Why do you see the speck of chaff that is in your brother’s eye, but don’t consider the beam that is in your own eye?
Parallel Translations
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Why do you see the speck of chaff that is in your brother’s eye, but don’t consider the beam that is in your own eye?
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Why seyst thou a moote in thy brothers eye and considerest not the beame that is in thyne awne eye?
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And why seest thou a mote in thy brothers eye, and considerest not the beame that is in thine owne eye?
Cross-references (14)
Passages linked to Luke 6:41 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- John 8:7 But when they continued asking him, he looked up and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw the first stone at her.”
- James 1:24 for he sees himself, and goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.
- Romans 2:1 Therefore you are without excuse, O man, whoever you are who judge. For in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself. For you who judge practice the same things.
- Romans 2:21-24 You therefore who teach another, don’t you teach yourself? You who preach that a man shouldn’t steal, do you steal? You who say a man shouldn’t commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who glory in the law, do you dishonor God by disobeying the law? For “the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you,” just as it is written.
- Matthew 7:3-5 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but don’t consider the beam that is in your own eye? Or how will you tell your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye;’ and behold, the beam is in your own eye? You hypocrite! First remove the beam out of your own eye, and then you can see clearly to remove the speck out of your brother’s eye.
- 2 Samuel 12:5-7 David’s anger burned hot against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As Yahweh lives, the man who has done this deserves to die! He must restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing, and because he had no pity!” Nathan said to David, “You are the man. This is what Yahweh, the God of Israel, says: ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul.
- Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things and it is exceedingly corrupt. Who can know it?
- John 8:40-44 But now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth which I heard from God. Abraham didn’t do this. You do the works of your father.” They said to him, “We were not born of sexual immorality. We have one Father, God.” Therefore Jesus said to them, “If God were your father, you would love me, for I came out and have come from God. For I haven’t come of myself, but he sent me. Why don’t you understand my speech? Because you can’t hear my word. You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and doesn’t stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks on his own; for he is a liar, and the father of lies.
- 2 Samuel 20:9-10 Joab said to Amasa, “Is it well with you, my brother?” Joab took Amasa by the beard with his right hand to kiss him. But Amasa took no heed to the sword that was in Joab’s hand. So he struck him with it in the body, and shed out his bowels to the ground, and didn’t strike him again; and he died. Joab and Abishai his brother pursued Sheba the son of Bichri.
- 2 Samuel 20:20-21 Joab answered, “Far be it, far be it from me, that I should swallow up or destroy. The matter is not so. But a man of the hill country of Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, has lifted up his hand against the king, even against David. Just deliver him, and I will depart from the city.” The woman said to Joab, “Behold, his head will be thrown to you over the wall.”
- 1 Kings 2:32 Yahweh will return his blood on his own head, because he fell on two men more righteous and better than he, and killed them with the sword, and my father David didn’t know it: Abner the son of Ner, captain of the army of Israel, and Amasa the son of Jether, captain of the army of Judah.
- 1 Chronicles 21:6 But he didn’t count Levi and Benjamin among them; for the king’s word was abominable to Joab.
- Ezekiel 18:28 Because he considers, and turns away from all his transgressions that he has committed, he shall surely live. He shall not die.
- Psalms 36:2 For he flatters himself in his own eyes, too much to detect and hate his sin.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (17 sources)
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Hypocrites, which are very severe reprehenders of others, are…
Hypocrites, which are very severe reprehenders of others, are very quick of sight to spy other men’s faults, but very blind to see their own.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 41 And why beholdest thou the mote that is…
41 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
Ver. 41. See Mat 7:3.
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.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain See Poole on "Mat 7:3", and following verses to…
See Poole on "Mat 7:3", and following verses to Mat 7:5.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain By the mote in our brother’s eye, is meant…
By the mote in our brother’s eye, is meant some small and little sins discerned, or some sin suspected. By the beam in our own eye, some greater sin undiscerned. Now, says our Saviour, there is no greater sin of hypocrisy than to be curious in spying out the smaller faults of others, and at the same time indulge greater in ourselves.
Learn hence, that there is no such way to teach us charity in judging of others, as to exercise severity in judging of ourselves.
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2. That those who desire others should look upon their failings with a compassionate eye, must not look upon the failings of others with a censorius eye; for with what measure we mete, it shall be measured to us again.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Either how canst thou say to thy brother,.... Guilty…
Either how canst thou say to thy brother,.... Guilty of the lesser sin;
brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye; that is, suffer me to reprove thee for thy sin: the word "brother" is omitted in the Cambridge copy of Beza's, and in the Persic version; nor is it in Matthew; but in the Syriac and Ethiopic versions it is read, "my brother"; pretending great affection and sincerity:
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when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? that is, takest no notice of, and dost not refrain from a greater iniquity continued in:
thou hypocrite; as such an one must be, that bears hard upon his brother, and severely censures him for a small crime, when he indulges in himself a far more abominable sin:
cast out first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brother's eye: the sense is, that a man should first reform himself, and then others.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Matt. vii, 3.
Matt. vii, 3.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 41. And why beholdest thou the mote] See…
Verse 41. And why beholdest thou the mote] See this explained on Mt 7:3-5.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Luk 6:41-42. And why beholdest thou the mote —…
Luk 6:41-42. And why beholdest thou the mote — See notes on Mat 7:3-5. Be not ye like the disciples of the Pharisees, censuring others, and not amending yourselves.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain (See on Mat 7:3-5, Mat 7:16-27.)
(See on Mat 7:3-5, Mat 7:16-27.)
