Lord of the Sabbath - Mark 2:23-28

23 One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. 24 The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?”
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. 

Much of this legalism was based on the Mishnah, a redaction of the oral traditions of the Pharisees from the Second Temple period (536 BCE – 70 CE). The Mishnah is comprised of examples of Rabbinical judgments that were used to determine the correct way to carry out laws recorded in the Torah. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mishnah

Concerning the legalism of the Pharisees with regard to the Sabbath, J. W. Shepard, in his book, The Christ of the Gospels, writes:

“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-61-11

The 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.

__________________________ 

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 

 __________________________

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.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=208242766188854&id=100010093953581

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.

The New Way - Mark 2:18-22

18 Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. Some people came and asked Jesus, “How is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?”

19 Jesus answered, “How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them. 20 But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast.

21 “No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. Otherwise, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. 22 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins.” (Mark 2:18-22 New International Version)

This passage in the Second Chapter of Mark is the climax and summary of the three previous stories about Jesus' new teaching on inclusion and community over the letter of the law and religious practice. The opening statement of the Gospel, that Jesus is the Messiah, God's chosen king to bring about the new eschatological era for Israel, is reiterated with the previous stories illustrating the new covenant he brings and how it differs from the old. Zealous pursuit of the letter of the law and religious ritual is characterized as the old way while a focus on community, inclusion and principles of mercy and justice behind the Law are portrayed as a totally new way and not merely an addition to the existing ethos which is to be abandoned in favour of the new.

All three synoptic Gospels share this story and all three place it directly after the story about the calling of Levi and the Pharisees' criticism of Jesus and his disciples for eating at Levi's home with tax collectors and sinners.  It seems clear that this passage is a continuation of this story with the question about Jesus' disciples not fasting suggesting that instead of taking part in the regular fasting period of the disciples of the Pharisees and John the Baptist, the disciples of Jesus were eating with tax collectors and sinners at Levi's home.

This sets up an opportunity to contrast the vision of Jesus and the vision of the Pharisees.  The writer insists that Jesus' teaching is not just an addition or amplification of the existing, but something completely new.  Jesus' "Way" is compared to new cloth which must be used to make a new garment or a new wine requiring new wineskins.  It can not be used as a patch on the existing way, but requires that it be made into an entirely new garment.  The old way can not be used as a vessel for the new, but requires a new vessel, or both will be ruined. 

Judaic thought of the time, as represented by John and the Pharisees, was one of a community of exclusive holiness.  Only by the people becoming more holy and purging themselves of the unclean, fulfilling their side of the covenant through strict adherence to the 
Law, would God fulfill his side and drive out their oppressors and make them a nation again.  This could only be accomplished through increased zeal in meeting the letter of the law for the purity and holiness regulations and rituals as a community.  This mindset demanded the exclusion and censuring of those who did not, or could not, meet these practices to the level demanded.  We see this in this passage and the preceding stories through the exclusion and condemnation of the disabled, the ill, and those not tithing or meeting the purity practices and rituals.

The new way of Jesus as illustrated by the three preceding stories envisions a community of inclusive compassion.  Laws, practices and individual behaviour are secondary to a whole and inclusive community and to the principles of community, compassion and equality behind the law.  This is illustrated in the previous stories by Jesus going out of his way and even breaking purity laws and religious practice to bring into community those who were excluded and even reviled:

• Absolution of a disabled man who could not fulfill the temple sacrifice forgiven
• Holiness practices disregarded as part of healing a leper
• Fasting forgone in preference to honouring tax collectors and sinners.

__________________________ 

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

 __________________________

Pope Francis is someone who understands the community of Mark's teaching of the way of Jesus.  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.  This Pope understands that community is more important than "purity".

