The Woes of the Pharisees is a list of criticisms by Jesus against scribes and Pharisees recorded in Luke 11:37–54 and Matthew 23:1–39. Mark 12:35–40 and Luke 20:45–47 also include warnings about scribes. Eight are listed in Matthew, and hence Matthew's version is known as the eight woes. These are found in Matthew 23 verses 13–16, 23, 25, 27 and 29. Only six are given in Luke, whose version is thus known as the six woes. The woes mostly criticise the Pharisees for hypocrisy and perjury. They illustrate the differences between inner and outer moral states. Context and background The woes are mentioned twice in the narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. In Matthew they are mentioned after Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem, where he teaches in the Temple, while in Luke they are mentioned after the Lord's prayer is given and the disciples are first sent out over the land. Before introducing the woes themselves, Matthew states that Jesus criticized them for taking the place of honor at banquets, for wearing ostentatious clothing, for encouraging people to call them rabbi. The woes are all woes of hypocrisy and illustrate the differences between inner and outer moral states. Jesus portrays the Pharisees as impatient with outward, ritual observance of minutiae which made them look acceptable and virtuous outwardly but left the inner person unreformed. See also Letter and spirit of the law. The seven woes The seven woes are: They taught about God, but did not love God – they did not enter the kingdom of heaven themselves, nor did they let others enter. They preached God, but converted people to dead religion. They taught that an oath sworn by the temple or altar was not binding, but that if sworn by the gold ornamentation of the temple, or by a sacrificial gift on the altar, it was binding. The gold and gifts, however, were not sacred in themselves as the temple and altar were, but derived a measure of lesser sacredness by being connected to the temple or altar. The teachers and Pharisees worshiped at the temple and offered sacrifices at the altar because they knew that the temple and altar were sacred. How then could they deny oath-binding value to what was truly sacred and accord it to objects of trivial and derived sacredness? They taught the law, but did not practice some of the most