Matthew 11:20

OUTBURST OF FEELING SUGGESTED TO THE MIND OF JESUS BY THE RESULT OF HIS LABORS IN GALILEE. (Mat 11:20-30)

Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Mat_11:20-24

Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsatda!

The damnation under the gospel more intolerable than that of Sodom

I.

There shall be a day of judgment.

II. In the day of judgement some sinners shall fare worse than others.

III. In the day of judgment there will de a distribution of sinners; punishments according to the exact rules of justice.

IV. In the day of judgment it will be more tolerable for Sodom than Capernaum. These two cities may be considered under a threefold distinction.

1. Nominal.

2. Local.

3. Moral.

V. That the worst of the heathen who never had Christ preached to them shall fare better in the day of judgment, than those that continue impenitent under the gospel. Why?

1. Because impenitency under the gospel hath more of sin in it, than any sin of the heathen. It is without excuse. Cannot plead ignorance.

2. Impenitency under the gospel is a resisting the loudest calls of God to repentance, The heathen called to repentance by natural conscience, creation; now by the Holy Spirit. Higher motives are laid before sinners.

3. There is the highest contempt of God in it

(1) of His authority:

(2) of His goodness:

(3) of His threatening.

4. This impenitency is a disappointing of God in His end.

5. This impenitency hath much folly in it, as well as sin.

6. Impenitency under the gospel shows greater wilfulness in sin.

7. Impenitency under the gospel is attended with the greatest resistance of the Spirit.

Wherein the greater intolerableness will consist?

1. Such will suffer greater torments from their own consciences.

2. More than others from the devil and his angels.

3. Christ Himself will appear in greater severity against such.

4. Witnesses will rise up against these more than other sinners.

Application.

1. We may hence learn what to judge of the heathen who have not heard of Christ.

2. The greatest favour and privilege to a people, may be the occasion of the greatest evil.

3. How ineffectual the best outward means are of themselves to bring a people to repentance.

4. What little reason men have to boast of their knowledge of gospel privileges, when these may turn to their surer condemnation.

5. To awaken us who have gospel favours above most people under heaven. (M. Barker, M. A.)

I. Does God grant to all mankind a sufficiency of means of repentance.

II. Is it any contradiction to his granting a sufficiency to all, that in the high exercise of his sovereignty he grants to some special assistance.

He gave time to Chorazin and Bethsaida what He granted not to Tyre and Sidon. When I read that Tyre and Sidon would have repented with the same means of grace that were given to Chorazin, I naturally inquire whether the means actually afforded to Tyre were sufficient. Then I ask if Tyre only wanted additional means, how could it consist with the justice of Gods dealings to have refused those means? Lay it down as an axiom that the Judge of all the earth must do right. We forget that Chorazin and Tyre were under different dispensations, one under light of the gospel, the other in darkness of heathenism; one would be judged by the standard of revelation, the other not. And what is there incredible in the supposition that the means afforded to Tyre, in order to obedience, were as ample as those given to Chorazin for raising her to the loftier elevation which the gospel demanded? Means must be judged in connection with this end, and in this connection could their difference or equality be decided. If one man be required to lift one thousand tons, and another only one, it is obvious the arm of either must receive strength before it could accomplish the task. But they do not need the same strength. Tyre had as much help as Chorazin in view of her duties; less is required of the heathen. There are mysteries about the doctrine of election But why does not God give to each of us grace as His omniscience sees will be effectual? But has not God given us enough to render our condemnation just? We have sufficient for our salvation. Means must be kept within certain limits. Means which exceeded them not in Chorazin, would not in the case of Tyre. The means consistent with responsibility in Chorazin might have destroyed it in Tyre. (H. Melvill, M. A.)

The danger of impenitence where the gospel is preached

I. I observe from this discourse of our Saviour, that miracles are of great force and efficacy to bring men to repentence.

II. That god is not obliged to work miracles for the conversion of sinners.

III. That the external means of repentance which God affords to men, do. Suppose an inward grace of God accompanying them sufficiently enabling men to repent, until by obstinate neglect and resistance we provoke God to withdraw it from the means, or else to withdraw both the grace and the means from us.

IV. That an irresistible degree of grace is not necessary to repentance, nor commonly afforded to those who do repent.

V. That the sins and impenitence of men receive their aggravation, and consequently shall have their punishment proportionable to the opportunities and means of repentance which those persons enjoyed and neglected.

VI. That the case of those who are impenitent under the gospel is of all others the most dangerous, and their damnation shall be the most severe. (J. Tillotson, D. D.)

The sentence of Chorazin

We can conceive some inhabitant of these Jewish towns demanding with astonishment how the heathen could be preferred in their stead. The Almighty Judge, in apportioning rewards and punishments regards not the actual amount of profligacy and virtue, but also the means of improvement enjoyed. He could see in Tyre and Sidon, debased as they were, a disposition not indifferent to those proofs of Divine revelation which to Bethsaida and Chorazin were exhibited in vain. He judges according to that hidden temper, not by the acts done. He judges of a degree of faith never actually called into existence.

I. THE first conclusion to be drawn relates to the future condition of those millions of men, who depart this life in ignorance of a Saviours name.

II. The probability of our being mistaken in our views of the future judgment.

III. Warning against drawing hasty conclusions from anything which we can interpret as a manifest interference of Divine Providence for the punishment of sin.

IV. Such is the sentence against ourselves if we know these things and do them not. (C. Girdlestone, M. A.)

The woe of Capernaum

While Christ was unmoved at the foreseen decay of Capernaum, He wept at the thought of the desolation of Jerusalem; a sign of His perfect manhood that He should thus have most sympathy with those who were His countrymen.

I. What is implied by the renunciation of Capernaum as exalted unto heaven. The Bible finds man in a garden, it leaves him in a city; intimating that the highest kind of life is social. We are not to regard the accumulation of men into great communities as an unmixed evil. It may be a source of temptation; it is also the means of drawing out some of the holiest charities of the soul, some of the noblest endowments of the mind. It is this selfexaltation which is the snare of evVVV man who is one of a great community. The concourse of men has a tendency to put God at a distance. Hence arises an independent spirit. If we would lead a life safe from the casting down of shame and care, we must keep before us the thought of an ever-present, personal God. Distraction of mind makes men wretched. This is produced by absence of religious obedience. Men are worn out with the eternal strife to reconcile impossibilities. In putting our life under God, lies its own safe exaltation.

II. But it is not only the being independent of God which our Lord charges upon Capernaum; He speaks of it as being in an especial degree insensible to his own wonder-working power. Here Christ appears to lay bare another fault to which large and flourishing communities are peculiarly liable, viz., insensibility to distinct religious impressions. This shows itself by the small proportion of people who attend public service or partake of the Lords Supper. Not difficult to see the reason why this should be the besetting sin of those who live in large cities.

1. The personal insignificance of each individual in this place is a snare. One man is nothing the mighty throng.

2. There is never wanting in a vast population the support of others.

3. In living amongst large numbers, we become acutely suspicious of being deceived and misled. We learn to distrust our best feelings. Not more mighty works were done in Capernauru than in our own streets if we have hearts to receive them. All that savours of the supernatural in religion, finds men apathetic. For a little while we catch a glimpse of what is, we know what it is to believe; and then the cold black flood of worldliness and unconcern rolls back and the solemn union grows indistinct and fades away. The spirit of insensibility possesses us again. Then awaits that man a fall more disastrous than ever overtook any earthly city-not the casting down of walls, but the undermining of every high resolve, the decay of every unselfish principle, the ruin of every goodly hope. (J. R. Woodford, M. A.)

The sin and danger of abusing religious privileges

It is a sin of the deepest dye.

1. A great contempt and affront are cast upon God.

2. It shows a mans determined hardness of heart.

3. Let us consider the privileges we enjoy in this favoured land. (E. Cooper.)

Judgment on Capernaum

I. Capernaum was exalted to heaven because of Christs preaching and performing so many miracles there.

1. Here He performed most of His miracles.

2. Here Jesus preached.

3. Here Jesus prayed.

4. Here the Holy Spirit descended, for conversion of souls. So Scotland has been exalted to heaven.

(1) By the preaching of the gospel.

(2) By the pouring out of the Spirit.

II. Capernaum repented not.

1. Some would not go to hear.

2. Some went for awhile.

3. Some followed Him all the time, but did not repent.

III. Capernaum was brought down to hell.

1. According to justice.

2. According to truth.

3. In the nature of things. (McCheyne.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 11:20-24. Then began he to upbraid the cities — Which he had often blessed with his presence, and in which he had preached many awakening sermons, and performed many astonishing miracles. It is observable, he had never upbraided them before. Indeed, at first they had received him with all gladness, Capernaum in particular. Wo unto thee, Chorazin, &c. — That is, miserable art thou. For these are not curses or imprecations, as has been commonly supposed; but a solemn, compassionate declaration of the misery they were bringing on themselves. Chorazin and Bethsaida were cities of Galilee, standing by the lake of Gennesareth, in which and the neighbouring places Jesus spent a great part of his public life. See notes on chap. Mat 4:13-16. If the mighty works — The great miracles, which were done in you, had been done [of old] in Tyre and Sidon — Though cities inhabited by heathen, and remarkable for their luxury, pride, and contempt of religion, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes — That is, they would have exercised the deepest repentance, for sackcloth and ashes were used by the Jews in token of the bitterest grief. But I say unto you — Besides this general denunciation of wo to those stubborn unbelievers, I declare particularly that the degree of their misery will be greater than even that of Tyre and Sidon, yea, of Sodom. And thou, Capernaum, &c. — He mentions Capernaum separately by itself, and last of all, because, being the place of his ordinary residence, it had been blessed with more of his sermons and miracles than any other town. Nevertheless it abounded with wickedness of all kinds, and therefore he compared it to that city which, on account of the greatness of its crimes, had been the most terrible example of the divine displeasure that ever the world had beheld. It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom, &c. — That is, the condition of the inhabitants even of the land of Sodom, in the day of the final judgment, shall be more tolerable than thy condition. For thy condemnation shall rise in proportion to thy more aggravated guilt, and to those more valuable mercies and privileges which thou hast abused. Dr. Hammond understands this passage as referring to the temporal calamities to come on those places by the Romans; who did indeed shortly after overrun the whole country, and made dreadful ravages in some of those cities. But, as Doddridge justly observes, “There is no evidence that the destruction of those cities was more dreadful than that of Tyre and Sidon, and it was certainly less so than that of Sodom and Gomorrah: besides, our Lord plainly speaks of a judgment that was yet to come on all these places that he mentions.” From this passage, therefore, we learn “two important particulars: 1st, That the punishments to be inflicted upon wicked men in the life to come shall not be all equal, but in exact proportion to the demerit of the sins of each. 2d, That great and signal punishments, befalling sinners in this life, will not screen them from the wrath of God in the life to come; for Jesus Christ, the judge, here declares that Sodom, though burned by fire and brimstone from heaven, shall suffer such dreadful things, that, in speaking of the pains of the damned, he mentions this city as an example of very great punishment.” — Macknight.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§ 40. — UPBRAIDING OF THE IMPENITENT CITIES, Mat_11:20-24.

20. The cities — The children who justified divine wisdom were but the few. Whole cities rejected it, to whom it had been offered in all its beauty and power. Upbraid — Rebuke, reprove. Repented not — Our Lord upbraided not the bare walls or buildings of the cities, but the individuals in them who could repent of sin, but would not. As the Lord passed from considering John’s wavering faith to the faithlessness of that generation, so now he passes from that generation to the cities who had been most favoured, and were therefore most guilty of want of faith. Mighty works — There are those who maintain that miracles, even if performed, are no proof of a divine message. But this is as contrary to common sense as it is to Scripture. Mankind fully believe with their ordinary common sense that if a man in the name of God perform undoubted miracles, he is a messenger from God. Such is the doctrine of our Lord in this and many other passages.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL NOTES

Mat_11:21. Sackcloth and ashes.—In the East, it was common for mourners to put on a black garment which resembled a sack, with holes for the arms, and to strew ashes upon the head. The symbol of mourning and of repentance (Lange).

Mat_11:23. Hell.—Hades (R.V.), denotes a far-down subterranean region and so used figuratively to express a position of the utmost abasement (Wendt). The antithesis of heaven; the lowest as contrasted with the highest position (Mansel).

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Mat_11:20-24

Invincible unbelief.—Three cities are made to stand out here among all the cities of Galilee. One of these is made to stand out in a similar way amongst these three. We shall examine what is said of them here as they are thus separated by the Saviour; considering the first two in the first place, and the remaining third in the second.

