Pastor Rick’s Study Notes

The Power of a Moment: One Divide Mark 7:1-15

First Impressions:

This passage demonstrates the divide between earning one’s way into heaven and receiving the free gift of redemption. The priests were concerned about their dirty hands; Jesus cleanses dirty hearts. They want to keep the colon clean; Jesus wants to keep the lifestyle clean.

Illustration: The “traditions of the elders” are like most systems of tradition. Who knows why something is done except someone did it and they codified it? I’m reminded of the husband’s conversation with his wife as they were preparing to cook a roast. She cut about two inches off the end before she put it in the oven, and he asked why the waste? She had always done it but called her mom who had always done it and she called her mom. The grandmother confessed her pan was too short for a full roast, so she always had to cut two inches off to make it fit.

Pastor Rick’s Translation (PRT):

Mark 7:1-15

1 Some Pharisees and religious legal experts from Jerusalem got together and came to Jesus.  2 And they watched some of his disciples eating bread with ceremonially unpurified and unwashed hands. 3-4 (After all, the Pharisees and all the proper Jews are very careful not to eat unless they first wash their hands so that they maintain the traditions of the forefathers; and when they come from the market, if they do not wash they do not eat and this is along with other practices they embrace which were passed down like washing cups and cooking pots and dishes and tables.) 5 And the Pharisees and religious legal experts questioned Jesus about the reason why his disciples do not live in line with the traditions of the forefathers but eat bread with ceremonially unwashed hands. 6-7 Then Jesus said to them “Isaiah was right when he foretold about you hypocrites, that ‘these people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are absent and far away from me. And further, they worship me in hollow and fruitless ways, teach the rules of men as doctrines.’ 8 They walk away from God’s commands by holding dearly to the traditions of the forefathers.”  9 And he said to them, “You nobly discard the commandment of God just so you can carefully hang on to your traditions.” 10-12 “For example, Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’ and ‘The one who reviles and abuses his father or mother must perish in his death;” and you further say, “It is taught that when a man says to his father or mother, this gift belongs to God (meaning you say to them ‘it is a gift that you cannot benefit from)’, you no longer allow him the ability to give anything to his father or mother.”  13 “You invalidate and override the Word of God with your traditions that you’ve handled like handcuffs alongside many other things you do like this.” 14-15 Then Jesus called the crowd to pay attention and he said to them, “Listen up, everyone, and get this: There is nothing outside a person that goes inside that can make him unclean. It’s the things that comes out from the inside that make him impure.”

Verse-by-verse Notes:

1:1 Some Pharisees and religious legal experts from Jerusalem got together and came to Jesus.

These religious leaders set the rules. They demanded the respect because they wielded the rod of reprimand. They had a bunch of laws focused on outward behavior and heaven-forbid anyone threaten this power. Then came Jesus.

Got together could be that they colluded; but it could mean that they got together with Jesus. Either way, they got together in Jerusalem and came after Jesus.

They were quite a few miles from Jerusalem (120 miles) and had to wait until the Feast days would allow them to travel. They had plenty of time to think about what they would seek to trap Jesus in. And they got hung up on hand-washing!

This passage is the third in a series of rebukes of the religiosity. The first was about who you could associate with, the second about the Sabbath and worship, and this one about what makes one holy inside and out. The answer to all three is Jesus’ way of turning their world upside down. Hang out with who needs your compassion, hold onto worship all week long, hand your heart to the Father for his holiness.

v. 2 And they watched some of his disciples eating bread with ceremonially unpurified and unwashed hands.

I added “ceremonially” to the mix as this is what the phrase means. They snuck in to a gathering and spotted at least a few of the followers forget to wash up before they sat down. Clean hands is a good thing; making it a provision to being right with God is religiosity. The word is “unclean” – the same word a leper cries out as he or she approaches people.

The word for “unpurified” is “common as in koine.

vv. 3-4 (After all, the Pharisees and all the proper Jews are very careful not to eat unless they first wash their hands so that they maintain the traditions of the forefathers; and when they come from the market, if they do not wash they do not eat and this is along with other practices they embrace which were passed down like washing cups and cooking pots and dishes and tables.)

They had it down to a religious practice – the word actually means “to the fist.” So they wash up all the way to the joint where the fist meets the wrist. They would angle the hands made into a sort of fist so the water stayed on the hands and didn’t pass the wrist (presumably so the unclean-ness wouldn’t trek up the arm.)

And everyone knows that, when you rub shoulders with people in the open market, you’re bound to have the sinfulness of the world rub off on you. Unlike Jesus who took the Good News of the Kingdom to the marketplace.

This was a culture that ate with their fingers; of course the disciples cleaned their hands before they chowed down. But they didn’t do the full ceremonial act; and it ticked off the religious leaders!

Ablutions today are important in Islam. In fact, five times a day unless the ceremonial washing is done perfectly, the prayers are rejected.

The word for cooking pots and dishes is a Latin word that Mark pulls from the Romans – it means a reusable kitchen container, usually made of wood or metal. The clay ones were not reusable and binned.

The word for table means not just the table but the whole of the reclining, eating, banquet “design” – the couch, the cushions, the table, that was for reclining to eat at. Table fits the purpose here, but dining room might be more accurate.