The fundamental nature of this message as central to the way of Jesus is spelled out by the community of Mark in the portion of the passage where Jesus is related as describing himself as a bridesgroom.  This is a common metaphor in the Tanakh (Jewish Scriptures) where the relationship between God and the people of Israel is described as one between husband and wife.  Recasting Jesus as the husband in this allusion is a reoccurring one in early Christianity and common to the movement.  It is seen in the earlier Epistles of Paul and the much later Gospel of John.  In the Third Chapter of the Gospel of John, John the Baptist is presented as referring to Jesus as both the messiah and a bridesgroom with the crowds who moved away from himself to Jesus referred to as the bride.

The metaphor of God as the spouse of Israel is a common one in the mindset of the Second Temple Period.  It also has a strong eschatological connection.  In the book of Hosea, this marriage ends in a separation or divorce because of Israel's unfaithfulness. The eschatological or messianic age is given as a time when the marriage between God and Israel will be renewed. 

"...a marriage metaphor was often used to describe God’s relationship with his people in the Hebrew Bible. The marriage ended in disaster because Israel was an unfaithful spouse. But in the eschatological age, God will restore Israel to her former position and create a new covenant with them. God in fact does a miracle by restoring the faithless bride to her virgin state and re-wedding her in the coming age... Jesus stands in this prophetic tradition when describes the eschatological age as a wedding celebration and himself as the bridegroom in Mark" Richard D. Patterson   https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.etsjets.org/files/JETS-PDFs/51/51-4/JETS%252051-4%2520689-702%2520Patterson.pdf&ved=0ahUKEwjQ7rah-YfMAhXBtIMKHfv2DH44HhAWCB0wAg&usg=AFQjCNEhyN3tD5sQeU7ydmJWyI7M56gUQA&sig2=TzN7_iMq17iJCOcPSqhhlA

The authority of this new teaching, this new way, is that of the messiah who ushers in the renewed marriage between God and his people, a new relationship where no one is excluded.  The meal with the sinners and tax collectors becomes a wedding feast celebrating this new covanent where those who were excluded and reviled are honoured and no one is turned away.  Legalism and ritual are swept away in an outpouring of community that embraces all.

Even Tax Collectors - Mark 2:13-17

13 Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them. 14 As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.  15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. 16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”  17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mark 2:13-17 NIV)

In this next passage from the second Chapter of Mark, we are given yet another story of Jesus demonstrating the inclusive nature of his ministry and of his coming kingdom.  This is the third story, one right after the other, about the inclusiveness of Jesus. Rabbi Dr. Hillel ben David (Greg Killian) relates that according to Jewish law, once something is done three times it is considered a permanent thing (http://www.betemunah.org/three.html). This is called a “chazakah".  For the community of Mark to put three stories in a row centered on Jesus' inclusion of those considered outsiders in the society of his time is a strong and definitive statement about the importance of inclusion as a defining principle in their understanding of the way of Jesus.

Let's look at these three stories:

In the previous passage Jesus is shown as forgiving the sins of a man who by nature of being crippled was excluded from the temple and the temple practice of sacrifice and forgiveness.  As such he was a religious and social outcast. The community of Mark used this story to illustrate that none among them were by their nature, or by virtue of who they were, excluded from Jesus' kingdom, or the full fellowship of God.  


The story before that was the healing of the leper.  The man with leprosy breaks the rules regarding proximity and social contact for lepers when he approaches Jesus.  He puts Jesus, and the crowd that was most likely around him, at risk of becoming unclean themselves and unable to worship God until they underwent purification. Jesus, however, instead of shunning or rebuking him, not only interacted with the man, but also touched him to heal him, making himself ritually unclean.  

Lepers were considered to be in a constant state of ritual impurity and were excluded from the community worship of God and from interaction with, "clean", people.  Jesus' compassion in wanting to see the man returned to fellowship with the people and with God overrode any concerns over his own religious purity and ritual cleanliness.  The community of Mark included Gentiles and women, people who were by their very nature considered to be, "unclean", by Judaic law and ineligible for full communion and worship of God.  This story told them that they were included, that no ritual or religious law could bar them from full membership in the community and the faith, and that Jesus' coming kingdom was for all of them.

