“But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?”
But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? The Pharisees and Sadducees represent the two dominant Jewish political-religious parties of the period — the Pharisees as the teachers of tradition and oral law, the Sadducees as the aristocratic temple establishment. Their arrival at John's baptism prompts not welcome but denunciation: brood of vipers. The snake imagery recalls Genesis 3 and the enemy of humanity; it will reappear in Matthew 12:34 and 23:33 as Jesus' characterization of the same leadership. Who warned you? is a challenge about motivation: are they coming to genuinely repent, or to manage their public image in light of the movement's popularity?
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