MATTHEW 23:37 — KING JAMES VERSION 0
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!”
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! The lament over Jerusalem — one of the most poignant passages in the Gospels — is the mourning of the rejected lover. The hen-and-chicks image communicates the maternal tenderness of the divine pursuit: how often would I have gathered you — the repeated attempts throughout the prophetic history — and you were not willing. The unwillingness is the consistent human rejection that the divine love consistently pursues.
Church Fathers on Matthew 23:37
The Lord next turns to address the city, desiring to instruct His bearers thereby. 'O Jerusalem, Jerusalem:' this repetition of the name is a mark of compassion and intense love.
By 'Jerusalem' He means not the stones and buildings, but the dwellers there, over whom He laments with the feeling of a Father.
Foreseeing the destruction of the city, and the blow it would receive from the Romans, He called to mind the blood of the saints which had been, and should yet be, shed in it. Thou killedst Esaias who was sent unto thee, and stonedst my servant Jeremias; thou dashedst out the brains of Ezechiel by dragging him over stones; how shalt thou be saved, which wilt not suffer a physician to come nigh thee?
Read all 13 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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