Matthew 6:23

Matthew 6:23
	← 6:22 6:24 →
	"Sermon on the Mount". Tiffany stained glass window in the Arlington Street Church, Boston, Massachusetts.
Book	Gospel of Matthew
Christian Bible part	New Testament

Matthew 6:23 is the twenty-third verse of the sixth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament and is part of the Sermon on the Mount.

Content

In the King James Version of the Bible the text reads:

But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall

be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in

thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

The World English Bible translates the passage as:

But if your eye is evil, your whole body will be

full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you

is darkness, how great is the darkness!

For a collection of other versions see BibleHub Matthew 6:23

Analysis

The previous verse established a somewhat ambiguous metaphor of the generous/undivided eye being the source of light into the body. This verse presents the opposite stating that an evil eye plunges one into darkness. The evil eye was both an expression for jealousy and for stinginess (cf. Matthew 20:15.[1]

The verse puts great emphasis on the depth of darkness that a poor spiritual eye will place a person in, because placing too much focus on wealth or possessions can distort judgment.[2] Morris feels that it implies that those who are so blinded cannot even realize that they are in darkness.[3] John Phillips suggests that here Jesus teaches the possibility of having a "spiritual astigmatism" (failing to converge vision in one focal point), and urges the disciples to have a "single" eye to "see through the folly of laying up treasure on earth and keeps the next world in proper focus".[4]

The metaphor of light as holiness and darkness as evil is also found in the Qumran literature and in the Gospel of John.

References

France, R.T. (2007). Bruce, Frederick Fyvie (ed.). The Gospel of Matthew. New international commentary on the New Testament. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. p. 262. ISBN 9780802825018.
Coogan, Michael David (2007). Coogan, Michael David; Brettler, Marc Zvi; Newsom, Carol Ann; Perkins, Pheme (eds.). The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books: New Revised Standard Version, Issue 48 (Augmented 3rd ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 16 New Testament. ISBN 9780195288810.
Morris, Leon. The Gospel According to Matthew. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans, 1992.
Phillips, John (2005). Exploring the Gospel of Matthew: An Expository Commentary. The John Phillips Commentary Series. Volume 1 (reprint ed.). Kregel Academic. p. 119. ISBN 9780825433924.

Sources

Hill, David. The Gospel of Matthew. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1981

Preceded by Matthew 6:22	Gospel of Matthew Chapter 6	Succeeded by Matthew 6:24

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[1] France, R.T. (2007). Bruce, Frederick Fyvie (ed.). The Gospel of Matthew. New international commentary on the New Testament. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. p. 262. ISBN 9780802825018.

[2] Coogan, Michael David (2007). Coogan, Michael David; Brettler, Marc Zvi; Newsom, Carol Ann; Perkins, Pheme (eds.). The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical Books: New Revised Standard Version, Issue 48 (Augmented 3rd ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 16 New Testament. ISBN 9780195288810.

[3] Morris, Leon. The Gospel According to Matthew. Grand Rapids: W.B. Eerdmans, 1992.

[4] Phillips, John (2005). Exploring the Gospel of Matthew: An Expository Commentary. The John Phillips Commentary Series. Volume 1 (reprint ed.). Kregel Academic. p. 119. ISBN 9780825433924.