I. The first two.—These are by name Chorazin and Bethsaida, and are believed to have been situated, the one on the western shore of the Lake of Gennesaret, and the other, probably, at its northernmost point, and on each side of the river Jordan as it there enters the lake. They are compared by the Saviour with two others, Tyre and Sidon, on the borders of the far larger Mediterranean Sea; but not belonging in any way to the land and people of Israel. Of Chorazin and Bethsaida, as compared with these well-known cities, the Saviour here, in the first place, implies a good deal. In temporal matters, e g. He seems to imply that the two Jewish cities thus named were so far like the Gentile cities in question as to be places, as these were, of no little success in the pursuit of commerce and wealth. In spiritual matters, on the contrary, He implies clearly that they were not at all alike; and that Chorazin and Bethsaida had had advantages in this respect which had been wholly confined to themselves; the teaching and the “mighty works” which had abounded in them having been wholly unknown in the other two. From this the Saviour goes on to declare very much more. He opens to us, as it were, the secret door of the hypothetical and contingent. He declares to us what would have been had things been otherwise than they were; and does not hesitate to say what Tyre and Sidon would have done had they had the advantages which they had not. On this point He is, indeed, peculiarly outspoken and clear. They would not have done, He says, as had been done by those other two cities. They would not have refused to “repent” (Mat_11:20). Still less would they have refused with the same continued impenitence, notwithstanding all that was done. On the contrary, He says, they would have “repented long ago,” and that openly and in “ashes” (Mat_11:21). In a word, all would have been present in their case, that was so conspicuously absent in the case of those others. Finally, from this the Saviour goes on to a higher step still. He does not hesitate even to forecast the issues of the day of all days. He tells us exactly how it will be with those He is speaking of in that time of judgment and light. How the people, e.g. that had the less light will not then be held responsible for more than that light; and will not, therefore, be called on to suffer beyond a certain amount. Also, how, all the same for that (cf. πλὴν, nevertheless, Mat_11:22) and however bad that certain amount may be to them—and it is not spoken of, be it observed, as being anything else—worse still will be the doom of those who used greater light to worse ends. It is a terrible picture, and need not be dwelt on. But it must not be slighted, or put to one side. “I say unto you that it shall be more tolerable (!) for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you” (Mat_11:22).

II. The remaining third.—The parallel here is on the same lines with—but considerably in advance of—the preceding one. This is true, in the first place, as to the cities compared. If Tyre and Sidon, among the cities outside of Israel, had been specially warned and denounced by the prophets of God on account of their abundance and “pride” (see Isaiah 23; Ezekiel 26; Ezekiel 27), much more had this been so of that one city specified now (Gen_13:13; Genesis 19; Isa_1:9; Isa_3:9; Rev_11:8). The very place of that city, in fact, had been for ages past a standing testimony against it (Jud_1:7). On the other hand, if Chorazin and Bethsaida had been places favoured singularly and above others by the presence, and teaching, and miracles of the Saviour, even more so, in all respects, had been “His own city” (Mat_9:1) Capernaum. In this respect, indeed, it might be said to have been—or, possibly, because of this, had itself supposed that it would be—“exalted unto heaven” (Mat_11:23). No greater privileges of that kind could very well be. Also, in regard to the cities compared so are the declarations here uttered about them. More is taught, e.g. about the case of Sodom than had been of those others. Of them, it is said, that if they had had the light, it would have led them to repent. Of Sodom it is taught, that if she had had the light, she would have repented to good purpose. In other words that her repentance would have been accepted, her sentence reversed, herself spared to that day (Mat_11:23). Even more terrible, therefore, is that which is finally told us in this connection about the last day. Briefly put, it is this, that of all “intolerable” sentences passed in that day of abiding decision, none will be worse than that passed on those who have received most and profited least. No name of shame, in that day of shame, will be lower than theirs. “Howbeit I say unto you,” etc. (Mat_11:24).

How much light is thrown by these words of Jesus:—

1. On the breadth of His mercy.—Not only Israel, but those outside it; not only their doings, but what they would have done also—are thought of and allowed for!

2. On the intensity of His love.—He is far more grieved for these guilty Galilean cities than they are for themselves.

3. On the supreme dignity of His person.—Nothing is worse for any than neglect of Himself! Nothing that He declares can be ever set aside! Nothing can be removed that He has once fixed. All that He declares about all is to be as He says (cf. Joh_16:9; Joh_5:22; Act_17:31, etc.).

HOMILIES ON THE VERSES

Mat_11:20-30. Christ’s voice.—

I. The voice of sad upbraiding (Mat_11:20-24).

II. The solemn voice of thanksgiving (Mat_11:25-26).

III. The majestic voice of self-attestation (Mat_11:27).

IV. The pleading voice of universal invitation (Mat_11:28-30).—A. Maclaren, D.D.

Mat_11:20-24. Mighty works.—

I. That God vouchsafes a greater manifestation of Himself to some men than to others.

II. That the design of all these mighty works is man’s spiritual reformation.

III. That the mighty works which would prove effective to reform some have no saving effect upon others.—Does not this show—

1. The diversity in souls.

2. The moral freedom even of depraved souls.

3. The sovereignty of God in His dealings with men.

4. That we must not depend too much upon “mighty works” to convert.

IV. That the guilt of the unconverted is measured by the Divine works that have been done amongst them.

V. That the relative degree of guilt belonging to sinners will fully appear on the day of judgment.—D. Thomas, D.D.

Mat_11:20. The true test of success.—We see the Son of man mourning over comparatively wasted labour. There were Galilean cities, with Capernaum at their head, in which He had spent much of His time, and done most of His mighty works. Great blessings had been conferred, great joy created. But there was not repentance, and all the other fruit of our Lord’s ministry failed to meet His desire. This fact shows us what in the judgment of Jesus is the high and true success.

I. Glance at what took place in Capernaum, at the spirit the people manifested, and at the great amount of good that was done.—

1. By going through the four Gospels and making a complete history of Capernaum, in relation to our Lord’s ministry, we find the conduct and the experience of the men of that city were in happy contrast to the experience and conduct of men in most other cities embraced by His labours. E.g. cf. Mat_13:58. Surely, if the people had lacked sympathy with our Lord’s benevolent purpose, if they had lacked confidence in His healing power, if they had lacked thankfulness for the blessings He conferred, He would not in their midst have done “most of His mighty works.”

2. Who can fully realise the joy there must have been in Capernaum while our Lord was ministering there? If we had heard that He was going to speak concerning the city and His ministry in it, we should have gathered about Him, expecting to see His countenance lit up with triumph, and to hear His lips pour forth exultant strains. His countenance was dark, His tones were sad, His heart was bleeding, for the great end of His ministry had not been secured.

II. The lessons which this one fact teaches us are very obvious. In our Christian labour, whether at home or abroad, we must not be satisfied with results that did not satisfy Christ. The evangelical history will be sure to be repeated wherever the gospel is preached. Miracles will not be wrought, but, by processes that work just as certainly, though more slowly, temporal good will be created. We may use these temporary results as an instrument for securing the end. The end is not temporal prosperity, but spiritual life; not the refinement of society but the conversion of the individual.—Charles Vince.

Mat_11:23-24. Capernaum and Sodom.—

1. The honour of a town is the gospel; and where it is most clearly preached, that place is exalted most and made nearest heaven.

2. Means of grace if they avail not unto true conversion, do bring a man deeper in the state of condemnation.

3. Abuse and contempt of the gospel, impenitent unbelief, and disregarding the offers of God’s grace do weigh heavier in God’s balance than the grossest sins against the law.—David Dickson.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

4. Royal denunciation of Judgment on the cities of Galilee. Mat_11:20-24

20Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works [wonderful] works, or miracles]27 were done, because they repented not: 21Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works [miracles], which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. 22But I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you. 23And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven,28 shalt be brought down [go down]29 to hell [hades]Matt 30: for if the mighty works [miracles], which have been done in thee, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. 24But I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for thee.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Mat_11:20. Then began He.—The accent lies on ότε, not on ἥρξατο. According to the account of Luke, the decisive denunciations of Christ on the cities of Galilee occurred at a later period, when He took final leave of them. This is quite in accordance with what we would have expected at the close of His ministry. But even at this stage, partial predictions of judgment must have been uttered, which Matthew, according to his systematic plan, here records in their final and complete form.

Mat_11:21. Chorazin.—The name occurs neither in the Old Testament nor in Josephus, and in the New Testament only in this place and in Luke 13. According to Jerome, it was situate two miles from Capernaum. See the different conjectures as to its unknown locality in the Encycls., and Robinson, 2:405.—Bethsaida == בַּית־צֵידָה commonly rendered, house of fishes; or, home of hunting, or catching. A city of Galilee (Joh_12:21), on the western shore of the lake (Mar_6:45; Mar_8:22). The home of Peter, of Andrew, and of Philip, Joh_1:44; Joh_12:21.—Another town of this name was situate in Lower Gaulonitis, on the eastern side of the lake. Philip the tetrarch elevated it to the rank of a city, giving it the name of Julias, after the daughter of the Emperor Augustus (Luk_9:10). The situation of Bethsaida is not marked by any ruins, and wholly unknown.

[According to this passage, most of the miracles of Christ were done in these cities of Galilee, and yet not one is recorded in the Gospels as having been done in Chorazin and Bethsaida. A confirmation of Joh_21:25.—P. S.]

Tyre and Sidon.—Heathen cities in the immediate neighborhood. The point of the comparison lay in their being inhabited by a large, busy, heathen population, whose corruptness had been exposed even in the writings of the prophets. The original seats of the service of Baal.

[They would have repented.—The knowledge of our Saviour extended also to contingencies, i. e., to things which would have happened under certain conditions. Comp. Henry and Wordsworth, in loc.—P. S.]

In sackcloth and ashes.—In the East, it was common for mourners to put on a black garment which resembled a sack, with holes for the arms, and to strew ashes upon the head. Hence this was regarded as the symbol of mourning and of repentance.—Luke: sitting: καθήμεναι. Mourners and pentents were wont to sit on the ground.

Mat_11:23. Exalted unto heaven, or highly glorified.—“Not by its rich produce of fishes (Grotius,31 Kuinoel, Fritzsche), but by the residence and works of Jesus (Bengel, Paulus).” De Wette.

To hades.—In opposition to heaven—the lowest depth (comp. Eze_31:16). The temporal judgments which soon afterward passed over these cities, till their every trace has been swept from the earth, are here referred to, as well as the final judgment.—The Greek word ᾅδης is equivalent to, though not quite identical with, the Hebrew sheol, שְׁאוֹל. On the doctrine of Sheol, compare the article “Hades” by Güder, in Herzog’s Encycl. This must not be confounded with hell or gehenna. The essential ideas attaching to hades are: (1) Habitation of the dead before the completion of redemption; (2) contrast between the higher and the lower region, between the place of rest and that of torment, Luk_16:19-31; (3) state of imperfectness of the souls in hades—disembodied state, longing, waiting for final decision, 1Pe_3:19; (4) continuance as an intermediate kingdom till the end of the world. Popular views concerning it: It was a subterranean place, etc. Symbolical import: Depth of misery or of judgment, intermediate states, purifications, to the end of the world.

[J. J. Owen in loc.: “The word here rendered hell, is not gehenna, but hades, the invisible or lower world, where dwell, according to the ancient conception, the shades of the dead. It does not here signify the place of future punishment any more than heaven, in the preceding clause, means the seat of bliss where God dwells. Both are figuratively used, to denote great spiritual privileges as well as temporal prosperity [?], and the depth of ruin into which they would fall through the abuse of these privileges.”—J. A. Alexander in loc.: “Heli here means the unseen world, the state of the dead, the world of spirits, without regard to difference of character and condition. … It is here used simply in antithesis to heaven, and must be explained, accordingly, as meaning the extremest degradation and debasement of a moral kind, but not perhaps without allusion to the loss of all external greatness, and oblivion of the very spot on which the city stood.”]

Mat_11:24. Unto you—comp. in thee, Mat_11:23.—Euthymius Zigal., very correctly: τὸ μὲν ὑμῖν πρὸς τοὺς πολίτας τῆν πόλεως ἐκείνης εἵρηται, τὸ δὲ σοὶ πρὸς τὴν πόλιν.

For the land of Sodom.—Compare the history of Sodom in the Book of Genesis, and the art in the Bibl. Cyclops. Nor must we overlook the contrast between the Dead Sea and the Lake of Tiberias, as, in the former comparison, that between the cities of Galilee and Tyre and Sidon. Lake Gennesareth shall, from the wickedness of the people, descend in judgment to a lower level than the cities of the Dead Sea. The two comparisons are taken from different periods: the one from the present, the other from antiquity; the one from a region over which judgment has already passed, the other from cities which were yet to be judged. But the cities of Galilee had experienced a much more gracious visitation than either the doomed region of the Dead Sea, or heathen Tyre and Sidon. They had been the scene of most of His mighty deeds, and Capernaum had even been chosen as His abode.

[It is a remarkable fact, that the very names and ruins of these three cities on the Lake of Gennesareth have utterly disappeared, and their locality is a matter of dispute among travellers, while even that of Sodom and Gomorrha is pointed out on the shores of the Dead Sea. Thus the fearful prediction of our Saviour has already been literally fulfilled on these cities; but a more terrible spiritual fulfilment is awaiting its inhabitants on the great day of judgment.—P. S.]

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. The woe which Christ here pronounces on the cities of Galilee is a proof that the judgment of hardening had already passed upon them. But clear evidence of this only appeared when Jesus finally forsook Galilee. Still, every woe of judgment pronounced by Christ is the echo of a woe of pity in His heart, and indicates that outward judgments are now unavoidable, since the inward judgment of hardening had already commenced.

2. The Lord here evidently assigns to His miracles the highest power and import in quickening and strengthening faith. Similarly, He knows and perceives that Tyre, Sidon, and Sodom would have repented sooner than those cities of Galilee, which implicitly yielded themselves to the deadening influences of Pharisaism. History has confirmed this prediction so far as this was possible. Tyre became a Christian city; while, by the Lake of Galilee, sprang up Tiberias, the capital of Jewish Talmudism.

[3. Import of the passage, especially the words: It will be more tolerable, etc., Mat_11:22; Mat_11:24, on the doctrine of different degrees of punishment, corresponding to the measure of opportunity enjoyed, and of ingratitude manifested in this life. Comp. Mat_5:21-22; Mat_10:15; Luk_12:47-48; Joh_9:41; Joh_15:22; Joh_15:24; Rom_2:12. This distinction removes many popular objections to the doctrine of eternal punishment.—P. S.]