The third story on the principle of inclusion is the passage we are currently looking at.  Here Jesus calls a Tax Collector named Levi to follow him, to become one of his disciples.  He is also criticized for eating at Levi's house with tax collectors and, "sinners".  Let's start off by looking at Tax Collectors in first century Palestine and the people's perception of them.

Tax Collectors were reviled by the Jews of Jesus' time because they were usually fellow Jews collaborating with the Roman occupiers.  They were seen as greedy opportunists using the oppression of their fellow Jews as a source of profit for themselves.  They worked for tax farmers, a form of revenue leasing where the tax collector leases the right to collect and retain the whole of the money owed to the state in return for a fixed payment.  Known to cheat the people they collect from by collecting more than what was required, they were usually well to do and formed their own elite social group.

Tax Collectors were seen by the Jewish community and particularly the Religious Leaders as enemies to both them and God, to be shunned and despised like lepers and the disabled.  Think of the Nazi collaborators in France during the German occupation and how the people of France viewed them.  The Tax Collectors not only gained profit by supporting the people's oppressors, they were in competition with the collection of the Temple taxes and the tithes.   The Religious Authorities believed the people of Israel needed to pay these tithes and Temple taxes to be right with God as part of carrying out their side of their Covenant with God.  It was believed that the reason God had allowed them to be defeated as a nation was a lack as a people in fullfilling the obligations of Covenant in terms of the Law and that they needed to follow the regulations to a greater degree before God would rid them of the Roman occupiers and make them a nation again.

The Tax Collectors, if not unpopular enough, used violence, or the threat of violence in order to extort their money from the people under the auspices and authority of Rome and the backing of the occupying Roman military forces. 

To appreciate how the Jewish people felt about Publicans, consider the modern parallel of the Black community in the town of Ferguson Missouri. We have watched on television the protests and rallies against the white city officials and judiciary who use legalized force to exploit and further impoverish the Black community.  In Ferguson they do this through a de facto taxation system of laws and regulations targeted at extorting money specifically from members of the Black Community.  The Jewish community would have harbored a similar resentment to their exploitation by Tax Collectors for Roman taxes.

Now, in the Gospel story so far, Jesus has already gained a great deal of popularity with the people and a popular Rabbi calling someone to be his talmidim, or disciple, was a great honour and a great commitment on both their parts.  To bestow this honour on someone from a group considered to be an enemy of the Jewish people and their return to nationhood was shocking to say the least.  To the teachers of the law who were Pharisees, this was close to both heresy and treason.

To put this into perspective, imagine a Christian faith healer and teacher with a following in the Southern U.S. gaining a lot of attention, drawing crowds due to his miraculous faith healings and growing in popularity among Christians there.  Imagine him publicly picking a newly immigrated Gay Socialist Transvestite Arab as one of his inner circle.  Like the Pharisees of Jesus day, the leaders of the Religious Right would be outraged.

"God hates them" 

"These people are the reason God is not blessing us, the reason why we are no longer great" 

"God is punishing us because we tolerate this kind" 

"We need to get rid of them in order for God to bless us and bring us prosperity and victory again"

Jesus drove his message further home by having dinner at Levi's house with a group of tax collectors and "sinners", those who did not tithe or follow the Jewish purity rituals and practices.  Eating with tax collectors and sinners is the issue that the teachers of the law who were Pharisees criticize him for.  To fully understand why this offended them, one has to look at table politics and etiquette in first century Judea.

Commensality, the practice of eating together, or its absence, was a sign of group membership. "Likes eat with Like." The meals of Judeans showed their group affiliation, or their separation. Food also functioned as a metaphor for the word of God. Concern for doctrinal and ethnic purity were mirrored in the dietary and commensality practices. 

