THE PHARISEES’ TRADITION CHIDED, (REBUKED) V. 1-23

1) “Then came together unto Him the Pharisees,” (kai sunagontai prosauton hoi Pharisaioi) “And the Pharisees came in assembly to Him,” a band of the Pharisees.

2) “And certain of the scribes,” (kai tines grammateon) “And some of the scribes;” The term “certain” indicates picked or selected scribes, for the purpose and with the intent of, watching and entangling our Lord in error.

3) “Which came from Jerusalem.” (elthontes apo lerousolumon) “Who had come or were having come down from Jerusalem,” where there was much hostility among the leaders against Jesus and His followers (His church then functioning), up in Galilee, Mar 3:22. The distance of more than sixty miles that they had traveled indicates their zeal in efforts to entrap and destroy Jesus.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES

Mar. 7:3. Oft.Literally, with the fist, hence vigorously. The idea is, that the Pharisees had inaugurated an elaborate and painstaking ceremonial, which was now adopted by the whole body of the Jews. The Evangelist may possible mean, that it was actually a part of the prescribed ritual to keep the one hand closed while the other was being rubbed with it.

Mar. 7:4. Wash.Either , take a bath, or , sprinkle water over themselves. Have received to hold.Accepted as suitable or worthy to retain (or hold fast).

Mar. 7:11-13. For true reading and rendering see R. V. When an unnatural son wished, either in a temporary fit of passion, or under the goad of an abiding selfishness, to get quit of the importunity of a destitute father or mother, he had just to say, in reference to whatever was craved, Corban! and then not only was he released from obligation to assist his needy parent, but was actually bound, as by the highest authority, to withhold the desired relief. Nor was it necessary that he should actually make the offering to the service of God; he might keep it himself, or do anything he chose with it, save only that he must not give it to his parent! Could human ingenuity go further in the direction of annulling the Word of God?

Mar. 7:18. Are ye so, etc.Or, What! are ye also void of understanding?

Mar. 7:19. It is difficult to determine whether the words purging (or cleansing) all meats are a part of our Lords discourse, or an explanatory addition by the Erangelist. The R. V., following Origen, Chrysostom, and Gregory Thaumaturgus, adopts the latter interpretation, reading for the of the Textus Receptus; and certainly the which immediately follows looks like an indication that the quotation of Christs words, after being broken off for a moment, is now resumed. He saith (and in so saying He cleanseth all meats). And He said further Dr. Jas. Morison, however, while defending as the true reading, thinks that it must apparently refer to the draught, which, by receiving the refuse, draws off as it were the impurities of the food, or those elements that remain after the nutritive ingredients have been eliminated and assimilated.Mr. J. B. McClellan, on the other hand, decides against , on the ground that although it has far the greatest external support, yet as Wordsworth has noted, the itacism of and is so common in MSS. that this fact is of little weight against the ordinary rules of grammatical construction, and, he might have added, against the certain requirements of the sense. It was not by the appeal and explanation to the disciples in our present verse, but by the original declaration to the multitude in Mar. 7:15, that our Lord made all meats clean. Hence in the verse before us the masc. is out of place in regard to our Lord. In every other reference it is grammatically untenable. With all confidence therefore we retain the neut. , and construct it in apposition with the sentence.

Mar. 7:22. Covetousness.The word is in the plural: for this greedy lust of lawless having runs out on more lines than one: it is a moral monster of several tentacles: like the cuttle-fish, it puts forth many feelers armed with suckers. Avarice is a branch only of the root covetousness. Sometimes this pleonexy, or amor sceleratus habendi, is associated with adultery: but in that case it less denotes the lust of impurity than connotes a lawless desire to overreach ones neighbour; for the adulterer defrauds the husband in seizing what is the husbands property. In short, love of pleasure, and love of money, and love of power are but so many forms of this unbridled and unhallowed possessiveness. Wickedness.Also in plural: villainiesactive wrongdoing of all sorts. Jeremy Taylor explains it as an aptness to do shrewd turns, to delight in mischief and tragedies; a love to trouble our neighbour and to do him ill offices; crossness, perverseness, and peevishness of action in our intercourse. An evil eye.Niggardliness as to ones own possessions, and envy as to those of others. See Deu. 15:9; Deu. 28:54; Sir. 14:8-10; Tob. 4:7-9; Mat. 6:23; Mat. 20:15. Blasphemy.Reviling either of God or man. Pride.An overbearing attitude. Folly.Senselessness or infatuation. Such is the true nature of all sin.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Mar. 7:1-23

(PARALLEL: Mat. 15:1-20.)

