Jesus Christ · On the Last Things
The Sheep and the Goats
It is the last teaching Matthew records before the plot to kill Jesus begins — and He spends it describing His own return. The Son of Man on a throne of glory, every nation gathered, and a shepherd’s motion older than Israel itself: sheep to the right, goats to the left. Then two sentences, and the astonishing accounting behind both — everything done, or never done, to “the least of these my brethren” was done, or never done, to the King.
The Throne
— Matthew 25:31-33 — His own description of His returnNo prophet describes this scene for Him; Jesus describes it Himself, in the first person, two days before His arrest. The one who is about to stand silent before Caiaphas’s judgment seat announces the day the seating is reversed — the Son of Man in His glory, every angel with Him, every nation gathered in front of Him, and the oldest working image in Scripture for what happens next: a shepherd at evening, parting the flock.
When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, He will sit on His glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate the people one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep on His right and the goats on His left.When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him - With what majesty and grandeur does our Lord here speak of himself Giving us one of the noblest instances of the true sublime.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament (1755), on Matt 25:31
When the Son of man shall come in his glory--His personal glory. and all the holy angels with him--See De 33:2; 1Pe 3:22. then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory--the glory of His judicial authority.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871), on Matt 25:31
All nations - Literally, all the nations - all the Gentile world; the Jews are necessarily included, but they were spoken of in a particular manner in the preceding chapter. He shall separate them - Set each kind apart by themselves. As a shepherd divideth, etc. - It does not appear that sheep and goats were ever penned or housed together, though they might feed in the same pasture; yet even this was not done but in separate flocks; so Virgil, Eclog. vii. v.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1832), on Matt 25:32
Shall set the sheep ... - By the sheep are denoted, here, the righteous. The name is given to them because the sheep is an emblem of innocence and harmlessness. See Joh 10:7, Joh 10:14-16, Joh 10:27; Psa 100:3; Psa 74:1; Psa 23:1-6. On the right hand - The right hand is the place of honor, and denotes the situation of those who are honored, or those who are virtuous. See Ecc 10:2; Eph 1:20; Psa 110:1; Act 2:25, Act 2:33. The goats - The wicked. See Eze 34:17. The left - That is, the left hand.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869), on Matt 25:33
The Two Sentences
— and the asymmetry Chrysostom would not let his hearers missTO THE RIGHT HAND
“Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom”
Matthew 25:34 →PREPARED FOR
you — from the foundation of the world
the ground named: hunger fed, thirst answered, the stranger taken in, the naked clothed, the sick and imprisoned visited — done to His brethren, counted as done to Him
TO THE LEFT HAND
“Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire”
Matthew 25:41 →PREPARED FOR
the devil and his angels — never, in the sentence, for men
the ground named: nothing monstrous — only what was never done. The goats are not charged with cruelty but with omission.
But to the others He saith, "Depart from me, ye cursed," (no longer of the Father; for not He laid the curse upon them, but their own works), "into the everlasting fire, prepared," not for you, but "for the devil and his angels." For concerning the kingdom indeed, when He had said, "Come, inherit the kingdom," He added, "prepared for you before the foundation of the world;" but concerning the fire, no longer so, but, "prepared for the devil." I, saith He, prepared the kingdom for you, but the fire no more for you, but "for the devil and his angels;" but since ye cast yourselves therein, impute it to yourselves.
John Chrysostom· Homily on the Gospel of Matthew 79 (407), on Matt 25:41
Tremble, then, O man, and understand from this that these men were not punished as fornicators, or robbers, or perpetrators of any other vice, but for not having done good.
Theophylact of Ohrid· Commentary on Matthew (1107), on Matt 25:42-46
Come, Ye Blessed
— Matthew 25:34-40 — the surprised righteousThe sentence comes first, the evidence after — and the strangest note in the scene is that the righteous do not recognize their own record. “Lord, when saw we thee hungry?” They had not been keeping accounts; the King had. Six ordinary mercies — food, drink, welcome, clothing, a sickbed visit, a prison visit — are read back as things done to Him personally.
Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave Me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me something to drink, I was a stranger and you took Me in, I was naked and you clothed Me, I was sick and you looked after Me, I was in prison and you visited Me.’Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You something to drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? When did we see You sick or in prison and visit You?’ And the King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’'when saw we thee?' — the righteous kept no ledger.
Inherit the kingdom - Purchased by my blood, for all who have believed in me with the faith which wrought by love. Prepared for you - On purpose for you. May it not be probably inferred from hence, that man was not created merely to fill up the places of the fallen angels?
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament (1755), on Matt 25:34
This is the holy love whose practical manifestations the King is about to recount in detail; and thus we see that their whole life of love to Christ is the fruit of an eternal purpose of love to them in Christ.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871), on Matt 25:34
“The Least of These My Brethren”
— who they are — the readings, and who holds eachEverything in the scene funnels through one phrase, and the church has read it more than one way. The readings are laid out below at their real strength; the page renders no verdict.
Inasmuch as ye did it to one of the least of these my brethren, ye did it to me - What encouragement is here to assist the household of faith? But let us likewise remember to do good to all men.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament (1755), on Matt 25:40
It were indeed free to us to understand that it is Christ in every poor man whom we feed when he is hungry, or give drink to when he is thirsty, and so of other things; but when He says, In that ye have done it to one of the least of these my brethren, He seems tome not to speak of the poor generally, but of the poor in spirit, those to whom He pointed and said, Whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother. (Matt. 12:50.)
Jerome· Catena Aurea by Aquinas (420), on Matt 25:40
Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren - The meanest follower of Christ is acknowledged by him as his brother! What infinite condescension! Those, whom many would scorn to set with the dogs of their flock, are brothers and sisters of the blessed Jesus, and shall soon be set among the princes of his people.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1832), on Matt 25:40
The readings, and who holds eachone phrase, three centuries-deep answers
The needy anywhere:the widest and most preached reading — Christ met in every hungry and imprisoned person. Chrysostom leans this direction in practice while grounding it in baptismal brotherhood (“every believer… baptism and communication of the Divine mysteries makes him a brother”).
Christ’s own people:the reading the text’s language favors for many careful readers, since Jesus elsewhere defines “my brethren” as those who do His Father’s will (Matt 12:50). Jerome above says it outright — “not of the poor generally” — and Wesley’s “household of faith” stands with him, while adding “let us likewise remember to do good to all men.”
The dispensational reading:in the pre-tribulational premillennial school this scene is the judgment of the living nations at the Second Coming — distinct from the great white throne of Revelation 20 — and “my brethren” are Jesus’s own kinsmen, the Jewish people of the tribulation years, with the nations judged by how they treated them. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, no dispensationalists, already conceded the textual hook: what is described here “is of course so far not general.”
All three readings agree on what the scene demands of the reader now: mercy to the people the King calls His own is mercy the King takes personally.
The Same Word, Twice
— Matthew 25:46 — the verse's own symmetryThe scene closes on one sentence with one adjective used twice: aiōnios — everlasting punishment, everlasting life. Whatever the word means in one clause it means in the other; the duration of the life and the duration of the punishment stand or fall together in the grammar. The nature of that punishment has its own long discussion on this site — doored below, not re-argued here.
And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”one adjective, both destinies.
Where It Points
— the scene's place in what is still comingWhere this judgment sits in the order of the last things — one final assize, or the judgment of living nations distinct from the great white throne — follows the reader’s school of Revelation, and those schools have their own honest pages. What no school disputes: the Judge in this scene is Jesus, the criterion is mercy, and the verdicts are final.
Closing
A throne, a flock, two sentences. The kingdom was prepared for its heirs from the foundation of the world; the fire was never prepared for men at all; and the evidence read out at the end is mercy — shown or withheld to people the King is not ashamed to call brethren.