Matthew 23: Like a Hen Gathers her Chicks

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Everybody wants to be somebody, sometime.

Would you rather be the performer on the stage taking bows to a standing ovation or the man in the lobby of the theatre, wiping up the melted snow from the boots of the attendees with a big, fat mop and a dirty pail? Would you rather be the queen waving to her subjects from her carriage or the person who cleans up behind the horses in her stable?
Chapter 23 is aimed straight at the teachers of the law and the Pharisees, not because they are not learned keepers of the texts of the Talmud and the Torah, but because their knowledge and actions don't match. It's their hypocrisy that's in focus, and hypocrisy's effects are felt in proportion to the power that the hypocrite holds. Who cares if the homeless man professes to be honest and then steals a toque from Walmart? But when our leaders preach justice, mercy and faithfulness and don't themselves practice it, what has anyone to learn from them? What becomes of the congregation?
Matthew's gospel was for the instruction of the early church and his emphasis on the horizontal nature of the Kingdom can't be missed. “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi,’ for you have one Teacher, and you are all brothers. And do not call anyone on earth ‘father,’ for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one Instructor, the Messiah. The greatest among you will be your servant. For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

There follows a section titled Seven Woes on the Teachers of the Law and the Pharisees. As closely as I can ascertain what this list of their sins are—and for which they will suffer woe—are:
  1. You don't listen to my gospel and do your best to prevent others from hearing it,
  2. You make every effort to win converts to your thinking, and then turn them into worse hypocrites than yourselves,
  3. You respect the trappings of religion more than the one for whom they exist,
  4. You tithe meticulously, but pay little attention to real matters: justice, mercy and faithfulness,
  5. You're all gleam and polish on the outside, self-indulgent when you're not observed,
  6. Same as the above,
  7. You lament that your ancestors killed their prophets; meanwhile, you kill the prophet in your midst,
You continue to persecute the bearers of the truth as you have always done, Matthew sums up. How can you do this when God has sought to give you every good thing: “I have longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing.”

In the horizontal Kingdom, leaders are the ones who wash your feet, every person has value equal to every other one, people's public and private standards are indistinguishable.

In the horizontal Kingdom, the focus is not on niceties, but on justice, mercy and faithfulness. It's for each age to determine what is just, how mercy shall be exercised and what faithfulness requires, I guess.

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