Next: Luke Chapter 7
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 41. beholdest thou the mote] The hypocrite sees (blepei)…
41. beholdest thou the mote] The hypocrite sees (blepei) at the slightest glance the mote in his brother’s eye; but not the most careful inspection enables him to observe (katanoein) the very obvious beam in his own eye. The word mote is in the original karphos, a stalk or chip, and this is also the idea of mote. Thus in Dutch mot is dust of wood; in Spanish mota is a flue on cloth.
the beam] The entire illustration is Jewish, and was used to express impatience of just reproof (Babha Bathra, f. 15. 2) so that ‘mote’ and ‘beam’ became proverbial for little and great faults. The proverb also implies, ‘How can you see others’ faults properly with a beam in the depth of your eye (ἔκβαλε … ἐκ, Mat_7:5)? how dare you condemn when you are so much worse?’ Comp. Chaucer (Reeve’s Prologue),
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“He can wel in myn eye see a stalke
But in his owne he can nought seen a balke.”
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.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (41) And why beholdest thou . .?—See Notes on…
(41) And why beholdest thou . .?—See Notes on Mat_7:4. The two reports of the proverb agree almost verbally, as if its repetition had impressed it deeply on the minds of the hearers.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain And why beholdest thou the mote that is in…
And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother"s eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye? The thought-leaders of the day were in good truth hypocrites, proud, avaricious, in many cases self-indulgent, bigoted, and selfish; they were utterly unfit to be the moral teachers of the people a position they had arrogated to themselves. The homely but well-known Jewish proverb of the mote and the beam picturesquely put before his listeners the position as it appeared to the Lord. The very defects among the people which the religious teachers professed to lecture upon and to discuss, disfigured and marred their own lives. They were these priests and scribes and Pharisees worse than self deceivers; they were religious hypocrites. The now famous illustration of the mote and the beam is, as has been said, purely Jewish, and was no doubt a familiar one to the people. It is found in the Talmud (treatise "Bava Bathra" fol. 15. 2). Farrar quotes from Chaucer"He can wel in myn eye see a stalke, But in his owne he can nought see a balke.
The word "mote" translates the Greek karfov , a chip. In Dutch mot is the dust of wood. In Spanish recta is the flue on cloth.
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Vers. 41, 42. Keenness and dulness of spiritual vision.
Of all the surprising things in this world there is nothing more wonderful than the way in which men mistake one another and misconceive themselves. Their vision is so seriously, so thoroughly distorted.
I THE KEENNESS OF SPIRITUAL VISION some men exhibit. They have the nicest discernment of faults and failings in their brethren. There is nothing too minute to escape their notice and their condemnation. Censoriousness is a very great mistake in every light. Those who are guilty of "beholding the mote in their brother"s eye" are wrong in four respects.
1. They do substantial injustice in their judgment and by their action; for they lay stress on the one small infirmity while they leave unregarded and unacknowledged many honourable acquisitions, many valuable virtues.
2. They are inconsiderate of the difficulties which the victims of their severity have had to contend with, and in doing battle with which they may have put forth the most commendable exertion.
3. They forget that every one of us is and will be subject to the judgment and (where it is due) the condemnation of God. (see Rom_14:4, Rom_14:10)
4. They show a perverted ingenuity. It would be a most excellent quality to cultivate if they would only exert the same subtlety and patient observation in descrying the virtues and the beauties of those in whom they detect so many failures. This keenness of spiritual vision is a mistake in two other ways.
(1) It is usually unprofitable; for it is more irritating than advantageous to those on whom it is expended.
(2) It is odious to man, and it is unpleasing in the sight of God. Both in the human and in the Divine estimate, severity is the unattractive and charity is the becoming thing.
II THE DULNESS OF SPIRITUAL VISION other men manifest. They do "not perceive the beam that is in their own eye." This fact in human experience is only too palpable. We see men whose souls are painfully charged with selfishness, or pride, or frivolity, or cruelty, or irreverence, or impurity, who have no conception that they are in grave spiritual delinquency and danger. There is not a mote but a beam in their eye, and they are blind to it altogether. They are not entitled to offer a judgment on the defects or transgressions of others, so far are they themselves from the straight line of truth. And any note of censure from their lips is utterly and even ludicrously misplaced.
III OUR WISDOM IN VIEW OF THESE MISTAKES. It is to be far more concerned to be right and pure in our own hearts than to be keen in the detection and exposure of other people"s shortcoming. Since men do so seriously and so fatally mistake their own spirit and condition, it behoves us to do these three things:
1. To examine our own. hearts with impartial and anxious eye.
2. To welcome any friendly counsel or warning that may be offered us; and "it is lawful to learn even from an enemy.
3. To be often and earnestly asking God to show us what is wrong within, that we may see ourselves as he sees us. "Who can understand his errors.9 Cleanse thou me from secret faults!" (Psa_19:12, Psa_19:13; and see Psa_139:23, Psa_139:24). C.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain And why beholdest thou the mote that is in…
Luk_6:41-42
And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brothers eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
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The true and the false reformer contrasted
Now, as no age has been without its abominations, so none has been without its reformers. We read of them alike in sacred and in secular history. We hear of them alike in Heathendom and in Christendom, in lands of barbarous darkness and in lands of religious enlightenment. Abel, Enoch, and Noah were reformers. So were Abraham, Moses, Samuel, David, Elijah--in fact, all the Israelitish prophets, and many of the Israelitish kings. Confucius in China, Zoroaster in Persia, Socrates in Greece, Cato in Rome, were all of the same order. In truth, all genuine Christians, rightly viewed, are reformers. Ye are the salt.of the earth, to rectify its putrescencies. Ye are the light of the world, to disperse its shades of darkness. But every genuine good thing amongst men has also its counterfeit. The grand forger and fabricator of all such hollow, delusive imitations of the exterior of excellence, is the devil. God prepares a purifying salt, Satan also manufactures an article, resembling it in appearance, but without its pungent savour and antiseptic properties. Our Lord, in His Sermon on the Mount, warns us against being deceived by these pseudo-reformers: and also against the still more fatal position of actually belonging to their ranks. We may gather from this passage of stern rebuke the character of a false or pretended reformer; and, by considering its contrast, that of a true and effective one likewise. Both may be zealous; both may be bold; both may be firm. Earnestness, intrepidity, immobility, may belong to each alike. No! the distinction between the true and the false reformer consists not in any difference of ardour, perseverance, or resoluteness. It is not a variation of degrees, but a variety of kind. It stands not in diversities of intensity, but in contradictions of essential quality. We shall find, by an analysis of our text, that the false reformer is at the antipodes of the true in all that goes to constitute fundamental, or radical, distinctions in moral character.
