Hypocrisy: The Sermon On The Mount

One day, Jesus led an immense crowd along with His twelve disciples up a mountainside to teach Christian ethics for believers and non believers. His teachings, or His sermon, are appropriately named the Sermon on the Mount. While the multitude of people stood in front, Matthew and the other disciples stood beside Jesus on the mountainside. In Matthew chapters 5-7, Matthew documented Jesus’ teachings that encapsulate His guidance about living a life that is dedicated to God and abundant in grace, love, and discernment. However, the life that is pleasing to God must also be free from hypocrisy. In Matthew 7:1-6, Jesus specifically speaks about the topic of those who feel superiority over others in terms of condemning, and ultimately judging,

The second definition is a commandment concerning a decision in the court, and the third alludes to judgment that results in a disagreement over a condemnation or a sentence. The first definition explains both divine and human judgment and its effect on those who act at variance with Scripture or disobey the will of God. Whether the judgment is divine or human, there will be controversy over how a situation is handled and whether or not the decision corresponds with the moral sense of right and

In Matthew, and specifically in the Sermon on the Mount, all verses refer to one who pretends. The Pharisees, or hypocrites, that Jesus was referencing, were unable to ‘take the plank out of their own eye’ (Matthew 7:5). They were claiming to be able to aid somebody else to identify sin when the hypocrites were merely unqualified pretenders that needed to rid themselves of sin prior to recognizing insufficient sin in others.

The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis defines “hypokritēs” as a “pretender, hypocrite, a godless man.” All definitions are similar to the overall definition of a pretender, especially in regard to the contrasting attitudes and actions of the Pharisees. Even currently, when someone can honor God externally, but not internally, they are hypocritical by saying they worship the Lord when they are only claiming to. Hypocrisy is not simply a conscious act of dissimulation, but a perverse blindness.

Interpretation of the