Can a blind person guide a blind person?
Will not both fall into a pit?
No disciple is superior to the teacher;
but when fully trained,
every disciple will be like his teacher.
The Pharisees were spiritually blind and yet they styled themselves as teachers. This was perilous for others who had not yet had their spiritual sight healed. They might easily careen after anyone claiming to be a teacher all the way into a ditch. They needed to be wary of whether or not the teacher was the model they wanted to emulate, someone whom they wanted to become. When they were fully trained they would become like their teacher, for better or for worse. If their teacher was spiritually blind they would become more so themselves. If their teacher had clear vision eventually they might hope to become so as well.
Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye,
but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own?
Obstructions in one's spiritual vision would have the necessary result of preventing one from acting in accord with reality. One's decisions would be based on the phantoms and illusions created by the ego rather than on what was real. This was the case with the Pharisees who noticed splinters in the eyes of others without noticing the wooden beams in their own. This meant they would be unable to help anyone else have clearer vision since they had already trained themselves to overlook massive problems for the sake of trivial infractions. For them, blindness was a skill which they had spent their careers practicing.
Jesus was able to remove the splinters and beams from the eyes of others because he alone saw with perfect clarity. Unlike the Pharisees, he was not a hypocrite putting on a show, but always acted with sincerity and integrity. His goal when he criticized others was never to benefit himself but rather the ones who heard him. Disciples of Jesus could one day hope to be clear sighted as he was precisely because he, more than anyone, saw well enough to help.
A good tree does not bear rotten fruit,
nor does a rotten tree bear good fruit.
For every tree is known by its own fruit.
Seeking out a teacher, especially since one's own spiritual vision was not yet healed, was a tricky endeavor. An individual probably wouldn't be able to choose simply on the basis of superficial external appearances. One could, however, avoid corrupt teachers on the basis of the rotten fruit they produced. Their words and deeds would ultimately give them away if they were closely scrutinized. Teachers with rotten fruit might have words with the pretense of truth, but they would be ordered toward evil ends, such as the condemnation of others, or their own pride and vanity. They might have arguments that seemed persuasive, but to what end were they trying to persuade? Words had an inherent direction to them which might at first appear to be some kind of fruit but under a closer inspection would be revealed as rotten.
We are trees the fruit of which is still potentially corruptible. But we are being infused with life by the source of life. And his resurrection will one day clothe us in incorruptibility. Now sin is a risk of which we must be ever on guard. But the more we are in Christ Jesus the less we are under the law. And if we hold fast to the grace he gives we will one day have the fullness of victory. So even though our efforts here below are halting and imperfect they are not necessarily in vain, if they are ordered toward the resurrection life of the Kingdom, as fruit is made to grow by water and sun.
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