1. They start from opposite points of the compass. The one begins by reforming his neighbours; the other, by reforming himself. The one begins by looking around; the other, by looking within: the one, by sweeping the streets of the city; the other, by cleaning the rooms of his own house: the one, by attempting to remodel society; the other, by seeking a change in his own character. The one sees first what is amiss abroad; the other, what is amiss at home. First cast out the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brothers eye.
2. When both are engaged in the work of the worlds reformation, they differ in the selection of the objects on which their corrective measures are brought to bear. They not only start from contrary points, but they also proceed in contrary directions. The false reformer is presumptuous, the true reformer is condescending. The one looks above himself, the other looks below. All this, too, appears plainly from the text, Cast out the beam from thine own eye, then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brothers eye.
3. A distinction between the real and the apparent reformer is to be found in the state of their own minds respectively. The former is clear in his perceptions and correct in his judgments. He knows how to discriminate cautiously and accurately, between good and evil. But the latter is ever confused in his views and erring in his decisions. Through precipitancy and prejudice, he mistakes the sweet for the bitter, and tim bitter for the sweet. We do not indeed claim infallibility for the true saint, but we do claim for him as correct a discernment of character and knowledge of truth as may be attainable by man in this world. The Scriptures doubtless guarantee this to every simple-hearted, docile, prayerful man, who studies their pages.
Hence we read of the anointing of the Holy One, which leads those who receive it into all truth: and we are told, that if any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God. Again, if thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light: and, if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men freely, and without up braiding. Such as are the sons of God are represented as being led by His Spirit You find him opposing only what ought to be opposed, and promoting only what deserves encouragement. He does not magnify the mole-hill into a mountain, nor minify the mountain into a mole-hill. He does not treat trifles as matters of essential moment, nor momentous matters as trifles. He is not deceived by mere, or by first appearances.. The sham reformer hides the real nature of objects, or deceitfully exaggerates their dimensions. He beholds all persons and things through a discolouring and perverting medium. Through the magical spectacles of prejudice he ever looks, and therefore sees not what really is, but what his own fancy conjures up, or his excited passions prompt him to desire. Whilst gazing upon others, their noblest virtues become transformed into foulest vices, their little infirmities swell into hideous sins. And how should it be otherwise? The man has a beam in his eye. He is dismally blinded. His whole soul is in darkness. His mind is bewitched by the sorceries of sin and Satan a dreadful spell has bound his spirit: a moral madness has distracted his heart. He can see neither perspicuously nor correctly: not afar off at all, and nigh at hand only imperfectly. Such is the delusion and blindness of the pseudo-reformer, hinted at so intelligibly in the expression of the text, Then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brothers eye.
4. There is a contrast between the real and the pretended reformer, not only in the head, but in the heart; not only in the perceptions, but in the intentions; not only in the understanding, but in the motives and affections. Indeed, here lies the root of the whole matter. The one is sound, the other rotten at the core. The one is sincere, the other deceitful. The one rejoices inwardly in the truth, the other in iniquity. The one means to amend, the other to cavil and find fault. The one is actuated by an honest desire to see improvement in others, the other by a malignant censoriousness, which rather revels in prevalent corruption than bewails it. The true reformer loves those whom he strives to benefit: the false reformer really despises or hates those in whom he professes to be interested. He is spiteful and envious, a carping meddler, a dangerous busybody. He is a disguised foe to society. He has no love of peace, no relish for trustful concord.
1. We allude to that company of captious borderers just beyond the limits of Church communion, who refuse to step across those limits, because of the alleged inconsistencies or sins of some who are already there. Such persons can see nothing in the gospel but its difficulties, nothing in ecclesiastical organizations but their defects, nothing in Church members but their inconsistencies, real or attributed.
2. There is a class of the hypocrites, rebuked in the text, to be found inside the pale of Church communion. The needed remedy must be applied to thine own heart. It is at home where reform, as well as charity, must begin. Get all set right between thine own conscience and God. Let His love again expand and cheer thy heart: and then thy fellow-believer will appear more amiable in thy sight. If any little inconsistencies attach to him, thou shalt clearly see them, and mayest be able, with all the nice discrimination of a sound mind, and all the delicate dexterity of a charitable hand, to take the mote out of thy neighbours eye: and both of you shall be benefited by the operation. Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him; let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins. (Sermons by Wesleyan Ministers.)
The mete and the beam
1. This parable implies that there are different degrees of sin. Not that any sin is trifling; but some are more heinous than others, either in themselves, or by reason Of aggravating circumstances.
