This is the fiercest of all the hard things which the gospel of Matthew has to say about the scribes and Pharisees. It introduces a sevenfold curse upon them. The Pharisees were the party of the Jews most concerned about the exact observance of the prescriptions of the Law of Moses. The ‘scribes’ were lawyers to whom they would turn in the case of a clash between two laws. Their attention to detail and their fussiness often made them lose sight of the real purpose of the Law. However, Jesus was prepared to meet them on the Pharisees’ own ground and debate with them on their own terms. In the gospels, and especially in Matthew (written towards the end of the first century), the hostility of the early Christians to the Pharisees has obviously become fiercer, no doubt because of their persecution of the followers of Jesus. As Matthew warns, ‘They will flog you in their synagogues.’ One of their concerns was obviously the status of the religious leaders. It looks as though they were almost turning themselves into little gods. So here the gospel stresses, by contrast, that all the disciples of Jesus are equal: in Christianity there is only one Father, only one Teacher for all. What are the charges here levelled against the Pharisees? What qualities earn Christian leaders the respect of others?