Matthew 23:15

Matthew 23:15 in other versions

• King James Version (KJV)Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.
• New International Version (NIV)“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.
• English Standard Version (ESV)Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves.
• New King James Version (NKJV)“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

Context of Matthew 23:15

13Jesus spoke to the teachers of God's Law and the Pharisees. ‘It will be very bad for you,’ he said. ‘You are hypocrites! You have stopped people who wanted to go into the kingdom of heaven. It is like you have shut the door so that they cannot go in. Then you yourselves do not even go in. 14[It will be very bad for you, teachers of God's Law and Pharisees. You are hypocrites! You take things away from women after their husbands have died. You pray for a long time so that other people will praise you. God will punish you much more than other people.] It will be very bad for you, teachers of God's Law and Pharisees. You are hypocrites! You travel far across land and sea. You do this to make one person believe what you believe. Then, when he does believe your ideas, he becomes worse than you are. He shows that he belongs to hell even more than you do. 16It will be very bad for you, teachers. You cannot see what is true, but you show people which way to go. You say to people, “You may make a promise by the name of the temple. Then it is not a serious promise. You do not have to do it. But you may also make a promise by the gold things in the temple. Then it is a serious promise, and you must do it.” 17This shows that you are fools. You do not understand what is true. Think about which of these is more important. Is it the gold things in the temple? Or is it the temple itself? It is the temple that makes the gold things special.

Matthew 23:15 word by word

Οὐαὶ ὑμῖν, γραμματεῖς καὶ Φαρισαῖοι ὑποκριταί, ὅτι περιάγετε τὴν θάλασσαν καὶ τὴν ξηρὰν ποιῆσαι ἕνα προσήλυτον, καὶ ὅταν γένηται, ποιεῖτε αὐτὸν υἱὸν γεέννης διπλότερον ὑμῶν.¶Read the interlinear

Words taken from the KJV.

• Woeοὐαίouai · woe!G3759
• unto youσύsu · youG4771
• scribesγραμματεύςgrammateus · scribeG1122
• andκαίkai · andG2532
• PhariseesΦαρισαῖοςPharisaios · PhariseeG5330
• hypocritesὑποκριτήςhupokritēs · hypocriteG5273
• forὅτιhoti · that/since: sinceG3754
• ye compassπεριάγωperiagō · to take/go aroundG4013
• seaὁho hē to · the/this/whoG3588
• seaθάλασσαthalassa · seaG2281
• landξηρόςxēros · dried up/witheredG3584
• to makeποιέωpoieō · to do/make: doG4160
• oneεἷςheis · oneG1520
• proselyteπροσήλυτοςprosēlutos · proselyteG4339
• whenὅτανhotan · when(-ever)G3752
• he is madeγίνομαιginomai · to beG1096
• himαὐτόςautos · it/s/heG846
• twofold moreδιπλοῦςdiplous · doubleG1362
• the childυἱόςuihos · sonG5207
• of hellγέενναgeenna · hell: GehennaG1067

Cross-references for Matthew 23:15

• Galatians 4:17Those false teachers try very much to please you. But they do not really want what is good for you. They want to make you turn away from me. Then you will only want to listen to them.
• Galatians 6:12Do not agree with those people who want to make you obey the Jewish rules. They say that you must let someone circumcise you. They want other people to think that they are important. They do not want to receive any trouble from others. They are afraid to teach that Christ's death on the cross is enough to save us.
• Esther 8:17When the new law reached every region and every city, the Jews became very happy. The other people who lived there were now afraid of the Jews. Because of that, many people said that they themselves had become Jews.
• Acts 2:10Some of us are from Phrygia and Pamphylia. Some of us are from Egypt. Some of us are from the country of Libya, near the town of Cyrene. Some of us have come from Rome to visit Jerusalem.
• Acts 13:43When the meeting finished, many people followed Paul and Barnabas. Some of them were Jews. Others were Gentiles who now worshipped God. Paul and Barnabas said to them, ‘God has been very kind to you. You should continue to trust him.’
• John 8:44You belong to your father, the Devil, and you want to do the things that he wants. From the beginning, he has been someone who murders people. He refuses to accept the truth, because there is nothing true in him. When he tells lies, he is showing what he is really like. He always tells lies. He is the father of all lies.
• Acts 13:10‘You are a servant of the Devil! You are against everything that is right. Your mind is full of lies and other bad things. You try to change the true message of the Lord and make it into lies. You must stop doing that!
• Acts 14:2But some of the Jews refused to believe God's message. They told the Gentiles that they too should not believe it. The Jews put bad thoughts into the minds of the Gentiles so that they became angry against the believers.
• Acts 17:5Some other Jews in the city were jealous of Paul and Silas, because people believed their message. So they went to the city's market place and they found some bad men there. These men often caused trouble in the city. Now the Jews brought these men to come together with them in an angry crowd. This crowd made a lot of noise and trouble in the streets of the city. They went to Jason's house and they broke down his door. They wanted to find Paul and Silas. They wanted to bring them out of the house to the crowd.
• Ephesians 2:3At one time, all of us lived like those people. We did whatever bad things our bodies wanted to do. If our thoughts made us want to do something, we did it. Because we were like that, God was angry with us. He should have punished us, just like everyone else.

