§150B, “Defilement—Traditional and Real.”
Matthew 15.7-9, Mark 7.6-8, Isaiah 29.11-14 (v13 LXX).
Mt 15.7
Mk 7.6 He told them,
Is 29.13 LXX The Master said, “This people come near to Me, and honor Me with lip service. Their heart is kept far distant from Me. They worship Me for show. They teach human ideas for their teachings.”
Slightly different order of events in the gospels: In Matthew, Jesus quoted Isaiah after He explained how the Pharisees violated the Law in favor of their customs. (Mt 15.3-6) In Mark, He quoted Isaiah first, then followed up with His critique. (Mk 7.9-13)
The full bible quote, which the Pharisees likely knew already, fits them rather well. Isaiah gave it after he had prophesied that God was gonna turn her enemies loose upon her.
Is 29.11 To you this vision is like the words of a sealed book. If it’s given to someone who can read, saying, “Read this aloud,” he can’t, because it’s sealed. 12 If it’s given to someone who can’t read, saying, “Read this aloud,” he says, “I can’t read.”
29.13 My Master says, “This is because the people approach Me and honor Me only with their mouths and lips. Their heart is far away from Me. Their fear of Me is a human command they memorized.” 14 Listen to me: God will add to His wonders for the people, wonderful wonders. He will wreck the wisdom of His sages; whatever you thought you knew will become mystery.
I know; you’re probably seeing a lot of parallels between the Hebrews in Isaiah’s day, the Jews in Jesus’s, and the Americans in ours. I’ll get to that in a bit.
There has always been hypocrisy. Jesus was probably the first to give it the name “hypocrisy,” from ὑποκρῐτής/ypokrítis, “over-the-face,” which the Greeks called the actors in their dramas who wore the big giant masks. Nowadays people think “hypocrisy” means someone who says one thing and does another, which is inconsistency, not hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is fraud: you claim to do one thing and do another. Hence my translation “phonies.”
Isaiah’s problem—like Jesus’s—was the common attitude of the Jerusalemites that, because they regularly sacrificed to God, the worship canceled out all the savage, evil behavior they practiced the rest of the time. Lots of Christians have the same attitude: God forgives everything, so we can do whatever we like on weekdays, and on weekends we’ll go to confession or privately beg God’s forgiveness, and we’ll get it, and be clean.
The Pharisees’ variation of this was that they followed their elders’ rulings, and if they followed their elders—regardless of whether their elders followed the Law—they were fine. And the elders invented plenty of loopholes. In fact, it can be argued that the Mishna—our copy of the elders’ rituals that made it to the present day—is all loopholes. The way it frequently reads is, “Rabbi A says to do it this way; Rabbi B disagrees.” The reader is frequently free to pick their favorite rabbi.
How’d the Pharisees go so wrong?
Sadly, hypocrisy always begins with an actual devout follower of God. It’s not his fault. He was trying to serve God as best he could, and invented a religion that would encourage his relationship with God. The first Pharisees were hardcore followers, and the whole point behind their traditions was to keep the Law better. That way the Hebrew people—who became the Jewish people—wouldn’t slide into paganism like their ancestors regularly did.
The original devout follower isn’t the hypocrite. It’s his successor that becomes the hypocrite. The devotee says, “Check out my religion! I’ve had really great success with it. Follow it, and you too can be close to God.” So he makes disciples, and tries to pass down the religion… and somehow or other neglects to emphasize the relationship, which is after all the whole point behind the religion. It’s pretty stupid to practice all these rules for following God when you’re not really all that interested in God. But hypocrites are that kind of stupid.
…Well, sorta. In our culture you don’t need to be a follower of God; you can be an atheist or agnostic and largely get away with it. In the Hebrew culture you were a traitor, worthy of the death penalty, if you didn’t at least pay God lip service, so that’s what they did. In Jesus’s day, you could be a pagan and not be killed for it, although the Jewish community would shun you. In many parts of the United States you’d be just as shunned for being a non-Christian. So, for political reasons, hypocrisy made sense.
And since it’s a political thing—in other words, it’s about power, and power over others—the dead religion turns into manipulation and control. The hypocrites pretend to have a relationship with God, but they only want a relationship where they’re in charge, and no one is in charge of God, but anyone can take charge of a religion. Just put yourself in a position where you get to enforce the rules—and change them, or at least determine the loopholes—and there ya go.
The actual relationship with God—which regularly results in the sort of visions that God gave Isaiah—is far beyond hypocrites. Even the experts in their rules will be so fuddled by the visions that he’ll even turn to the ignorant, as if they can help. (Is 29.11-12)
“Their fear of Me is a human command they memorized,” God points out. (Is 29.13) They don’t know Him; they only know of Him. The more they know of Him, the better they can pretend they do know Him, which is why your average hypocrite is so very interested in memorizing verses and theology. Back when I was a young hypocrite, I absorbed as much bible trivia as possible, because the more you know, the better you look.
One of my theology professors lamented that the biggest pitfall to his job was that everyone automatically assumed he was a better Christian than he was, simply because he taught theology. I never understood this till I taught theology myself. Your students too often assume you’re infallible, and of course you can be totally wrong. No matter how often I warned them “I could be wrong,” they regularly presumed I wasn’t. It’s like pudding sharpening iron.
Hypocrites, on the other hand, want everyone to think them infallible, and want to be authorities above question. They want to be always right, always wittier, always more logical, always more authoritative. They want to be as smart as God. Smarter, if possible.
So God has to humble this arrogance: “God will add to His wonders for the people, wonderful wonders,” Isaiah says; “He will wreck the wisdom of His sages.” (Is 29.14) The hypocrite puts God in a little white box of theology. God kicks that box open by doing something that, to the hypocrite, is “out of character” for God; something “God would never do.”
