But woe unto you scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites
It seems from hence, that the Scribes and Pharisees had not left
him, at least not all of them, notwithstanding the confusion they
were thrown into; but were still about him, observing what he
said to the people, and watching an opportunity to take every
advantage against him; whom he addresses in a very awful manner,
calling them "hypocrites", as he truly might; for they were such,
both to God and men: he had detected them already before the
people, in several instances of hypocrisy; and gives sufficient
reasons, in the following part of this chapter, to support the
character, he gives of them, and his charge against them;
denouncing a woe upon them in this world, and that which is to
come, no less than eight times; expressing his abhorrence of
their wickedness, his commiseration of their case, and their
certain destruction: "for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven
against men": not eternal life and happiness, the entrance into
which can neither be opened nor shut by men: those whom God
determines to bring thither, shall have an entrance abundantly
ministered to them, in spite of the opposition of men and devils;
though these men did all that in them lay, to hinder persons
enjoying everlasting glory. But the Gospel dispensation is here
meant, which opened by the ministry of John the Baptist, Christ
and his disciples, and which the Scribes and Pharisees did all
they could to shut; by discouraging the preaching of the Gospel,
and the administration of ordinances, in which this dispensation
lay; and prejudicing the minds of men against it, that they might
not embrace the doctrines of it, nor submit to its ordinances:
they, by their office, ought to have opened and explained the
Scriptures, the prophecies of the Old Testament relating to the
Messiah, and led the people into a knowledge of the mysteries of
his kingdom, and encouraged them to enter into this new state of
things; which, according to the true intent of Scripture, was to
take place, and now did: but instead of this, they shut up the
Scriptures, took away the key of knowledge, and laid it aside;
and darkened the Scriptures by their false glosses, and obliged
the people to observe the traditions of the elders, and which
they call (hrwtl gyo) ,
"an hedge for the law" F23; to which Beza thinks, the allusion
is here, and by which men were shut up, and kept from the true
knowledge both of law and Gospel:
for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them
that are
entering to go in:
they neither believed in the Messiah themselves, nor embraced the
doctrines relating to his person and office: have any of the
Pharisees believed on him? No; they received him not, they
rejected him, and also the counsel of God, against themselves,
not being baptized with the baptism of John, the forerunner of
Christ; nor would they suffer others, that were inclined to
profess their faith in him, and be baptized, to do it; but
discouraged them all they could, by their reproachful treatment
of the person, miracles, and ministry of Christ, and by their
threatenings and menaces, and by their excommunications of such
as made a confession of him.