Tithing in the New Testament: What Did Jesus Actually Say?
Search “tithe in the new testament” and you’ll find the word barely shows up. A handful of verses, most of them Jesus talking to Pharisees, one of them a writer in Hebrews looking centuries back at Abraham. No epistle says “thou shalt tithe ten percent.” So what do you do with that?
Some people take the silence as an exit. If the New Testament barely mentions it, the tithe must have died with the old covenant. Others point to the verses that are there and say Jesus settled it. Both readings skip past what’s actually on the page. Let’s look at every New Testament passage that uses the word, then ask what the New Testament pattern of giving actually looks like once you widen the lens past that one word.
If you haven’t read the fuller case for whether tithing carries into the new covenant, Is Tithing Biblical for Christians Today? walks through the Old Testament foundation this article builds on. Read that first if you want the whole arc. This one stays inside the New Testament.
Matthew 23:23 and Luke 11:42: Jesus Rebukes the Pharisees, Not the Tithe
The two clearest New Testament tithing verses come from the same rebuke, recorded twice.
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices, mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law, justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter without neglecting the former.” (Matthew 23:23)
Luke records the same confrontation almost word for word:
“Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practiced the latter without leaving the former undone.” (Luke 11:42)
People quote the first half of this verse and stop. Jesus calls out the Pharisees, so tithing must be the problem, right? Read the whole sentence. Jesus names two things: the tithe, and justice, mercy, faithfulness. He doesn’t say drop the tithe and pick up justice. He says do both. “Without neglecting the former” is Jesus explicitly telling them to keep tithing while they fix what they’d let die.
This is the single clearest word Jesus ever gave on tithing, and it’s an affirmation wrapped inside a rebuke. The sin wasn’t the ten percent. It was tithing down to the herb garden while ignoring the poor person at the gate.
Luke 18:12: The Pharisee’s Boast
The other place the word shows up in the gospels is a parable, and it’s a warning, not an endorsement of the speaker.
“I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.” (Luke 18:12)
This is the Pharisee praying in the temple, comparing himself favorably to the tax collector nearby. Jesus isn’t holding up his tithing as the model. He’s holding up the tax collector, who won’t even lift his eyes to heaven and prays “God, have mercy on me, a sinner” (Luke 18:13). Jesus says that man, not the tither, went home justified.
Does this mean tithing is worthless? No more than fasting is worthless because a hypocrite also fasts. The parable isn’t rating the practice. It’s rating the heart behind the practice. A tithe offered as proof of your own righteousness accomplishes nothing. That’s true of a tithe, a fast, a Bible reading plan, or a mission trip. The problem was never the ten percent.
Hebrews 7:1-10: Tithing Predates the Law by Centuries
The most theologically loaded New Testament tithing passage isn’t in the gospels at all. It’s the writer of Hebrews making an argument about Jesus’ priesthood, and the argument only works if the tithe means something specific.
Hebrews 7 retells Genesis 14: Abraham, returning from battle, meets Melchizedek, a priest-king with no recorded genealogy. Abraham gives him a tenth of everything.
“This Melchizedek was king of Salem and priest of God Most High. He met Abraham returning from the defeat of the kings and blessed him, and Abraham gave him a tenth of everything.” (Hebrews 7:1-2)
The writer’s whole point is that Melchizedek’s priesthood outranks the Levitical priesthood that came later, because Abraham, the father of the Levites, paid tithes to Melchizedek generations before Levi existed. “One might even say that Levi, who collects the tenth, paid the tenth through Abraham” (Hebrews 7:9). That’s a strange sentence unless the tithe already carried real weight as an act of worship, not a Mosaic invention.
This is the passage that matters most for the “is tithe in the New Testament” question, because it’s the New Testament’s own commentary on where the tithe came from. Not Sinai. Genesis. Abraham gave a tenth to Melchizedek in Genesis 14:20, and his grandson Jacob independently vowed the same thing at Bethel: “Of all that you give me I will give you a tenth” (Genesis 28:22). Both moments happen centuries before Moses receives the Law. Hebrews doesn’t quietly assume this. It builds an entire argument on it.
