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Mat_7:3. Κάρφος , a minute fragment of twig, wood, or straw, which, in entering the eye (see Wetstein), becomes the figurative representation of a slight moral fault; δοκός , again, is the figure by which a heinous[425] fault is denoted. Comp. Lightfoot, p. 307; Buxtorf, Lex Talm. p. 2080. Tholuck prefers to find the point of comparison in the pain caused by the splinter or beam in the eye. This is inadmissible, for otherwise it could not be said, in reference to the beam in the eye, οὐ κατανοεῖς , i.e. thou perceivest not, art not aware. It is the magnitude of his own moral defects that the self-righteous man fails to discover. The brother, as in Mat_5:22. Notice, further, the arrangement of words so appropriate to the sense in the second clause.
[425] The view of Theophylact, Baumgarten-Crusius, and several others, that the beam in a man’s own eye is calculated to make him conscious of his incapacity for recognising the faults of others, is foreign to the context. Luther correctly observes: “That He may the more earnestly warn us, He takes a rough simile, and paints the thing before our eyes, pronouncing some such opinion as this,—that every one who judges his neighbour has a huge beam in his eye, while he who is judged has only a tiny chip, (and) that he is ten times more deserving of judgment and condemnation for having condemned others.”