“Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.”
King James Version (KJV)
23:13 Wo to you - Our Lord pronounced eight blessings upon the mount: he pronounces eight woes here; not as imprecations, but solemn, compassionate declarations of the misery, which these stubborn sinners were bringing upon themselves. Ye go not in - For ye are not poor in spirit; and ye hinder those that would be so.
23:14 #Mark 12:40|; Luke 20:47.
23:16 Wo to you, ye blind guides - Before he had styled them hypocrites, from their personal character: now he gives them another title, respecting their influence upon others. Both these appellations are severely put together in the 23d and #Mt 23:23|,25. 25th verses; and this severity rises to the height in the 33d verse. The gold of the temple - The treasure kept there. He is bound - To keep his oath.
Mt 23:15 Ye compass sea and land. Spare no effort. To make one proselyte. Induce Gentiles to become circumcised and to keep the Jewish religion. This is the sense in which "proselyte" was then always used. Twofold more the child of hell. Usually the proselytes of such teachers went to even more sectarian extremes than their teachers.