The big picture
Jesus’ public indictment begins by distinguishing the authority associated with Moses’ seat from teachers whose conduct contradicts what they say. Heavy burdens are placed on others, religious signs are enlarged for visibility, and public honours become part of the problem because the governing desire is to be seen. The woes then move through blocked access, exploitation, misdirected zeal, evasive oaths, distorted priorities, and clean surfaces hiding corrupt contents. The image of straining at a gnat while swallowing a camel gives the chapter some of its sharpest humour, but the point is deadly serious: precision about small matters can coexist with neglect of judgment, mercy, and faith. Honouring the tombs of dead prophets is finally placed beside the announced persecution of living messengers, exposing continuity with the conduct the leaders claim to reject. Yet the final movement is not satisfaction at coming judgment. The Book of Matthew closes the address with Jesus lamenting Jerusalem as a hen desiring to gather her young beneath her wings.
Central truth
Jesus defeats attempts to trap his teaching, grounds the law in love of God and neighbour, and exposes religious performance that neglects justice, mercy, and faith before lamenting Jerusalem’s refusal to be gathered.
The study notes have a page of their own
The movement by movement analysis, the words to trace, the verse by verse notes and where readers differ are written for someone studying alone. They are on the Deep Personal Reflections page for this chapter. This page is the lesson.
A chapter-specific teaching brief
These anchors come from this chapter itself. They help a teacher use the Level 1 overview, the Level 2 study, and the Scripture text as one lesson.
Open with the chapter’s first image
Matthew 23:1: “Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples,”
Slow down at the turning point
Matthew 23:19: “Ye fools and blind: for whether is greater, the gift, or the altar that sanctifieth the gift?”
Keep this word trail visible
scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, swear, blind, prophets
What to explain, in order
Teach the passage in this order. Each step names the verses it rests on, so every point can be shown in the text before it is applied.
Matthew 22:1-14
The wedding feast and the garment
Begin with the third of the three parables answering the leaders' challenge. Tell it in its stages: the invited refuse, some violently; the king's anger; the open invitation; the guest without a garment. Explain the garment as fitting clothing for the occasion; the text does not say who provided it, so do not build on a supposed custom. Read it as the response the invitation calls for, which Matthew describes elsewhere as doing the Father's will (7:21). Teach this first because it frames the questions that follow: who will respond to the king's invitation.
Matthew 22:15-22
Caesar's coin and God's image
Explain the two groups who come together: Pharisees, who resented Roman rule, and Herodians, supporters of Herod's family under Rome. Their flattery is true in content and false in motive. Explain "tribute" as the head tax paid to Rome and "superscription" as the inscription on the coin. Jesus' answer gives Caesar a real but limited claim and God an unlimited one. Draw out the image language without forcing it on the class: if the coin bears Caesar's image, what bears God's? Keep present-day politics out of the room.
Matthew 22:23-33
The God of the living
Explain that the Sadducees, the priestly party, accepted only the books of Moses as binding and denied the resurrection, which is why Jesus answers from Exodus. Their question rests on the law of levirate marriage in Deuteronomy 25:5-6, where a brother raises up children for one who died childless. Jesus answers two errors in order: they misunderstand the power of God, who can make a new kind of life, and they misread Scripture, which speaks of God as the God of Abraham still. Spend time on that argument; it rests on one verb.
Matthew 22:34-46
The great commandment and David's Lord
A lawyer, an expert in the law of Moses, asks which commandment is greatest. Jesus answers with two, joined. Explain "hang" as everything in the law and prophets depending on them. Then Jesus asks his own question about Psalm 110:1: the Messiah is David's son, so how can David call him Lord? Explain that the answer the Psalm implies is that the Messiah is greater than David. Teach the two halves together because the man who embodies love of God and neighbour is the one who now asks who the Christ is, and the questioning ends.
Matthew 23:1-12
One Master, all brethren
Notice that Jesus speaks to the crowds and his disciples, not to the Pharisees. He tells them to respect the teaching of Moses' seat and not to copy the practice of those who sit in it. Explain phylacteries as small boxes containing Scripture worn on the arm and forehead, and borders as the tassels of Numbers 15:38. The problem is not the objects but doing it "to be seen of men". Then 23:8-12: no titles that set some above others, because one is Master and Father. Christians apply the titles differently; point to what all agree on, servanthood in 23:11.
