Luke 11:37-54

Contemporary English Version

Jesus Condemns the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law of Moses

(Matthew 23.1-36; Mark 12.38-40; Luke 20.45-47)

³⁷When Jesus finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him home for a meal. Jesus went and sat down to eat.^[a] ³⁸The Pharisee was surprised that he did not wash his hands^[b] before eating. ³⁹So the Lord said to him:

You Pharisees clean the outside of cups and dishes, but on the inside you are greedy and evil. ⁴⁰You fools! Didn't God make both the outside and the inside?^[c] ⁴¹If you would only give what you have to the poor, everything you do would please God.

⁴²^(A) You Pharisees are in for trouble! You give God a tenth of the spices from your gardens, such as mint and rue. But you cheat people, and you don't love God. You should be fair and kind to others and still give a tenth to God.

⁴³You Pharisees are in for trouble! You love the front seats in the synagogues, and you like to be greeted with honor in the market. ⁴⁴But you are in for trouble! You are like unmarked graves^[d] that people walk on without even knowing it.

⁴⁵A teacher of the Law of Moses spoke up, “Teacher, you said cruel things about us.”

⁴⁶Jesus replied:

You teachers are also in for trouble! You load people down with heavy burdens, but you won't lift a finger to help them carry the loads. ⁴⁷Yes, you are really in for trouble. You build monuments to honor the prophets your own people murdered long ago. ⁴⁸You must think that was the right thing for your people to do, or else you would not have built monuments for the prophets they murdered.

⁴⁹Because of your evil deeds, the Wisdom of God said, “I will send prophets and apostles to you. But you will murder some and mistreat others.” ⁵⁰You people living today will be punished for all the prophets who have been murdered since the beginning of the world. ⁵¹^(B) This includes every prophet from the time of Abel to the time of Zechariah,^[e] who was murdered between the altar and the temple. You people will certainly be punished for all of this.

⁵²You teachers of the Law of Moses are really in for trouble! You carry the keys to the door of knowledge about God. But you never go in, and you keep others from going in.

⁵³Jesus was about to leave, but the teachers and the Pharisees wanted to get even with him. They tried to make him say what he thought about other things, ⁵⁴so they could catch him saying something wrong.

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Footnotes

11.37 sat down to eat: See the note at 7.36.
11.38 did not wash his hands: The Jewish people had strict laws about washing their hands before eating, especially if they had been out in public.
11.40 Didn't God make both the outside and the inside: Or “Doesn't the person who washes the outside always wash the inside too?”
11.44 unmarked graves: Tombs were whitewashed to keep anyone from accidentally touching them. A person who touched a dead body or a tomb was considered unclean and could not worship with other Jewish people.
11.51 from the time of Abel … Zechariah: Genesis is the first book in the Jewish Scriptures, and it tells that Abel was the first person to be murdered. Second Chronicles is the last book in the Jewish Scriptures, and the last murder that it tells about is that of Zechariah.