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

How the royal dignity of Christ appeared, both in His compassion and in His indignation about the hardness of His contemporaries.—The woe pronounced by the Lord: 1. A cry of woe in His heart; 2. a cry of woe in the heart of those cities (their judicial hardening); 3. a cry of woe in the dispensation of outward judgments. Or, 1. a verdict; 2. a prediction; 3. an earnest of judgment.—Jesus taking leave from Galilee, and His taking leave from the temple and from Jerusalem.—The predictions of the Lord confirming His Divine character, even as His miracles had done.—The height of privileges despised, leading to the depth of Divine judgments.—Three chosen cities sunk so low (among them, Bethsaida, the city of the Apostles, and especially Capernaum, that of the Lord Himself).—Christ’s mild judgment on the heathen world: 1. An evidence of His unfathomable Wisdom 2. of His inexhaustible mercy; 3. of His Divine penetration.—The different degrees of judgment and of punishment.—The final judgment will throw light on the import of temporal judgments.

[Quesnel: Mat_11:20. We cannot complain that we have seen no miracles, since all those of our Creator are exposed to the eyes of our mind and our body, and all those of our Saviour to the eyes of our faith. Let us take to ourselves these reproaches of our Lord, since His miracles also are designed for us.

Mat_11:21. An impenitent Christian is worse than a pagan.

Mat_11:22. How terrible are God’s judgments on the impenitent! Everything will help to overwhelm them at the tribunal of God; the benefits and favors which they have received, as well as the sins which they have committed.

Mat_11:23. The proud, who of all sinners are the most difficult to be converted, shall likewise be the most humbled. Pride hardens the heart even more than the greatest sins of impurity. There is nothing more opposite to the Christian religion, the whole design of which is to make us humble. Lord, humble us at present, rather than reserve us for the eternal humiliation of the reprobate!—P. S.]

Starke:—Zeisius: The brighter the summer-day, the louder the thunder-storm.—The greater grace, the heavier judgment, Joh_12:48; 2Pe_2:21.—Open and notorious sinners will more readily be converted than hypocrites.—As some sins are more heinous that others, so also shall they receive greater condemnation.—Many a nominal Christian will receive heavier punishment than the poor heathen.

Heubner:—Great is the guilt of those who despise the means of grace.—Sometimes places which experience the most gracious visitations are the most barren.—Every one shall be judged according to the measure of the means of grace which he has enjoyed.—Fallacious prosperity of great cities.—The higher they stand in their own imaginations, the lower shall they be cast down.

Footnotes:

[27] Mat_11:20.—[Lange, with de Wette, translates δυνάμεις: Wunder, justly differing from Luther, who renders simply: Thaten. The N. T. has three words for miracles (in the general sense) or supernatural deeds and events: 1) τέρας, which occurs 16 times and is uniformly and correctly rendered in the E. V. wonder (an extraordinary, mysterious, and inexplicable phenomenon, portent); 2) δυνάμεις is, miracles proper, as the effect of a supernatural power, which is variously translated: wonderful works (Mat_7:22), more frequently: mighty works, and still oftener: miracles (Mar_9:39; Act_2:22; Act_8:13; 1Co_12:10; 1Co_12:28-29; Gal_3:5); 3) ση μεῖον, sign, pointing to the moral aim of the supernatural act; here the E. V. varies somewhat arbitrarily between sign (about 40 times), miracle (about 20 times), and wonder (3 times). Comp. Lange’s doctrinal comments on Mat_8:1-13, p. 154, and the dictionaries sub verbis.—P. S.]

[28] Mat_11:23.—The reading: ὑψωθεῖσα in K., M., X.; ὑψώθης in Griosbach. Tischendorf; on the authority of E., F., G., etc.; μὴ ὑψωθήσῃ in Lachmann with B., C., D. “The last gives no good sense.” Meyer. [It gives good sense if we regard it as a question with the expectation of a negative answer (μή): Shalt thou be exalted to heaven? Nay; thou shalt go down to the underworld, or as Irenæus quotes the passage (Adv. hær. iv. 36): Et tu Capernaum, numquid usque ad cœlum exaltaberis? Usque ad inferos descendes. The reading: μὴ … ὑψωθήσῃ is now also sustained by Cod. Sinaiticus, and adopted by Tregelles, Conant, and Alford in the 4th edition.—P. S.]

[29] Mat_11:23.—Lachmann, Tischendorf [Alford]: καταβήσῃ, descend, go down, after B., D., Vulg., Itala. The lectio recepta is taken from Luk_10:15. [Cod. Sinait. sustains the passive καταβιβασθήσῃ, thou shalt be brought down.—P. S.]

[30] Mat_11:23.—[Lange: Unterw lt, i. e., underworld. So also Dr. Conant, and the revised version of the Am. B. U. throughout. I prefer Todtenreich for the German, and hades for the English. The English language, owing to its cosmopolitan or (sit venia verbo!) panlinguistic composition, can much easier retain and appropriate for popular use the Greek term than the German. Why should we not use it as well as the terms paradise, Eden, and many other foreign words which have become perfectly familiar to the reader of the Bible? This translation cuts off all disputes about locality (of which we know nothing certain), and the different renderings which might be proposed, as underworld, spirit world, region, or rather state of the dead or departed, etc. The important distinction between hades (ᾴδης) i. e., the world of all the dead, the intermediate spirit world, and hell (γέεννα), i. e., the final abode and state of the lost, should be restored in the English Bible, if it should ever be revised. (Comp. footnote on p. 114.) In this passage hades, with its gloomy depth below, is contrasted with the heaven or the blessed height above; comp. Psa_139:8; Job_11:8; Rom_10:6-7, and especially Isa_14:15, to which our passage seems to allude; εἰς ᾅδου καταβήσῃ (Babylon). See Com.—P. S.]

[31][It seems improbable that such a man as Grotius should give such a low and silly interpretation. But so it is. He says in loc.: “Hoc non dubito quin ad res huius vitœ pertineat, ut in his quœ sequuntur assurgat oratio. Florebat Capernaumum piscatu, mercatu et quœ alia esse solent commoda ad mare sitarum urbium.” Even Barnes still speaks in this connection of the successful commerce, temporal wealth and prosperity of Capernaum, although he rises above Grotius by emphasizing the spiritual privileges, which here alone are meant. Stier (Reden Jesu, i., p. 491) refers the expression to the lofty situation of Capernaum, which is not much better and besides a matter of geographical uncertainty.—P. S.]

Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 11:20-30.

Upbraiding The Impenitent Cities, And Inviting The Heavy Laden

The remainder of the discourse given by Matthew as occasioned by the message from John the Baptist, (Mat 11:2) consists of two main divisions.—Mat 11:20-24 is given also by Luke (Luk 10:12-15) as spoken with reference to the mission of the Seventy. As (Compare Mat 10:15) to Mat 11:25-30, see on "Mat 11:25". Some recent commentators coolly take for granted that Matt. has wrongly located a passage really belonging where it is given by Luke. But it is perfectly natural that a religious teacher, going from place to place, should repeat favourite thoughts. (Compare at beginning of Matthew 5.) The present passage is as appropriately connected in Matt. as in Luke—Mat 11:20. Then would naturally mean immediately or soon after what precedes, but is sometimes used quite generally. (See on "Mat 3:13".) The same is true of the stronger expression in Mat 11:25, ’on that occasion,’ ’at that season.’ (Compare on Mat 12:1) It is easy here to trace an internal connection. The thought of the unreasonable conduct of the people towards John and himself (Mat 11:16-19) would naturally suggest the kindred fact that even the cities in which the greater part of his miracles occurred, were still refusing to repent. (Mat 11:20-24.) (See further as to the connection on Mat 11:25.) Began is perhaps nothing more than a touch of that circumstantiality of description for which the Hebrew style is remarkable. (Compare on Mat 5:2) So probably in Mat 16:22 while in other cases we can see that ’begin’ adds something to the sense; as in Mat 11:7, Mat 16:21, Mat 24:49, Mat 26:22, Mat 26:37, Mat 26:74. To upbraid, rendered ’reproach’ in Mat 5:11, Mat 27:44. This strong term, and the language of the following verses, shows that he felt not only pitying grief, but also indignation. It was not mere childish folly,—as some might perhaps have thought from Mat 27:16,—it was a wicked and shameful thing, that they so acted. Stier : "Gracious as is the Son of man in his exhibition of himself as the friend of publicans and sinners, (Mat 11:19) he can also insist upon repentance, and threaten judgments upon the impenitent as severely as John himself; yea, more vigorously and severely than he, since he is himself the Judge."Wherein most of his mighty works were done, or ’occurred,’ the word explained on Mat 1:22, Mat 5:18, Mat 6:9, etc. Mighty works, or miracles, (see on "Mat 12:38"), literally powers, works of power, and hence rendered by Com. Vet. ’mighty works.’ But Tyndale and his followers here translated it ’miracles’, (Mat 11:20-21, Mat 11:23) and that word ought to be restored, as in Bible Un. Ver., and Noyes. Repented, see on "Mat 3:2". Our Lord’s main object, in working his numerous and striking miracles, was to convince men of his divine mission, and thus induce them to repent, that they might become subjects of the Messianic reign. If they did not repent, they had witnessed his miracles in vain, yea, with aggravated guilt, so that they were more blameworthy than the most wicked heathen. Bengel: "Every hearer of the New Testament is either much happier, (Mat 11:11) or much more wretched than the men who lived before Christ’s coming."’ Most of his miracles’ may mean only a majority of those which occurred in that part of the country. We have no record of any miracles wrought at Chorazin or Bethsaida, though we read of many at Capernaum (see on "Mat 11:23"). The great mass of the miracles are unnoticed except by some such general expression as this (compare on Mat 4:21, Mat 8:16, and see Joh 20:30). That Matthew and Luke should record this saying without having described any miracles as wrought at Bethsaida or Chorazin, is really a proof (Plumptre) that the words are genuine, for they would not have been introduced into a pre-existing narrative without examining whether any miracles had been referred to those places.

Mat 11:21 f. Examples of the upbraiding. Woe unto thee. See in "Mat 23:13 ff." Chorazin, not mentioned elsewhere in New Testament, save the similar passage in Luk 10:13. Eusebius and Jerome tell us that it was now deserted, and two Roman miles from Capernaum. If the latter be placed at Tel Hum, as is of late the almost universal opinion (see on "Mat 4:13"), then there can be little doubt that Chorazin is the extensive ruin called Kerazeh, which is up among the hills, two miles from Tel Hum; and the Arabic name would be the singular form, corresponding to Chorazin, as Aramaic plural. So Wilson, Guerin, McGarvey. Bethsaida probably signifies ’house of fishing,’ English fish-town, indicating that it began as a fishing-station. There seem to have been two places of that name on or near the Lake of Galilee. The well-known Bethsaida Julias, near to which the five thousand were fed, was on the northeastern side of the lake; in fact on the eastern bank of the River Jordan, some distance above its mouth (see on "Mat 14:13"). The Bethsaida here and most frequently mentioned, the native place of Andrew and Peter and of Philip, (Joh 1:44, Joh 12:21) was in the land of Gennesaret, (Mar 6:45, Mar 6:53) on the northwestern side of the lake. (See on "Mat 14:34".) This fact seems to preclude the otherwise plausible suggestion of Dr. Thomson ("Land and Book"), that Bethsaida was originally on both sides of the Jordan, and that the eastern part, being (as we know) greatly favoured by the tetrarch Philip, gradually drew everything away from the western part, which thus entirely disappeared. The question of its exact location depends on the extent of the land of Gennesaret, and may never be settled. But there is now little doubt that there were two towns of this name on opposite sides of the lake or the river—a thing very natural upon a lake so abounding in fish, and in districts seldom under the same rule. Observe that Joh 12:21, ’Bethsaida of Galilee,’ seems clearly to indicate that there was another Bethsaida from which this needed to be distinguished. Before Reland suggested this idea (Palestina, A. D. 1714), the allusions to Bethsaida were a vexed question, and no doubt gave rise to many charges of hopeless "discrepancy" between the Gospels.

Tyre and Sidon were doubtless chosen because they lay close by, had long been famous for the splendid wickedness which so often marks commercial centres, and were intimately associated with the Baal worship which had wrought such evil in Israel. Their wickedness was often denounced by the prophets, Joel, Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and particularly that of Tyre by Ezekiel 26-28. Repeated in sackcloth and ashes, as the people of Nineveh actually did at the preaching of Jonah. (Mat 3:5 ff.) The sackcloth so often mentioned in Scripture was roughly woven from the short hair of camels, cattle, etc., and was worn as an expression of great grief—sometimes instead of the ordinary garments, (Jon 3:6) oftener under them, next to the flesh, (2Ki 6:30) and loosely girt around the waist. (2Sa 3:31 Joe 1:8) Sometimes the person spread it under him and sat on it, (Isa 53:5) or lay on it at night. (1Ki 21:27) (As to the similar coarse garments of hair, habitually worn by Elijah and some other prophets, see on "Mat 3:4".) On occasions of extraordinary mourning they often added ashes, which were sometimes put on the head, (2Sa 13:19 Lam 2:10) and at other times the mourner sat in ashes, (Joh 3:6) lay in them, (Est 4:3) even wallowed himself in them. (Jer 6:26; Mic 1:10) Accordingly Job says, (Job 42:6) "I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes," and Daniel prayed long, (Dan 9:3)" with fasting and sackcloth and ashes." (Compare above on Mat 6:16) It should be remarked that these and various other modes of manifesting grief among the Israelites (such as rending the garments, tearing the hair, etc.), were not a matter of divine appointment, but were natural to the impassioned Oriental character, and are still customary among Eastern nations.