Matthew 23:13-36
The woes
Explain "woe" as a cry of grief and warning, like a prophet's lament over coming disaster, not a curse. Take the woes in groups rather than one by one: shutting others out, false oaths, misplaced priorities, outward cleanness, honouring dead prophets while opposing living ones. Explain "whited sepulchres" as tombs whitewashed so that people would not touch them by accident. Say clearly that Jesus speaks to particular leaders of his time, as the prophets spoke to Israel's leaders, and that many Pharisees, like Nicodemus and Joseph, are not in view. The warnings apply first to Christian leaders today.
Matthew 23:37-39
The hen and the chicks
Close with the lament, and lower your voice for it. Jerusalem has killed prophets, and Jesus' response is the picture of a hen gathering chicks under her wings, a mother sheltering her young from danger. Explain "your house is left unto you desolate" as the temple left without his presence; chapter 24 begins with Jesus leaving it. Then point to 23:39 and the hope it holds out, the welcome of Psalm 118:26 that the crowds sang in 21:9. The chapter ends not with contempt but with longing.
Where learners get stuck
The misreadings this passage tends to produce, and how to answer each from the text.
"The man without the wedding garment was thrown out because he was poor."
The guests were gathered from the highways, "both bad and good" (22:10), so poverty cannot be the issue; everyone in the hall came in off the street. The man is addressed as "Friend" and has no answer (22:12). The garment stands for a fitting response to the king's invitation. Matthew's Gospel keeps calling that response righteousness and fruit (5:20, 7:21, 21:43). The parable warns against taking the invitation lightly, not against the poor.
"Render unto Caesar means Christians must do whatever the government says."
Jesus gives Caesar what bears Caesar's image, the coin, and gives God "the things that are God's" (22:21), which includes everything, Caesar too. The apostles later said "We ought to obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29) when commanded to stop preaching. The verse teaches that paying taxes is right and that the state's claim has a limit. It does not settle any modern political question, and the lesson should not try to.
"When we die we become angels."
Jesus says the risen "are as the angels of God in heaven" (22:30) in one respect: they "neither marry, nor are given in marriage". He compares, he does not equate. The passage is about the resurrection of the body, and he proves it from God being the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who remain themselves. Learners grieving a spouse can be assured that the love they shared is not lost, even though resurrection life is not marriage as we know it.
"Jesus hated the Pharisees, and this chapter is about the Jewish people."
Jesus tells the crowds to observe what is taught from Moses' seat (23:2-3), and his woes are aimed at hypocrisy in leaders, much as the prophets spoke against the leaders of Israel. Jesus himself, his disciples and the crowds were Jewish. The chapter ends with grief, not hatred (23:37). Christians have misused this chapter against Jewish people, and that is a grave sin. Its warnings fall on anyone, especially church leaders, who say and do not.
"Call no man father means a child cannot call his dad father."
Jesus commands honour for father and mother in 15:4 and 19:19. In 23:9 he addresses titles of religious rank that set some disciples above others, "for one is your Father, which is in heaven" and "all ye are brethren" (23:8). Christian traditions use titles for ministers in different ways and read this verse accordingly. What all share is the point of 23:11-12: the greatest is the servant.
Learning objectives
- Explain the wedding invitation’s combination of welcome and accountability.
- Identify both obligations in the reply about Caesar’s coin.
- Explain Jesus’ correction of the resurrection hypothetical.
- State how the two great commandments relate to the law.
- Compare outward appearance with the weightier matters Jesus names.
- Distinguish the closing lament from satisfaction at judgment.
Teacher preparation
- Map Matthew 22–23: banquet, tribute, resurrection, commandments, David’s Lord, rebukes, and lament.
- Gloss superscription as inscription, lawyer as an expert in the law, and uppermost rooms as places of honour.
- Read Deuteronomy 25:5–6 and Exodus 3:6 for the resurrection dispute, then Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18 for the commandments.
- Compare Zacharias son of Barachias in 23:35 with Zechariah son of Jehoiada in 2 Chronicles 24:20–22; preserve the differing patronymics.
- Attribute the accusations to Jesus’ addressed opponents; avoid putting living religious or ethnic groups on trial.
Evidence and interpretation checks
Explicit
Locate the hostile purpose in Matthew 22:15, the paired commandments in 22:37–40, and judgment, mercy, and faith in 23:23.
Scripture-supported
Compare Matthew 22:32 with Exodus 3:6 and 22:37–39 with Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18; Jesus argues from Scripture.
Strong inference
Set Matthew 23:4 beside 23:11–12; infer a contrast between status that loads burdens onto others and greatness expressed through service.
Possible or traditional reading
Present the wedding garment’s identification with received righteousness or a fitting transformed response in Matthew 22:11–13 as interpretations; the passage does not explicitly explain the symbol.
Limit
State that Matthew 22:21 is not a complete theory of government, and 23:35 does not explain the identification difficulty surrounding Zacharias’s patronymic.