The tradition of men.

I. Traditionalists conspiring against Christ.

1. Their evil design. See Joh. 7:1.

2. Their cunning method. They sought to bring in our Lord guilty of impiety by teaching His disciples to transgress the tradition of the elders.

II. Traditionalists confounded by Christ.

1. By shewing that they taught for doctrines the commandments of men which were in opposition to the commandments of God.
2. By shewing the folly of these human traditions.

Lessons.

1. A sad tendency of human natureto honour God with the lips while the heart is far from Him.

2. The manifestation of this tendency (Mar. 7:8-9).

3. The real source of evilthe human heart.

4. The manifestations of the controlling power of the sinful heart (Mar. 7:21-22).

5. Real defilement before Godthat of the inner source of evil.D. C. Hughes.

Christian controversy.Christ, when on earth, maintained two descriptions of intercourse with the people: the one was of a friendly and social nature, such as a friend maintains with his friend, when a congeniality of mind, combined with a similarity of habit, is found to subsist between them; the other was controversial, when proclaiming the true character, mind, and will of His Heavenly Father in opposition to the false opinions entertained respecting Him by the scribes and Pharisees, who, while altogether uninfluenced by the spirituality of what they taught, nevertheless maintained such strictness in the form and selfish regard for the moral requirements of religion, that, being irreproachable in the sight of men, they vainly conceived they must be equally so in the sight of God, forgetting or being wilfully ignorant that, whilst men judged from the appearance only, His all-seeing eye penetrated within the veil, discerning the thoughts and intents of the heart. Respecting the first of these two, namely, our Lords social and friendly intercourse with men, we may well conceive the meek, the gentle, yet dignified Jesus a guest within the house of one of His disciples, unfolding the nature of God to those in company with Him, announcing Him a Spirit who cannot be deceived, and who claims from His creatures a worship in spirit and in truth, which, when rendered, He willingly accepts, and mercifully pardons their transgressions. But though there were some who gladly received Him, and listened with the purest joy to His holy conversation, they were comparatively but few, and for the most part humble in their circumstances; whilst the great majoritythe wealthy, the noble, and the learnedstood opposed to Him, ever on the watch to entangle Him in His talk, and find something whereof they might accuse Him to their rulers, and so be rid of One whose arguments they could not meet, and whose positions they could not controvert; yet with the most uncompromising integrity did the Saviour stand His ground, exposing the falsehood, the fraud, the errors, or the hypocrisy of those who from their superior education ought to have been the first to recognise Him as Messiah and submit to His authority, combating wrong notions, rectifying mistaken principles, whenever or by whomsoever advanced. This controversial intercourse in no small degree characterised our Lords ministry; nor could it be maintained without incurring all that hatred and opposition which the exposure of falsehood and error is sure to draw down on the person whose sense of moral responsibility would prevail to incite to it; still, disagreeable as is the office of setting those right who have been all their lives wrong, it becomes a solemn obligation, because involving the exercise of that charity or love which will not suffer us to see an immortal being persisting in a course obviously opposed to the will of God without warning him of his danger. With the psalmist the true and faithful servant of Christ can say, All false ways I utterly abhor. Receiving his instructions from that Divine Master, he learns to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints, and as a good soldier, serving a good Master, to endure hardness in the contention, when others oppose themselves and would pervert the right ways of the Lord, knowing as he does that there is no other name under heaven given among men [but Jesus Christ], whereby we must be saved (Act. 4:12); nor can any man lay any other foundation on which to build his hopes for admission into heaven hereafter than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ (1Co. 3:11). Thus does the Bible furnish one great saving truth, and one only, which men are called upon to receive, and which, if they reject, they reject at their peril. To proclaim Gods eternal and unalterable truth, whether men will hear or whether they will forbear, is charitylove unfeigned. Would it be charity to suffer some dear friend or relative to languish from day to day upon the bed of sickness and not administer the medicine which the physicians skill had prescribed for a cure, lest it might prove nauseous and unpalatable? Would it be charity if, passing through a town at dead of night, and seeing a house on fire, we should refrain from rousing its inhabitants, through fear of disturbing their