Mat 11:22. But I say unto you. The connecting word rendered ’but’ or ’nevertheless’ (Tyndale and followers) seems to imply some such idea as this: "It is true that Tyre and Sidon did not have the opportunity of witnessing these miracles, and you may thus regard yourselves as peculiarly favoured; but it shall be more tolerable even for them in the day of judgment than for you; therefore be not proud of your privilege, but tremble at your responsibility and guilt." The words Tyre and Sidon are so placed in the Greek as to be emphatic. The ’woe’ denounced against Chorazin and Bethsaida seems to combine the ideas of temporal calamity to the cities, and future punishment to individuals, as in Mat 3:10-12; but Mat 11:22 seems to show (Godet) that the latter idea is the prevailing one. Day of judgment. This phrase appears in Mat 10:15, Mat 11:22, Mat 11:24, Mat 12:36; 2Pe 2:9, 2Pe 3:7; 1Jn 4:17, and compare Act 17:31; Jdg 1:6. It is also called the day of God, of the Lord, of Christ, the last day, the day of wrath, that day, (Mat 7:22; 1Th 5:4) and (simply) the day, (Heb 10:25) also the judgment. (Mat 12:41 f.) He who here foretells the decisions of the day of judgment will himself be the King and Judge. (Mat 7:22, Mat 25:34)

This declaration of Jesus was no doubt startling to the Jews, accustomed to think themselves safe for eternity because they were Abraham’s descendants, and to look down with contempt upon all Gentiles. And to us, in general, there is here brought out the great truth that men’s lot in the world to come will have degrees proportioned to their advantages in this world. (Compare on Mat 12:41, Mat 23:13, and consult Luk 12:47 f.) This truth throws some rays of light athwart the dark, sad question of the fate of the heathen. Men will be judged and punished according to their opportunities of knowing truth and duty. The heathen will not be condemned for rejecting Jesus if they had no opportunity to know of him; but only for disregarding their own conscience, (Rom 2:14-16) the light of external nature, (Rom 1:20 ff.) and any true religious ideas which may in whatsoever way have reached them. On the other hand, those who know of Jesus, and live surrounded by Christian influences, and yet will not repent, incur an unspeakable aggravation of guilt and punishment. But the expression ’more tolerable,’ or more endurable, easier to bear, is general and indefinite, and does not warrant any attempt to determine precise degrees of punishment.

Mat 11:23 f. The same thing is here said, and in yet stronger terms, of Capernaum, which was a more prosperous city than Chorazin or Bethsaida, and more favoured with the Saviour’s residence, miracles, and teaching. Stier: "To the two cities, two others are first opposed; and then one city to the one." Capernaum, see on "Mat 4:13". Numerous miracles (Plumptre) have been described as occurring at Capernaum (besides the allusion in Luk 4:23): the nobleman’s son; (Joh 4:46-54) the demoniac in the synagogue; (Mar 1:23-28) with Peter’s wife’s mother, and mention of a multitude of other healings; (Mat 8:14-17) the paralytic borne by four; (Mat 9:2-8) Jairus’ daughter and the woman with the issue of blood, together with the two blind men and the dumb demoniac; (Mat 9:18-33) and the centurion’s servant. (Mat 8:5, Mat 8:13) Which art, etc., rather, Shalt thou be exalted unto heaven? thou shalt go down unto Hades.[1] In the question a Greek particle is used which implies that the answer must be negative. Capernaum, already prosperous, was cherishing, like Babylon, (Isa 14:13) arrogant hopes of unlimited prosperity in future. But this expectation is delusive. The result, as in the case of Babylon, (Isa 14:15) will on the contrary be utter destruction, as the penalty of privileges abused. The contrasted expressions ’exalted to heaven’ and ’brought down to Hades’ seem here to indicate the temporal prosperity and destruction of the city, as they do in the passage of Isaiah from which the imagery is derived. This destruction might have been obviated. Capernaum might have continued to exist and prosper if it had listened to the miracle-working Teacher, and repented, as even the wicked Sodom would have done. We might not be able to decide whether Mat 11:23 indicated, besides temporal destruction of the city, the future punishment of individuals; but this thought is brought out clearly in Mat 11:24.

[1] ’Shalt thou be exalted’ is the reading of B א C D L (which represent all three pre-Syrian types of text), and most of the early versions. It could easily change, by a slight alteration of two Greek words, into ’that wast exalted’; and the former being an unexpected turn of expression, the latter is likely to have been preferred by ordinary copyists, while really the sharp and startling interrogation is much after the manner of the Great Teacher. Thus both intrinsic and transcriptional probability concur with the leading documents in supporting the former reading. The case is substantially the same in Luk 10:15.—Whether the second clause shall read ’go down’ or ’be brought down,’ is a difficult question. The external evidence for the former comprises only the "Western" documents and B. In Luk 10:15, it has only part of the usual "Western" group with B. Now the Rev. Test. concludes that this reading is right in Matthew and wrong in Luke, which would account for the phenomena thus far stated; while W. H. as usual follow B, and read ’go down’ in both passages. But the imagery is evidently drawn from Isa 14:13-15 (see Westcott Hort, Appendix), which reads ’go down,’ without known variation. It is then a very natural supposition that the "Western" documents, which make so many arbitrary changes, have altered the text of Matthew and some of them that of Luke, into accordance with the Sept., a very common species of alteration. This view would doubtless be at once accepted by every one, were it not for the support of B. But Westcott Hort admit that B has some merely "Western" readings in the Epistles of Paul, and internal evidence is believed to show that the same is true in the Gospels. If this be so, the reading ’go down’ should probably be rejected both in Matthew and in Luke, as a "Western" alteration. Internal evidence is in this case not clear on either side.

Hell. The Greek word Hades, which etymologically means ’the unseen (land),’ ’the invisible (world),’ is in accordance with its classical use, and with that of the Hebrew Sheol, employed in Septuagint and New Testament to denote the receptacle of departed spirits, without reference to differences of condition between good and bad. It was conceived of as far under the ground, and so ’brought down to Sheol’ (Hades) was contrasted with ’exalted to heaven.’ (Compare Job 11:8; Psa 139:8; Amo 9:2; Rom 10:6-7) Some have proposed to render it ’the underworld’ (Bible Un. Ver., Noyes), which, though inadequate, is perhaps the best translation our language now affords. The word ’hell’ formerly translated Sheol and Hades, for it originally signified (Skeat), a concealed or hidden (place.) But it has come to be associated so exclusively with the idea of torment, that Rev. Ver. properly uses it only to translate Gehenna (see on "Mat 5:22"), and borrows Hades whenever that term occurs in the New Testament (So Darby, Davidson.) In like manner the Hebrew Sheol, substantially equivalent to Hades, is borrowed by Rev. Ver. in many passages of Old. Test., and ought by all means (as by Aroer. Revisers,) to have been used everywhere, instead of sometimes retaining ’grave’ and ’hell,’ which are both misleading. Hades is used in some passages of the New Testament where the connection does not suggest any idea either of happiness or misery—it is simply the abode of the departed; (Act 2:27, Act 2:31 Rev 1:18) one passage has ’in Hades, being in torment.’ (Luk 16:23) It is also employed in Mat 16:18 (see below), in 1Co 15:55 (common Greek text, but the correct reading is ’death’ in both clauses); and in Rev 6:8, Rev 20:13 f. In 2Pe 2:4, still another Greek word is used, derived from Tartarus, and signifying, like Gehenna, the place of torment.

Mat 11:24. Sodom was a still more conspicuous example than Tyre and Sidon, of wickedness and punishment. All the world knows how it was suddenly and completely destroyed. Its indescribable abominations and its terrible doom have always thrilled men with horror whenever it has been mentioned. And yet Sodom would have repented, and remained through two thousand years till our Saviour’s day, had its people seen the miracles which took place in Capernaum. (Compare Eze 16:48) Is this a mere hyperbole, like the precept to turn the other cheek, or to go two miles with the impressing officer? We are hardly warranted in saying so. If then one should ask why the messenger Jehovah, who stayed behind with Abraham, did not go with the two angels to Sodom, work miracles, teach repentance, and save it from destruction, we may see two things to reply. (1) We may answer as Paul does in Rom 9:18-20, that God is sovereign, doing what he pleases, and always doing right. (2) We may observe that the divine plan required that the permanent appearance of the Son of God should take place only among the Jews, and only "when the fulness of time was come ", (Gal 4:4) and this divine plan, whether we can see it or not, was doubtless best for total humanity, and for the moral government of the universe. When the time came, many of the Jews had been hardened by disregarding previous divine influences, so that they were slower to believe Christ, with all his mighty miracles, than wicked heathen cities would have been. (Compare Joh 1:11-13) The land of Sodom, the district belonging to the city, and not simply the city itself. (Compare Mat 4:15 Act 7:11) I say unto you.... than for thee. In Mat 11:22, each clause has the plural, which must then refer to the people of the two cities; therefore the opening plural here probably refers to the people of Capernaum, and not generally to the hearers of the discourse. If we suppose the discourse to have been delivered at Capernaum or in the plain of Gennesaret—which is probable, but the point cannot be determined—then the hearers were mainly people of those three cities, and that would account for the ambiguity of the expression. ’Thee’ of course means Capernaum, but with reference to the eternal destiny of its individual inhabitants. For but (howbeit), more tolerable, and day of judgment, see on "Mat 11:22". Stier: "We read of no enmity or persecution to which he was subjected in Capernaum; but the careless reception of his word and works was yet worse, and more condemnable than any eruption of malice would have been; it bespoke that slothful, dead, impassive indifference, for which nothing more could be done."

Mat 11:25 f. The remaining division of the discourse given by Matthew as occasioned by the message from John (compare on Mat 11:2 and Mat 11:20), viz., Mat 11:25-30, consists of two distinct portions. Mat 11:25-27 is also given by Luke, (Luk 10:21 f.) as spoken immediately after the return of the Seventy: Mat 11:28-30 is found in Matthew only, but is closely connected with the end of Mat 11:27.

At that time, ’on that occasion’[1]. This answers to ’then’ in Mat 11:20, and connects all with the message from John the Baptist. (Mat 11:2) Our Lord has been speaking of the unreasonable and determined rejection of both John and himself by the Jews, (Mat 11:16-19) and the impenitence of even the cities in which most of his miracles occurred. (Mat 11:20-24) Yet these Jews, especially the religious teachers and other leading men, were wise and intelligent, well acquainted with many aspects of religious truth. It seemed strange that they should fail to comprehend and appreciate Christ’s teachings, which were understood and received by the lowly and comparatively ignorant. This is the point to which he now addresses himself. He not only submits to this state of things, but he recognizes the propriety of it, and gives thanks for it.

[1] The word kairos is not adequately translated by ’time,’ for it denotes the exact time, the fixed time, the appropriate time, occasion, opportunity, season. The Com. Ver. renders ’season’ in various places, including Mat 21:41, Mat 24:45 Luk 13:1 (where the phrase is similar to this of Matthew.); Act 1:7, Act 1:24-25 Gal 6:9; and opportunity in Gal 6:10 Heb 11:15. It should be rendered ’season’ in many others, including Mat 12:1, Mat 13:30, Mat 14:1, Mat 21:34, and ’opportunity’ in several, as Eph 5:16 Col 4:5, ’buying up the opportunity’ (Rev. Ver. margin). But there are some cases in which neither season nor opportunity, nor any other term will suit the connection, and we have to lose the peculiar color of the Greek word and content ourselves with rendering ’time,’ as in Mat 8:29, Mat 16:3 (spurious); Mat 26:18; yet in every case the Greek word has its own distinctive meaning, though we cannot express it. The Rev. Ver. has translated it by ’season’ in many more places than Com. Ver., but might have done so in several others, as Mat 13:30. (compare Mat 12:1, Mat 14:1)

Answered. By a peculiar Hebrew idiom, this word is often used in the Scriptures where there is no previous question, nor even any thing that has been said by another. "Yet in probably all cases, we can see something in the foregoing connection to which the words are in some sense a response, or which formed the occasion for their being spoken." (compare Mat 17:4, Mat 26:63, Mat 28:5) In response to, or as suggested by, the sad truths just uttered, (Mat 11:16-19, Mat 11:20-24) Jesus states the comforting thoughts which follow. I thank thee. The word originally signifies to make open or full confession or acknowledgment, as above in Mat 3:6; derivatively, like a corresponding Hebrew word, and somewhat like our phrase" to make acknowledgments, "it signifies to thank and hence to praise. (Rom 14:9) The early and the recent Eng. versions are here about equally divided between praise and thank. The idea seems to be, "I fully recognize the propriety of thy course, I rejoice over it, (consult Luk 10:21) and praise thee for it." O Father. We find a similar direct address to his Father in Joh 11:41, Joh 12:28 Luk 23:34. The added form of address, Lord of heaven and earth, is impressively appropriate. It is the Sovereign of the universe that does this; who shall hesitate to acknowledge that what he does is right? Our Lord here sets us the example of employing in prayer such names of God, and phrases descriptive of him, as are appropriate to the special subject of the prayer, or of each particular portion of it—a thing manifestly proper and important, but often neglected. That thou hast hid these things, viz, the things taught by Jesus, as for example, the teachings of this discourse. From the wise and prudent—understanding, or ’intelligent.’ ’Prudent’ was a good translation in the Latin and early English versions (though Geneva gave ’men of understanding’), but in modern English it is too restricted in meaning (see also in Act 13:7, 1Co 1:19). Bible Union Ver. and Noyes give ’discerning’; Davidson retains ’prudent.’ The Greek has no article, ’from wise and intelligent (persons’), compare on Mat 9:13, Mat 11:5. The expression is general, but here applies especially to the Scribes and Pharisees, and other religious teachers (compare on Mat 11:16). The reference is of course to wisdom and intelligence misused, perverted through pride, separated from a child-like spirit. Unto babes, literally, infants, those who cannot speak.(compare Rom 2:20) This surely does not, as some imagine, designate simply the apostles, but the disciples of Jesus in general. Those who were not wise and intelligent, but had a child’s simplicity and humble docility, understood and delighted in the teachings of Jesus (compare Psa 19:7, Psa 116:6 Joh 7:48 f.; 1Co 1:26 ff.). We often now witness the same state of things. Intelligent and reflecting men frequently overlook the simple beauty and perfect fitness of the plan of salvation, which is plain enough to those who are consciously and confessedly weak, and who gladly receive the Lord’s teachings without cavil or difficulty. The gospel is so intensely practical that it can he understood at the outset only by persons willing to receive it, and will be thoroughly known only in proportion as it is truly loved. Here, as everywhere, we see the adaptation of the gospel to mankind. Not all men can become wise and intelligent, but all may, by the grace of God, become babes. (compare 1Co 3:18) The most useful Christians will be those who are ’wise and intelligent,’ and are also ’babes’—intellectual and cultivated as possible, but childlike in spirit. And when the wise and intelligent fail to discover the significance and value of Christ’s teachings, it is not the fault of their intelligence, but of this lack of a right spirit. Paul says ’not many wise after the flesh’; (1Co 1:26) there have always been some. Observe that Jesus makes acknowledgment to the Father both for hiding these things from the one class, and for revealing them to the other. We may say that the latter is the chief subject of thanksgiving, yet the former is here the immediate occasion of introducing the topic. Meyer justly says that both propositions form the ground of the thanksgiving and praise, being two sides of one great truth. So in Rom 6:17, which is often compared with this passage.

