What Does Matthew 23:15 Mean?
Woe to you, writers and separated ones, masked ones! For you circle sea and land to make one who has come near, and when he becomes such, you make him twice as much a child of the valley of Hinnom as you yourselves are.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves.THE KEY
A person can be brought near to a religious movement only for its leader’s own ruin to be reproduced in them with greater force.
THE MEANING
Religious effort can reach across great distances while still carrying a person toward ruin. The one brought into the movement can take on the guide’s direction so fully that the harm is intensified: they become “twofold more the child of hell.” Coming near to a religious community does not, by itself, mean coming near to life.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that intense religious outreach, or joining a religious movement, necessarily leads a person toward life.
THE ROOT
προσήλυτον
prosēlyton
GROWS FROM
προσέρχομαι (proserchomai), built on ἔρχομαι (erchomai)
To come toward, approach, draw near.
“one who has come near” in this verse is prosēlyton. A proselyte is described as someone who has come near and joined. The verse’s sharp turn is that coming near does not guarantee movement toward life: a person can be drawn into a community and formed by its destructive direction.
ALSO GROWS
proserchomai: Come to, approach, draw near.
προσέρχομαι
This is the verb behind the idea of a newcomer: someone who comes near and joins.
erchomai: Come, go.
ἔρχομαι
The underlying movement of coming makes the verse’s contrast clear: arrival in a religious community does not determine where that community leads.
διπλότερον
diploteron
GROWS FROM
διπλοῦς
diplous
Double, twofold.
“twice as much” in this verse is diploteron. The word sharpens the accusation: the person brought near is described as more deeply identified with ruin than the guides themselves. What the guide embodies is not merely copied; it is multiplied in the person they form.
ALSO GROWS
diplous: Double, twofold.
διπλοῦς
This base form carries the image of doubling that makes the verse’s multiplication explicit.
diploō: Double, make twofold.
διπλόω
The related verb shows the same movement of making something double, echoing how the guide’s direction intensifies in the follower.
THE PATTERN
Those who form others can reproduce their own direction in them, deepening the very condition they carry.
If a ruler hears and responds to lies, all who stand before him are restless.A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully mended will be like his teacher.But evil humankind and chanting deceivers will cut their way forward toward the worse, leading others off the path and wandering themselves.THE THREAD
A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully mended will be like his teacher.This verse names the formation mechanism at work in Matthew: a disciple becomes like the one who trains them. Matthew shows that likeness turning destructive, with the follower’s condition described as even more severe.
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