Food, articulated in terms of who eats what with whom under which circumstances, had long been one of the most important languages in which Jews conceived and conducted social relations among human beings and between human beings and God. Food was a way of talking about the law and lawlessness (Gillian Feeley-Harnik1981:72).  
https://www3.nd.edu/~jneyrey1/meals.html

For the pharisaical teachers of the law, Jesus, who claimed authority to teach Scripture and therefore be one of their group, was acting as if their group included "these kind" of people.  He included those who were considered outside of the fellowship and love of God in the same group as the Teachers of the Law who considered themselves as holy and set apart.  By proclaiming the Tax Collectors and Sinners to be members of the same group as the Teachers of the Law, Jesus was also demanding that the Teachers of the Law treat them as they treat each other.  By eating with them he proclaimed them to be as special to God as the Teachers of the Law. This may be the main message of the community of Mark; all are included in the fellowship and love of God with no special favorites and none excluded. 

All are included in the fellowship and love of God with no special favorites and none excluded.

Now some with a more "fundamentalist" perspective of Christianity as a religion of rules, condemnation and control might focus on the last verse of the passage, verse seventeen, where Jesus replies to the question the Tachers of the Law who were Pharisees asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

A "conservative" view might see this as Jesus condemning the Tax Collectors and those at the meal who did not observe Jewish religious practices, the "sinners", and inferring that the only reason he associated with them was to cure them of the wickedness of their behavior and lifestyle.  I can picture the conservative mind imagining the scene at the meal consisting of Jesus lecturing them on the wickedness of their ways and refusing any fellowship and companionship that might taint him with their influence until they had agreed to bow their knee and recite the Sinner's Prayer with him.

However, there is no lecturing, preaching or condemnation by Jesus mentioned in the story.  In fact, the only group of people that Jesus ever condemns or lectures throughout the Gospels is the Pharisees and the teachers of the law.  What sort of lecture would Jesus preach during the meal to correct the "sinners" the Pharisees talk about?  What might he preach to those who failed to keep the Jewish purity rituals, laws and regulations which the Pharisees felt were the requirement to be right with God and an accepted part of their community?  Jesus himself was constantly being criticized by the Pharisees for not following these regulations to the degree they felt required.  He and his disciples didn't observe the proper washing rituals before eating and they were lax in following the dietary rules.  In fact in one of the Gospel stories when Jesus is sending out his disciples to teach his way, he specifically tells them when staying in someone's home to eat whatever is put before them without question.  He was always pushing the boundaries and deliberately breaking the religious laws, healing on the Sabbath, touching lepers, eating with the "unclean" to prove that the principles of equality, compassion and justice behind the law are more important than blind adherence.

To see Jesus' table fellowship with sinners as correction rather than inclusion also depends on the dubious presumption that Jesus considers the Pharisees and teachers of the law as healthy and righteous in terms of being preferred by God and in a right and whole relationship with God.  Since Jesus is answering the Pharisees it could appear he is implying that the Pharisees and their ilk are the healthy and the righteous, but I don't think that is what is going on here.

 

As we saw in the two earlier stories, sickness and disability is not associated with individual failing, moral lack, or a fundamental ineligibility to be part of community in this Gospel.  The issue is not the leprosy or the lameness per say, it is with how it causes the person to be excluded from the community and the community's fellowship with God.  Once Jesus personally absolves the lame man's sin he solves the man's problem of being excluded due to his inability to participate in Temple sacrifice and gain his forgiveness along with the rest in his community in that manner.  The healing is then an afterthought to prove a point to the teachers of the law.

One of the mistakes we as modern readers make with these stories is that we project our own cultural prejudices and values on them.  Individualism is a strong cultural perspective for us, but in this time community was the much stronger focus.  I believe the sickness that the writer has Jesus refer to is the exclusion of the Tax Collectors and "sinners" from the Jewish community, exclusion from fellowship with the community of God. It is a sickness of the community, not of the "sinner".