Our Lord enters into no explanations of God’s sovereign dealings with men. He simply adds, Even so (or yea) Father,[2] for so it seemed good (or, was well-pleasing) in thy sight. (Compare Eph 1:5, Eph 1:9 Php 2:13) ’Well-pleasing,’ as in Mat 3:17; Luk 2:14 (Rev. text). If with some of the ablest expositors and Rev. Ver. margin, we render ’that’ instead of ’for’ (the original word meaning either according to the connection), the sense is substantially the same: ’Yea, Father, (I thank and praise thee) that so it was well-pleasing in thy sight.’ Notice that this is not, as often quoted, an expression of mere resignation. Our Lord acknowledges the propriety of the sovereign Father’s course, and praises him for it. Whatever pleases God ought to please us.

[2] Here the Greek nominative with the article is clearly used in address, and equivalent to the vocative in Mat 11:25. This was a common colloquial usage in Greek, seen often (Buttmann, p. 140) in Aristophanes and the Dialogues of Plato; and accordingly it appears frequently in Biblical Greek, which rests on a colloquial basis; important examples are Joh 20:28 Heb 1:8.

Mat 11:27. Having referred to the fact that not the wise and intelligent, but babes, understand his teachings, Jesus now presents himself as Teacher; declaring that only he can give a true knowledge of the Father, (Mat 11:27) and inviting all to come and learn from him. (Mat 11:28-30) All things were delivered to me of (by) my Father. At some past time, not specified, say when he entered upon his earthly mission—or, perhaps, when the covenant of redemption was formed in eternity (compare on Mat 3:17)—all things were committed to him, viz., all that pertains to the instruction of men in religious truth. (Compare Joh 16:15) It is another and distinct fact that all authority in heaven and earth was given to him as the Mediatorial King. (Mat 28:18, 1Co 15:24 f.) Jesus is the authorized instructor in the knowledge of God. No man (no one) knoweth. The verb is compounded with a preposition, so as to mean ’knows fully,’ as in Mat 7:16; and so Davidson here translates. Luke in the similar passage (Mat 10:22) has the uncompounded verb ’know.’ On the one hand, no one really and thoroughly knows the Son except the Father, so that he must not be considered a mere ordinary human teacher, and so that we need not wonder if the wise and intelligent of earth fail, in their proudly speculative and merely theoretical study, to comprehend and appreciate his teachings. (Compare ’reveal’ here and in Mat 11:25) On the other hand, no one knows the Father, with that real knowledge which is eternal life, (Joh 17:3) except the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will (willeth to) reveal him. In old English ’will reveal’ expressed the idea, but that phrase has become a simple future, and the Greek must now be translated ’willeth to,’ ’is pleased to,’ or the like. (See especially Joh 7:17, 1Ti 2:4, 2Pe 3:9) All their wisdom and intelligence will not avail to gain a true knowledge of the Father, unless the Son chooses to reveal him to them. To him, then, let all come. (Compare Joh 8:19, Joh 10:15, Joh 14:9, Joh 16:15) Keim : "This self-enclosed world of the Father and the Son opens itself to the lower world, to men, only by its own free act, because it wills to open itself and to admit to companionship whom it will." Jerome: "It is one thing to know by equality of nature, and another by the condescension of him who reveals." On another occasion also (Luk 10:22) he adds to his thanksgiving that the Father had hid these things, etc., the same statement as here, ’All things were delivered,’ etc.; which shows that the two ideas are very closely related. The Son approves the Father’s will as to hiding and revealing, and the Father has authorized him to reveal or not, according to his wilt. (Weiss.) Meyer says that this statement (Mat 11:27) "bears the stamp of superhuman consciousness." Only here (with Luk 10:22) and in Mar 13:32 (with perhaps Mat 24:30) do the three first Gospels contain the expression ’the Son.’ This whole passage (Mat 11:25-30) has often been remarked upon as resembling the Gospel of John, and suggests to us that great mass of similar sayings of Jesus which only the Fourth Gospel contains. John’s mental and spiritual constitution peculiarly fitted him to be the medium of communicating to us those discourses, as may be seen from his employing in his Epistles a style which so closely resembles them. But such passages as this show that that class of ideas and expressions was not foreign to the other Gospels, and that the Jesus of the Fourth Gospel is not essentially different from the Jesus of the other three.

Mat 11:28-30. He stands as the Great Teacher, who alone can give true, saving knowledge of God (Mat 11:27), whose teachings, while hid from the wise and intelligent, are revealed to babes. (Mat 11:25.) Though rejected by many (Mat 11:20-24), and even slandered and reviled (Mat 11:16-19), still he stands, in the fullness of his wisdom, and the gentleness of his love, and invites all the toiling and burdened to come to him, to wear the easy yoke of his instruction, and they shall find rest for their souls, Notice how the invitation follows immediately upon the statement that no one knows the Father but the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son chooses to reveal him. To his mind there was no contradiction between sovereign, electing grace, and the free invitations of the gospel. Come unto me, literally, hither to me, the word in the original being an adverb much used in animated invitations. (Compare Mat 4:19, Mat 19:21, Mat 21:38, Mat 22:4, Mat 25:34, Mat 28:6) It expresses lively interest on the part of the speaker, and invites them to come at once and heartily. ’Me’ is not emphatic, as the original shows; the point is, I alone can give knowledge of the Father; come to me, and receive my instruction. All, together with the whole connection, suggests a general audience (Weiss); and if we understand all since Mat 11:2 to be one discourse, then we know that ’multitudes’ were present. (Mat 11:7) All ye that labour and are h envy laden, or more literally, all the toiling and burdened. ’Toiling’ denotes active effort to perform difficult and painful duties, while ’burdened’ denotes passive endurance.[1] The Jewish teachers of the time promised rest on condition of minute attention, not only to all the ceremonies of the written law, but also to all the traditions of the eiders. This was declared by Peter (Act 15:10) to be "a yoke which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear." And Jesus said of the Scribes and Pharisees, (Mat 23:4) "They bind heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with their finger." Our Lord does not mean to exclude any from the privilege of coming to him, who are not toiling and burdened; but no one would care to learn from him who did not desire saving knowledge of God, or who was satisfied with the knowledge already possessed, and he addresses his invitation to those who in the nature of the case would be likely to accept it. The most natural tendency with any one who has become painfully conscious of sin, is to seek God’s favour by his own doings and sufferings. And I will give you rest. The original makes ’I’ emphatic; he would do what the Scribes and other Rabbis did not do. The great difference between Jesus and other religious teachers is that he can give power to be and do what he requires; we find rest not simply in the superiority of his precepts, but in the supports of his grace.

[1] The Geneva version has ’all ye that are weary and laden’ (instead of Tyndale’s ’that labour and are laden’); this Geneva rendering is still common in religious speech and writing, having been perpetuated by traditional use, aided doubtless by a hymn of which one verse begins,"Come, ye weary, heavy-laden." (By John Hart, written in 1759,).

Take my yoke upon you, and learn of (from) me. Among the Jews a pupil who submitted himself to the instruction of a certain teacher was sometimes said to take his yoke. Compare Sirach (Ecclus.) Sir 51:25, where Wisdom says, "I opened my mouth and spoke, acquire for yourselves without money; put your neck under the yoke, and let your soul receive instruction..... see with your eye that I toiled a little, and found for myself much rest"—’toil’ and ’rest’ being also the same words as here. Compare also Sir 6:24. The later Jewish writers frequently speak of taking or rejecting the yoke of the law, the yoke of the kingdom of heaven. (Compare Act 15:10) ’Take my yoke upon you’ is therefore only a figurative way of saying, Become my pupils (disciples), submit yourselves to my instruction; which is then stated again in unfigurative terms, ’and learn from me.’ To interpret this last as meaning simply, learn from my example, is not natural to the expression, nor appropriate to the connection. For I am meek and lowly in heart. ’Meek’ as opposed to the haughty and harsh teachers to whom they were accustomed. (Compare Jas 1:5) ’Lowly (or ’humble’) in heart,’ not proud and repulsive, and not ambitions of domination over the minds of men. Accustomed to haughtiness and pride in their teachers, (Joh 1:49) his hearers might be slow to come to him; and he condescends to assure them that he is meek and humble, and they need not shrink from him. Remember also that some teachers may be outwardly meek and humble without being so in heart. Stier: "I am meek in heart, although I spoke words of such stern condemnation, Mat 11:20, Mat 11:24. I am lowly in heart, notwithstanding that I have borne witness to myself as the Son of the Father, Mat 11:25-27." Here also, as in Mat 11:26, it is possible to render ’that’ instead of ’for,’ learn from me that I am meek, etc. So the Peshito, and possibly (though less naturally) the Latin versions; and so Augustine interpreted, with many Latin followers. (See Aquinas, Maldonatus.) This, however, is an artificial interpretation, and not suitable to the connection—which makes it all the more natural that Matthew Arnold should receive it. And ye shall find rest unto (for) your souls. This expression is drawn from Jer 6:16, according to the Hebrew, not the Septuagint. Remember that our Lord used two expressions from the Psalms when on the cross, (Mat 27:46 Luk 23:46) and made three quotations from Deuteronomy during the Temptation. (Mat 4:4 ff.) All religions profess to give rest for the spirit—Christianity alone can truly fulfil the promise. Others may give a kind of repose, but it is that of self-righteousness, or other self-Delusion.—christianity affords a well-founded and lasting repose, as to our guilt, our inability to gain God’s favour, and our sinfulness of nature. How Jesus will do this, he does not here set forth; indeed it could be fully understood only after his atoning death and ascension, and the special coming of the Holy Spirit, and so the complete explanation of it was left for the inspired writings of his apostles (e. g., Rom 5:1 ff.; Rom 8:1 ff.) From them we know that our guilt may be cancelled through the Saviour’s atonement, that we may be accepted into God’s favour through his perfect righteousness, that the dominion of sin within us can be broken by his regenerating Spirit, and by degrees completely destroyed by that Spirit’s sanctifying grace. Even the painful consciousness of remaining tendencies to sin need not prevent a certain repose of spirit, since we have the assurance of God’s word that in the truly regenerate and believing soul these tendencies shall at last he completely overcome. Yet, even now the Saviour’s invitation and promise, in the unexplained and concrete form, brings rest and joy to many a trusting heart. A loving reliance on the personal Jesus, a loving submission to his authority, and obedience to his commandments, is the very essence of Christian piety.

For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. There is no particular emphasis on ’my’; the contrast with other teachers has been sufficiently indicated before, and is not here expressed. ’For’ presents this as a reason for what precedes, in general, but especially for the promise just given: ’Ye shall find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy,’ etc. The word rendered ’easy’ means agreeable and serviceable—a yoke that does not gall the neck, nor cramp so as to hinder the drawing. The Latin version and Peshito render by words signifying sweet, pleasant, and Davidson ’good.’ He requires of his pupils only what is possible to do and bear, so that they will actually find rest, and not be vainly seeking it. Still we must really take his yoke upon us—must receive his instructions, and submit to his directions—must set ourselves to do what he bids us, whether it seems likely to be pleasing or painful. He not only teaches what to do, but can give us strength to do it. And in proportion as we do really submit, and conform and trust, we shall find his requirements "not grievous", (1Jn 5:3) but helpful and pleasant. If Christ’s yoke ever galls the neck, it is because we do not work steadily in it. Augustine: "This burden is not the weight upon one that is laden, but the wing of one that is about to fly." And if it ever feels like a weight and an incumbrance, that is when the soul has soiled this heavenly plumage with the mire of earth. It is true that the morality enjoined by Jesus was more spiritual, and thus in one sense more severe than that taught by the Scribes and Pharisees, (compare Mat 5:17 ff.) but a morality depending on a multitude of minute outward observances and imperfectly known traditions must necessarily he burdensome, while spiritual morality grows increasingly easy to the spiritually minded. Observe that our Lord’s invitation is supported, not only by the great promise, ’ye shall find rest for your souls,’ but by two encouragements; one, the personal character of the Teacher, ’meek and humble in heart’; the other, the fact that his requirements are not severe and oppressive: ’my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.’