2. Our sins often are really very great in themselves; and they would appear so to us, did we properly consider everything with which we are acquainted in our own case,
3. Men are generally most ready to mark the sins of others, when they are insensible of their own.
4. To be severe on the sins of others, and indulgent to ones own, is very hypocritical.
5. In order to be prepared for the office of a reformer, a man must be reformed himself.
6. It is the duty of those who are reformed, to try to reform others. (James Foote, M. A.)
On censuring others
Nothing is so easy as to censure, or to contradict a truth; for truth is but one, and seeming truths are many; and few works are performed without errors. No man can write six lines, but there may be something one may carp at, if he be disposed to cavil. Men think by censuring to be accounted wise; but, in my conceit, there is nothing shows more of the fool. For this, you may ever observe, that they who know the least, are most given to censure; and this I believe to be a reason, why men of secluded lives are often rash in this particular. Their retiredness keeps them ignorant of the world; if they weighed the imperfections of humanity, they would be less prone to condemn others. Ignorance gives disparagement a louder tongue than knowledge. Wise men had rather know than tell. Frequent dispraises, at best, show an uncharitable mind. Any clown may see when a furrow is crooked; but where is the man who can plough me a straight one? The best works are not without defects. The cleanest corn is not without some dirt among it; no, not after frequent winnowing. I would wish men, in the works of others, to examine two things before they judge: whether there be more of what is good, than of what is ill, in what they examine? and whether they themselves could at first have done it better? If there be most of good, we do amiss, for some errors, to condemn the whole. As man is not judged good or bad for one action, or for the fewest number, but as he is most in general: so in works, we should weigh the generality, and our censure should be accordingly. If there be more of good than ill in him, I think he deserves some praise for raising nature above her ordinary flight. Nothing in this world can be framed so entirely perfect, but it will have in it some imperfections; if it were not so, it were not from human nature, but the immediate Deity. And next, whether we could do better than that which we condemn? To espy the inconveniences of a house when built, is easy; but to lay the plan well at first, is matter of more pate, and speaks the praise of a good contriver. Judgment is easier in things done, than in knowing what is best to be done. If we decry a copy, and are not able to produce an original, we show more criticism than ability. We ought rather to magnify him who has gone beyond us, than condemn him for a few faults. Self-examination will make our judgments charitable. It is from where there is no judgment, that the heaviest judgment comes. If we must needs censure, it is good to do it as Suetonius writes of the twelve Caesars, to tell both their virtues and their vices impartially, and leave others to determine for themselves. So shall men learn, by hearing of the faults of others, to avoid them, and by knowing their virtues, endeavour to practise the like. We ought rather to commend a man for the best part of his character, than brand him for the worst part of it. We are full of faults by nature; we are good, not without our care and industry. (Owen Felltham.)
Hypocrisy and self-ignorance
The words which thus meet us are not only proverbial in form but have become proverbial in their application. They have passed into the common speech of men. They furnish the readiest answer to the man who condemns another for sins of which he himself is guilty. The hypocrite is confronted by them at every turn.
1. First, then, we have the law, that the habit of judging others--of looking at their evil deeds--is a hindrance to self-knowledge. The man forgets the beam that is in his own eye, because his whole mind is bent on observing the motes that are in his brothers eye. And this is, as the words of Christ imply, the act of one who is a hypocrite. The hypocrisy is all the more deadly and evil in its nature because it is in part unconscious. The man who strives to know what God is--who lets the light shine in on him--who is taught to see himself by that light in the mirror of Gods Word,will find it impossible to go on acting a part which is not his own. If he knows truth and goodness to be the great blessings of earth and Heaven, he will find the misery of seeming to be true and good when he is not so, altogether insupportable. The warning which this law involves is necessary for all men. It is absolutely essential for those who have been called, by an outward or inward vocation, by the circumstances of their lives or the solemn purposes which God has put into their hearts, to do battle in His service against the world and the flesh, to feel that in fighting against them they are fighting also against the devil. Consider what the work of those disciples must have been, as they preached the glad tidings of the kingdom in the cities and villages of Galileo, as they afterwards had to proclaim the same message in the great cities of Asia or Europe. How often they must have been tempted to think with scorn of those who were living in brutalizing sins, or bowing before dumb idols, or warring and fighting with each other! Was it not easy to think that their warfare against these monstrous forms of wickedness was so urgent as to leave them no leisure for self-scrutiny or self-discipline? easy to forget the law that the battle could not be fought successfully without it? And was there not an almost equal risk, when they protested, as their Lord had taught them to protest, against proud, self-righteous formalists, of their falling unconsciously into the sin which they rebuked?
2. But, secondly, we are taught that this self-discipline is not to end in itself. It is the means to something beyond it, the preparation for a work which could not be done successfully without it? One who rested in the first half of the precept might satisfy himself by a simple indifference to the acts, whether good or evil, which he witnessed. Silence would seem an adequate fulfilment of it. To check the expression of any judgment with the lips, to endeavour to suppress even the half-formed judgment of the mind, to pass through the world without coming into collision with its selfishness and godlessness--this would be to such a man the ideal of a blameless life. He might easily come to persuade himself that this was the temper of the true Christian charity which hopeth all things, endureth all things, and believeth all things. But the charity which Christ requires--it would be truer to say, the charity which Christ gives, of which His life on earth was the manifestation--is the very opposite of all this. It cannot remain neutral in the great battle between good and evil, between the armies of the living God and the lust and hatred that war against His order. It burns, as with a consuming fire, against the tyranny and wrong-doing wherewith one man works misery and destruction for his brothers, against the worship of sensuous lusts, or the idolatry of wealth, which lead men to forget the honour which is due to God. Words and acts which are to all appearance simply indifferent, light things, which may be passed over--idle words, for which men think that they shall not have to render an account in the day of judgment--will be seen by those whose eyes are opened, to be the outgrowths of some root of bitterness, stifling and strangling the growth of the good seed, hindering it from bringing forth any fruit to perfection. They therefore will, of all men, be least disposed to sit still, in the comfort of an easy-going Epicurean neutrality, when there are giant evils in the world still unchecked, and monstrous wrongs still unredressed. They will least allow those, the souls for whom Christ died and who are fellow-heirs with them of His eternal kingdom, to perish for lack of knowledge or continue in their blindness till they sleep the sleep of death. But then they will have learnt to contend against evil and falsehood, without judging the doer of evil or him who is the slave of falsehood. They will find it possible to make that distinction which the man who has not perceived and cast out the mote that was in his own eye never makes, between the offence which must be condemned, and, if need be, punished, and the offender who stands at Gods judgment-seat and not at ours. They can say, The thing that has been done is evil; the man who has done it has thereby made himself the slave of evil, and brought himself into darkness and misery, and God is calling us to help him. Conclusion: We must not look, either in ourselves or in others, for a perfect union of these two forms of charity. This is not reached at once. Even he who is earnestly striving after it will make mistakes. But he will not forget that these very mistakes form a part of the education by which God is training him to do His work on earth more effectually. They teach him to retrace his steps, to go through the process of preparation mice again, once again to cast out the beam that is in his own eye that he may see clearly to pull out the mote that is in his brothers eye. They tend to make his sympathy with the hearts of his fellow-men wider and deeper than it was. (J. S. Hoare, M. A.)
