Holy denunciation.
Revised Version, "Ye serpents, ye offspring of vipers, how shall ye escape the judgment of hell?" margin, "Gehenna." It is neither right nor wise to attempt any mitigations or modifications of this intensely severe sentence. Let the words stand precisely as we find them; and let the sentence be the sternest, severest, intensest sentence that ever passed the Divine lips of our blessed Lord. Capable of being misunderstood and misrepresented, they are capable also of most rational and most reasonable explanation. All we have to do is to inquire whether the persons referred to, and the circumstances under which the words were uttered, would justify a noble-minded man in speaking so intensely. If they would. then Jesus is justified.
I. THESE DENUNCIATIONS, READ IN THE LIGHT OF THE PERSONS DENOUNCED. Explain that they would have been unsuitable for the Pharisees as a class. They would have been over-intense if applied to the formalist and hypocritical sections of the Pharisee class. But they are strictly appropriate to those few men who, for months past, had been resisting every witness that favoured Christ's claim; had been plotting, dodging, scheming, to destroy Christ; had come fawning upon him, with malice, hatred, and all uncharitableness in their hearts. Defeated in argument, they would not admit defeat. Humiliated by our Lord s answers, they were still bent on effecting their shameless purpose. What did such men deserve? What was left to be done with them? They had to be shown up, as men are shown up when withering denunciations are heaped upon them, under which they cower, conscience smitten. Jesus was doing the best thing possible for those wretched men, by these holy enunciations, the mere form of which must be judged by Eastern, not Western, models.
II. THESE DENUNCIATIONS, READ IN THE LIGHT OF THE PERSON DENOUNCING. Those who so readily accuse Christ of over-severity would be the very first and loudest in accusing him of moral weakness, inability to recognize or respond to sin, if such instances of severity had not been recorded. The true man, the Divine man, feels adequately in response to every situation; and we may unhesitatingly affirm that this was a time to be sublimely indignant, and that burning words of wrath—terrible as these—were the fitting thing for the occasion.—R.T.