The most exactly parallel application of this invitation now, is to persons who vainly strive in other than gospel ways to obtain salvation and find rest; as, for example, by an upright and charitable life, or by the diligent observance of religious ceremonies—toiling to make the exterior of their life correct in the sight of men and acceptable to God, while within, the pollution of sin is not removed, the power of sin is unbroken, the guilty conscience can find no true relief; so also to those who are trying to obtain rest through false religions, or perversions of the true religion, or any of the forms of would-be philosophic infidelity. All such persons, if deeply earnest in their quest, are assuredly "toiling and burdened." Oh, that they would listen to the Great Teacher! But the invitation may be naturally and reasonably extended to all who desire religious repose in the knowledge of God. Jesus, and he only, can give it, and he has left a standing invitation: "Come to me, take me as your religious Teacher, and ye shall find rest for your souls."—When we come to Jesus now, that is not a bodily removal from one place to another; for he is present whenever and wherever we seek him. But the object in coming, the feeling with which we come, may be the same now as when he was on earth. Whenever we want anything from Jesus, let us draw near to him in heart, and ask him for it as if bodily present.

Homiletical And Practical

Mat 11:20. Gospel-hardened! Henry: "He began to preach to them long before, (Mat 4:17) but he did not begin to upbraid till now. Rough and unpleasing methods must not be taken, till gentler means have first been used."

Mat 11:22. Meeting the heathen on the day of judgment. (1) The doom of all will be proclaimed as a thing unalterably determined. (2) Men will be judged according to their opportunities in this life; and the condemnation of the impenitent from Christian countries will be unspeakably more terrible than that of the heathen. (3) Then should we not avoid sending the gospel to the heathen? Nay, for on that principle we ought to keep our own children ignorant of the gospel, ought to wish there had never been any gospel. (4) Will not the heathen pour upon us deserved upbraidings because we left them in ignorance of the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he sent? (Joh 17:3)

Mat 11:25. Mankind are prone to find fault with God’s mode of procedure in every respect. All rulers are blamed; and the only perfect ruler is blamed most of all. The pious heart should sympathize with this utterance of Jesus, and make acknowledgment to the Father that he is right in all his doings. But this does not mean that we are to be indifferent to the fate of our fellow-men. This same Jesus wept over ruined Jerusalem. gregory the great (Aquinas): "In which words we have a lesson of humility, that we should not rashly presume to discuss the counsels of heaven concerning the calling of some, and the rejection of others; showing that that cannot be unrighteous which is willed by Him that is righteous."—The gospel offered to all. (1) Not all can be rich, but all may be poor, and poor in spirit. (Mat 5:3) (2) Not all can be wise and intelligent, but all may be babes. (3) No one can commend himself to God by his natural good works, but any one may believe in Christ, and gain the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Mat 11:25-30. Sovereignty and Invitation. (1) The sovereign Father reveals the Son only to the lowly. (2) The sovereign Son reveals the Father only to such as he chooses. (3) All who need and desire the rest-giving knowledge of the Father are invited to learn from this sovereign, yet meek and lowly Teacher.

Mat 11:27-30. Full knowledge of God. (1) It can be had only through the Son of God. (2) It is conferred by the Son upon such only as he willeth. (3) He willeth to confer it upon all who will come and take him as religious Teacher. (4) He is a gentle Teacher, and his requirements are easy and pleasant. (5) To accept his teaching will bring rest to the soul.

Mat 11:27 f. True knowledge of God, and true rest in God.

Mat 11:28. Alexander: "Inviting men to come to him, not in the way of speculation, but of penitent submission, not as philosophers to be enlightened, but as sinners to be saved. There is exquisite beauty in this sudden but not harsh transition from the mysteries of the Godhead to the miseries of man. The Son is the Revealer of the Father, not to stimulate or gratify a mere scientific curiosity as to the mode of the divine existence, but to bring the Godhead into saving contact with the sin-sick, ruined soul." Melanchthon(in Meyer): "In this all thou shouldst include thyself also, and not think that thou dost not belong therein; thou shouldst seek no other list of them that are God’s." Luther: "They are words of majesty when he says, I will give you rest. No angel, let alone a man, would undertake to promise that."

Mat 11:28-30. The Great Invitation. (1) The gentle Teacher. (2) The easy yoke. (3) The assured rest. Chrysostom: "Christ did not mention the gracious things only, and then hold his peace, nor the painful things only, but set down both. Thus he both spake of a yoke, and called it easy; both named a burden, and added that is was light; that thou shouldst neither flee from them as toilsome, nor despise them as over easy." Hilary: "And what is easier than his yoke, what lighter than his burden? To become praiseworthy, to abstain from wickedness, to choose the good and refuse the evil, to love all and hate none, to gain eternal things and not be taken with things present, to be unwilling to bring upon another what yourself would find hard to endure."—To be toiling and burdened does not confer the right to come to Christ, but should produce the disposition to come. Some persons come truly to Christ without any long and conscious toiling to save themselves otherwise; such persons are not specially addressed in this particular invitation, but are amply invited elsewhere.

Mat 11:29. We are freed from the yoke of sin by taking the yoke of Christ. Henry: "The way of duty is the way of rest." Augustine: "Thou hast made us for thyself, and our heart is restless until it rests in thee."

Mat 11:30. Henry: "It is a yoke that is lined with love." Augustine: "All things are light to love." Luther: "Christ’s burden is light because he helps us to bear it, and when it becomes too heavy for us he puts himself under the load with us. The world thinks it heavy and unbearable; but not so, for one has a good comrade. You two can easily bear a load, though one by himself cannot."

John A. Broadus, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (American Baptist Publication Society, 1886) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

SOVEREIGN, DISCRIMINATING MERCY OF GOD

Mat 11:20-30. “Then He began to upbraid the cities, in which most of His mighty works were wrought, because they did not repent: Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! because if the mighty works which have been wrought in you were in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. Moreover I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you.” Chorazin was a magnificent city, twenty miles to the northwest of the Galilean Sea, on a mountain slope, and very conspicuous. We saw it almost constantly while sailing on that sea. This prophecy has been literally and signally fulfilled in the utter ruin of that city, which remained without an inhabitant through the intervening centuries, till about twenty years ago a Jewish colony reached the old site. It is now a very flourishing city of twenty-five thousand inhabitants, one of the cheering omens of the swiftly approaching end of Israel’s long desolation, and inspiringly ominous of the Lord’s near coming. (Mat 24:29-30.) Bethsaida stood on the northwestern shore of that sea, the home of Peter, Andrew, and Philip. Signally has this woe been fulfilled in its utter destruction. This day it is without an inhabitant, though rather a favorite camping-ground for travelers, as the great spring, which evidently originally determined the location, still rolls its clear, limpid waters into the sea. We spent an hour, lunched, and fed our horses, enjoying copious draughts from this spring.

Of course, this city will be rebuilt in the good time coming. Tyre and Sidon are among the most ancient cities in the world, situated in Phenicia, on the Mediterranean coast, twenty miles apart. They were the inventors of the royal purple, which erelong became the uniform of all the kings throughout the known world, thus making these cities immensely rich by their patronage, as they enjoyed a monopoly of the costly and gaudy apparel worn by the royal families in all the earth. They suffered terribly in the conquest of Nebuchadnezzar, 600 B. C. Having somewhat revived, they again suffered awfully in the conquest of Alexander, 325 B. C., in after ages being conquered by the Romans, so that in the Savior’s time, though they still existed, scarcely a vestige of their former grandeur existed. These were Gentile cities. Jesus says that with the opportunities enjoyed by those Jewish cities, they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes.

“And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted up to heaven, shall be cast down to Hades; because, if the mighty works which have been performed in thee, were among the Sodomites, they would have remained until this day. Moreover I say unto you, That it shall be more tolerable for the land of the Sodomites in the day of judgment than for thee.” Why was Capernaum exalted up to heaven? Because she enjoyed the residence and the ministry of Jesus, the richest blessing in all the earth; no city on the globe ever so signally favored. How plain the preaching of Jesus! Remember, He was in that city when he pronounced this awful, withering woe, which has been literally verified in the utter destruction of the city, remaining through the ages without an inhabitant. They are now beginning to rebuild that memorable city. When I reached the sea of Galilee, and embarked in a boat to go sailing all around, I said to them, “Take me, first of all, to Capernaum,” which is about ten miles from Tiberias, whence we sailed. O how I enjoyed walking on the ground where Jesus had walked, and standing where He preached to the multitudes. The revival of this city is of very recent date; a Latin convent, claiming to occupy the site of Peter’s house, which was the home of Jesus, being the principal interest. Hades means the unseen world, which we all enter when we evacuate these tenements. There are two words in the Greek, “Hades” and “Gehenna,” both translated “hell” in E.V.; the latter always meaning hell, and the former simply meaning the eternal world, including both heaven and hell. Sodom and Gomorrah were Gentile cities, so awfully wicked that God rained on them fire and brimstone, thus destroying them. Here our Savior says that with the opportunities enjoyed by these Hebrew cities, they would have repented. I have met many idle and foolish talkers who even dare to impeach the Divine benignity, saying that it is unfair to give the millennial generations an earthly paradise, with no devil to tempt them, when all the premillennial ages have to pass through Satan’s flint-mills, taking chances for heaven. Who art thou that repliest against God? Hath not the Almighty a perfect right to dispense His sovereign mercy pursuant to His infallible will? We know He makes no mistakes. Here, Jesus says that if these great Gentile cities, Tyre and Sidon and Sodom, had enjoyed gospel privileges, they would have repented. Let us thank God for our opportunities, and be sure that we appreciate them.

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

11:20-24 The miracles Jesus performed confirmed him as Messiah (11:5-6) and demanded repentance (11:20). Rejecting the Messiah would result in terrible judgment because the evidence of Jesus’ identity was clear.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Mat 11:20. Τότε ἤρξατο, then He began) He had not previously upbraided them. This upbraiding is the prelude to the Last Judgment. Every hearer of the New Testament is either much more blessed (v. 11) or much more miserable than them of old time.—δυνάμεις, mighty works) See Mat 11:5. [Repentance and the knowledge of Jesus Christ are always conjoined.—V. g.]

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat_11:20 ff. Then He began, and so on (ἤρξατο). Luke introduces this upbraiding of the cities at a later stagethat is, on the occasion when the instructions were addressed to the Seventy (Mat_10:13-15), for which he is assigned the preference by Schleiermacher, Schneckenburger, Holtzmann; while de Wette and Keim are justified in going against Luke, who generally uses considerable freedom as to the connection in which he introduces the sayings which in this chapter are all connected with the same subject.

The Gospels make no further mention of the miracles in Chorazin and Bethsaida (not far from Capernaum; Robinson, neuere Forsch. p. 457 ff.), Joh_20:30.

ἐν Τύρῳ κ. Σιδ., κ.τ.λ.] Even these wicked heathen cities would have been brought to amendment long ago with deep sorrow for their sins. The penitent sorrow is represented by ἐν σάκκ. κ. σποδῷ, a form of mourning in popular use among the Jews (comp. on Mat_6:16).

ἐν σάκκῳ] i.e. in the dark, sack-shaped mourning attire, made of coarse cloth, and drawn over the naked body; Gesenius, Thes. III. p. 1336.

Mat_11:22. πλήν] however, in the sense of ceterum, that is, to add nothing more, I tell you. Frequently used in this way by classical writers, and comp. note on Eph_5:33.

Mat_11:23. And thou, Capernaum, who hast been exalted to heaven, i.e. raised to the highest distinction through my dwelling and labouring within thee, wilt be brought down to Hades, namely, on the day of judgment, to undergo punishment in Gehenna; see Mat_11:24. Grotius, Kuinoel, Fritzsche interpret the exaltation of Capernaum as referring to its prosperity, derived from trade, the fisheries, and so on. But this is not in keeping with the connection as indicated by ἐν αἷς ἐγένοντο αἱ πλεῖσται δυνάμεις αὐτοῦ in Mat_11:20.

Still more humiliating than the comparison with Tyre and Sidon, is that with Sodom; because the responsibility was greatest in the case of Capernaum.

ἔμειναν ἄν] This ἄν, here and in Mat_11:21, is simply according to rule, because the antecedent clauses contain a sumtio ficta (Ellendt, Lex. Soph. I. p. 488).

Mat_11:24. Comp. on Mat_10:15.

ὑμῖν … σοί] Euth. Zigabenus: τὸ μὲν ὑμῖν πρὸς τοὺς πολίτας τῆς πόλεως ἐκείνης εἴρηται· τὸ δὲ σοὶ πρὸς τὴν πόλιν. The ὑμῖν, that is, does not refer to the audience (see Mat_11:22).

Observe further in Mat_11:21-24, first, how the passage assumes the form of a weighty climax; and then, secondly, the solemn parallelism of the antecedent clauses in Mat_11:21; Mat_11:23, and of the threatened punishments in Mat_11:22; Mat_11:24.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 11:20-24 . Reflections by Jesus on the reception given to Him by the towns of Galilee (Luk 10:13-15 ).