The mote and the beam
Morality is not religion, but morality and religion have an organic unity. False religions sever religion and morality. Christ, in the Sermon on the Mount, makes morality grow out of religion. We are to be kind because God is kind; ready to forgive because God is merciful; slow to judge because we have a Judge whose dealings with us will be regulated by our dealings with others. Let us now say something of the caution in the text, reading it in the light of the great truths which we find in the context.
I. If a Christian man be thoroughly penetrated with the truth respecting his own relations, and those of other men, to God it is quite certain that JUDGING AND REPROVING OTHERS WILL BE A WORE WHICH, SO FAR AS MAY BE, HE WILL DECLINE. And this for two reasons:
1. Because he doubts his own knowledge of other men; and--
2. Because he doubts the strength of his own sympathy.
II. But now, besides these thoughts, there is the most conclusive thought of all--OUR OWN DEMERIT: OUR LYING OPEN OURSELVES TO GODS JUDGMENT AND TO MANS. The case which the Saviour here points to is not simply that of one judging another, who is himself an evil-doer, but the case of one judging another whose sin is to that of the person he censures as the beam to the mote. When we are wrong-doers ourselves, and when we see our own acts under the colouring lights of self-love; when we review them with the help of all the apologies and extenuations which we are able to devise, and then turn to other persons acts, all these lights being withdrawn, and criticise them in a clear, cold, and speculative way, or, even worse, under the influence of anger, or jealousy, or prejudice, is it not quite certain that we shall think less of the beam in our own eye than of the mote in our brothers eye? (J. A. Jacob, M. A.)
The splinter and the beam
This metaphor in frequent use among the Jews. Thus, for instance, Rabbi Tarphon, when lamenting the impatience of correction which marked his time, complains that if any one said to his neighbour, Cast out this or that straw from thine eye, the response was sure to be, Cast out the beam from thine own eye. The good man, being one of those just persons who need no repentance, never dreamt that there was a beam in his eye, and that therefore the retort was perfectly fair. The Lord Jesus adopted the Hebrew metaphor, but not in the Hebrew spirit. On His lips it does not justify, but censures, those who assumed to judge and rebuke their brethren.
1. If we are so quick to see straws in the eyes of our neighbours that we can hardly look into any face without detecting one, the probability is that we carry a beam in our own eye of which we greatly need to be rid.
2. The Lord Jesus says that we are hypocrites, if, with a beam jutting from our own eye, we say to our brother, Let me pull out the splinter from thine eye. Is it hypocritical, then, to do a kindness, and to offer help, when we ourselves stand in need of help? By no means. But while our words mean, O it is very wrong to suffer the smallest speck to remain in the eye; our conduct means, There is no great harm in letting even a beam remain in it. That is to say, we are hypocrites; we talk one thing and act another. If the sinner rebuke sin, who will listen? If the sinner, while rebuking sin, affect a righteous austerity and assume to be innocent of transgression, who will not scorn both him and his rebuke?
3. But here we touch on a question of grave practical moment: Are only the holy to open their mouth against sin P When Miss Nightingale went about among the sick soldiers of the Crimean hospitals, there was no need to rebuke them for profane language or obscene jests, although these were familiar to many of their lips. They felt they could not utter them in a presence so kind and pure. Many of them, we are told, folded their hands as if in prayer while she passed by. Do you imagine that.when she spoke to a man, if she ever did, of his faults and sins, he felt that she had no right to speak, that she was a hypocrite for her pains? But why not? Simply because, as they looked up into that pure, single eye, they could see the splinters in their own, and grew ashamed of them. See what force a holy character gives to rebuke!
4. From this man with a beam in his eye we may learn at least what to avoid. What are his faults?
(1) lie does not know that the beam is there.
(2) Because he is not conscious of the beam in his own eye, he assumes airs of moral superiority, and carries himself like a judge instead of a brother. Put these two pictures side by side, and you will not doubt from which of them we should draw our inspiration. There goes a judge, immaculate in his own conceit; he stares with cold rebuke at the splinters which deform all eyes but his, and condemns in others faults not comparable to the crimes with which he pollutes the judgment-seat. And here come two brothers; and as they fall on each others neck, they cry, Ah, brother, I see you are troubled with the very straws and splinters which afflict reel help me, and let me help you, that we may both be quit of them.
5. Is not this parable true to our experience of life? It is against the unconscious self-assumption so prevalent among us that our Lord warns us in this parable. (S. Cox, D. D.)
