William Shakespeare based a whole play on the second verse of Matthew 7

William Shakespeare based a whole play on the second verse of Matthew 7. Measure for Measure is classified as a 'comedy', and indeed everything works out very well in the end. But much of the play is dark and disturbing. Angelo, a noble but stern lord, is left in charge of Vienna while Vincentia, the Duke, goes away for a spell. At least, he pretends to go away, but actually he stays near at hand, in disguise. No sooner has Angelo taken power than, obeying the Duke's instructions, he tightens up the ancient laws, condemning to death one Claudio, who has fathered a child out of wedlock. Isabella, the condemned man's sister, pleads for his life, warning Angelo that judgment from God himself is impartial, and that he too may find himself in need of the mercy which God provided in Christ:

Why, all the souls that were were forfeit once;

And He that might the vantage best have took

Found out the remedy. How would you be

If He, which is the top of judgment, should

But judge you as you are? 0, think on that;

And mercy then will breathe within your lips,

Like man new made.

Measure for Measure Act 2, Scene 2

Angelo refuses: Claudio must die. But at the same time Angelo is smitten by a passionate lust for Isabella herself, and offers to spare her brother if only she will allow him to have his way with her. The plot twists and turns, but ends with Angelo, his own vice having been exposed, pleading for the death he richly deserves. But the Duke, weaving the threads of the story together, pardons one and all, while at the same time a deep and rich justice is done.

Shakespeare hints throughout at the Christian meanings of justice and mercy. The sovereign God, who seems to be absent from the world, is in fact present, supremely of course in Jesus himself. He takes human sin and self-righteousness, exposes them and deals with them, and yet allows mercy to triumph gloriously over justice.

There is a mystery here which deserves much pondering. This is the mystery that lies underneath the present passage. Jesus warns sternly against condemning others. Of course, this does not mean (as some have thought) that no follower of Jesus should ever be a magistrate. God intends that his world should be ordered, and that injustice should be held in check. Jesus is referring, not to official lawcourts, but to the judgments and condemnations that occur within ordinary lives, as people set themselves up as moral guardians and critics of one another.

We rightly guess that he had a particular target in mind. In 5.20 he has named them: the scribes and Pharisees. Though we know from history, and from the New Testament itself, that there were many scribes and Pharisees who were genuinely and humbly pious people, the tendency of hard-line pressure groups - which is what the Pharisees basically were - is always to create a moral climate in which everybody looks at everybody else to see if they are keeping their standards up.

In many countries, this kind of moral climate used to be maintained in relation to sexual morality. Often, today, the moralism is just as fierce, but the target has changed. Today it might be, for instance, conservation and the environment. In some countries, neighbours spy on each other to make sure they place the right kind of garbage in the right kind of bag, so concerned are they about proper disposal and the danger of pollution. That word, in fact, is an indication of what's going on: 'pollution' was precisely what the Pharisees were afraid of.

Jesus warns against all such 'judgment'. He doesn't mean that we shouldn't have high standards of behaviour for ourselves and our world, but that the temptation to look down on each other for moral failures is itself a temptation to play God. And, since we aren't God, that means it's a temptation to play a part, to act, to be a 'hypocrite' (which literally means a playactor, one who wears a mask as a disguise).

With the warning example of Angelo before us, we can see what will happen to such people. Judgment will bounce back on them, the measuring-stick they use for others will be lined up against them, and, while they patronizingly try to sort out other people's problems, their own will loom so large that they won't be able to see straight. Jesus, we should note, doesn't rule out the possibility that some people will eventually be able to help others to take specks of dust out of their eyes. He isn't saying that there is no such thing as public morality. But he is warning that the very people who seem most eager to tell others what to do (or more likely what not to do) are the people who should take a long look in the mirror before they begin.

n  N T Wright ‘MATTHEW 7.1--6 On Judging Others’ in his book Matthew for Everyone