Matthew Poole and continuators on Luke 11:51

51 From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, it shall be required of this generation.

See the Notes on Matth. 23.29. to v. 37. The Pharisees like a company of wretched Hypocrites, under a pretence of their honouring the Memories of the Prophets, under the Old Testament, took a great care to Repair, and to Adorn their Sepulchres, while in the mean time, their Hearts were as full of Malice against the Truth, and against Christ, and those who came to reveal Gods Will to them, as ever were their Fathers against the Prophets, and saith our Saviour, I, who am the Wisdom of God tell you, that I shall send you Apostles, and Prophets, and some of them you shall Kill, others you shall Persecute; that all the Righteous Blood that hath been shed on the Earth, from the Blood of Abel, to the Blood of Zacharias, may come on you, which mind being in you, the same as in your persecuting predecessours, your Building, and Adorning the Old Prophets Tombs, is not (as you would have it thought) any Testimony, of your Honour to the Prophets; But rather to your Fathers that killed them, a kind of Trophey for the Victory your Fathers got over the Prophets of the Lord; so as by that Act you give a Testimony, that you own them, as your Fathers who killed the Prophets, and glory in what they did, for if you truly honoured their Memory, you would not retain the same Malicious bloody Mind. It is gross Hypocrisy for Men to magnify the Servants of God in former Ages; and in the mean time to Malign and Persecute the Servants of the same God, in a present Age, owning but the same Truths, and living up to the same Rule. See further Notes on what is in these Verses, in the Notes on Matth. 23.29. where the same things are said with larger Circumstances. They truly Honour Martyrs, that live the same Lives they did, and adhere to the same Truths of God, in a Testimony to which they Dyed.

Marginal references: Gen. 4.8.; 2 Chro. 24.20, 21.