Illustration: The Traditions filled in every nook and cranny that the Law wasn’t specific about. Just like today, legalists among the church take this beautiful symphony of freedom in Christ where there are definite notes of boundaries with open spaces in the score where our walk with the Holy Spirit fills in with the freedom of following Him – and they jam notes to their making or presumption and it becomes a wall of sound that allows no improvising or harmony.

v. 5 And the Pharisees and religious legal experts questioned Jesus about the reason why his disciples do not live in line with the traditions of the forefathers but eat bread with ceremonially unwashed hands.

Their issue wasn’t with anyone else but Jesus, so they attack his leadership of his followers by accusing them of not following (the word means “line up” or match the requirements) the elders’ traditions.

Eating bread was a colloquialism for eating food. But the word is clearly “bread” so I’ll keep it that. It means they ate food.

v. 6 Then Jesus said to them “Isaiah was right when he foretold about you hypocrites, that ‘these people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are absent and far away from me.’”

It’s clear that Jesus doesn’t address his disciples for not “obeying” the letter of the legal experts’ laws. He is good with his disciples’ actions. But he has clear issues with the Pharisees and scribes. They might have the right activity based on the OT and the laws; but they are so far removed from God that they aren’t even marked present. They are far from His voice, even as He speaks to them.

Note: we can be close, but inside far away. We can be in the seat, but absent from the room. We can have God’s message go in the ear, but never register in the mind and heart. We can lift our hands, we can make the activity match what others should see if we love God; but our hearts and souls are far away bowing to someone else.

Jesus uses a bit of sarcasm and/or irony here – Isaiah was spot-on to describe you as such. I carry this tone into the sentences following.

Illustration: We can take the actions that “show” people we are Christ-followers, make them a part of our personalities, and they become cover for an empty heart and callous over our hardness toward Jesus. We default to the outward to keep from giving our hearts away to the God who woos us.

vv. 7-8 “And further, they worship me in hollow and fruitless ways, teach the rules of men as doctrines, and walk away from God’s commands by holding dearly to the traditions of the forefathers like ceremonially washing cups and dishes and other such thing like you do.”

Their hearts make the acts of worship hollow and they bring no benefit to themselves, to those they lead, and to the nation they are to serve. They supplant God’s Word with man’s rules. They are so bent toward protecting their power that they chase down Jesus and others for breaking the rules; and that chasing leads them further away from a heart malleable to the Spirit.

v. 9 And he said to them, “You nobly discard the commandment of God just so you can carefully hang on to your traditions.”

Nobly is a bit of sarcasm but he seems to be drawing a sketch of what they project to the people. You act nobly before everyone in your traditions; but you discard God’s intent in His Word.

vv. 10-12 “For example, Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’ and ‘The one who reviles and abuses his father or mother must perish in his death;” and you further say, “It is taught that when a man says to his father or mother, this gift belongs to God (meaning you say to them ‘it is a gift that you cannot benefit from)’, you no longer allow him the ability to give anything to his father or mother.”

They might say, “you can take your riches and declare “corban” – or “for the temple” – over it; that means you don’t have to support your parents in their need and then can use it for your own or you can leave it to the temple. Then, if the son has a change of heart and wants to reposition his resources to help his parents, the Pharisee will say, “Oh no, your vow sticks. You cannot help your parents with this.”

The one who curses or reviles can also mean abuses them by action and words. And that person doesn’t just “earn” death – he dies the death.

The Pharisees looked backward to Moses as the source of the “unwritten” traditions; Jesus refers to Moses in his written Word from God to contradict and condemn them. The Jewish man would say, according to archeologist’s findings: All that a man may find to his profit in the ossuary is an offering to God from him who is within it.  In other words, if you want to profit from my stuff, you are taking it from God Almighty. Beware!

v. 13 “You invalidate and override the Word of God with your traditions that you’ve handled like handcuffs alongside many other things you do like this.”

The “traditions” was really a body of laws that were said to have been given verbally to Moses from God, but never written down back in the day. And it was passed down as the traditions. It became primary to God’s Word. After speaking so harshly to the Pharisees from all over who had come to trap him, he addressed the crowd directly. Although I believe they were hanging on the words Jesus was saying. And it all started because the disciples forgot to wash up like they were supposed to!

v. 14-15 Then Jesus called the crowd to pay attention and he said to them, “Listen up, everyone, and get this: There is nothing outside a person that goes inside that can make him unclean. It’s the things that comes out from the inside that make him impure.”

He gathered the crowd around him and got their attention.  It’s the heart issue that makes a person need Jesus. Jesus’ call to “pay attention” is in the form of a prophetic declaration to the people of God. Jesus takes the role of teacher and prophet in these fifteen verses.

This really is Jesus’ answer to the original scribal gripe. What makes a person unclean? And he answers this at the level the charge was issued. He answers his disciples before the crowd. The scribes invited this injunction.

Once again, the disciples (Matthew declares it was Peter) don’t quite connect the dots. They were raises on the outward religion as the means for inward cleansing. And they would never, ever eat bacon!

The next eight verses explain what he means about the heart:

1. It’s not what you eat that corrupts (all food is good).
2. It’s what we determine to do with what our hearts tempt us with – hatred, lust, greed, pride, foolishness – that makes us unclean.  The thoughts lead to desires that lead to intent that lead to action that lead to darkness that lead to death.