(16) Are ye also yet without understanding?--The pronoun is emphatic: "Ye, My disciples, who have heard from My lips the spiritual nature of My kingdom, are ye too, like the Pharisees, still such backward scholars?"

Verse 16. - Are ye also yet without understanding? Even yet; ἀκμήν: adhuc. In spite of all that has passed - my teaching, my life, my miracles - do you not understand in what real purity consists? Often had Jesus to complain of the dulness of his disciples' intelligence, the slow appreciation of his meaning, the indifference to the spiritual side of his acts and doctrine. Up to the very last they failed to apprehend his mission; nor was it till the Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was poured upon them, that they really and in fulness understood the Lord's teaching and their own duties and powers.

15:10-20 Christ shows that the defilement they ought to fear, was not from what entered their mouths as food, but from what came out of their mouths, which showed the wickedness of their hearts. Nothing will last in the soul but the regenerating graces of the Holy Spirit; and nothing should be admitted into the church but what is from above; therefore, whoever is offended by a plain, seasonable declaration of the truth, we should not be troubled at it. The disciples ask to be better taught as to this matter. Where a weak head doubts concerning any word of Christ, an upright heart and a willing mind seek for instruction. It is the heart that is desperately wicked, Jer 17:9, for there is no sin in word or deed, which was not first in the heart. They all come out of the man, and are fruits of that wickedness which is in the heart, and is wrought there. When Christ teaches, he will show men the deceitfulness and wickedness of their own hearts; he will teach them to humble themselves, and to seek to be cleansed in the Fountain opened for sin and uncleanness.And Jesus said,.... As wondering at, and as being displeased with, and as reproving them for their dulness and ignorance:

are ye also yet without understanding? you, my disciples, as well as the Scribes and Pharisees; you, who have been with me so long, who have heard so many discourses from me, who for so long a time have been instructed by me, both in private, and in public; and yet do not understand what is so plain and easy, that has nothing of difficulty in it, but what might easily be accounted for.