Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
https://soundcloud.com/hapearce/reflection-for-july-31-2025
Mark 7:1-23
Clean and Unclean
The Pharisees and some of the teachers of the law who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus 2 and saw some of his disciples eating food with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed. 3 (The Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they give their hands a ceremonial washing, holding to the tradition of the elders. 4 When they come from the marketplace they do not eat unless they wash. And they observe many other traditions, such as the washing of cups, pitchers and kettles.)
5 So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with ‘unclean’ hands?”
6 He replied, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:
“‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
7 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are but rules taught by men.’
8 You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.”
9 And he continued, “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’ 11 But you say that if anyone says to their father or mother: ‘Whatever help you might otherwise have received from me is Corban (that is, a gift devoted to God), 12 then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. 13 Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.”
14 Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. 15 Nothing outside a person can make them ‘unclean’ by going into them. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that makes them ‘unclean.’”
17 After he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about this parable. 18 “Are you so dull?” he asked. “Don’t you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? 19 For it doesn’t go into their heart but into their stomach, and then out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared all foods clean.)
20 He went on: “What comes out of a person is what makes them ‘unclean.’ 21 For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, 22 adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. 23 All these evils come from inside and make a person ‘unclean.’”
It seems to me that many modern Christians believe the traditional Hebrew laws on purity — things like the prohibition of eating pork — were meant to protect God’s chosen people from various illnesses that are less of a problem with modern hygiene and food-preparation practices like refrigeration and preservatives. I guess the reason people believe that is that they’re trying to explain why the traditional purity laws were binding on the people of Israel, but aren’t binding on us today. But I can’t help feeling that this is a mistaken belief. After all, there were other ethnic groups living around the Hebrew people who ate pork and shellfish all the time and did just fine with them.
I’d like to suggest a different understanding of the laws of Moses. It seems to me that the real point of those laws — and especially the purity laws — was to remind the Hebrews that they were a people set apart by God for his holy purposes. This system of ritual purity was meant, it seems to me, to be a daily reminder that God’s people were called to be a counterculture, and to live with a purity of heart and spirit that made them different from all other peoples.
Over the centuries, it seems that the covenant people sort of lost perspective on this way of thinking about the rules of purity. Instead of regarding them as practices that reminded them to live holy lives, the Hebrews fell into the habit of thinking that just doing the rituals – washing your hands in a certain way before meals, or cleansing yourself after childbirth or menstruation and so on – was all it took to make you pure and holy in God’s eyes.
(That, by the way, is one of the great dangers of rituals of the faith. They are meant to serve as reminders of how God wants us to live, but people keep making the mistake of thinking that the rituals themselves make us godly. It’s as if the rituals have magic power. Baptism is a good example. Some people mistakenly believe you can’t be saved unless you’re baptized. But baptism is a reminder of the new life we live as followers of Jesus, not a magic act that saves you.)
Sometimes Jesus and his disciples were criticized because they didn’t always strictly observe all these religious rituals. The Pharisees criticized them for eating without performing the prescribed hand-washing ritual. And that doesn’t mean they routinely ate with dirty hands. The rituals had to be done in very specific ways to guarantee purity. But in response to the Pharisees, Jesus said that lots of those who strictly observe the traditional practices were guilty of sins that made them far from pure and holy.
In our reading for today, Jesus gives a specific example of a religious practice with overall effects that were more sinful than holy. The religious leadership had established a system whereby people could make a formal commitment to leave all their wealth to the temple when they died. We have this practice in our time — it’s formally called a ‘charitable remainder trust.’ People use their money when they’re alive, then leave it to some good cause when they die.
The problem in Jesus’ time was that some people were making this commitment to the temple, and getting the VIP status that goes with making a generous gift. But then, people would refuse to provide any support for their needy parents, leaving elderly people on the edge of starvation. That might have fit with the temple rules, but nobody who gave it a moment’s thought could believe that it was consistent with God’s commandment to honor your father and mother.
When it comes to maintaining a pure way of life, Jesus said it’s pointless to worry about the dirt that comes from the outside, or even about what kind of food you eat. Those things can’t really make us ‘unclean’ in God’s eyes. What makes us unclean are the sins we commit. Then Jesus lists some of those sins. He includes the sins we enjoy talking about so much — like sexual sins and theft and murder. But he also includes sins like malice and greed and slander and envy and arrogance. Unless I’m very much mistaken, just about all of us can find some of our own sins on that list.
And no amount of ritual hand-washing can make us clean from our sins – unless it also reminds us to wash away our real ‘uncleanness’ by confessing our sins and committing our hearts to live more and more in imitation of the standard God set for us in Jesus.
Let’s pray. Lord, we ask that with each day that we live, you would be working in our hearts to make us more and more pure in your sight – more obedient to your commandments, more loving to your children, more devoted in serving others in your name and making Jesus known wherever we go. Amen.
Blessings,
Henry
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