mutually increased each other's sin, will mutually exasperate each other's ruin.
V. Instruction given to the disciples concerning the truth Christ had laid down, v. 10. Though Christ rejects the wilfully ignorant who care not to be taught, he can have compassion on the ignorant who are willing to learn, Heb. 5. 2. If the Pharisees, who made void the law, be offended, let them be offended; but this great peace have they who love the law, that nothing shall offend them, but, some way or other, the offence shall be taken off, Ps. 119. 165.
Here is, 1. Their desire to be better instructed in this matter; (v. 15.) in this respect, as in many others, Peter was their speaker; the rest, it is probable, putting him onto speak, or intimating their concurrence; Declare unto us this parable. What Christ said, was plain, but, because it agreed not with the notions they had imbibed, though they would not contradict it, yet they call it a parable, and cannot understand it. Note, (1.) Weak understandings are apt to turn plain truths into parables, and to seek for a knot in a bulrush. The disciples often did so, as John 16. 17. even the grasshopper is a burden to a weak stomach, and babes in understanding cannot bear and digest strong meat (2.) Where a weak head doubts concerning any word of Christ, an upright heart and a willing mind will seek for instruction. The Pharisees were offended, but kept it to themselves; hating to be reformed, they hated to be informed; but the disciples, though offended, sought for satisfaction, imputing the offence, not to the doctrine delivered, but to the shallowness of their own capacity.
2. The reproof Christ gave them for their weakness and ignorance; (v. 16.) Are ye also yet without understanding? As many as Christ loves and teaches, he thus rebukes. Note, They are very ignorant indeed, who understand not that moral pollutions are abundantly worse and more dangerous than ceremonial ones. Two things aggravated their dulness and darkness.
(1.) That they were the disciples of Christ; "Are ye also without understanding? Ye whom I have admitted into so great a degree of familiarity with me, are ye so unskilful in the word of righteousness?" Note, the ignorance and mistakes of those that profess religion, and enjoy the privileges of church-membership, are justly a grief to the Lord Jesus. "No wonder that the Pharisees understand not this doctrine, who know nothing of the Messiah's kingdom; but ye that have heard it, and embraced it yourselves, and preached it to others, are ye also such strangers to the spirit and genius of it?"
(2.) That they had been a great while Christ's scholars; "Are ye yet so, after ye have been so long under my teaching?" Had they been but of yesterday in Christ's school, it had been another matter, but to have been for so many months Christ's constant hearers, and yet to be without understanding, was a great reproach to them. Note, Christ expects from us some proportion of knowledge, and grace, and wisdom, according to the time and means we have had. See John 14. 9. Heb. 5. 12. 2 Tim. 3. 7, 8.
3. The explication Christ gave them of this doctrine of pollutions. Though he chid them for their dulness, he did not cast them off, but pitied them, and taught them, as Luke 24. 25—27. He here shows us,
(1.) What little danger we are in of pollution from that which entereth in at the mouth, v. 17. An inordinate appetite, intemperance, and excess in eating, come out of the heart, and are defiling; but meat in itself is not so, as the Pharisees supposed. What there is of dregs and defilement in our meat, nature (or rather the God of nature) has provided a way to clear us of it; it goes in at the belly, and is cast out into the draught, and nothing remains to us but pure nourishment. So fearfully and wonderfully are we made and preserved and our souls held in life. The expulsive faculty is as necessary in the body as any other, for the discharge of that which is superfluous, or noxious; so happily is nature enabled to help itself, and shift for its own good: by this means nothing defiles; if we eat with unwashen hands, and so any thing unclean mix with our food, nature will separate it, and cast it out, and it will be no defilement to us. It may be a piece of cleanliness, but it is no point of conscience, to wash before meat; and we go upon a great mistake if we place reUgion in it. It is not the practice itself, but the opinion it is built upon, that Christ condemns, as if meat commended us to God; (1 Cor. 8. 8.) whereas Christianity stands not in such observances.
(2.) What great danger we are in of pollution from that which proceeds out of the mouth, (v. 18.) out of the abundance of the heart: compare ch. 12, 34. There is no defilement in the products of God's bounty; the defilement arises from the products of our own corruption. Now here we have,
[1.] The corrupt foundation of that which proceeds out of the mouth; it comes from the heart; that is the spring and source of all sin, Jer. 8. 7. It is the heart that is so desperately wicked; (Jer. 17. 9.) for there is no sin in word or deed, which was not first in the heart. There is the root of bitterness, which bears gall and wormwood. It is the inward part of a sinner, that is very wickedness, Ps. 5. 9. All evil speakings come forth from the heart, and are defiling; from the corrupt heart comes the corrupt communication.
[2.] Some of the corrupt streams which flow from this fountain, specified; though they do not all come out of the mouth, yet they all come out of the man, and are the fruits of that wickedness which is in the heart, and is wrought there, Ps. 58. 2.
First, Evil thoughts, sins against all the commandments. Therefore David puts vain thoughts in opposition to the whole law, Ps. 119. 113. These are the first-born of the corrupt nature, the beginning of its strength, and do most resemble it. These, as the son and heir, abide in the house, and lodge within us. There is a great deal of sin that begins and ends in the heart, and goes no further. Carnal fancies and imaginations are evil thoughts, wickedness in the contrivance, (Διαλογισμοὶ πονηροὶ,) wicked plots, purposes, and devices of mischief to others, Mic. 2.1.
Secondly, Murders, sins against the sixth commandment; these come from a malice in the heart against our brother's life, or a contempt of it. Hence he that hates his brother, is said to be a murderer; he is so at God's bar, 1 John 3. 15. War is in the heart, Ps. 55. 21. James 4. 1.
Thirdly, Adulteries and fornications, sins against the seventh commandment; those come from the wanton, unclean, carnal heart; and the lust that reigns there, is conceived there, and brings forth these sins, James 1. 15. There is adultery in the heart first, and then in the act, ch. 5. 28.
Fourthly, Thefts, sins against the eighth commandment, cheats, wrongs, rapines, and all injurious contracts; the fountain of all these is in the heart, that is it that is exercised in these covetous practices, (2 Pet. 2. 14.) that is set upon riches, Ps. 62. 10. Achan coveted, and then took, Joshua 7. 20, 21.
Fifthly, False witness, against the ninth commandment; this comes from a complication of falsehood and covetousness, or falsehood and malice in the heart. If truth, holiness, and love, which God requires in the inward parts, reigned as they ought, there would be no false-witness bearing, Ps. 64. 6. Jer. 9. 8.
Sixthly, Blasphemies, speaking evil of God, against