An eye with a beam, and an eye for a mete
It takes a long time to learn by heart so as to take to heart Archbishop Whatelys maxim, that ten thou sand of the greatest faults in our neighbours are of less consequence to us than one of the smallest in ourselves. Elsewhere he says, Never is the mind less fitted for self-examination than when most occupied in detecting the faults of others. Have you never, asks Ellesmere, found the critic disclose four errors on his own part for one he delights to point out in the sayings or doings of the persons he criticizes? Shakespeares Birch claims the right to ask his companions, noble and royal alike, Dumain, Longueville, and the King of Navarre, addressing them singly and collectively:--
But are you not ashamed? nay, are you not,
All three of you, to be thus much oershot?
You found his mote; the king your mote did see,
But! a beam do find in each of three.
Who, exclaims Juvenal, can stand hearing the Gracchi complaining of sedition?
O wad some powr the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
For that, presumably, would from many a blunder free us, and foolish notion--
We, who surround a common table, And imitate the fashionable, Wear each two eye-glasses: this lens Shows us our faults, that other mens. We do not care how dim may be This by whose aid our own we see; But, ever anxiously alert That all may have their whole desert, We would melt down the stars and sun In our hearts furnace, to make one Through which th enlightened world might spy A mote upon a brothers eye. (F. Jacob.)
Among sins, which are motes and which are beams?
We are apt to answer such a question according to our taste, and our habits; the motes being the sins we are inclined to, the beams those we have no mind to. To one the mote is covetousness, and the beam the drinking of a glass of wine or the smoking of a cigar. To another the mote is sharp practice in business and the beam taking a walk on a Sunday. To a third the mote is spending the evening in scandalising ones neighbours all round, and the beam spending it at whist. To a fourth the mote is behaving like a bear or any other brute in his own house, and the beam any offence against good manners in his neighbours house. To a fifth the mote is swindling to the extent of £100,000, and the beam the neglect of family prayer. To a sixth the mote is theft, and the beam the being found out and exposed. To a seventh the mote is fraudulent bankruptcy, and the beam unsound views about original sin. And so we might go on, and show that, in our judgment, the mote and the beam often take each others places, the less sin being accounted the greater, and the greater the less. Now when we try to learn what Jesus meant by the mote and what by the beam, we arrive at this result--that the sins of the publicans and sinners, who knew no better, their drunkenness, their lewdness, their Sabbath-breaking, their profaneness, their disregard for all religion and all morality, were, in His estimation, as motes compared with the sins of the scribes and Pharisees who laid claim to much goodness, and yet were covetous, unjust, and extortionate under the cover of a religious profession. Their sins were beams, and the beam of beams was hypocrisy. There was no open and avowed sin that our Lord seems to have detested so much as a false profession of religion. And it were well for us to bear this in mind, so that we may have a just idea of the greater and lesser sins, and so neither deceive ourselves, nor too severely judge our neighbour, whose sin may be to our own no more than the smallest splinter of a lucifer-match in comparison with a tree fit to make the mast of a ship. (H. S. Brown.)
Correcting others faults
If it was out of place to set up as the censurer of your brothers mote when your own faults were to his as a plank to a splinter, it is surely still more out of place to set yourself up for his correcter. The comparison sounds extravagant; since, though minute fragments from a twig may get into the eye and need to be taken out, to speak of a great beam of timber in the same connection is absurd. The extravagance of the phrase, however, did not hinder its being a usual and accepted one in oriental speech; and as such our Lord borrowed it to point His moral. What that moral is, is plain enough. In the first place, it is in a preposterous degree unbecoming to be so quick to see, much more to propose to mend, small faults in another when ones own are so very great. It is, as we say, like Satan reproving sin. Besides, it is not only a grotesque betrayal of self-ignorance, but a presumptuous over-estimate of ones own ability. To mend a brothers fault, one has need of a most clear and undistorted spiritual vision, an eye of the soul quite single and limpid, No task asks cleaner motives, a truer insight, or more of that perfect fairness which can only spring from love, than this task of a reformer of manners. But there is more to be said than this. The interference of such blind guides and ignorant teachers is worse than a blunder. It is an hypocrisy. You profess to be so deeply concerned for the faults of your neigh-hour, that you would fain do him a service by ridding him of them: you are ardent in the interest of his reformation, a self-constituted preacher of righteousness. That looks well. But if it were really concern for the correction of evil and the cure of souls which inspired this officious zeal of yours, would it not show itself first of all in the reformation of yourself? A very little honest desire to have Gods kingdom come and His will done would suffice to reveal to yourself how much more shameful and painful your own moral disorders are than any you propose to remedy; and in the hard task of casting out your own huge sins of heart, you would find work enough to keep your hands full. The tu quoque rejoinder, Physician, heal thyself, is in its place here. First cast out the beam. This very officiousness in well-doing, this arrogant setting up as a correcter of morals, this immodest and loveless meddling with your neighbours--what is it but a sign how pride has made you stone-blind, and a proof that it is not the sympathy of a penitent which inspires you, but the conceit of a fault-finder? (J. O. Dykes, D. D.)
Fault-finding reproved
Why will you search another mans wound while your own is bleeding? Take heed that your own vesture be not full of duet, when you are brushing your neighbours. Complain not of dirty streets, when heaps lie at your own doors, Many people are no longer well than while they arc holding their fingers upon another persons sores: such are no better in their conduct than crows, which prey only upon carrion. (Archbishop Secker.)
Beholding others faults
A wise heathen said, Every man carries two wallets with him, hanging the one before and the other behind him. Into that before, he puts the faults of others; into that behind, he puts his own. By this means he never sees his own failings, while he has those of others always before him.
