Matthew 6:23

But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

Berean Standard Bible

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Study note

Setting — Jesus addresses his followers in the Sermon on the Mount, following his teaching on the eye as the body's lamp and preceding his warning about serving two masters. He speaks to them about the internal condition that determines their spiritual perception.

The words — πονηρὸς (ponēros) translates literally as "evil" or "bad," describing the state of the eye. ὀφθαλμός (ophthalmos) means "eye," functioning here as the organ of spiritual sight.

The thread — The imagery of darkness and light recurs in 1 John 2:11 and Isaiah 5:20, where moral failure and false teaching are equated with walking in darkness. Matthew 6:22 provides the immediate contrast, pairing the good eye with a body full of light.

Why it lands — The text states that a corrupted spiritual perception fills a person with darkness, warning that an internal source of light that becomes dark is profoundly deceptive. It demands immediate self-examination of one's foundational loyalties and moral clarity.

Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.

The Greek words

King James Version

But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!

Cross-references

1 John 2:11 But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness. He does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
Matthew 6:22 The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light.
Isaiah 5:20 Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who turn darkness to light and light to darkness, who replace bitter with sweet and sweet with bitter.
Proverbs 26:12 Do you see a man who is wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.
Jeremiah 4:22 “For My people are fools; they have not known Me. They are foolish children, without understanding. They are skilled in doing evil, but they know not how to do good.”
1 Corinthians 3:18 Let no one deceive himself. If any of you thinks he is wise in this age, he should become a fool, so that he may become wise.
1 Corinthians 1:18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
Isaiah 44:18 They do not comprehend or discern, for He has shut their eyes so they cannot see and closed their minds so they cannot understand.
Romans 2:17 Now you, if you call yourself a Jew; if you rely on the law and boast in God;
1 Corinthians 2:14 The natural man does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.