Luke 6:37-38

Vers. 37 and 38. “ And judge not, and ye shall not be judged; condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned; forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. 38. Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom; for with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall be measured to you again. ”

There is no reference here to the pardon of personal offences; the reference is to charity, which, in a general way, refuses to judge. Jesus evidently has in view in this passage the judgment which the scribes and Pharisees assumed the right to exercise in Israel, and which their harshness and arrogance rendered more injurious than useful, as was seen in the effect it produced on the publicans and other such persons (Luke 6:30; Luke 15:28-30). Καί indicates the transition to a new but analogous subject: And further. Κρίνειν, to judge, is not equivalent to condemn; it means generally to set oneself up as a judge of the moral worth of another. But since, wherever this disposition prevails, judgment is usually exercised in an unkindly spirit, the word is certainly employed here in an unfavourable sense. It is strengthened by the following term: condemn, to condemn pitilessly and without taking into account any reasons for forbearance. ᾿Απολύειν, to absolve, does not refer, therefore, to the pardon of a personal offence; it is the anxiety of love to find a neighbour innocent rather than guilty, to excuse rather than to condemn. The Lord does not forbid all moral judgments on the conduct of our neighbour; this would contradict many other passages, for example 1 Corinthians 5:12: “ Do not ye judge them that are within? ” The true judgment, inspired by love, is implied in Luke 6:42. What Jesus desires to banish from the society of His disciples is the judging spirit, the tendency to place our faculty of moral appreciation at the service of natural malignity, or more simply still: judging for the pleasure of judging. The reward promised: not to be judged or condemned, to be sent away absolved, may refer either to this world or the other, to the conduct of men or of God. The latter is the more natural meaning, it enforces itself in the next precept.

It is probably from here that the fifth beatitude in Matthew has been taken: “ Blessed are the merciful; for they shall obtain mercy. ”

With a disposition to absolve those that are accused, is naturally connected that of giving, that is to say, of rendering service to all, even to the greatest sinners. This idea is introduced here only as an accessory to the other. There is some feeling in these successive imperatives, and a remarkable affluence of expression in the promise. Some one has said: “Give with a full hand to God, and He will give with a full hand to you.” The idea of this boundless liberality of God is forcibly expressed by the accumulation of epithets. The measure, to which Jesus alludes, is one for solids (pressed, shaken together); the epithet, running over, is not at all opposed to this.

The expression, into your bosom, refers to the form of the oriental garment, which allows of things being heaped together in the large pocket-shaped fold above the girdle (Rth 3:15).

The plur. δώσουσιν, they will give, corresponds to the French indef. pron. on; it denotes the instruments of divine munificence, whoever they may be (Luke 12:20; Luke 12:48).

This precept is found, in very nearly the same terms, in Matthew 7:1 et seq., immediately following an exhortation to confidence in Providence, and before an invitation to prayer, in a context, therefore, with which it has no connection. In Luke, on the contrary, all is closely connected.