Luke 11:47

47 What sorrow awaits you! For you build monuments for the prophets your own ancestors killed long ago.

Luke 11:47 Meaning and Commentary

Luke 11:47

Woe unto you
Meaning particularly the lawyers or Scribes, together with the Pharisees, and even the whole body of the people, who in general were of the cast and complexion here described:

for ye build the sepulchres of the prophets;
(See Gill on Matthew 23:29)

and your fathers killed them;
the prophets; "or whom your fathers killed", as read the Syriac, Arabic, and Persic versions; the one put them to death, and the other erected stately monuments over them, or adorned them; and yet both had the same malignant spirit against the faithful servants and messengers of God; and which showed their great hypocrisy.

Luke 11:47 In-Context

45 “Teacher,” said an expert in religious law, “you have insulted us, too, in what you just said.”

46 “Yes,” said Jesus, “what sorrow also awaits you experts in religious law! For you crush people with unbearable religious demands, and you never lift a finger to ease the burden.

47 What sorrow awaits you! For you build monuments for the prophets your own ancestors killed long ago.

48 But in fact, you stand as witnesses who agree with what your ancestors did. They killed the prophets, and you join in their crime by building the monuments!

49 This is what God in his wisdom said about you: ‘I will send prophets and apostles to them, but they will kill some and persecute the others.’