Note that Jesus never asks the sinners and tax collectors to change their actions and there is no discussion indicating that they make any changes.  The only action, the only change in behaviour, was on the part of Jesus and his disciples in including the outcasts as part of their group and as part of the wider religious and social community.

 

In the Gospel of Luke there is another story about Jesus eating in the home of a Tax Collector.  Jesus publically invites himself to the home of a chief tax collector named Zacchaeus.  In this story there is a change in behaviour by the outcast. When Jesus comes to his home, Zacchaeus pledges to give half of his goods to the poor and to restore fourfold anything he has taken from anyone by false accusation.  Nowhere in the story does Jesus condemn him or instruct him to do these things.  It is just a heartfelt reaction to the respect and dignity Jesus shows him through inclusion.

It is probably fitting to note here that the Gospels have Jesus state that all the Commandments and the Law, all that God expects of us, can be fulfilled by loving God and loving our neighbour as ourselves.  The only new commandment they have him give is that we love one another as he has loved us.

The Jesus of this passage as portrayed by the Community of Mark has little to no concern about rules to control peoples' behavior, or how individuals stack up to some behavioural standard.  His concern is only about the inclusion, the love, and the respect that the community should show everyone irregardless of their behavior or practices.  It is all about the faith that including and respecting others will generate a love that will be contagious and inspire others to act in the same way.  The only behaviour targeted is that of the wider community in excluding and margainalizing some of it's members.  That this inclusion and respect often inspires those ot embraces to act in the way they have been loved and respected is just a byproduct of the wholeness Jesus calls us to.

Your Sins Are Forgiven - Mark 2:1-12

A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. 2 They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. 3 Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. 4 Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

6 Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, 7 “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”

8 Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these things? 9 Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’? 10 But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the man, 11 “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” 12 He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”

In the beginning of the second chapter of the Gospel of Mark, we are back in Capernaum in the, "Galilee of the Gentiles".  This choice of setting by the community of Mark, who we believe had a large Gentile segment, was likely deliberate.  They may have found it important to portray Jesus as delivering his message primarily in areas that had a known Gentile population to reinforce to themselves that Jesus' teaching was not just for Jews.  There must have also been some importance to the community in telling the story of Jesus' early ministry as a rural populist movement.  They have him begin with rural grassroots support before moving him to the large urban centre of Jerusalem.

On his return to Capernaum, Jesus has gained quite a reputation and a large crowd has gathered to hear him; so large that they overflowed the meeting place and were surrounding the building to hear his word.  This must have irked the religious authorities to no end, particularly the, "teachers of the law".  These were religious leaders who had not yet gained the credentials to give their own interpretation, or teaching, but had completed the training and had the permissions to teach accepted interpretations and teachings from those who did.  

The teachers of the law, to get this title would have to have been the best at their Beth Sefer and then their Beth Midrash.  They may have already spent time as a student of a certified Rabbi in order to work their way to the point where they might someday be considered as a candidate for semicha, Rabbinic ordination, and be granted their own s'mikhahto, "authority", and be able to give their own teaching.  Now they had to watch this country bumpkin, shaman, and faith healer draw in crowds of admirers that had come to hang on the words of a teaching he had no right or authority to give.  Why should he get the honour and respect that should be shown to those like themselves who had worked for it and earned it.  No wonder they were spoiling for a fight and looking to find fault that they might discredit him with the people.

Jesus provides that fault when he tells the paralyzed man that his sins are forgiven.  Actually, Jesus identifies what their criticism is going to be before they even get a chance to say it.  "Only God can forgive sins.  Are you so deluded that you think you are God?"  The writer answers the question both for the crowd in the story and for those Jews that would have questioned the legitimacy of Jesus as a criticism of the writer's community.  He does it in a way that both denies Jesus' divinity and establishes his right to give his teaching.

