I think that when our Lord began to utter “Woe,” he turned to the men of station and substance in whom curiosity was mixed with considerations of prudence. They are not denounced for being rich any more than the poor are blessed for being poor; but their calamity is this, that in riches they find enough consolation to prevent their striving heartily after anything better. They do not “hunger and thirst after righteousness,” they do not “seek a country;” they do not steadily seek anything; but, if they feel for a moment uneasy, they clutch their possessions and say, “At any rate I have thus much comfort secure here.” This it was which made it next to impossible for them to enter the kingdom of God, and our Lord cries unto them, “Woe.”
In the last denunciation our Lord comes back to the disciples again. The ills that men's hatred brought with it were patent enough, but men's favour was an insidious snare; for it might lead [pg 257] them unawares to love “the praise of men more than the praise of God.” The more kindly the young preacher is received, the more distressing it is to him to incur dislike; and consequently the greater is the temptation to soften down Christ's sternness and to meet the world halfway. Our Lord warns his new helpers by the example of those who in old times had prophesied smooth things, and had gone the way of the world while the world had made believe it was going theirs.
The beatitudes and warnings of woe form the prelude, and when this was over our Lord may be supposed to have lifted up his eyes from those who stood nearest—probably the Apostles and most notable persons—and to have addressed the whole multitude; for, His words, “But I say unto you which hear,”[176] I take to imply, “all you which hear.” The twelve verses which follow form a sermon of general application of which “Love your enemies” is taken as the text.
On this sermon being ended we read
“And he spake also a parable unto them, Can the blind guide the blind? shall they not both fall into a pit? The disciple is not above his master: but every one when he is perfected shall be as his master.”[177]
This parable is addressed to the newly appointed Twelve. It bears on the temptations of young teachers. They are in danger of being elated [pg 258] at finding themselves teachers when they had so lately been learners; they might lean to correction, and might incline to be over busy in giving directions and in finding fault; they might persuade themselves too that they thought only of the learners' good, when in reality there was, mixed with this, a good spice of the love of exercising superiority. They are told that if they are to act as guides they must see their own way first; the light within them must not be darkness.
The last verse of the last quotation, refers, not to Christ and His disciples—there is no suggestion that these should reach His perfection—but to the disciples and their scholars. The especial point of the verse is the responsibility laid upon the teacher, by the pupils taking him as their ideal. The pupils of the disciples would copy the disciples themselves, and they could not excel their pattern. The learner could not be above his master, what is cast in a mould cannot be better shaped than the mould itself; but the perfected work that is turned out exactly represents the mould. The disciples therefore must watch against every defect, for their pupils would copy them faults and all.
The text has another application besides this, the pupil when perfected would stand on a level with His master; the latter had no indefeasible superiority. When they had lighted the lamps of others the light of the rest would be as bright as their own. If they were to glory it should be, not [pg 259] in their superiority to their pupils, but in their pupils having become as good as themselves. They were not to be like those teachers who keep back from their prentices some special secret of their art.
Next comes the verse, “For there is no good tree that bringeth forth corrupt fruit.”[178] This applies both to those who teach and to those who learn. If the master's scholars mostly turn out ill it may be inferred that he is a bad master; and if the master be self-seeking at bottom, whatever disguise he may put on, the evil will come to light: selfishness always generates counter-selfishness, and false pretension detected in one case may lead a young man into general mistrust.
In another view of the verse, the behaviour of the man is the fruit and his nature is the tree. This fruit is not without value in itself, but is of more value still as an evidence of the condition of the tree. This falls in with the constant burden of Christ's teaching, “God looks to what you are as well as to what you do, and part of the importance of what you do comes from its shewing what you are, or from its helping by way of practice to confirm you in your ways whether good or bad.”