Defining Hypocrisy
By Anthony Casperson
10-24-26

You don’t have to look very far to find a claim of hypocrisy pointed at a follower of Jesus. On TV, in YouTube videos, all over social media, and even in person, you can witness a near endless assault of condemnatory words toward the people of God.

If we look at the claims as a whole, I believe that there are several categories into which we can sort them.

Absolutely, far too many of the claims are legitimate hypocrisy. I want to make sure we don’t gloss over that fact. And the solution to them is to—in godly love—call out the hypocrisy of others, and repent of our own hypocritical failures.

However, not every claim of hypocrisy is actually hypocrisy. A number of the claims speak about Christians not being as loving as the God we claim to serve. Such claims revolve around moments we speak against certain actions and lifestyle choices.

But I would posit—and have written a number of blogs about previously—that this is more of a problem with definitions than hypocrisy. The same God who loves the world also is holy and without sin. Jesus does call us to love our neighbors, but he also calls those he loves to “go and sin no more.”

Likewise, some of the claims against followers of Jesus are aimed at a false presumption of perfection in the Christian life. Those who levy claims of hypocrisy at followers of Jesus assume—or, unfortunately, were told directly—that Christians are supposed to be completely holy and sinless in this life.

But the fact is that every follower of Jesus is on a journey of becoming more and more like him. No one who starts learning a skill or craft is expected to be a grandmaster on day one, or even year one. No one opens up a tabletop RPG core rulebook, reads it once, and then knows every rule and system by heart and can run it without error.

Why then are followers of Jesus expected to be perfect in our actions right away? The whole process takes time. And is more difficult than learning a new skill, because everything within our selfish, fallen human body fights against the process of becoming more like our holy God.

On account of all of these thoughts about hypocrisy, I felt it good to take this blog to look at several bible passages that can guide our search for understanding. And then, we might have a better definition of what hypocrisy actually is, which might then aid us in staying away from and repenting of our own hypocrisies.

It might benefit us to start by looking at a few of Jesus’ words about hypocrisy. (And while these passages might have parallel accounts in other gospels, we’ll stay in Matthew for consistency’s sake.)

One of the common passages that people point to in order to claim that followers of Jesus aren’t as loving as God is comes from Matthew 7:1, where Jesus says, “Don’t judge, lest you be judged.” Yet, this verse is often taken out of context. Jesus isn’t saying, “Don’t ever judge,” because the very next verse shows him saying that the same judgement we place on others will be placed upon us.

If his words meant we should never ever judge, then he wouldn’t have needed verse 2’s words at all. Therefore, he has to mean something else. And the context gives us the clues. Not only is Jesus making clear that we shouldn’t have multiple sets of judgments depending upon whether it’s us or someone else under scrutiny, but he’s also showing us the proper manner in which to clearly see what godly judgement is all about.

Verses 3-5 are where he gives the illustration of, “take the log out of your own eye first, then take the speck out of your brother’s eye.” If there were no judgement, then he would’ve stopped at “take the log out of your own eye” rather than continuing to give advice about how to judge the removal of the brother’s speck.

It is the very act of trying to judge others without applying the same judgement to ourselves first that causes Jesus to call the person a hypocrite. The hypocrisy is not in the fact that the person has a log in their own eye. It’s not even just the fact of comparison of which side has the bigger obstacle in need of removal. Rather, the hypocrisy is that the person is trying to do delicate eye surgery while totally ignoring the obvious blinder that prevents their own clear sightedness.

The hypocrisy comes about when a glaring problem is ignored or excused in our own lives.

We can see this sort of thing in action in Matthew 15:1-11, where the Pharisees question Jesus as to why his disciples don’t follow the Pharisaical code of hand washing. These Pharisees witness the disciples eating without washing their hands according to the customs written over the past few centuries about what is clean enough.

To this, Jesus basically says, “You’re worried about people breaking human-made customs, when you break the very commands of God?” The Pharisees were angry that their little books on manners were being disregarded, while they were breaking the law that was supposed to rule over their nation.

Jesus gives an example of their law-breaking by showing how they disregard the command to honor their parents by using a code they wrote around the law. The Pharisees were telling their elderly and needy parents, “I’d love to help you out, mom and dad, but this here is all I have. And it’s devoted to God. So, I don’t really have it, even though this ‘God-devoted gift’ can be used on things I need and/or want.”

It’s a loophole that really breaks the meaning of the Law of God. Appearing as if righteous, while actually being selfish and sinful. Their tradition seeks to void the very word of God.

