Charles Ellicott Commentary Luke 6:24

"But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation." — Luke 6:24 (ASV)

But woe unto you that are rich!—Better, woe for you, the tone being, as sometimes (though, as Matthew 23 shows, not uniformly) with this expression, one of pity rather than denunciation. (Mark 13:17; Luke 21:23.) We enter here on what is a distinct feature of the Sermon on the Plain—the woes that, as it were, balance the beatitudes. It was obviously St. Luke’s purpose, as a physician of the soul, to treasure up and record all our Lord’s warnings against the perilous temptations that wealth brings with it. The truth stated in this way in its naked awfulness is reproduced later in the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19).

Ye have received your consolation.—Better, simply, you have your consolation—that is, all that you understand or care for, all, therefore, that you can have. The thought appears again in the words of Abraham, Thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things (Luke 16:25). The verb is the same as in they have their reward, in Matthew 6:2; Matthew 6:5.