§150D, “Defilement—Traditional and Real.”
Matthew 15.10-14, Mark 7.14-15, Luke 11.39-41.
Mt 15.10 Summoning the crowd, He told them,
Mk 7.14 Re-summoning the crowd, He was telling them,
Lk 11.39 The Master said to him,
Mt 15.12 Then the students who came told Him, “Did You see how the Pharisees who heard Your teaching were tripped up?”
15.13 The One with all the answers said,
As I pointed out, the Pharisees—the observant, religious, practicing Jews, who among us Christians would be the people who like to call themselves “Christ followers” instead of Christians—were extremely consistent about ritual washing. They wanted to be ritually clean so that they could be constantly ready for temple or synagogue. But that was just their outside. God looks at hearts, and these “religious” folks had profoundly unclean hearts, (Mt vv8-9 = Mk vv6-7, Lk 11.39-41) as evidenced by the fact that their rituals permitted them to violate God’s commands. (Mt vv4-6 = Mk vv10-12)
After demonstrating this, Jesus suddenly turned to a crowd to have them witness: “Now everyone listen to Me and get this.” (Mk v14) Wait: Where’d this crowd come from? Was there a crowd here the whole time? Apparently so. This accusation of not washing had come from a group of observant Jews, and more than one scholar that they had imported from Jerusalem. (Mt v1 = Mk v1) When they came to confront Jesus on this, they didn’t do it privately, like Jesus tells Christians to. (Mt 18.15) They did it nice and publicly and embarrassingly, like Christians do regardless of Jesus’s orders. They were trying to shame Him into conforming. Hence the crowd.
Which utterly backfired. Jesus’s defense was that the Pharisees’ customs violated the Law, and that washing was just another form of hypocrisy—to their public embarrassment.
Jesus’s students wanted to revel in it: “Did You see how the Pharisees who heard Your teaching were tripped up?” (Mt v12) Usually it’s translated “had You known?”—which is usually interpreted, “Say, Jesus, did you know that what you said really offended those guys?” Jesus isn’t naïve, and the students weren’t surprised by the Pharisees’ reaction. On the contrary, they were reveling in the reaction. “Tripped up,” or σκανδαλίζω/skandalídzo, implies the Pharisees fell into a booby trap that Jesus had set for them. “Had You known you were setting a trap for them?” is a sloppy interpretation; of course He knew. “Had You known it would work so well?” is a better sense.
We humans tend to look at Jesus giving the Pharisees their comeuppance as an “Oh, snap!” moment—they wanted to trap Jesus, and Jesus trapped ’em back. We enjoy it; it’s a form of revenge. We wouldn’t mind being the instrument of revenge, when our brilliant comments during a debate just destroy the other side. But that’s us. Jesus isn’t like that. He doesn’t enjoy destroying the opposition. He’ll still do it, but it isn’t for fun or revenge or to make Himself look brilliant. It’s to keep other people from following them to their own destruction. (Mt v14) Jesus didn’t care to gloat: “Forget them.” (Mt v14) The truth, not the victory, is the important thing.
Back to the crowd. So Jesus called them to witness that He was speaking the truth: “Nothing from outside you, going in, is able to make you a pagan. But what comes from the person, and exits you, that’s what makes a person pagan.” (Mk v15) Matthew has it in a more memorable form: “Whatever enters your mouth, it doesn’t mean you’re a pagan. But what exits your mouth, that’s what means a person is pagan.” (Mt v11) And the evidence for Jesus’s statement—embarrassingly—were Pharisees. They may have had clean hands, and may have washed themselves regularly and religiously, but they were plotting to manipulate the Law in order to shaft people, and that invalidated any washing they did. God doesn’t care to interact with a heart that’s full of greed and evil plans. (Lk v39)
Here’s something to think about: The Pharisees would not have countered Jesus publicly if they had any idea that Jesus could—or would—hit back like this. Then, as now, trial lawyers and politicians look at their own weak spots first, ’cause they know their opponents will find those spots and hammer away at them. Unless, of course, they have no idea that these things are weak spots. Politicians are regularly surprised when some minor, irrelevant behavior gets totally blown out of proportion in the press. Except sometimes those behaviors actually aren’t irrelevant. The adulterous politician really should not be so foolish as to believe the electorate doesn’t really care about adultery—well, in the United States, anyway. But that’s the way he thinks when he doesn’t care about it. If it’s his blind spot, he’ll unthinkingly assume it’s everyone’s blind spot.
That‘s what happened to the Pharisees. They totally didn’t see that their behavior was inconsistent religion. To them, they were consistent—and, with respect to their rituals, they were. They were very careful to follow all of their rituals. The problem was that God had never called them to practice their rituals; He called them to practice His. This was the “plant My heavenly Father never planted.” (Mk v13) They were consistent within their religion, but their religion wasn’t God’s religion, and that was the inconsistency.
