Matthew Chapter 5 verse 23 Holy Bible
If therefore thou art offering thy gift at the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee,
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If then you are making an offering at the altar and there it comes to your mind that your brother has something against you,
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If therefore thou shouldest offer thy gift at the altar, and there shouldest remember that thy brother has something against thee,
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Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee;
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read chapter 5 in WBT
"If therefore you are offering your gift at the altar, and there remember that your brother has anything against you,
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`If, therefore, thou mayest bring thy gift to the altar, and there mayest remember that thy brother hath anything against thee,
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Pulpit Commentary
Pulpit CommentaryVerse 23. - Therefore. Seeing that the consequences of an angry spirit are so terrible. For there is no thought here of an unforgiving spirit spoiling the acceptance of the gift (vide infra). Our Lord is insisting that it is so important to lose no time in seeking reconciliation with a person whom one has injured, that even the very holiest action must be put off for it. If thou bring; Revised Version, if... thou art offering; ἐὰν... προσφέρῃς (similarly, πρόσηερε, ver. 24), the technical word coming some sixty times in Leviticus alone. Christ implies that the action has already begun. Thy gift; a general word for any sacrifice. To the altar. Since those to whom he spoke were still Jews, Christ illustrates his meaning by Jewish practices. A perverse literalism has found here a direct reference to the Eucharist. For reasonable adaptations (cf. even in ' Didache,' § 14.) of these two verses to this, see Waterland, 'Doctrine of the Eucharist,' ch. 13. § 4 (pp. 359-362, Oxford, 1868). And there rememberest, etc. For the spirit of recollection may well culminate with the culminating action. Lightfoot ('Hor. Hebr.') shows that even the Jews taught such a postponement of the sacrifice if theft was remembered. He therefore thinks that the stress is on "ought" (τι): "For that which the Jews restrained only to pecuniary damages, Christ extends to all offences against our brother." But he overlooks the fact that, while the Jewish precept had reference to a sin (or even the neglect of some ceremonial rule, cf. Mishna, 'Pes.,' 3:7) vitiating the offering, there is no thought of this hero (vide supra). Thy brother (ver. 22, note). Ought. So from Tyndale downwards. Revised Version, aught, here and apparently always, after the spelling now preferred as marking the difference from the verb.
Ellicott's Commentary
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(23) If thou bring thy gift to the altar.--Literally, If thou shouldst be offering. Our Lord was speaking to Jews as such, and paints, therefore, as it were, a scene in the Jewish Temple. The worshipper is about to offer a "gift" (the most generic term seems intentionally used to represent any kind of offering), and stands at the altar with the priest waiting to do his work. That is the right time for recollection and self-scrutiny. The worshipper is to ask himself, not whether he has a ground of complaint against any one, but whether any one has cause of complaint against him. This, and not the other, is the right question at such a moment--has he injured his neighbour by act, or spoken bitter words of him?