slumbers? Or would it be charity if, observing a blind man fearlessly to approach a precipice, we should be silent, suffer him to advance on his destruction, and not tell him of his danger? We protest against such charity as this. We prefer the discharge of our duty, as faithful ambassadors of the Lord Jesus Christ, commissioned to preach repentance towards God, and faith in Him who has sent us; we are ready, in maintaining the Lords controversy with His people, to endure the worlds misrepresentation. Nevertheless we do maintain that our labour is labour of love, the work of faith, the fruit whereof is charity out of a pure heart. Our Lord did not shrink from the work which the Father had given Him to do because of the misconstruction put upon His conduct by the enemies-of righteousness, nor was He restrained by the rude rebuffs of an insolent world; no, He loved even His cruel persecutors too well to suffer them to run upon their ruin without telling them the consequences which would inevitably result, should they pass from time to eternity without effecting their reconciliation with God, through Him, the only Mediator. In what moral darkness would the world now be plunged had error and falsehood been progressing for the last eighteen hundred years in a ratio similar to what it had been up to the period of the Saviours manifestation in the flesh, to detect and dissipate the fearful gloom by the shining of the glorious gospel of truth into the hearts of His people! An accumulation of falsehood such as dissolved the tie of filial affection and filial duty, on the childs telling his aged and perhaps destitute parent that it was Corban, that is to say a gift, by whatsoever that parent might be profited by him, suffering the son no more to do ought for his father or his motherthus permitting a corrupt and unnatural tradition, derived from sinful and selfish men, virtually to repeal the fifth commandment, given by God Himself, and the unwritten expedient of human policy to supersede the unalterable will of Jehovah, proclaimed with a trumpets tongue amidst thunderings and lightnings and smoke, which, the people seeing, removed and stood afar off. Had falsehood thus audaciously advanced, what bonds would have proved strong enough for uniting the relative positions of society, what barriers have restrained the overflowings of ungodliness, or checked the violation of natural affection, when thus sanctioned by uninspired and lawless traditions, usurping the sacred authority of Gods Holy Word? The scribes and Pharisees ranked the foremost in opposing our Lord in all His teaching; their principal error consisted in a superstitious regard for the traditions of the elders; and to such a length did they carry their veneration for this description of authority that there was scarcely a passage of any moment in the sacred records that was not frittered away, and its plain and obvious meaning lost in the false glosses put upon it by these unauthorised means, making the Word of God of none effect through their traditions: their scrupulous exactness regarding external cleanliness made them unconcerned respecting that which was of higher importance, though hidden and unseenthe heartand for the cleansing of which one (who, had they remembered him as an elder, it would have been well) evinced such anxiety that he prayed, Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Their spring of action, however, arising from a desire to be seen of men rendered them totally indifferent about any and everything not having human applause for its object, so that the heart, the inward part, where God requires truth to dwell, was overlooked and unattended to by them. Such were the practices and such the doctrine which our Lord on the present occasion set Himself to refute, shewing how injurious in its effect was every deviation from the written Word; for however useful the tradition of the elders might be for the well-regulating of society or establishing habits of personal cleanliness, yet it would be infinitely better to forego it altogether, than by adopting it cast a slight upon a much higher authority. To teach for doctrines the commandments of men was a most grievous error, and fraught with the most dangerous consequences, for which reason our Lord fearlessly condemns it, and nobly reproves those who, whilst professing an honour for Gods Word, would sanction a system which directly insulted it. Well hath Esaias prophesied of you, hypocrites, etc. Then instancing the case of the fifth commandment, Jesus proceeds to shew that it was not external cleanliness, or the neglect of itwashing the hands on certain occasions, or omitting itnot one sort of meat or another; in fact, nothing from without a man, entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man. What is in the heart the heart will, like a fountain, be sending up, until changed by Divine grace; for by nature it is a corrupt fountain, and consequently from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, etc. Let us take any of these evil things which abide in the heart of the unconverted and natural man, and observe its process of defilement.