The writer does this in two ways; first in the title he has Jesus claim, and second in the act of healing the paralyzed man.  In Jesus response to the question, "Do you think you are God", he calls himself, "the Son of Man".  This both denies any claim at divinity and names his authority as stemming from his role as one of God's Prophets, one that is chosen by God to speak on his behalf.

"Son of Man", literally in Hebrew, "Human Being",  is the title most often used by God in the Hebrew Scriptures to address one of his Prophets to emphasise the difference between God's divine stature and the Prophet's mortal humanity.  But, noting the semantics, the writer is having Jesus claim another source of authority as well.  Jesus doesn't just call himself a Son of Man, but, "the", Son of Man.  Thereby stating that he is the Messiah, God's chosen king for the new Messianic Age.

“In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. (Daniel 7:13 NIV)

"The Son of Man", is a title referring to the final king in Daniel's vision in the seventh chapter of the Book of Daniel who is described as being" like a son of man". In the vision, four future rulers are portrayed as beast like creatures.  After these leaders a fifth ruler is portrayed as a human/angelic figure.  This last king is given authority and dominion over the earth.  Note the semantics again.  The writer is not having Jesus claim to be, " The One Like a Son of Man".  He is claiming to be the person represented in the vision by an angelic figure, not an angelic creature himself.  Just as the preceding kings in the vision represented as beasts are revealed in the susequent interpretation in the passage as being human leaders of actual empires, the, "one like a son of man", is explained in the interpretation as being an actual man chosen by God to have authority and dominion over the earth.  And, as Jesus explains in the story, this includes the authority to forgive sins.

He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed. (Daniel 7:14 NIV)

The second way Jesus establishes his right to give his own teaching and give authority to the claim he has just made in the story, is to heal the paralyzed man.  The fact that God performs acts of miraculous mercy through Jesus proves that God affirms Jesus' words.  If what Jesus says is not from God, why would God show his power through him?  This is why it was important for the writer and his community to include so many stories of Jesus', "mighty deeds".

The passage also raises a question about the community's view on the cause of illness and infirmaries.  It looks at first glance that they are attributing the cause of the man's paralysis to some sin that he has committed.  However, a closer look at the passage shows the forgiveness of his sin and the healing of his paralysis are two separate acts.  The man is still paralyzed after Jesus forgives his sin.  It is not until after Jesus decides he needs to give the religious authorities an object lesson on his right to forgive sin and commands the man to get up does the healing occur.

So, what was this sin and why in the story is it made more important for the man to be forgiven than healed?  Imagine the bewilderment of the man's four friends.  The man's reuse of his legs was obviously of great importance to them and they made a herculean effort to get him in front of Jesus in order to get that fixed.  They had just worked as a team to haul the guy up on top of the house, dig through the roof and lower him inside on a mat.  Then all Jesus does is proclaim that the guy's sin is forgiven.

Or, were they bewildered?  The modern reader might think they would be, but there is no response from them or the crowd that Jesus missed the point of what they wanted.  To the Jewish mind of the time, the need to have one's sin forgiven was extremely important and prerequset to being accepted by God and by the community.  This was done by making sacrifice at the temple.  But, as a cripple, this man was excluded from the temple, was excluded from forgiveness, and was therefore a social outcast.

16 The Lord said to Moses, 17 “Say to Aaron: ‘For the generations to come none of your descendants who has a defect may come near to offer the food of his God. 18 No man who has any defect may come near: no man who is blind or lame, disfigured or deformed; (Leviticus 21:16-18)

8 Now David said on that day, “Whoever climbs up by way of the water shaft and defeats the Jebusites (the lame and the blind, who are hated by David’s soul), he shall be chief and captain.”Therefore they say, “The blind and the lame shall not come into the house.” (2 Samuel 5:8)

The four friends would never have expected Jesus to forgive the man's sin, but it served for them the primary goal, to bring him back into full fellowship with God and their community.  This would have been an important part of the story to the community of Mark.  They were saying that none among them, were they Gentile, female, crippled, or homosexual, were by their nature, or by virtue of who they were, excluded from Jesus' kingdom, or the full fellowship of God.  