Like Jesus. The Pharisees assumed that if Messiah came, He would never act the way Jesus did; He would follow all their customs and traditions perfectly, and impress them to no end by confirming everything they were teaching. He would not challenge them, or embarrass them by exposing their inconsistencies—or do something so radical as to go out of His way to violate their customs. He would behave Himself. He would remain “their” Messiah—with “theirs” in as possessive a sense as I can make it. He’d fit in their box.
Putting the infinite God in a finite mental construct is all kinds of stupid. Attempting to manipulate the intangible God is profoundly dumb. But if you don’t really believe in God—or you think you’ve got Him all figured out—then you’ll naturally do as the hypocrites do.
We regularly do the same thing as the Pharisees. We have relationships with our bibles, with beliefs and creeds and doctrines and theologies, with the pastor and the people of our church, with our denominational structures, with the sort of worship and music we participate in at our churches, with our ministries and missions and events and outreaches, with our favorite Christian authors and books and radio shows and podcasts. We are deeply engaged in Christianity rather than Christ, the religion instead of the relationship. Not that any of those things are bad. But if our religion doesn’t grow our relationship with God, it needs to go.
Because once God gets ahold of it, He’s gonna wreck it.
Mt 15.7: ὑποκριταί, hypocrites, καλῶς ἐπροφήτευσεν περὶ ὑμῶν Ἠσαΐας λέγων· [how] well prophesied about you all, Isaiah, saying:
8: ὁ λαὸς οὗτος τοῖς χείλεσίν με τιμᾷ, the people, this [one], by lips they honor me; ἡ δὲ καρδία αὐτῶν & the heart of them πόρρω ἀπέχει ἀπ᾿ ἐμοῦ· [forward] distantly is kept away from me;
9: μάτην δὲ σέβονταί με & uselessly they worship me διδάσκοντες διδασκαλίας ἐντάλματα ἀνθρώπων. teaching [the] teachings, precepts of humans.
Mk 7.6: Ὁ δὲ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς· & the [one] said to them: καλῶς ἐπροφήτευσεν Ἠσαΐας περὶ ὑμῶν τῶν ὑποκριτῶν, [how] well prophesied Isaiah about you all the hypocrites, ὡς γέγραπται [ὅτι] οὗτος how he prophesied [that] this: ὁ λαὸς τοῖς χείλεσίν με τιμᾷ, the people by lips they honor me; ἡ δὲ καρδία αὐτῶν & the heart of them πόρρω ἀπέχει ἀπ᾿ ἐμοῦ· [forward] distantly is kept away from me;
7: μάτην δὲ σέβονταί με & uselessly they worship me διδάσκοντες διδασκαλίας ἐντάλματα ἀνθρώπων. teaching [the] teachings, precepts of humans,
8: ἀφέντες τὴν ἐντολὴν τοῦ θεοῦ forgiving the command of the God, κρατεῖτε τὴν παράδοσιν τῶν ἀνθρώπων. you all seize the customs of the humans.
Is 29.13 LXX: Καὶ εἶπεν κύριος and [the] Master said Ἐγγίζει μοι ὁ λαὸς οὗτος they come near to me, the people, this [one], τοῖς χείλεσιν αὐτῶν τιμῶσίν με, by the lips of them they honor me ἡ δὲ καρδία αὐτῶν πόρρω ἀπέχει ἀπ᾿ ἐμοῦ, & the heart of them [forward] distantly is kept away from me μάτην δὲ σέβονταί με uselessly they worship me διδάσκοντες ἐντάλματα ἀνθρώπων καὶ διδασκαλίας. teaching [the] precepts of humans and teachings.
Is 29.11: וַתְּהִי לָכֶם חָזוּת הַכֹּל and it will be to them, the vision whole, כְּדִבְרֵי הַסֵּפֶר הֶחָתוּם like words of the book sealed, אֲשֶׁר־יִתְּנוּ אֹתוֹ אֶל־יוֹדֵעַ הַסֵּפֶר which he gives to him, to [a] knower of the book, [סֵפֶר] [book] לֵאמֹר קְרָא נָא־זֶה saying: call, please, this; וְאָמַר לֹא אוּכַל כִּי חָתוּם הוּא׃ and he says: I am not able because it [is] sealed. 12: וְנִתַּן הַסֵּפֶר עַל אֲשֶׁר לֹא־יָדַע סֵפֶר it’s been given, the book, over [to one] who not knows [a] book, לֵאמֹר קְרָא נָא־זֶה saying: call, please, this; וְאָמַר לֹא יָדַעְתִּי סֵפֶר׃ and he says: I do not know [a] book. ס
29.13: וַיֹּאמֶר אֲדֹנָי יַעַן כִּי נִגַּשׁ הָעָם הַזֶּה my master says: for the reason because come near the people this בְּפִיו וּבִשְׂפָתָיו כִּבְּדוּנִי by mouth of him and by lips of him, they make honor to me, וְלִבּוֹ רִחַק מִמֶּנִּי and heart of him goes very far from me and is the fear of them at me [a] command of men, [a] training. 14: לָכֵן הִנְנִי יוֹסִף לְהַפְלִיא אֶת־הָעָם־הַזֶּה so look at me: he adds to being wonderful to the people this הַפְלֵא וָפֶלֶא וְאָבְדָה חָכְמַת חֲכָמָיו to be wonderful and wonder, and he has destroyed the wisdom of the wise of him וּבִינַת נְבֹנָיו תִּסְתַּתָּר׃ and knowledge being understood, it hides itself. ס