Mat 11:20 . τότε , then , cannot be pressed. Luke gives the following words in instructions to the Seventy. The real historical occasion is unknown. It may be a reminiscence from the preaching tour in the synagogues of Galilee (Mat 4:23 ). The reflections were made after Jesus had visited many towns and wrought many wonderful works ( δυνάμεις ). οὐ μετενόησαν : this the general fact; no deep, permanent change of mind and heart. Christ appearing among them a nine days’ wonder, then forgotten by the majority preoccupied with material interests.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The proud reject the Gospel offered unto them, to their great hurt and smart which turneth to the salvation of the simple.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Verse 20. Then began he to upbraid the cities] The more God has done to draw men unto himself, the less excusable are they if they continue in iniquity. If our blessed Lord had not done every thing that was necessary for the salvation of these people, he could not have reproached them for their impenitence.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(20) Then began he to upbraid.—The rebuke is inserted by St. Luke in our Lord’s charge to the Seventy (Luk_10:13-15). As in the case of the passages common to both Evangelists in Matthew 10 and Luke 10, we need not assume that the former has compiled a discourse from fragments collected separately. It is far more natural and probable to believe that our Lord in this case, as in others, used at different times the same, or nearly the same, forms of speech.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

20–24. The Cities that repented not

St Luk_10:13-15, where the words form part of the charge to the seventy disciples. It is instructive to compare the connection suggested by the two evangelists. In St Matthew the link is the rejection of Christ by the Jews—then by these favoured cities; in St Luke, the rejection of the Apostles as suggestive of the rejection of Jesus.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Woe unto thee, Chorazin!.... Though many of Christ's mighty works were done in this place, yet mention is made of it no where else, but here; whether it was a single city, or a country, is not easy to determine: the word "Chorasin", signifying "woody places", Dr. Lightfoot (l) conjectures it might include Cana, in which Christ wrought his first miracle, and a small adjacent country, situated in a wood, and be so called from thence; and Origen (m) reads it, , "the region of Zin":

woe unto thee, Bethsaida! This was the city of Andrew and Peter; see Gill on Joh 1:44; so that as bad as it was, some persons were called out of it by the grace of God, and to the high office of apostleship; and which makes that grace in such the more distinguishing:

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. These words are to be understood in a popular sense, as Grotius observes, and express what was probable, according to an human judgment of things; and the meaning is, that if the inhabitants of Tyre and Sidon had had the advantages of Christ's ministry, and of seeing his miracles, as the inhabitants of Chorazin and Bethsaida had, it looks very likely, or one would be ready to conclude, especially from many coming out of these parts, to attend on Christ's ministry, Mar 3:8 and from the conversion of some of them in after times, Act 21:3 they would have repented of their sins; at least, in an external way, signified by sackcloth and ashes, which were outward signs of repentance; see Isa 58:5. And which, if it had been only performed in such a manner by the inhabitants of Chorazin and Bethsaida, would have saved them from temporal judgments, which their sins now called for. The words are an hyperbolical exaggeration of the wickedness of those cities, like to Eze 3:5 showing, that they were worse than the Tyrians and Sidonians; an Heathenish and idolatrous people, who lived very profligate and dissolute lives, in all intemperance, luxury, and impiety; and therefore would be punished in a severer way: neither this passage, nor what follows, can be any proof of God's giving sufficient grace to all men alike, which in some is effectual to conversion, and in others not, but of the contrary; since the men of Tyre and Sidon had not the same means, or the same grace, as the inhabitants of the other cities, if the mighty works done among them are to be called so; or that man has a power to repent of himself, in a spiritual and evangelical way; or that outward means, as doctrines and miracles, are sufficient to produce such a repentance, without efficacious and unfrustrable grace; since only an outward repentance is here supposed, such as that of Ahab, and of the Ninevites.

(l) Chorogr. Cent. in Matth. p. 84. Vol. 2. (m) Philocalia, p. 109.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

20 Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not:

Ver. 20. Then began he to upbraid] Haply, because these cities, drawn by the authority of the Pharisees, made less account of our Saviour’s doctrine or miracles, by them maliciously depraved and disparaged. The blind led the blind, but both fell into the ditch, though their leaders lay undermost.

Because they repented not] There is a heart that cannot repent; that hath lost all passive power of coming out of the snare of the devil; that is, become such through long trading in sin, as neither ministry, nor misery, nor miracle, nor mercy can possibly mollify, Rom 2:5. Upon such you may write, "Lord, have mercy upon them." "Oh!" said a reverend man, "if I must be put to my option, I had rather be in hell with a sensible heart than live on earth with a reprobate mind."

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Then began he to upbraid ... - That is, to reprove, to rebuke, to denounce heavy judgment.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Our Lord had hitherto spent most of his time in Galilee, and the cities belonging to that province: there both John the Baptist and himself had preached the gospel, there he had wrought many miracles, by both aiming at their repentance; but there were multitudes that did not receive him, nor would be brought to any sight of their sins, or any acknowledgment of him as the Messias. He now begins to reprove them smartly, not that they did not applaud and commend him, but because they did not repent. This was Christ’s end in all his preaching, and in all his miraculous operations, to bring men to repentance, and to receive him as the Messias; and this should be the great end pursued by all his ministers.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Vers. 20-24. Woe on those who reject him. The parallel passage, Luk_10:12-15, comes almost at the close of the commission to the seventy. It is represented in the commission reported by St. Matthew by Mat_10:15 alone, which is almost verbally identical with ver. 24. It is possible that St. Matthew or the author of the source used by him did not care to interrupt the subject of Mt 10 by inserting more of these verses there, even though that place more nearly represented their original position. Observe that here they are connected with the rejection of John and of our Lord; in Luke, with the rejection of his disciples and of himself in them.

In Matthew only. It seems to be a kind of introduction, like ver. 7 a, perhaps marking vers. 20-24 as a fresh section in the discourses. It serves more particularly as an explanation why our Lord especially mentioned these cities. Then began he to upbraid (Mat_5:11, note; comp. also Mar_16:14) the cities wherein most of his mighty works (Mat_7:22, note) were done, because they repented not . "Quilibet auditor Nov. Test. est nut multo beetler (ver. 11) ant multo miserior antiquis" (Bengel).

Vers. 20-24. The Lord"s denunciation of judgment.

I ITS CAUSE.

1. Knowledge. The Lord"s tone assumes a greater severity a severity which perhaps favours the view that St. Luke gives (Luk_10:13) the true chronological order. The people of Galilee had seen most of the mighty works of Christ. His life had been long before their eyes; they knew him well; they watched him as he walked in their streets, as he healed the sick, or cleansed the leper, or gave sight to the blind. They knew every feature of that holy face, every tone of that blessed voice. They had been astonished with a great astonishment. But now they were becoming so familiar with the Lord"s power that his miracles, it may be, excited less wonder. Perhaps, like the Nazarenes, (Luk_4:23) they were beginning to regard his healing virtue almost as if it were at their disposal, almost as their right. They knew him, or seemed to know him, so well now, that the old excitement had passed away, the intense interest with which they used to regard him was becoming lukewarm.

2. Obstinate indifference. They repented not. They had heard his teaching, they had seen his works. There had been excitement, astonishment, enthusiasm; but even that was passing away, and, except in comparatively few, there had been no repentance. Repentance had been the first note of John the Baptist"s preaching, the first note of our Lord"s; but the message had been unheeded, the works by which the message had been attested had not produced real conviction. All had been done that could be done to bring them to repentance; but they would not come unto Christ that they might have life. And now the Lord upbraids them, not in wrath, but in sorrow; as afterwards he wept over the impenitent Jerusalem. Let us listen to those solemn words, and let us take to our hearts the great truth that repentance, a change of heart, is the essence of personal religion, and that all outward privileges, whatever they may be, are lost upon us if they do not, by the grace of God, produce that inward change.

II ITS TERMS.

1. The judgment of Chorazin and Bethsaida. Bethsaida was the home of three of the apostles. Chorazin, too, it seems, had been often graced by the Lord"s presence. They had had great opportunities, but they had failed to use them; and now the woe goes forth against them. "Woe unto thee]" It is a word of judgment, but it is also a word of sorrow. (comp. Rev_18:10, Rev_18:16, Rev_18:19) The Lord grieves while he pronounces sentence. "Peace be unto thee!" would come more sweetly from the lips of the Prince of Peace; but he could not say "Peace," where there was no peace. The Galilaeans, it may be, had often condemned the idolatry and the licentiousness of the great cities which lay near their northern border. But, in truth, the guilt of Tyre and Sidon was not so great as that of Chorazin and Bethsaida. For guilt is measured, not absolutely, as it is seen in the guilty deed; but relatively, in its relations to opportunities, to privileges, to knowledge. The men of Tyre and Sidon had not seen the works of Christ; had they seen them, he himself says, they would have repented. Their knowledge was less; their guilt was less; their condemnation would be less.

2. The judgment of Capernaum.

(1) It had become the Lord"s own city. He had chosen to dwell there when he left the unbelieving Nazareth. The people of Capernaum had known him well and long; they had seen many of his miracles; they had followed him in crowds when he went to the house of Jairus; the maiden whom he had raised from the dead lived among them. The rulers of their synagogue, the centurion who had built it, could bear witness to the power and goodness of the Saviour. They all knew him; they had watched him day after day as he walked by the lake; they had listened, many of them, as he taught sitting in some fishing-boat by the shore. Several of his apostles, Matthew the publican, James and John, Peter and Andrew, were well known at Capernaum; people had talked to them constantly about their Master his wonder-working power; his unique and unapproachable holiness; his tender, compassionate love; his calm, simple dignity. He had been long one of the principal subjects of talk, one of the great centres of interest, in that little town. All the details of his daily life had been scanned with eager curiosity, all his doings had been watched by observant eyes. But were the people of Capernaum much improved by the presence of this great Example? Some were; but not the most of them not the town as a whole. "Shalt thou be exalted unto heaven?" the Lord asks sorrowfully. "No," was the solemn answer; "thou shalt be cast down unto Hades." For the light of God"s presence and love had shone in all its glory on Capernaum; and, in the midst of light, its people had turned their backs to the light, and had loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

(2) Capernaum worse than Sodom. The men of Sodom were wicked, and sinners against the Lord exceedingly. The Jews regarded the very name of Sodom with abhorrence and horror. But, in truth, they themselves had sinned more deeply yet; in the very presence of the Son of God they persisted in their sin and hardness. The Lord knew, in the far-reaching range of his Divine knowledge, that the men of Sodom would have repented if they had had the privileges granted to Capernaum. "Therefore," he said in Divine sorrow, "it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee." The words suggest many deep, mysterious, awful thoughts. The Lord does not satisfy our curiosity; he throws a veil over the secrets of the Divine judgment. It is enough for us to know that that judgment is both just and merciful. Account will be taken of circumstances, opportunities, privileges. The heathen will not be judged as the Christians, nor the ignorant as they that have know]edge. Is there hope for them who die unblest? We read this saying of our Lord"s; we compare it with other Scriptures for instance, with the latter part of the sixteenth chapter of Ezekiel; and we feel that "the secret things belong unto the Lord our God; but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this Law." "What is that to thee?" the Lord seems to say to us (as once he said to Peter) when our restless thoughts busy themselves about the dark problems of the mysterious future. "What is that to thee? follow thou me." We have greater privileges than the people of Capernaum. We have the Word of God, his sacraments, the promise of his Spirit. We have not known Christ after the flesh; but we may know him by a holier, a more precious knowledge the knowledge by which the true sheep know the good Shepherd. Let us fear the condemnation of those who, living in the light, love darkness rather than light; let us use our privileges; let us strive always to grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

LESSONS.

1. The heart must be changed; excitement, privileges, will not save us.

2. Pray for that great inner change of repentance; be satisfied with nothingless.

3. Use the means of grace; neglect involves an awful responsibility.

Vers. 20-24. A lament over wasted privileges.

Jesus is already approaching the sadder stage of his brief ministry; already to the eye of sense it begins to look like a failure. To some it was a failure. The seed had fallen by the wayside, and the birds had carried it away. A similar lament to that of Christ might well be uttered over many regions of favoured Christendom.

I THE GREATNESS OF THE PRIVILEGES. NO places on earth had been more privileged than these Galileean towns. Here Jesus had lived and worked; here his greatest miracles had been performed, and every miracle was an object-lesson setting forth before the eyes of men the blessings of the kingdom.

Privileges of knowledge. The inhabitants of these cities had heard the gospel from the very lips of the Saviour. They had seen the spirit of his life and the laws of the kingdom in everything he did. They who dwell in Christian]ands have privileges denied to the heathen. Still more have the children of a Christian home. If we have known Christ from our childhood, have been trained in Christian truth, have seen the work of Christ in the society in which we have lived, ours is the condition of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum.

II THE NEGLECT OF THE PRIVILEGES. These cities had heard, but they had not heeded. They had seen, but they had not followed. The gospel had come to their doors, but the foolish people had not received it into their hearts. The explanation of this indifference is given in the earlier verses of the chapter. The negligent people were unsympathetic they were like listless children sitting in the market-place. Their condition is representative of that of multitudes in our own day. The labours of the Church are expended on them in vain. They have had the truth of Christ"s gospel preached in their ears time after time. Yet to them it is nothing. Their very familiarity with the words only seems to render them callous to the meaning. They could pass an examination in religious knowledge with credit; some of them have done so, and have won high places and carried off prizes. Yet they are utterly indifferent to Christ. Here is an appalling condition! It is due to the hardening effect of sin or to the deadening that comes with wilful worldliness. If men and women will absorb themselves in questions of money-making, amusement, and fashion, they cannot receive Christ or feel the blessedness of his gospel.

III THE MELANCHOLY DOOM OF THOSE WHO WASTE GREAT PRIVILEGES. The cities are to be cast down. The prophecy of Christ has been literally fulfilled. All three cities have disappeared, and have left scarcely a ruin behind. Or at least there is a dispute as to what ruins may be identified with them, and Capernaum in particular has occasioned much trouble to the map-makers. The neglect of Christian privileges cannot continue for ever. He who has buried his talent will most assuredly be called to account for it. Then the doom will be proportionate to the privileges neglected. The vices of the three cities of Galilee may not have reached the hideous blackness of the wicked cities of the plain, nor the notorious corruption of Phoenicia. But the greater privileges will be thrown into the scale and will weigh it down. Decorous, respectable people who enjoy Christian privileges and neglect them will be more heavily condemned than the most degraded heathen. W.F.A.

