1 In the mean time, when there were gathered together an innumerable multitude of people, insomuch that they trode one upon another, he began to say unto his disciples first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. 2 For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; neither hid, that shall not be known. 3 Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light; and that which ye have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon the housetops. (Luke 12:1-3 KJV)
William Burkitt’s Commentary
In this chapter our blessed Saviour furnishes his disciples with many instructions for the worthy discharge of their function in preaching the gospel; particularly he recommends unto them two gracious qualifications, namely, uprightness and sincerity, verses 1,2,3. Secondly, courage and magnanimity, verses 4,5.
1. He recommends unto them the grace and virtue of sincerity: Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.
Learn hence, that hypocrisy is a dangerous leaven, which ministers and people are chiefly to beware of and to preserve themselves from. Hypocrisy is a vice in vizor; the face is vice, the vizor is virtue: God is pretended, self intended: hypocrisy is resembled to leaven; partly for its sourness, partly for its diffusiveness. Leaven is a piece of sourdough, that diffuses itself into the whole mass or lump of bread with which it is mixed. Thus hypocrisy spreads over all the man; all his duties, parts, and performances, are leavened with it.
Again, leaven is of a swelling, as well as of a spreading nature; it puffs up the dough, and so does hypocrisy the heart. The Pharisees were a sour and proud sort of people; they were all for pre-eminence, chief places, chief seats, chief titles, to be called Rabbi, Rabbi; In a word, as leaven is hardly discerned from good dough at first sight, so is hypocrisy hardly discerned and distinguished from sincerity. The Pharisees outwardly appeared righteous unto men, but within were full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
Observe next, the argument which Christ uses to dissuade men from hypocrisy: There is nothing covered that shall not be revealed. As if he had said, the day is coming, when a rotten and corrupt heart shall no longer pass under the vizor and disguise of a demure look. In the day of judgment hypocritical sinners shall walk naked; God, angels, and men, shall see their shame.
Learn hence, that God will certainly, however long, wash off all the varnish and paint which the hypocrite has put upon the face of his profession, and lay him open to the terror of himself, and the astonishment of the world.
BURKITT | Luke 12:1-3 | Luke 12:4-5 | Luke 12:6-7 | Luke 12:8-9 | Luke 12:10 | Luke 12:11-12 | Luke 12:13-14 | Luke 12:15 | Luke 12:16-21 | Luke 12:22-30 | Luke 12:31 | Luke 12:32 | Luke 12:33-34 | Luke 12:35-36 | Luke 12:37-40 | Luke 12:41-44 | Luke 12:45-48 | Luke 12:49-53 | Luke 12:54-59 |