25 He answered, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need?26 In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions.”
27 Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.” (Mark 2:23-28 NIV)
In the second chapter of the Gospel of Mark, the writer hammers the point of people being more important than legalism over and over. In the new way of Jesus, inclusion is more important than rigid adherence to religious laws. In other stories addressing legalism in the Gospels, Jesus breaks with rigid interpretations of the law where it conflicts with inclusion, compasion, or other greater principles. In this passage, the rejection of strict observance of religious practice is widened to encompass all situations where law is made more important than the people it was designed to serve.
The community of the Gospel of Mark must have found the issue of not following strict Jewish practice a major source of criticism by the rest of their Jewish neighbours that this theme is repeated so often. Scholars believe that the community that wrote the Gospel of Mark lived outside of the traditional lands of Israel as part of the Jewish Diaspora. Often cultural groups that establish themselves someplace geographically removed from their point of origin work to practice and preserve their culture to a degree greater than those who remain in their homeland. This is why music anthropologists were able to find examples of unchanged 18th century Celtic music in the hills of Appalachia in the Eastern United States that had been lost from their Irish and Scottish homelands.
This may well have been the case of the wider Jewish expatriate community in whatever country the followers of Jesus who wrote the Gospel of Mark lived. One can speculate that the wider Jewish community tried to be even more Jewish than those back in what had been Israel. One can also assume with the prominence of the Pharisees as antagonists in their stories of Jesus that the Jewish community in which the people of Mark found themselves largely followed the Pharisaic tradition. This tradition stressed the importance of a large collection of regulations passed down through Rabbinical teaching to clarify and break down in ever increasing levels of minutiae the proper observance of the Torah. These regulations set standards on what it meant to follow laws like the command to rest on the Sabbath. They defined for the observant Jew what should be considered "work" and therefore restricted on the Sabbath, what constituted the beginning and end of the Sabbath when these restrictions applied, and what exemptions were allowed.
“The Mishna says: ‘He that reapeth corn on the Sabbath to the quantity of a fig is guilty; and plucking corn is reaping.’ Rubbing the grain out was threshing. Even to walk on the grass on the Sabbath was forbidden because it was a species of threshing. Another Talmudic passage says: ‘In case a woman rolls wheat to remove the husks, it is considered sifting; if she rubs the head of wheat, it is regarded as threshing; if she cleans off the side-adherences, it is sifting out fruit; if she throws them up in her hand, it is winnowing’ [Jer. Shabt, page 10a]. The scrupulosity of these Jews about Sabbath was ridiculously extreme. A Jewish sailor caught in a storm after sunset on Friday refused to touch the helm though threatened with death. Thousands had suffered themselves to be butchered in the streets of Jerusalem by Antiochus Epiphanes rather than lift a weapon in self-defense on the Sabbath! To these purists, the act of the disciples was a gross desecration of the Sabbath law. ( J. W. Shepard, The Christ of the Gospels (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1939) https://bible.org/seriespage/18-great-sabbath-controversy-luke-61-11The philosophy of petty legalism focuses on the individual rather than others and the greater good, on self justification and self righteousness rather than selflessness and the spirit of God. It is motivated by the desire to label oneself as without fault through the careful navigation of minutiae and the letter of the law. It is a way of thinking that makes being, "right", being beyond reproach and superior, the primary concern. Legalism allows a person to gain a false self confidence and worth by viewing him or herself as better than others and allows the individual to judge and distance oneself from others. Since one's worth is based on comparison with others and finding one's value through judging others as lesser, this mindset moves people away from the compassion and inclusion central to Jesus' message.
As part of his homily at Mass on April 11, 2016, the Pope criticized those who care more
about the letter of the law than people’s individual situations. I know I included this quote in my last post, but it is so relevant here I couldn't help myself.
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Their hearts, closed to God’s truth, clutch only at the truth of the Law, taking it by ‘the letter,’ and do not find outlets other than in lies, false witness, and death,” Pope Francis
https://sojo.net/articles/pope-francis-again-blasts-moral-legalism-religious-leaders
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One aspect of this story in Mark that stands out is how trivial the reason is that's given for disregarding the zealous interpretation and practice of the law. There was no injustice to be corrected, no exclusion to be righted, or mission of compassion as in the other stories. The disciples are not portrayed as being in need due to hunger. They just wanted a snack and the Pharisaic regulations defining the law of the Sabbath were inconvenient.
Both the Gospels of Matthew and Luke recount the following as a saying of Jesus:
Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. (Matthew 23:23 NIV)This is a good summary of the justification given in the other stories of Mark where Jesus disregards the law. However, in the story in this passage, people are put above the law on a matter of principle, not just where there is a conflict with the underlying spirit of justice, mercy and faithfulness. Laws like observing the Sabbath are seen as being made to serve humanity, not humanity to serve the law.
In an article at Patheos.com, Morgan Guyton describes the dissagreement between Jesus and the Pharisees as a difference between consequentialist and deontological ethics. In consequentialist ethics, you decide what to do on the basis of what will cause the most good and least harm. In deontological ethics, you find an authority figure to give you a duty to obey. The more unreasonable the duty, the more "ethical" and faithful the observance.
People with deontological ethics only feel assured that they are submitting fully to an authority if they perform duties that make no sense from a consequentialist perspective. The duty must be opaque to be fully deontological. Deontological ethics says that unless I do what makes no sense to me, then my sense is my authority rather than the Bible.