A Man with Leprosy - Mark 1:40-45

40 A man with leprosy[h] came to him and begged him on his knees, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.”  41 Jesus was indignant.[i] He reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!”42 Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.  43 Jesus sent him away at once with a strong warning: 44 “See that you don’t tell this to anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” 45 Instead he went out and began to talk freely, spreading the news. As a result, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.
h. Mark 1:40 The Greek word traditionally translated leprosy was used for various diseases affecting the skin.
i. Mark 1:41 Many manuscripts Jesus was filled with compassion

This story marks the beginning of a theme important to the community of Mark in their Gospel, the elevation of compassion over purity as the imitation of God. The significance of the skin disease is that it made the man, "unclean", a literal untouchable according to the laws of Leviticus.

The Lord said to Moses and Aaron,2 “When anyone has a swelling or a rash or a shiny spot on their skin that may be a defiling skin disease,[a] they must be brought to Aaron the priest or to one of his sons[b] who is a priest. 3 The priest is to examine the sore on the skin, and if the hair in the sore has turned white and the sore appears to be more than skin deep, it is a defiling skin disease. When the priest examines that person, he shall pronounce them ceremonially unclean.

1. Leviticus 13:2 The Hebrew word for defiling skin disease, traditionally translated “leprosy,” was used for various diseases affecting the skin; here and throughout verses 3-46.

Someone who was, "unclean", was excluded from the worship of God. They were not allowed to come near the Tabernacle ( Num 5:3 ).  It placed a person in a "dangerous" condition under threat of divine retribution, even death ( Lev 15:31). Uncleanness among the people in general was feared. It could lead to expulsion by God of the land's inhabitants ( Lev 18:25 ) and its threat remained on those who did not undergo purification ( Lev 17:16 ; Num 19:12-13 ).

An unclean person was not allowed to eat or tithe consecrated food ( Lev 7:20-21 ; Deut 26:14), and had to celebrate the Passover with a month's delay (Num 9:6-13 ). An unclean person in general had to avoid that which was holy and take steps to return to a state of cleanness. Priests were to avoid becoming ritually defiled ( Leviticus 21:1-4 Leviticus 21:11-12 ), and if defiled, had to abstain from sacred duties.

Not only was a person with leprosy considered to be in an ongoing state of ritual uncleanliness, but anyone who touched that person became unclean as well until they underwent purification. This involved waiting a period of time (until evening for minor cases), and could also involve ritual washings symbolizing cleansing, atoning sacrifices, and priestly rituals.

As such, those with leprosy were treated as a pariah:

If a person contracted the contagious type, a priest declared him a leper and banished him from his home and city. He had to cry, "Unclean" when other people came near. Anyone who came in contact with a leper was also considered unclean. Lepers were not permitted to travel on the roadway, nor could they have any social contact with "clean" people. Therefore, lepers were isolated from the rest of the community so that the members of the community could maintain their status as worshipers. The leper was sent to live in a community with other lepers until he died. Lepers were social outcasts.
Once a man or woman was deemed leprous, he was totally abandoned by society. He had to keep his distance from others: six feet if there was no prevailing wind and over 100 feet if the wind was blowing. He also had to warn anyone in the vicinity that a leper was near by, crying out, "Unclean, unclean!" Upon hearing such a cry, the "normal" people of society would retreat to their homes or run away from the presence of the leper. No one dared to touch a leper either, for to do so would make a person ceremonially unclean. Anything the leper touched became unclean. (Life Application New Testament CommentaryBy Bruce B. Barton, Livingstone)

Persons with leprosy were not to be pitied or treated with compassion.  It was felt that they deserved their fate, that their affliction was a just punishment from God.  Many of the 55 times leprosy is mentioned in the old Testament are in association with punishment or the consequences of sin.  (https://answersingenesis.org/biology/disease/biblical-leprosy-shedding-light-on-the-disease-that-shuns/ )

When, in the story in this passage, the man with leprosy approaches Jesus, the man is breaking the rules regarding proximity and social contact.  He puts Jesus, and the crowd that was most likely around him, at risk of becoming unclean themselves and unable to worship God.  Jesus, however, instead of shunning or rebuking him, not only interacted with the man, but also touched him to heal him, making himself unclean. 