That’s why they really weren’t expecting Jesus to nail them. They didn’t realize they were falling into a booby trap. (Mt v12) Not that they had intentionally built the booby trap to catch anyone in. People dig ditches for all sorts of reasons; usually good ones. But when there are tragedies waiting to happen—like blind guides—the ditch will take them entirely by surprise, as Jesus did, and undo them.
How do we catch our own blind spots? Obviously, we need helpers who aren’t blind. We need fellow Christians who will tell us when we’re going astray. We need to listen to God when He says, “Stop; go no further.” His commands in the bible, fr’instance, do that—when we bother to read and follow them. Yeah, your average Christian doesn’t customarily follow all of them. But hopefully you’ve noticed, in all these verses I’ve dug through, that the one thing you can’t reliably count on are human customs.
Jesus’s solution for the Pharisees comes from Luke: “Regardless of what’s inside you, give charity, and look: what’s inside you is clean.” (v41) When we give, we’re denying that greedy impluse—the plunder and schemes—inside us. We’re loving your neighbors instead of ripping them off. Doing good deeds—for the sake of the One whom we’re trying to restore our relationship with—purges the evil out of us. Hypocrisy may make us look good with others, but it’s false religion.
Mt 15.10: καὶ προσκαλεσάμενος τὸν ὄχλον εἶπεν αὐτοῖς· and having summoned the crowd He said to them: ἀκούετε listen [now]! καὶ συνίετε· and incorporate this idea!
15.11: οὐ τὸ εἰσερχόμενον not the [thing] entering into oneself εἰς τὸ στόμα in the mouth κοινοῖ τὸν ἄνθρωπον, makes the human secular, ἀλλὰ τὸ ἐκπορευόμενον but the [thing] going out from oneself ἐκ τοῦ στόματος out the mouth τοῦτο κοινοῖ τὸν ἄνθρωπον. that makes the human secular.
15.12: Τότε προσελθόντες οἱ μαθηταὶ then the students having come λέγουσιν αὐτῷ· speak to him οἶδας ὅτι you have known that [did you realize how] οἱ Φαρισαῖοι ἀκούσαντες τὸν λόγον the Pharisees having heard the word ἐσκανδαλίσθησαν; were tripped up?
15.13: ὁ δὲ ἀποκριθεὶς εἶπεν· & the [one] having answered said πᾶσα φυτεία every plant ἣν οὐκ ἐφύτευσεν what is not planted ὁ πατήρ μου ὁ οὐράνιος the father of me, the heavenly {subject of previous verb} ἐκριζωθήσεται. will be uprooted.
15.14: ἄφετε αὐτούς· forgive [or put aside] them τυφλοί εἰσιν ὁδηγοί [τυφλῶν]· blind ones are [blind] guiders; τυφλὸς δὲ τυφλὸν ἐὰν ὁδηγῇ, & if a blind [one] may be leading a blind [one] ἀμφότεροι εἰς βόθυνον πεσοῦνται. both the two will fall into [a] cistern.
Mk 7.14: Καὶ προσκαλεσάμενος πάλιν τὸν ὄχλον having summoned the crowd again ἔλεγεν αὐτοῖς· he was telling to them ἀκούσατέ μου πάντες everyone listen [always]! καὶ σύνετε. and incorporate this idea! 7.15: οὐδέν ἐστιν ἔξωθεν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου nothing is from outside the human εἰσπορευόμενον εἰς αὐτὸν entering for itself into him ὃ δύναται κοινῶσαι αὐτόν, which is able to make him secular ἀλλὰ τὰ ἐκ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου but the [thing] out of the human ἐκπορευόμενά exiting for itself ἐστιν τὰ κοινοῦντα τὸν ἄνθρωπον. is the [thing] making the human secular.
Lk 11.39: εἶπεν δὲ ὁ κύριος πρὸς αὐτόν· & the master said to him: νῦν ὑμεῖς οἱ Φαρισαῖοι now you all, the Pharisees τὸ ἔξωθεν τοῦ ποτηρίου καὶ τοῦ πίνακος καθαρίζετε, the exterior of the cup and of the plate you all cleanse τὸ δὲ ἔσωθεν ὑμῶν γέμει & the interior of you all are full ἁρπαγῆς of plunder [extortion, seizure] καὶ πονηρίας. and schemes [depravity, wickedness]
11.40: ἄφρονες, senseless οὐχ ὁ ποιήσας τὸ ἔξωθεν not the [one] having made the exterior καὶ τὸ ἔσωθεν and the interior ἐποίησεν; he made?
11.41: πλὴν τὰ ἐνόντα even so the [things] being interior, δότε ἐλεημοσύνην, give! alms [always] καὶ ἰδοὺ and look: πάντα καθαρὰ ὑμῖν ἐστιν. every clean [thing] in you all, is.