The hypocrisy Jesus calls out, as we see in verses 7-9, is because they are ignoring the word of God, while claiming to worship him through their ungodly traditions. They are paying lipservice to Yahweh, while their hearts only seek selfish gain. It is vain and empty worship, because they worship their own excuses. Their willful blindness to the meaning of the ways of God gives them the audacity to go against what they actually know is God’s command.

The hypocrisy comes about when unrepentant excuses are used to blind us from the faithful actions that we know are right.

Further on in Matthew, we can see Jesus really lay into the Pharisees about their hypocrisy in Matt. 23:13-39. There are seven woes to the scribes and Pharisees here. And Jesus calls them several things in this conversation, including hypocrites.

Jesus calls them hypocrites because they slam the doors of the Kingdom of God in others’ faces, while not even entering it themselves. They may travel the world to teach one single person, but they end up making that person twice the miserable hypocrite than they are.

Taking measurements of what an oath is sworn upon, they forget the value of the God with whom the oath is sworn. Likewise, they measure out the exact percentage of giving for tiny seeds and spices, but they neglect the most important matters of justice, mercy, and faithfulness.

These hypocrites clean the outside of dishes, but fill them with things that don’t feed anyone. They make the outside of the graves look all pretty, but forget there’s death inside. And they might make the most gorgeous monuments to celebrate the work of the prophets, but they forget that they, themselves, were the ones who killed those prophets.

In general, they have focused on the appearance of godliness, while ignoring the true intent of God through it all. And then, they claim themselves superior for following all of these tiny self-made rules while totally excusing their actions that break the actual ways of God.

The hypocrisy comes about when all of their external work does nothing to change the inner person.

Some might look at these words of Jesus and assume that hypocrisy can be defined as, “Doing what you know to be wrong or ungodly.” And while I agree that this is part of the definition, let me take us to a passage written by the Apostle Paul before we solidify the word’s meaning.

In Romans 7:15-25, Paul speaks of a struggle in his inner being. His actions don’t line up with his beliefs. He knows better. He hates the sin that his body performs. Yet, because of his fallen nature, he does the things he doesn’t want to do. And the good and godly things he wants to do, those he ends up not doing.

Paul is admitting that he is doing what he knows to be wrong or ungodly. Are we saying that the Apostle to the Gentiles who wrote over half the books of the New Testament is claiming right here to be a hypocrite?

No.

While I’m sure Paul would admit to moments of hypocrisy in his life, he’s not doing so in this passage from Romans. He’s describing the difficulty of being a sinner-saint, of living in a fallen human body while seeking the holiness of God. He’s describing what every follower of Jesus experiences as we grow in our faith—even those God called to be his apostle.

So, what’s the difference? Why are the Pharisees’ actions hypocritical, while Paul’s in Romans 7:15-25 are not?

The answer lies in verses 24-25. “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

Unlike the Pharisees who ignore and excuse their failings, Paul grieves his inconsistency. He’s trying to judge rightly by taking the log of ungodly actions out of his eye. He’s repenting of breaking the law of God, even stating that he delights in God’s law, in verse 22. He’s working on cleaning the heart by reaching out for the only one who can deliver him from this body of death.

Hypocrisy isn’t just doing what we know to be wrong and ungodly. It is excusing the act of doing what we know to be wrong and ungodly. When we turn a blind eye to our failings, when we sweep those sins under the rug and claim to be dirt free, that is when we play the hypocrite. We wear the mask of hypocrisy when we refuse to admit that there’s even something in need of repentance.

We can join Paul in un-hypocritically admitting failings when we likewise grieve for our sins. It is not hypocritical to admit that what we just did was ungodly. That’s repentance. It’s saying the same thing about our sin that God does about it. We can take off the mask of hypocrisy when we look directly at the ungodly actions, refuse to excuse it for anything else, and cry out for a Savior who can deliver us from it.

If we try to blame others, or our situation, or our personal history, we are then reaching for excuses rather than our Savior. It is reaching for the mask to hide, much like our first ancestors reached for fig leaves to cover their shame.

But sin requires more than a covering. It requires repentance and atonement. An interpersonal exchange. And a cleansing on the inside.

Let’s stop trying to make a pretty mask to cover our shame. Instead, let’s bow before the feet of our Savior who is ready to deliver us.

We don’t need to be perfect to be a follower of Jesus. Actually, that expectation is what leads to hypocrisy more often than not. Instead, we admit that we fall and fail our calling. More often than we’d like to admit.

But our relationship with God is not dependent upon us or our actions. It is dependent upon the deliverance of our holy Savior as we agree with his judgement concerning those actions.

Grieve and repent. Oh, wretched sinners that we are! Who can deliver us from these bodies of death? Only Jesus, our Savior.