TRANSLATION MATTHEW 15:1

Then Pharisees and Legal Experts came to Jesus from Jerusalem, saying,”Why do your pupils dodge the tradition of the elders by not purifying hands before eating a meal? But he answered them,”And why do you set aside God’s commandment in favour of your tradition? For God said, ‘Honour your father and your mother’ ; also ‘the one who abuses father or mother is to be put to death.’ But you say, ‘ if anyone tells his father or mother, ‘whatever assistance you would have received from me is dedicated to God,’ he does not need to honour his parent.. So you render void the word of God in favour of your tradition! You play- actors! How well Isaiah prophesied. about you when he said,

“This people honours me with their lips

but their hearts are kept at a distance from me

and their worship of me is empty

for they teach as doctrines the rules of human beings.”

And he called the crowd around him and told them, “Listen and understand: It is not what goes into a person’s mouth that makes them impure, but rather the things that come out of the mouth make a person impure.”

Then his pupils came to him saying, “Do you know that the Pharisees who heard your word are scandalised? ” He answered, ” Every plant which is not planted by my father in heaven will be eradicated. Let them go; they are blind guides. If a blind man guides another who is blind, both of them will fall in a ditch.” Then Peter responded, “Explain the parable to us.”

Jesus said, “We’ve come this far and you’re still stupid! Don’t you know that everything that goes into the mouth proceeds into the bowels and is expelled into the latrine. But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart; those make a person impure: out of the heart come malicious purposes, murder, adultery, abhorrent sexual behaviour, theft, false communication and slander. These are things that make a person impure; eating with unpurified hands does not make a person impure.”

I could spend some time noting all the editing Matthew has done of his source in Mark 7, but it’s enough to note that whereas Mark’s version shows Jesus rejecting all eating laws, thereby challenging the biblical tradition, Matthew restricts Jesus’ overt challenge to additional rules of pharisaic tradition, especially ceremonial hand-washing. Nevertheless he keeps the distinction between “what goes into” and “what comes out of” a person which obviously has implications beyond the issue of hand-washing.

There is a deal of asperity in Jesus’ words about the pharisees, which many scholars attribute to the poor relationship between Christian and the orthodox Jewish leaders in Matthew’s time and place.(Syria 85 CE?). My guess is that the scandalising of the Pharisees by Jesus is a historical fact.. Paul for example, realised that faith in Jesus ruled out the Pharisaic legalism which he had formerly espoused.

Jesus’ tone (in Matthew especially) towards the Pharisees lacks the persuasive humour that he used with others. He doesn’t want to convert them, it would seem, but rather to persuade his fellow Jews to disregard them. I’m not sure that is historical, and it may belong to Matthew more than to Jesus. Matthew wants to show Jesus’ teaching as compatible with Judaism ( The Law remains in force) but not with a pharisaical interpretation of it.

Between majestic magic and real suffering in Matthew’s Jesus, there is the middle ground of his prophetic wisdom, by which he tries to persuade human beings to share in God’s creation of a perfect world. Because he shares fully in the magic and suffering of God, he is able to offer the profound worldly wisdom of his parables, arguments, and rules.