Ignoring the Beam
I recollect firing a shot once with much greater success than I knew of h certain person had frequently said to me that I had been the subject of her earnest prayers lest I should be exalted above measure, for she could see my danger; and after having heard this so many times that I really knew it by heart, I just made the remark, that I thought it would be my duty to pray for her too, lest she should be exalted above measure. I was greatly amused when this answer came, I have no temptation to be proud; my experience is such that I am in no danger whatever of being puffed up; not knowing that her little speech was about the proudest statement that could have been made, and that everybody else thought her to be the most officious and haughty person within ten miles. Why, do not you believe there may be as much pride in rags as in an aldermans gown? Is it not just as possible for a man to be proud in a dust cart, as if he rode in her Majestys chariot? A man may be just as proud with half a yard of ground as Alexander with all his kingdoms, and may be just as lifted up with a few pence as Croesus with all his treasure. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
Self-reformation the most effective
That earnest-minded man, Legh Richmond, was passing once through Stockport, at a time when political strifes disturbed the country. In consequence of his lameness, he was never able to walk far without resting. He was leaning on his stick and looking about him, when a poor fellow ran up to him, and offering his hand, inquired with considerable earnestness, Sir, are you a radical? Yes, my friend, answered Mr. Richmond, I am a radical; a thorough radical. Then give me your hand, said the man. Stop, sir, stop, replied Legh Richmond, I must explain myself: we all need a radical reformation; our hearts are full of disorders--the root and principle within is altogether corrupt. Let you and me mend matters there, and then all will be well, and we shall cease to complain of the times and government. Right, sir, answered the radical, you are right, and bowing, retired. (Sword and Trowel.)
Goodness essential to the true reformer
How bitter is the wail of the mighty Mirabeau, If I had but character, if I had but been a good man, if I had not degraded my life by sensuality, and my youth by evil passions, I could have saved France. Many a man has felt the same; he has clipped his own wings, he has suffered to be shorn away the sunny locks of the Nazarite who once lay weeping upon his shoulders, and wherein would have lain his strength. He has wounded himself, and even when the wound is healed, the fearful scar remains. But if, while he is himself still in the gall of bitterness and bond of iniquity, he essays to amend the morals of the world, he will either disgrace and weaken his own cause, or the good he does in one direction will be more than undone by the evil he is doing in another. To such a one, shaming him, warning him that they who bear the vessels of the sanctuary must themselves be clean, come the stern words of Christ--First cast the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to take out the mute which is in thy brothers eye. (Archdeacon Farrar.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 41, 42. The mote that is in thy brother's…
41, 42. The mote that is in thy brother's eye. See notes on Matt. 7:3–5.
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.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain Luk 6:41 - Luk 6:49.
Luke
THREE CONDENSED PARABLES
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Luk 6:41 - Luk 6:49.
Three extended metaphors, which may almost be called parables, close Luke’s version of the Sermon on the Mount, and constitute this passage. These are the mote and the beam, the good and bad trees, the houses on the rock and on the sand. Matthew puts the first of these earlier in the sermon, and connects it with other precepts about judging others. But whichever order is the original, that adopted by Luke has a clear connection of thought underlying it which will come out as we proceed.
I. The striking and somewhat ludicrous image of the beam and the mote is found in Rabbinical writings, and may have been familiar to Christ’s hearers.
But His use of it is deeper and more searching than the rabbis’ was. He has just been speaking of blind guides and their blind followers. That ‘parable,’ as Luke calls it, naturally images another defect which may attach to the eye. A man may be partly blind because some foreign body has got in. If we might suppose a tacit reference to the Pharisees in the blind guides, their self-complacent censoriousness would be in view here; but the application of the saying is much wider than to them only.
Verse 41 teaches that the accurate measurement of the magnitude of our own failings should precede our detection of our brother’s. Christ assumes the commonness of the opposite practice by asking ‘why’ it is so. And we have all to admit that the assumption is correct. The keenness of men’s criticism of their neighbour’s faults is in inverse proportion to their familiarity with their own. It is no unusual thing to hear some one, bedaubed with dirt from head to foot, declaiming with disgust about a speck or two on his neighbour’s white robes.
Satan reproving sin is not an edifying sight, but Satan criticising sin is still less agreeable. If only ‘he that is without sin among you’ would fling stones, there would be fewer reputations pelted than there are. Most men know less about their own faults than about their brother’s. They use two pairs of spectacles-one which diminishes, and is put on for looking at themselves; one which magnifies, and is worn for their neighbour’s benefit. But when their respective good qualities are to be looked at, the other pair is used in each case. That is men’s way, all the world over.
Christ’s question asks the reason for this all but universal dishonesty of having two weights and measures for faults. He would have us ponder on the cause, that we may discover the remedy. He would have us reflect, that we may get a vivid conviction of the unreasonableness of the practice. There is nothing in the fact that a fault is mine which should make it small in my judgment; nor, on the other hand, in the accident that it is another’s, which should make it seem large. A fault is a fault, whoever it belongs to, and we should judge ourselves and others by the same rule. Only we should be most severe in its application to ourselves, for we cannot tell how much our brother has had, to diminish the criminality of his sin, and we can tell, if we will be honest, how much we have had, to aggravate that of ours. So the conscience of a true Christian works as Paul’s did when he said ‘Of whom I am chief,’ and is more disposed to make its own motes into beams than to censure its brother’s.
The reason, so far as there is a reason, can only lie in our diseased selfishness, which is the source of all sin. And the blindness to our ‘beams’ is partly produced by their very presence. All sin blinds conscience. A man with a beam in his eye would not be able to see much. One device of sin, practised in order to withdraw the doer’s attention from his own deed, is to make him censorious of his fellows, and to compound for the sins he is inclined to by condemning other people’s.