Commentaries on Matthew 23:15

• Adam Clarke Bible Commentary · v. 15Compass sea and land - A proverbial expression, similar to ours, You leave no stone unturned; intimating that they did all in their power to gain converts, not to God, but to their sect. These we may suppose were principally sought for among the Gentiles, for the bulk of the Jewish nation was already on the side of the Pharisees. Proselyte - , a stranger, or foreigner; one who is come from his own people and country, to sojourn with another. See the…Read the comment
• Barnes’ Notes on the Bible · v. 15Ye compass sea and land - You take every means, spare no pains, to gain proselytes. Proselyte - One that comes over from a foreign nation, religion, or sect to us - a convert. Among the Jews there were two kinds of proselytes: 1.“Proselytes of righteousness,” or those who wholly and fully embraced the Jewish religion, who were baptized, who were circumcised, and who conformed to all the rites of the Mosaic institutions. 2.“Proselytes of the gate,” or…Read the comment
• Matthew Henry Concise Commentary · v. 13-33Verses 13-33 The scribes and Pharisees were enemies to the gospel of Christ, and therefore to the salvation of the souls of men. It is bad to keep away from Christ ourselves, but worse also to keep others from him. Yet it is no new thing for the show and form of godliness to be made a cloak to the greatest enormities. But dissembled piety will be reckoned double iniquity. They were very busy to turn souls to be of their party. Not for the glory of God and…Read the comment
• Tyndale Open Study Notes · v. 15A convert (proselyte) fully accepted Judaism by performing ceremonies like baptism, sacrifice, and circumcision (see Acts 13:43). A convert differed from a "God-fearer." A God-fearer was a person who accepted some Jewish beliefs, especially monotheism (belief in one God), without fully converting to Judaism (see Luke 7:4–5; Acts 10:2). To win a single convert likely means persuading God-fearers to fully convert by becoming circumcised (compare Galatians…Read the comment
• Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary · v. 1515. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte--from heathenism. We have evidence of this in Josephus. and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves--condemned, for the hypocrisy he would learn to practice, both by the religion he left and that he embraced.Read the comment

Topics related to Matthew 23:15

• Church
• Ecclesiasticism
• Hell
• Hypocrisy
• Pharisees
• Satire
• Teachers

In the dictionaries

• Abase
• Bewray
• Devour
• Exalt
• Fill
• Gehenna
• Gnat
• Ought
• Partaker
• Pharisees

Commentaries on Matthew 23

• Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
• Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
• Matthew Henry Concise Commentary
• Tyndale Open Study Notes
• Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary
• Calvin’s Commentaries
• John Wesley’s Notes
• Catena Aurea
• Illustrated New Testament
• Burkitt’s Expository Notes
• Darby Translation Notes
• Family Bible Notes
• Geneva Bible Translation Notes
• Kingcomments
• John Lightfoot Commentary
• Luther’s Commentary on Selected Bible Passages
• Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
• Matthew Henry’s Modern English Commentary
• The People’s New Testament
• Robertson’s Word Pictures
• Scofield Reference Notes, 1917 Edition
• The Fourfold Gospel and Commentary on Acts
• Original Douay–Rheims Annotations
• Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary
• EGW Writings