Discussion with answer guidance
1. Why does the wedding parable not end when the hall fills with guests?
What a good answer contains
Because the king comes in to see his guests. The first invited "made light of it" and some killed the servants (22:5-6); the hall is then filled from the highways, "both bad and good" (22:10). Then the king finds "a man which had not on a wedding garment" and asks how he came in; "he was speechless" (22:11-12). A good answer keeps both halves: the invitation is wide open to anyone, and those who come are expected to come ready, which Matthew elsewhere calls righteousness and fruit. Verse 14 seals it: "many are called, but few are chosen". A weak answer ends the parable at verse 10.
Show teacher guidance
Read 22:1–14: the widened invitation is followed by examination of a guest. Preserve both welcome and accountability; do not assert an unmentioned custom that the host provided every garment.
2. What does the coin question allow Jesus to distinguish?
What a good answer contains
They hope he will either approve the tax and lose the crowd or refuse it and be reported to Rome (22:15-17). Jesus asks for the coin and asks "Whose is this image and superscription?" (22:20). Then: "Render therefore unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's; and unto God the things that are God's" (22:21). A good answer sees the two claims and their difference in size: Caesar's image is on a coin, while God's image is on the human being (Genesis 1:27), so the person belongs to God. A weak answer reads it as a statement on modern politics or as giving the state everything it asks.
Show teacher guidance
Trace image and inscription to the reply in 22:19–21, including both Caesar and God. Do not reduce the answer to unconditional state authority or map it onto a modern party position.
3. What is wrong with the Sadducees’ seven-husband hypothetical?
What a good answer contains
They assume the life of the resurrection is this life continued, with the same marriages, so the woman of seven husbands makes it absurd (22:24-28). Jesus says they "do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God" (22:29): God can make a new kind of life, where "they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels" (22:30). Then he argues from Exodus 3:6, "I am the God of Abraham", present tense, long after Abraham died (22:32). A good answer gives both errors; a weak one says people become angels, which the verse does not say.
Show teacher guidance
Use 22:23–33: they assume resurrection simply reproduces current marriage arrangements and fail to know Scripture and God’s power. As the angels does not say that human beings become angels.
4. How do love of God and neighbour relate to the rest of the law?
What a good answer contains
Jesus joins Deuteronomy 6:5, love of God "with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind" (22:37), to Leviticus 19:18, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself" (22:39). He says "On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets" (22:40), like a door on its hinges. A good answer keeps the order, God first and the neighbour second but "like unto it", and sees that the other commands spell out what love does, not that love replaces them. A weak answer uses love as a reason to set aside the rest of what God has said.
Show teacher guidance
Read 22:37–40: the law and prophets hang on these commandments. Do not make love an excuse to ignore concrete obligations; it gives the whole instruction its coherent direction.
5. Why do the gnat, camel, cup, and tomb images belong with judgment, mercy, and faith?
What a good answer contains
Because each image shows a sense of proportion turned upside down. They tithe garden herbs and leave "the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith" (23:23). Jesus does not scorn the tithe: "these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone". Straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel (23:24) is careful about the tiny and careless about the huge. The cup clean outside and dirty within, and the whited sepulchres, make the same point about appearance and heart (23:25-28). A good answer applies the images to religious people in every age, beginning with ourselves.
Show teacher guidance
Read 23:23–28 for distorted priorities and inward corruption under polished appearances. Let the absurd scale of swallowing a camel expose the mismatch without making disability or ethnicity the joke.
6. How does the hen gathering her young change the sound of the final warning?
What a good answer contains
After the woes, Jesus speaks with grief: "how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings" (23:37). The desire to protect was his; the refusal was theirs. The house is left desolate (23:38), but verse 39 leaves a door open: "till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord". A good answer hears the woes as the words of someone who loves the city and weeps over it. A weak answer hears only condemnation, or turns Jesus' grief into a reason for contempt toward the Jewish people.
Show teacher guidance
Read 23:37–39 after the rebukes. Jesus voices a desire to gather and a refusal encountered; the lament prevents the teacher from delivering judgment with smug enjoyment.
Responsible application
Heart and habits
Evaluate a fictional act of meticulous religious display that neglects a clear obligation of mercy, using Matthew 23:23.
Relationships and community
Revise an imaginary leadership practice that adds burdens but offers no help; distinguish service from pursuit of titles.
Warning without contempt
Ask the class to write a sober explanation of the Jerusalem lament without transferring blame to a present-day people.
Session plans
Two timings of the same lesson. The shorter keeps the reading, the central discussion and one response; the longer gives the confusions and the application their own time.