The reason given for Jesus' shocking action is his compassion, his desire to see the man healed.  His compassion in wanting to see the man returned to fellowship with the people and with God overrode any concerns over religious purity and ritual cleanliness.  

The Greek word in verse 41 translated as, "indignant", or, "filled with compassion", is, σπλαγχνισθεὶς (splanchnistheis 4697).  Literally it means to have the seat of ones affections moved.

Cognate: 4697 splagxnízomai – "fromsplanxna, 'the inward parts,' especially the nobler entrails – the heart, lungs, liver, and kidneys. These gradually came to denote the seat of the affections" 

To translate this to say that Jesus was indignant at the idea that he might be unwilling to heal the man highlights Jesus attitude even more. No one is unworthy of restoration and inclusion with God and his people no matter what ritual and law stands in the way. To suggest as much is an affront to Jesus' very nature. Love and compassion is priority over law and purity.

It would seem pretty obvious why the community of Mark added this story.  This is a community that includes gentiles and women, people who were by their very nature considered to be, "unclean", by Judaic law and ineligible for full communion and worship of God.  This story told them that they were included, that no ritual or religious law could bar them from full membership in the community and the faith, and that Jesus' coming kingdom was for all of them.

I imagine this story would be especially meaningful to the Gentile members of the community and their advocates since it would remind them of another healing of leprosy told in the fifth chapter of Second Kings.

In the story from 2 Kings, God heals from leprosy the Gentile Naaman, the commander of the king of Aram's army, through his prophet Elisha. This is something there was no precedent of God doing even for those of Isreal.  It portrays Gentiles as being eligible for God's compassion and mercy.

The message of this story that was important to the community of Mark was that compassion is more important than purity.  This is the higher quality of God that they should imitate.  This compassion called them to include in their community and in their worship those who had been marginalized and disenfranchised.

Morning Prayer - Mark 1:35-39

35 Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. 36 Simon and his companions went to look for him, 37 and when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!”

38 Jesus replied, “Let us go somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach there also. That is why I have come.” 39 So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons.

One of the objectives of this blog is to discover the view point of the writers of the Gospel and their community. Why did they pick these stories?  What did these stories mean to them, and why did they tell them in the manner in which they did?  So, how does this apply to the passage above? 

We explored earlier how Jesus, the founder of their Jewish sect, had no mainstream credentials. He had no recognized right by the Jewish religious authorities to offer his own teaching, his own Mishnah, or interpretation of Scripture. Not having been certified by semicha, rabbinic ordination, Jesus did not have, s'mikhahto, "authority". His claim to legitimacy and the right to speak rests on being a Chasidium, a Rabbi who can dispense the mercy of God. As such, Jesus' message and mission depends on his personal revelation of, intimacy with, and favor from God rather than the continuation of existing recognized teaching or the agendas of the current religious authority.  

As members of a Jewish sect that followed Jesus' teaching, this community must have had to answer to other Jews and to themselves why they did not observe the same purity laws and rituals, or to the same degree.  What right did their founder have to give them a different direction?  Stories like this would reinforce their conviction that their teacher's direction came from personal interaction with God.  This story shows Jesus seeking out communication and intimacy with God as the source for his message and the purpose for his mission.  It follows that, after an early morning of isolated prayer, Jesus is presented as announcing his intention and purpose to preach throughout Galilee.