So Is Tithing Old Covenant Law?
Here’s the honest version of the objection, because it deserves a real answer, not a strawman: the tithe was codified in the Mosaic law (Leviticus 27:30, Numbers 18:21), Christians aren’t under the Mosaic law (Romans 6:14, Galatians 3:25), so the tithe ended with the law.
The first two claims are true. The conclusion doesn’t follow, and Hebrews 7 is exactly why. If the tithe started at Sinai, that argument would hold up fine. It didn’t. Abraham tithed before there was a law to keep. Jacob tithed before there was a law to keep. The Law took an existing act of worship and gave it structure, funding priests, festivals, and the poor (Deuteronomy 14:22-29). When the Law’s ceremonial and civil structures fell away at the cross, the worship pattern underneath them didn’t automatically fall with it, any more than prayer or gathering to worship did, and neither of those started at Sinai either.
Then Jesus, centuries after Malachi and centuries before the church existed, tells the Pharisees to keep tithing. That’s a strange thing to say if the practice was about to expire.
We’ll say plainly what we think: tithing is not an Old Covenant relic that Jesus tolerated on his way to something better. It’s a worship pattern older than the Law that Jesus affirmed and the New Testament’s giving instructions build on top of. We hold that with conviction. We also think the Christian who says “we’re not under law, so I give whatever I feel like” and then gives less than ten percent has usually talked themselves out of generosity, not into freedom.
What the Rest of the New Testament Says About Giving
Once you step past the word “tithe” itself, the New Testament has plenty to say about money, and none of it points toward less.
Paul’s fullest teaching on Christian giving is 2 Corinthians 8-9, where he’s raising relief funds for famine-stricken believers in Jerusalem. He praises the Macedonian churches, who gave “in the midst of a very severe trial” and “as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability” (2 Corinthians 8:2-3). Then comes the verse people lean on to argue the tithe is gone:
“Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” (2 Corinthians 9:7)
Read in context, that isn’t Paul lowering the bar to spare change. He’s writing to churches that already understood tithing as the baseline. He’s addressing the attitude, not inventing a new, lower number. Cheerful and decided in your heart describes how you give, not a license to give less.
Paul gives one more instruction, this one procedural: “On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income” (1 Corinthians 16:2). Regular. Proportional. Planned in advance. That’s the tithe’s rhythm even where the word doesn’t appear.
And the early church in Jerusalem went further still. “All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need” (Acts 2:44-45). Nobody in Acts 2 is calculating ten percent. They’re pooling everything. If you’re looking for New Testament evidence that giving got easier after the cross, Acts 2 says the opposite.
Put those together and a pattern emerges. Nowhere does the New Testament tell believers to give less than the tithe. Every instruction, cheerful giving beyond your ability, weekly proportional saving, communal generosity that erases the concept of “mine”, assumes more, not less. The floor doesn’t move. The ceiling disappears.
Where This Leaves You
The New Testament doesn’t hand you a tithing statute the way Leviticus does. What it hands you is better: Jesus affirming the practice to the Pharisees’ faces, Hebrews tracing it back past Moses to Abraham, and Paul pushing giving past ten percent rather than under it. If you came looking for a verse that cancels the tithe, it isn’t there. If you came looking for permission to give less than generously, that isn’t there either.
Ten percent is still the most honest starting point Scripture gives you. For more on how it fits with the whole of Scripture, read Is Tithing Biblical for Christians Today?. If you want the plain definition and history first, start with What Is a Tithe? For help landing on your actual number, How Much Should I Tithe? walks through gross versus net and what to do with irregular income.
Or skip straight to the math. Run your paycheck through the tithe calculator and see what the first ten percent looks like this week.