Matthew 23:23-39

What a disaster is coming on you religious teachers and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You pay a tithe of mint, aniseed, and cumin, but you neglect the vital aspects of the law—doing good, showing mercy, exercising trust. Yes, you should pay your tithe, but don't forget these other things. You blind guides—you strain what you drink to keep out a fly but then you swallow a camel! What a disaster is coming on you religious teachers and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside you're full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisees! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, so that the outside will also be clean. What a disaster is coming on you religious teachers and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, looking good on the outside, but on the inside full of skeletons and all kinds of rottenness. You're just the same. On the outside you look like good people to others, but on the inside you're full of hypocrisy and wickedness. What a disaster is coming on you religious teachers and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs as memorials to the prophets, and decorate the tombs of the good, and you say, ‘If we had lived in the times of our ancestors we would not have joined them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ But by saying this you testify against yourselves, proving that you belong to those who murdered the prophets! So get on with it—finish it all off using your forefathers' methods! You snakes, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the judgment of Gehenna? That's why I'm sending you prophets, wise men, and teachers. Some of them you will kill, some of them you will crucify, and some of them you will flog in your synagogues, hunting them from town to town. As a result, you will be held accountable for the blood of all the good people that has been poured out on the land—from the blood of Abel, who did what was right, to the blood of Zechariah son of Barachiah, whom you killed between the Temple and the altar. I'm telling you, the consequences of all this will fall on this generation. Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! So often I wanted to gather your children as a mother hen gathers her chicks under her wings—but you wouldn't let me. Now look—your house is left abandoned, totally empty. I tell you this: you won't see me from now on until you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.’”