Vers. 20-30. Jesus rejected by the wise, but owned by babes and the Father.

Having illustrated by one or two sayings of our Lord what was his judgment of John and of those who heard John"s teaching, Matthew sets alongside of these others regarding the towns which had enjoyed exceptional opportunities of forming an adequate idea of his Person and work. The complaint against these cities was that "they repented not." They were not sinners above other men, as Sodom and Gomorrah had been. But when Jesus came exhibiting the kingdom of heaven, and inviting men to enter it, they were expected to repent of having chosen any other object as their chief good, and to welcome the kingdom as the Father"s best gift. They were summoned at once to repentance and faith. In our Lord"s judgment, then, that is the most damning condition of human life, in which a man has seen the kingdom of God but not felt drawn to it above all else. In the case of Capernaum there is an additional element of woe. For some months Jesus had made it the centre of his operations. And it may not unnaturally have occurred to the inhabitants that, as Jerusalem had rejected the Messiah, this town might be exalted to the high position of metropolis of the kingdom. But when he definitely enounced the pure spirituality of his mission, intense repugnance and resentment at once took the place of admiration, and from a heaven of Messianic expectation they fell to a hell of disappointment, bitterness, and godless despair. Such transitions are of not infrequent occurrence. Religious enthusiasm has been kindled under false impressions of what our Lord offers, and when it becomes apparent that he does not bestow an easy conquest over sin, but only grace which enables a man through painful self-denial to win self-mastery, bitter murmuring takes the place of hope, and he turns in fierce resentment against our Lord, as if he were accountable for the misconceptions of his kingdom which a worldly, weak, and self-seeking nature cannot but make. In what spirit and temper did our Lord accept this sad result of his teaching? Admitting frankly and without any sneer that the wise and prudent had discountenanced him, he finds his solace in the fact that the babes had received him, and that, if earthly authorities disowned his claim, his Father knew him. The wise and prudent in his day were the trained teachers, the leaders in religion, the men who had been at much pains to ascertain the meaning of Scripture, and to maintain the kind of character which they considered acceptable to God. They had their minds made up already about all things human and Divine, and to minds thus filled with preconceived ideas Jesus seemed either unintelligible or blasphemous.

Sadly, therefore, he turns to those who were unsophisticated by centuries of systematic teaching, but could by their native instincts discern between good and evil. The law illustrated by our Lord"s experience is again and again referred to in Scripture, as if all religious teachers had been brought into practical contact with it. Paul e.g. says, "Not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called;" and this not as if God were jealous of the wise, or had some special dislike to men of education, but because the mind of the educated man has difficulties in the way of his acceptance of the gospel from which the uneducated is happily exempt. When we are introduced to truths which the intellect is too small to comprehend, we are tempted to reject them because the ordinary methods of inquiry fail us. Few men of intellect escape the mental perplexity and suffering which this entails. There are truths which we must accept in faith, on the word of him who is better informed than we, and whom we know to be true. Intellect has its place and its function in connection with Christian truth; but in point of fact and as matter of history intellect has not discovered God. Christ has done so, and that man makes best growth in Christ"s school who has humility enough to accept his teaching. But while our Lord was thus on all hands met by repulse and unbelief, he had one unfailing source of comfort. The Father knew who he was that he was no misled enthusiast, no pretentious blasphemer, but God"s own Son. Again, men might despise his unconventional teaching, mistaking genuine simplicity for ignorance of high matters, they might upbraid him with contradicting the received teaching about God, but he could say truthfully, "No man knoweth the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him." By this consciousness did he stimulate himself again to return, and once more to seek to convince men of the Father"s love. And there was a third element in this sustaining consciousness. Judged by his present success, he seemed feeble and of small influence, yet he reminded himself that "all things were delivered unto him of his Father." He was to be God so far as men and this world were concerned. Men might ignore him and deny his teaching, but they could not prevent him from raising the dead, from rebuking the winds and waves, from returning their contempt with compassion, their hatred with love, from living righteously and lovingly so as to be a light to all generations. They could not prevent him from accepting God"s Spirit and living in his humanity as the perfect image of the Father, and thus exercising an influence on human affairs that deepens as the world grows. But the practical outcome of our Lord"s experience of the hostility, suspicion, and contempt of men was not merely to confirm his own consciousness of his fellowship with the Father, but also to lead him confidently to invite to himself all who found life laborious and burdensome. And that he does this at the very moment when we should have naturally expected to find him most hopeless, is not without significance. He has been compelled by the cold reception given him to revise his claims, to cross-examine his own consciousness of a Divine commission, and the result of this is the tenderest and most assured invitation to weak and weary men that ever fell from his lips. It is not the cheerful and over-confident utterance of a happy moment; it is the sober, weighty, reasoned deliverance of one who has pondered the matter all round, and who promises only what he knows he can stand to and make good. He bids you consider that you may have rest. However defeated and soiled with the dust of conflict, however paralyzed and dismayed your heart, however weary of the little that comes of all your striving, to you he offers partnership with himself. He will make all things a school, in which you will be encouraged by his presence, and from which you shall pass into that full maturity and fitness for all the future which begin in meekness and lowly carrying of his yoke. D.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Then began he to upbraid the cities - It is observable he had never upbraided them before. Indeed at first they received him with all gladness, Capernaum in particular.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Then

The kingdom of heaven announced as "at hand" by John the Baptist, by the King Himself, and by the twelve, and attested by mighty works, has been morally rejected. The places chosen for the testing of the nation, Chorazin, Bethsaida, etc. having rejected both John and Jesus, the rejected King now speaks of judgment. The final official rejection is later. Mat 27:31-37.

For Another Point of View: See Topic 301190

For Additional Factors See Topic 301199

The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Woe upon the Galilean Cities.

v. 20. Then began He to upbraid the cities wherein most of His mighty works were done, because they repented not.

The historical occasion upon which Jesus said these words is not known. He may have used the same words here, in connection with His censure of the Pharisees, and also in His instructions to the seventy disciples, Luk 10:3-15. In order to avoid useless difficulties, it is a simple matter to remember that Jesus more than once found need and occasion to say the same things twice and oftener. He found Himself here obliged to objurgate, earnestly to scold the Galilean cities whose inhabitants had seen so many evidences of His divine power, in whose midst the majority of His signs and wonders in the northern country had been performed. They had marveled, they had been filled with astonishment, with amazement, they had praised the manifest glory of God, they had proclaimed Him a wonder, they had eagerly sought His help for their diseases, and welcomed Him as the Savior of the body. But—they had not repented, there was no change of mind and heart. They were just as far from the kingdom of God as they had been before the coming of Christ.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Our Saviour having gone through the cities of Galilee, preaching the doctrine of repentance, and confirming his doctrine with miracles, and finding multitudes, after all his endeavours, remain in their impenitence, he proceeds to upbraid them severely for their contempt of gospel-grace: Then began he to upbraid their cities, &c.

Where observe, 1. The cities upbraided, Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum: in their pulpits he daily preached, and those places were the theatres upon which his miracles were wrought; other cities onlyheard these saw; but where he preached most, he prevailed least; like some fishermen, he catched least in his own pond.

Observe, 2. What he upbraids them for; not for disrespect to his person, but disobedience to his doctrine; because they repented not. The great design of Christ both in the doctrine which he preached, and in the miracles which he wrought was to bring men to repentance; that is, to forsake their sins, and live well.

Observe, 3. Whom he upbraids them with; Tyre and Sidon, Sodom and Gomorrah, nations rude and barbarous, out of the pale of the church, ignorant of a Saviour, and of the ways to salvation by him.

Learn, that the higher a people rise under the means, the lower they fall if they miscarry. They who have been nearest to conversion, and not yet converted, shall have the greatest condemnation when they are judged. Capernaum’s sentence shall exceed Sodom’s for severity, because she exceeded Sodom in the enjoyment of means and mercy. The case of those who are impenitent under the gospel, is of all others the most dangerous, and their damnation shall be heaviest and most severe. Sodom, the stain of mankind, a city soaked in the dregs of villainy: yet this hell upon earth shall have a milder hell at the last day of judgment, than unbelieving Capernaum, as the next verse informs us, Mat 11:23.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

20. Then he began to upbraid the cities, etc. Compare Luke 10:12–15. The cities in the vicinity of the Sea of Galilee had, thus far, heard and seen the most of the Lord and had the least excuse for rejecting him. In all the reproofs of Jesus there is sadness in the severity. The very denunciations seem to mourn. Wherein most of his mighty works were done. We know of a number of miracles which had been wrought in these cities, the healing of the centurion's servant, of the son of the nobleman, of the diseased woman, of two blind men, and the raising of the daughter of Jairus. The Scriptures assure us that these were only a very small part of the mighty works he did. See Matt. 9:35. Because they repented not. The great end proposed by the gospel is repentance and a new life.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

General Information:

Jesus begins to rebuke the people of the cities where he previously did miracles.

rebuke the cities

Here "the cities" refers to the people who live there. AT: "rebuke the people of the cities" (See: Metonymy)

cities

"towns"

in which most of his mighty deeds were done

This can be translated in active form. AT: "in which he did most of his mighty deeds" (See: Active or Passive)

mighty deeds

"mighty works" or "works of power" or "miracles"

Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida!

Jesus speaks as if the people of the cities of Chorazin and Bethsaida were there listening to him, but they were not. (See: Apostrophe)

Woe to you

"How terrible it will be for you." Here "you" is singular and refers to the city. If it is more natural to refer to the people instead of a city, you could translate with a plural "you." (See: Forms of You)

Chorazin ... Bethsaida ... Tyre ... Sidon

The names of these cities are used as metonyms for the people living in these cities. (See: Metonymy and How to Translate Names)

If the mighty deeds ... in sackcloth and ashes

Jesus is describing a hypothetical situation that could have happened in the past, but it did not. (See: Hypothetical Situations)

If the mighty deeds had been done in Tyre and Sidon which were done in you

This can be translated with active forms. AT: "If I had done the mighty deeds among the people of Tyre and Sidon that I have done among you" (See: Active or Passive)

which were done in you ... than for you

Here the "you" is plural and refers to Chorazin and Bethsaida. If it is more natural for your language, you could use a dual "you" to refer to the two cities, or a plural "you" to refer to the people of the cities. (See: Forms of You)

they would have repented long ago

The pronoun "they" refers to the people of Tyre and Sidon.

would have repented

"would have shown they were sorry for their sins"

it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment than for you

Here "Tyre and Sidon" refers to the people who live there. AT: "God will show more mercy to the people of Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than to you" or "God will punish you more severely at the day of judgment than the people of Tyre and Sidon" (See: Metonymy)

than for you

The implied information can be made explicit. AT "than for you, because you did not repent and believe in me, even though you saw me do miracles" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

translationWords

Jesus

rebuke

might

works

repent

woe

Tyre

Sidon

sackcloth

judgment day

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

20–24. THE CITIES THAT REPENTED NOT

St Luk 10:13-15, where the words form part of the charge to the seventy disciples. It is instructive to compare the connection suggested by the two evangelists. In St Matthew the link is the rejection of Christ by the Jews—then by these favoured cities; in St Luke, the rejection of the Apostles as suggestive of the rejection of Jesus.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

20-30.] Second part of the discourse. See on ver. 7.

20. τότε ἤρξατο] This expression betokens a change of subject, but not of locality or time. The whole chapter stands in such close connexion, one part arising out of another (e.g. this out of ver. 16-19), and all pervaded by the same great undertone, which sounds forth in vv. 28-30, that it is quite impossible that this should be a collection of our Lord’s sayings uttered at different times. I would rather regard the τότε ἤρξατο as a token of the report of an ear-witness, and as pointing to a pause or change of manner on the part of our Lord. See note on Luk 10:13.

ὅτι οὐ μετ.] Connect this with the first subject of our Lord’s preaching, ch. 4:17. The reference is to some unrecorded miracles, of which we know (Luk 4:23: Joh 21:25) that there were many.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

20. The editor adds a connecting link in order to introduce the following paragraph, which in Lk. occurs in the charge to the Seventy.

(E) Then He began to reproach the cities in which His many miracles happened, because they repented not.

τότε] See on 2:7.—αἱ πλεῖσται δυνάμεις] For ὁ πλεῖστος = ὁ πολύς, cf. Blass, p. 143; Moulton, p. 79, “those very numerous mighty works.” δύναμις = “a miracle,” “a mighty deed,” is common to the Synoptic tradition, but is avoided by Jn. Cf. Abbott, Johannine Vocabulary, 1686 e.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mighty works [δυναμεις] . The supernatural works of Christ and his apostles are denoted by six different words in the New Testament, exhibiting these works under different aspects and from different points of view. These will be considered in detail as they occur. Generally, a miracle may be regarded :

1. As a portent or prodigy [τερας] ; as Act 7:36, of the wonders shown by Moses in Egypt.

2. As a sign [σημειον] , pointing to something beyond itself, a mark of the power or grace of the doer or of his connection with the supernatural world. So Mt 12:38.

3. As an exhibition of God 's glory [ενδοξον] , Luk 13:17; glorious things.

4. As a strange thing [παραδοξον] , Luk 5:26.

5. As a wonderful thing (qaumasion), Mt 21:15.

6. As a power [δυναμις] ; so here : a mighty work.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.