Luk 6:42 teaches that the conquest of our own discovered evils must precede efficient attempts to cure other people’s. To pose as a curer of them while we are ignorant of our own faults is, consciously or unconsciously, hypocrisy, for it assumes a hatred of evil, which, if genuine, would have found first a field for its working in ourselves. An oculist with diseased eyes would not be likely to be a successful operator. ‘Physician, heal thyself’ would fit him well, and be certainly flung at him. A cleansed eye will see the brother’s mote clearly, but only in order to help its extraction. It is a delicate bit of work to get it out, and needs a gentle hand.
Our discernment of others’ faults must be compassionate, not to be followed by condemnation nor self-complacency but by loving efforts to help to a cure. And such will not be made unless we have learned our own sinfulness, and can go to the wrongdoer in brotherly humility, and win him to use the ‘eye-salve’ which our conduct shows has healed us.
II. The second compressed parable of the two trees springs from the former naturally, as stating the general law of which Luk 6:42 gives one case, namely, that good deeds {such as casting out the mote} can only come from a good heart {made good by confession of its own evils and their ejection}.
It is often said that Christ’s teaching is unlike that of His Apostles in that He places stress on works, and says little of faith. But how does He regard works? As fruits. That is to say, they are of value in His eyes only as being products and manifestations of character. He does not tell us in this parable how the character which will effloresce in blossoms and set in fruits of goodness is produced. That comes in the next parable. But here is sufficiently set forth the great central truth of Christian ethics that the inward disposition is the all-important thing, and that deeds are determined as to their moral quality by the character from which they have proceeded.
Our actions are our self-revelations. The words are not to be pressed, as if they taught the entire goodness of one class of men, so that all their acts were products of their good character, nor the unmingled evil of another, so that no good of any kind or in any degree is in them or comes from them. They must be read as embodying a general truth which is not as yet fully exemplified in any character or conduct.
In Luk 6:45 the same idea is presented under a different figure-that of a wealthy man who brings his possessions out of his store-house. The application of the figure is significantly varied so as to include the other great department of human activity. Speech is act. It, too, will be according to the cast of the inner life. Of course, feigned speech of all sorts is not in view. The lazy judgment of men thinks less of words than of deeds. Christ always attaches supreme importance to them. Intentional lying being excluded, speech is an even more complete self-revelation than act. When one thinks of the floods of foul or idle or malicious talk which half drown the world as being revelations of the sort of hearts from which they have gushed, one is appalled. What a black, seething fountain that must be which spurts up such inky waters!
III. The third parable, of the two houses, shows in part how hearts may be made ‘good.’
It is attached to the preceding by Luk 6:46. Speech does not always come from ‘the abundance of the heart.’ Many call Him Lord who do not act accordingly. Deeds must confirm words. If the two diverge, the latter must be taken as the credible self-revelation. Now the first noticeable thing here is Christ’s bold assumption that His words are a rock foundation for any life. He claims to give an absolute and all-sufficient rule of conduct, and to have the right to command every man.
And people read such words and then talk about their Christianity not being the belief of His divinity, but the practice of the Sermon on the Mount! His words are the foundation for every firm, lasting life. They are the basis of all true thought about God, ourselves, our duties, our future. ‘That rock was Christ.’ Every other foundation is as sand. Unless we build on Him, we build on changeable inclinations, short-lived desires, transitory aims, evanescent circumstances. Only the Christ who ever liveth, and is ever ‘the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever,’ is fit to be the foundation of lives that are to be immortal.
Note the two houses built on the foundations. The metaphor suggests that each life is a whole with a definite character. Alas, how many of our lives are liker a heap of stones tilted at random out of a cart than a house with a plan. But there is a character stamped on every life, and however the man may have lived from hand to mouth without premeditation, the result has a character of its own, be it temple or pig-sty. Each life, too, is built up by slow labour, course by course. Our deeds become our dwelling-places. Like coral-insects, we live in what we build. Memory, habit, ever-springing consequences, shape by slow degrees our isolated actions into our abodes. What do we build?
One storm tries both houses. That may refer to the common trials of every life, but it is best taken as referring to the future judgment, when God ‘will lay judgment to the line, and righteousness to the plummet’; and whatever cannot stand that test will be swept away. Who would run up a flimsy structure on some windy headland in northern seas? The lighthouses away out in ocean are firmly bonded into living rock. Unless our lives are thus built on and into Christ, they will collapse into a heap of ruin. ‘Behold I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Why do you look ... brother's eye, but you…
Why do you look ... brother's eye, but you do not notice the log that is in your own eye?
Jesus uses this question to challenge the people to pay attention to their own sins before they pay attention to another person's sins. AT: "Do not look ... brothers eye while you ignore the log that is in your own eye." (See: Rhetorical Question)
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the tiny piece of straw that is in your brother's eye
This is a metaphor that refers to the less important faults of a fellow believer. (See: Metaphor)
tiny piece of straw
"speck" or "splinter" or "bit of dust." Use a word for the smallest thing that commonly falls into a person's eyes.
brother
Here "brother" refers to a fellow Jew or a fellow believer in Jesus.
the log that is in your own eye
This is a metaphor for a person's most important faults. A log could not literally go into a person's eye. Jesus exaggerates to emphasize that a person should pay attention to his own more important faults before he deals with another person's less important faults. (See: Metaphor and Hyperbole and Generalization)
log
"beam" or "plank"
How can you say ... eye?
Jesus asks this question to challenge the people to pay attention to their own sins before they pay attention to another person's sins. AT: "You should not say ... eye." (See: Rhetorical Question)
translationWords
brother
hypocrite
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 6:41 a log in your own: Jesus did not…
6:41 a log in your own: Jesus did not say that the speck in our friend’s eye is not our business, but that we must first correct our own faults so that we can see clearly enough to remove the speck. Jesus condemned hypocritical judgment; lovingly holding one another accountable regarding sin is desirable.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.