45 minutes
The wedding
Read 22:1-14. Take question one and confusion one.
Caesar and God
Read 22:15-22. Take question two and confusion two. Keep present-day politics out of the room.
Resurrection
Read 22:23-33 and take question three and confusion three.
Love and David's Lord
Read 22:34-46. Take question four and write the two commandments on the board.
Woes and lament
Read 23:1-12 and 23:23-28, then 23:37-39. Take questions five and six and confusion four. End softly.
Handout and prayer
Read the key verse and pray it back as a request to love God and neighbour.
90 minutes
Opening
Ask the group to name a trick question they have been asked. Then read 22:15 and set the scene of a day of tests.
The wedding feast
Read 22:1-14. Take question one and confusion one, linking back to 21:43.
The coin
Bring a coin and ask whose image is on it. Read 22:15-22 and Genesis 1:27. Take question two and confusion two.
The resurrection
Read 22:23-33 with Exodus 3:6. Take question three and confusion three with care for the bereaved.
Two commandments and Psalm 110
Read 22:34-46 with Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18 and Psalm 110:1. Take question four.
Moses' seat
Read 23:1-12. Take confusion five. Ask where leaders today love the chief seats.
The woes
Read 23:13-36. Take question five and confusion four. Ask each learner to choose the woe that most fits religious people they know, starting with themselves.
Lament and prayer
Read 23:37-39 slowly. Take question six. Use the application on warning without contempt, then read the key verse and pray.
Handout
Give out the sheet and point to the take-home line.
Adapting the lesson
Children
Use the wedding invitation: hand out paper invitations and ask what excuses people make for not coming to a party. Show a coin and ask whose face is on it, then say people carry God's picture, so we belong to him. Teach the two great commandments with hand motions, one up and one out. Leave out the burned city, outer darkness and the harshest woes; end with the hen and her chicks.
Youth
Start with the trick questions and let them try to answer the tax question before reading Jesus' reply. Ask what love God with all your mind might mean for a student. On chapter 23, ask where they see people living for appearances online and offline, and let them name it in themselves first. Make clear that this chapter must never feed contempt for Jewish people.
Adults
Give attention to the Old Testament texts behind each answer: Deuteronomy 25, Exodus 3:6, Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18 and Psalm 110:1. Read chapter 23 as addressed to religious leaders and let the class apply it to church life honestly. Name the history of Christian misuse of this chapter against Jewish people and reject it. Leave the politics of 22:21 to individual consciences.
One to one
Ask which question in chapter 22 they would most like to ask Jesus themselves. If they are grieving a spouse, read 22:30-32 gently and speak of the God of the living. If they are weary of religious burdens, read 23:4 beside 11:28-30. Close with 23:37 and ask whether they are letting Jesus gather them.
Song and video learning lab
A song or video may interpret, compress, or dramatize the text. Its value becomes clearer when its choices are compared with Scripture.
- Before the media: the exact passage and its central movement.
- During the media: the words, people, events, and emotions the artist emphasizes.
- After the media: what it clarifies, what it leaves out, and what belongs back in the biblical text.
Handout
One page for learners to take home. The print button prints this section alone.
Matthew 22–23
The passage in brief
Jesus tells of a king whose wedding guests refuse to come, so he invites everyone from the roads, and warns about one guest who came unprepared. Opponents test him with questions about taxes, the resurrection and the greatest commandment, and he answers each from Scripture: give God what is God's, God is the God of the living, love God and your neighbour. He then warns the crowds against leaders who say and do not, and grieves over Jerusalem like a hen longing to gather her chicks.
A verse to keep
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
Matthew 22:37-39 · King James Version
Questions to take home
Whose image was on the coin in 22:20, and whose image do you carry?
What are the two great commandments in 22:37-39?
What picture does Jesus use for himself in 23:37?
This week
Each morning this week, name one person you will love as yourself that day, and do one thing for them.
Music and video connected to the passage
Related media appears when its Scripture reference overlaps this study. Music and video can illuminate a theme while the biblical text remains the foundation.
A Stone at the DoorMatthew 27:57-66; Mark 15:42-47; Luke 23:50-56; John 19:38-42Listen to related music →
It Is FinishedMatthew 27:32-56; Mark 15:21-41; Luke 23:26-49; John 19:16-37Listen to related music →A House of PrayerMatthew 21:12-23:39; Mark 11:12-12:44; Luke 19:45-21:4Listen to related music →
Behold the ManMatthew 27:1-31; Mark 15:1-20; Luke 22:63-23:25; John 18:28-19:16Listen to related music →