Trinity Baptist Church

The Book of Mark

Scripture-Twisting Tradition

Mark 7:1-13

 

Mark 7:1-13

 

Verse 7 holds the key to understanding this section.  What does it mean to worship the God in vain?  How do we define “vain worship”?  Vain worship is empty, useless, pointless, lifeless, hypocritical worship. Jesus says this describes the worship of the people of Israel, and in particular the leaders of Israel at that time. 

 

And by the way, that wasn’t anything new, and I might add, it didn’t stop with them.   It was deeply imbedded in their religion. They were literally the products of centuries of hypocritical, superficial, empty, useless worship. It was directed at the right God but in the wrong way. God does not accept worship, even worship in His name directed at Him if it is done wrongly.

 

It’s a serious problem to worship the wrong God, but it is just as serious to worship the right God in the wrong way. And the Jews had turned this into a highly sophisticated art form.

 

God desires to be worshiped from the heart. When Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, He quoted Deuteronomy chapter 6.   “There is one God, one Lord and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, your mind and your strength. That’s the first and great commandment. The second, is to love your neighbor as yourself.”

That message hasn’t changed.  Jesus talked about this hypocritical worship in His day and we still deal with it today.  There is vast, far-reaching, sweeping, worldwide, empty meaningless worship directed at God that is nothing but hypocrisy and sham and ceremony and we’re all susceptible to it and probably guilty of it. 

 

Now where we are in the seventh chapter of Mark is on the heels of events in the ministry of Jesus that mark the peak of His popularity. He’s just fed a crowd of perhaps as many as 25,000, He’s been healing everyone, He’s walked on the water and those closest to Him are now convinced He is the Messiah. 

 

Others, interested only in the physical and material aspects of His power, have deserted Him.  They did not love God nor worship Him from the heart and consequently, they did not embrace Jesus as their Redeemer and Savior.

 

So what we have beginning at chapter 7 is a turning point in the popularity of Jesus.  Once He refused to keep up the free food and be forced to be a King, the crowd begins to diminish. There are still crowds. He’ll feed four thousand a little after this. There are still towns and villages that He circulates through. There will be some crowds, but through this final year of His life, they don’t reach the proportions that they did at the peak in Galilee.

 

And as His popularity begins to fade, the work of the scribes and Pharisees to discredit Him begins to gain momentum.

In fact, we know the timing of this because John 6 says it was around the Passover that He fed that crowd, probably preliminary to the Passover.

 

So we know it’s about a year now until His death. The Galilean ministry is coming to its end. And during this last year of ministry, He spends the majority of His time training the Twelve.  He begins to use parables more and more, explaining their significance to those closest to Him.

 

And here in chapter 7, we have highlighted one of those conflicts that occur.  I think it very likely Scripture does not record all the conflicts that happened between Jesus and the Pharisees.  I think what we see here was a very common occurrence. 

He was in constant conflict with the leaders of Israel.  

 

In this case, the conflict centers on religion.  He rejected all of the phony, hypocritical religion they offered.  Everything that made them appear to be something in front of men is rejected by Jesus. 

 

There are four segments in the story.  First we see

 

 

verses 1-5

 

As I mentioned, we are near the time of Passover when this delegation of Jewish officials from Jerusalem come to confront Jesus.  Now remember, as far as they and everyone else is concerned, they are the experts regarding Judaism. 

 

 

 

Apparently their Galilean counterparts request their help in discrediting Jesus so they arrive from Jerusalem.  They want Jesus dead and they’re looking for some way to make sure that can happen.

 

The first blow in the conflict is thrown by the scribes and Pharisees.

 

verse 2

 

Their accusation is not so much about being physical unsanitary as it is being ceremonially unclean.  Common sense tells us to wash before we eat. In fact, as far as the general public was concerned, that’s all the law required.  Protect what goes in your mouth. 

 

But the law required ceremonial cleansing for the priests in the book of Leviticus and over the course of time it had become traditional for all Jews to follow the prescribed cleansing for priests.

 

verses 3 and 4

 

In fact, the word translated “hands” in verse 3 is actually the word “fist”.  They had some kind of ritual ceremony that involved the fist, whether it meant they put their hand into a fist or whether it meant that there was some kind of washing that only went from the wrist forward.  Nobody really knows for sure what was involved, but it does indicate there were some specifics with regard to their washings that went far beyond what the law required.

 

And whatever it was, Jesus and His followers weren’t doing it.

This was not about sanitation.  This was about ceremony and traditions that had to do with ritual defilement.

 

So the conflict is not an argument about the Word of God.  It is about the traditions of men.  Over the course of time, it had gotten to the point of ridiculousness.  

