Jesus asks "why" to expose a blind spot: we notice small faults in others while ignoring large ones in ourselves. Barnes explains the command before it: "This command refers to rash, censorious, and unjust judgment." On this question he observes that we are "much more quick and acute to judge of small offences in others, than of much larger offences in ourselves." Gill takes the mote as "little sins, comparatively speaking, such as youthful follies, human frailties, and infirmities," and the beam as "greater sins, grosser abominations." The question invites the hearer to turn the eye inward.

Jesus presses the point with a second question: "how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?" (Matthew 7:4). Then He gives the remedy: "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye" (Matthew 7:5). The answer to the "why" is hypocrisy, and the cure is honest self-examination first.

A "mote" (karphos) is a tiny dry particle. Thayer defines it as a dry stalk or twig, a straw, chaff, and Barnes says, "A mote signifies any light substance, as dry chaff, or fine spires of grass or grain." A "beam" (dokos) is a building timber; Barnes says it "signifies a large piece of squared timber." Both words appear in the New Testament only in this teaching (Matthew 7:3-5; Luke 6:41-42).

The two verbs are different. "Beholdest" (blepo) is simply looking at, while "considerest" (katanoeo) means to notice or think carefully about. The person sees the speck but never stops to consider the beam. Barnes adds, "This was also a proverb in frequent use among the Jews, and the same sentiment was common among the Greeks." Gill cites a saying from the Talmud, the collection of early Jewish teaching, about one person telling another to cast out the mote from his eye.

This question reveals how God wants His people to see: themselves first, honestly, and others with mercy. The same measure we use will be used on us (Matthew 7:2). Matthew Henry turns the picture into a rule of the heart: "that which charity teaches us to call but a splinter in our brother's eye, true repentance and godly sorrow will teach us to call a beam in our own."

Notice that Jesus says "thy brother." The person with the speck is family, not an enemy. Jesus does not forbid helping him; He says that after dealing with your own beam, "then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye" (Matthew 7:5). The goal is clear sight and real help.