In regards to this difference in ethics in Jesus interaction with the Pharisees, Guyton explains:
For the Pharisees, the Sabbath is an opaque duty. The test of whether you’re honoring the Sabbath or not is whether you avoid doing even virtuous deeds for the sake of honoring God. When Jesus puts the Sabbath in terms of “doing good or doing harm,” he’s making the Sabbath consequentialist rather than deontological. The Pharisees would say that Jesus is offering a false choice. The cessation of work on the Sabbath is a duty. Making the Sabbath pragmatic destroys the deontological authority of the law.
Jesus makes his consequentialist stance explicit when he says, “The Sabbath was made for humanity, not humanity for the Sabbath, and the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27). So to me, respecting Jesus’ lordship as the chief interpreter of scripture means reading it consequentially rather than deontologically.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/mercynotsacrifice/2016/05/12/why-were-ethically-incomprehensible-to-each-other/
Modern Christianity, however, is also no stranger to deontological thinking and a Pharisaic devotion to legalism. I recently read an article posted on Facebook by a Christian organization where the author condemned Christians for using the abbreviation, "OMG".
OMG (for those who may live under a rock) stands for, "Oh My God", or, "Oh My Goodness". It is most commonly used as a dramatic expression of mock surprise, astonishment, or disbelief. The author of this article chastised fellow Christians for breaking God's law by taking his name in vain and stressed how the trivialization of God's name in the sake of silliness was jeopardizing their souls and the souls of non-Christians who may be witness to this display of non-piousness. This practice was decried even if the person intended the abbreviation as "goodness" rather than "God", because others might assume that the word "God" was intended.
I couldn't find the post or article I originally viewed, but in looking for it I found a multitude of articles and posts echoing the same theme, one of which I linked below.
At this point I must confess that I have had my own period of zeal for legalism in my Christian journey and that my criticism is somewhat directed to my younger self. As a young person, my understanding of being faithful to Christ centred around following the social rules the culture of my small town recognized as being "christian": being respectful and obedient to my town's recognized social leaders such as teachers, working hard and being successful at school and community organizations, obeying moral restrictions like sex outside of marriage, smoking, drinking alcohol, and swearing. In University I was quite disturbed to find that many of these rules were not a universally accepted understanding of Christianity, but were culturally specific, and that many people did not share what my home community agreed on without question was "good" and "Christian".
Discussing petty legalism reminds me of a time in my first year of University. In the middle of exams, I found myself stressed and anxious from many solitary hours in the library cramming readings. I found my anxiety coming out with the often repeated thought of, "rats". Now, at this time, I felt cursing in any form to be unchristian. I felt quite embarased at this lapse in mental discipline. Were not rats one of God's creatures? How could I claim to love God and use the name of one of his creatures in a curse like way? Although thinking positively about the world and all creation can be a healthy and helpful attitude that should be encouraged, I no longer think of failing to do so in a legalistic fashion, or as something one should condemn oneself for.
It seems that there is a large contingent in the Christian community that, like my earlier self, fail to understand the many stories in the Gospel about legalism like the one in our passage. It would also seem that there are many who also don't appreciate the stories in the Gospels where Jesus calls out the Pharisees and Teachers of the Law for public displays of holiness and righteousness like public prayer and acts of charity while minimizing the more important matters in honouring God such as mercy and justice. Overall, I get the feeling that there are many Christians who would feel more comfortable with the Pharisees than in the company of Jesus.
The commandment this overzealous legalism is based on is of course the fourth of the Ten Commandments:
You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. (Exodus 20: 7 NIV)
The King James Version translates this as taking the, "name of the Lord thy God in vain", which means to make it ineffectual, without significance, value, or importance. I like the New International Version's translation of this as "misuse". With that in mind, and the Gospel writers' portrayal of Jesus' emphasis on focusing on the "more important matters" behind the law, true misuse of God's name has little to do with silly abbreviations.
A truer example of misusing the name of God, would be Hitler's statement in Mein Kampf where he uses God to justify his campaign against the Jews.
I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Creator. By fighting off the Jews. I am doing the Lord's work.
Adolf Hitler - Mein Kampf
True misuse of God's name is when it is called on to justify or legitimize hate, intolerance, prejudice, oppression and injustice. The most blasphemous and evil misuse is to misrepresent God as having characteristics and values opposite to those revealed in the Gospel stories of Jesus. To use God's name to sanction prejudice and victimization of homosexuals, trans individuals, or people of minority religious or ethnic groups is the epitome of "taking God's name in vain". People who do this make the name of God meaningless and ineffectual, robbing it of it's transformational and life giving power. This is the more, "important matter" of this law that Christians should be focused on.
The Gospel of Matthew reports Jesus as stating that his "yoke", the rules he imposes on his followers, and his "burden" are light (Matthew 11:30). In terms of a lack of rules and regulations, particularly in contrast to the teachers of the Pharisees, this is true. However, his teaching comes with a "burden" that many find too heavy to bear, the onus of thinking for one's self rather than giving up that responsibility to authority. Instead of surrendering our personal accountability for moral and ethical thought and decision making to a set of rules and their interpretation by some authority figure, Jesus' teaching calls us to take this task with the potential for "getting it wrong" on our own shoulders. We are called to use the spirit of love, compassion and inclusion that he demonstrated in the Gospel to judge if and when a rule will cause the most good and the least harm and when it will not and make our decisions on that basis.
In short, Jesus is telling us to grow up and take responsibility for ourselves. We are directed to make the Sabbath serve humanity instead of making humanity serve the Sabbath. This can only be done by not blindly allowing rules and authority to make our decisions for us.
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