 

Therefore, I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

Here, the scribes and Pharisees continue their hypocrisy.  They are saying, “We’re not as evil as our prophet-killing ancestors,” and as they are talking, they are plotting the death of Jesus of Nazareth.  How thick can you get?  Self-deceived?  In denial?  I’m not so sure whether they were self-aware enough to know the truth about even their own souls and hearts.  But they were not godly people; they were people who did much harm to others in the name of righteousness.  

Jesus says all that on them: “All the righteous blood will be laid.  This is a harsh and terrible sentence.  From the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah.  Abel was killed early in the book of Genesis by his brother Cain; this was an early example of a person who was deeply jealous of him.  

Before the murder was completed, Cain stewed in his anger, and God spoke to him about a change of heart.  There was no need for Cain to be jealous of Abel; he could simply change his attitude and be on the same standing with God that Abel was.  But no.  Similarly, Zechariah told the people they should change their hearts — and the people (at the command of King Joash) killed him (2 Chronicles 24:20-22) .

Religious half-heartedness swings a bitter, bitter sword toward people who attempt to live true and godly lives.  This is the story of the OT, and it flows even into the New Testament era and throughout Church history.  

At our next meeting we will summarize what we have learned and be shocked by Jesus once again!