 

All of the additions that men made to the Law of God were eventually compiled into what was known as the Mishnah, which then gave way to The Talmud.  All of that happened at the schools of Jerusalem.  Later the rabbis in Babylon wrote their own Talmud four times larger than the Jerusalem Talmud.

 

It included every idea, both good and bad than everybody who was anybody had ever said. 

And as Mark indicates here, it covered every aspect of life. 

 

They had all kinds of laws about the washing of cups and pitchers and copper pots.  There are thirty chapters in the Mishnah that deal with nothing but the ceremonial cleansing of pots and pans. There’s one whole volume on how to rinse your hands. 

 

No wonder Jesus said, “You bind heavy burdens on people they can’t even carry them.”

 

And the rabbis were the only legitimate interpreters of Scripture.  No one else could keep up with all of it. 

And they were absolutely devoted to this material. 

The Jerusalem Talmud says, “The words of the scribes are more lovely than the words of the Law.”

 

It says, “It is a greater crime to transgress the words of the school of Rabbi Hillel than the words of the Scripture.” It says, “My son, attend to the words of the scribes more than the words of the Law.”

 

That helps us understand the conflict.  By the time Jesus comes on the scene, the Jews don’t have a clue what Scripture says about anything.  That’s the confrontation. They didn’t say to Jesus, “You broke the Law of God.” They said, “You violated the tradition.” This is the point of attack.  So that’s the confrontation.

 

Next comes

 

 

verses 6 to 9

 

His comments are a direct verbatim quote from the Greek translation of the Old Testament called the Septuagint. He quotes Isaiah 29:13.

 

Here we come to the real heart of the issue.  Religion is all about the external, ceremonial ritual.  And if it’s all about behavior and not about the heart, then it is not what honors God. That is the very essence of vain worship. 

 

And notice, Christ didn’t breaking their traditions.  In fact, I think He broke it intentionally and without regard for it. He had no respect for their whole traditional system. He ignored it. He swept it aside. It was meaningless.

 

 

What the disciples were doing was not a problem. What the Pharisees and scribes were doing was a big problem. They were actually going to go to hell with rinsed hands.

 

Then He gives them

 

 

 Notice He brings up their traditions again right at the end of verse 9.  Then He gives this illustration. 

 

Verse 10

 

That’s right out of Exodus 20:12, “Honor your father and mother.” That’s one of the Ten Commandments.  Exodus 21:17 says, “He who speaks evil of his father or mother, let him be put to death.” Kill him. The Law of God provided capital punishment for someone who shows disrespect to parents.

 

So what did they think about that? 

 

verses 11-12

 

Here’s what had developed in the rabbinic system. A man has parents who have a need.  They’re struggling financially and need help.  Instead of helping their parents, the rabbis opted out of helping by claiming everything they had was devoted to God. The word they used to indicate this gift was “Corban”, thus dedicating it to God. 

 

Complicating things was their gift was an estate gift.  It was pledge or promised, but it didn’t go to God until they died.  So they were still managing and controlling what happened with the gift. 

After all, Numbers 30:2 says “Don’t make a vow and break it.” So this was the rabbinical tradition of looking pious by devoting things to God and they were then free to violate the commandment to care for your aged parents who were in need. That’s how hard-hearted they were.

 

 “Oh, I’m very sorry, Mom, Dad, just can’t give it to you, I dedicated it all to God and you’ll understand that’s a much higher calling for this money, isn’t it? After all, there is nothing more noble than giving to God.

 

But the whole purpose was, they didn’t want to lose the cash. They wanted to avoid the loss by saying this and there were ways in the rabbinical system to undo the vow. The Talmud says that a man was not even bound after saying “Corban” to give the gift at all. 

 

In fact, some historians say it was typical to say “Corban” over everything you had and in that way you could look spiritual and give nothing to anybody. So you got around a biblical command and spent everything on yourself. 

 

That’s the hypocrisy of your religion. You’re causing people to disobey God and dishonor their parents.

 

Finally we come to

 

 

verse 13

 

 

What an indictment. They replaced the inspired Word of God with the opinions and traditions of man.  It’s an unbiblical religion.

 

There is no substitute for a true, humble, selfless love for God and love for the Lord Jesus Christ and delight in Him.  I’m afraid we’ve become used to phony religion in the church.  I would guess God’s name is taken in vain more times churches than anywhere else.

 

Empty ceremony, superficial worship, thoughtless praise, errant doctrine, indifferent prayer, lifeless ritual, these things abound. We don’t need tradition. There is one revelation of God that is absolutely true and it’s the Scripture.  And if we love God, we love His Word. If we love His Word, we love to obey His Word. True religion is humble love for and delight in God and this humble love leads us to love the Word and love to obey the Word.

 

It is unfortunate that a lot of people see the sin in their sin but they never see the sin in their religion.  There is no substitute for the real deal.  May God help us to find it.

 

Let’s pray.