1. Look at covetousness, e.g. the love of money, justly called the root of all evil. What can debase the soul more than this all-absorbing lust?hours, days, weeks, months, and years, nay, a mans entire life, passed in contrivances whereby to increase his store of gold, involving too often falsehood and deceit in order to attain his object; and when attained, with what complacency does he regard his success! Nor does moderate success satisfy him, verifying the proverb, Much must have more,religion discarded, its ordinances contemned, the Lords Day itself polluted, that nothing may impede his unhallowed pursuit of gain. Whence come the murders, the thefts, of which our Lord speaks? Come they not from covetousness? While other evils are partial in their operation, this takes no rest, knows no intermission, will have no repose. If the laws of the land protect the property of the owner from the aggression of the violent, and the penalty attached to the violation of the law restrains the covetous man from unlawfully attacking that which is anothers, yet how near will he approach the forbidden limit! If he is honest, he is hardly so; if he does bear restraint, tis with a bad grace: the evil lust of covetousness withers every generous sentiment; the sons and daughters of adversity may pine and die ere the sordid mind of covetousness would be moved to commiserate or relieve; nought is known but self; gold is the idol to whose service not only the bodily energies but the affections of the heart and all the faculties of the mind are devoted.

2. Consider, also, the countless impurities contained under the head evil thoughts. You are quite conscious of the vain ideas which run to and fro in the mind throughout the four-and-twenty hours of the day, so vain and evil that we should feel ashamed to speak of them to our nearest or dearest friend, and would be glad were they blotted from our memory the moment they recur to us; yet God searches and knows us, etc. (Psa. 139:1-4).

3. Look, again, at the insidious working of pride, often at the very moment when we think ourselves most humble,at one time piquing ourselves upon the elegance or beauty of our persons; at another regarding ourselves with the utmost satisfaction on a comparison with some one whom we look down upon as an inferior, either in birth, or fortune, or education, or mental capacity. Examine one or all, or which you will, of these evil things, and, oh! what an abyss of defilement forms itself, fed by that corrupt stream which ever flows from that polluted source, an unconverted heart, deceitful as it is above all things, and desperately wicked. Well might Abraham call himself sinful dust and ashes, or Job exclaim, Behold, I am vile, or Isaiah, I am a man of unclean lips: for who can know the depths of its depravity? Jesus knew them, and in our text declares them. And yet there is nothing over which we can exercise less control than our thoughts: a thought, a foolish or a corrupt thought, rises in the heart, and, like the blood in the natural system, is in an instant propelled through every inlet of the mind, and has fastened itself on us ere we are aware; and such is the strength and subtlety of that fiend who suggests the evil thought, that it not infrequently happens that what we desire to think least about is that which, through his agency, we think most of. I see from this review of my natural corrupt heart, says the newly awakened sinner, that it requires cleansing, must have renewing, must be fully converted, before I should either like heaven or be received in thither. But what can I do? It is not in my power to change my heart, and so produce a new current of thought, which would make me relish the pure and holy enjoyments of the redeemed,the work is superhuman. Beloved, you are quite right; the work is superhuman. But though powerless in ourselves, though the work of converting the sinners heart is superhuman, yet it is not impossible that Christ, by whom God the Father works, having put all things in subjection to Him, having given Him all power in heaven and in earth, power even to bend the stubborn and rebellious heart of His sinful creatures, He can cleanse and purify the fountain, so that the stream of thought shall run pure and holy. What says St. Paul, after confessing himself a wretched being, unable to deliver himself from the body of death, a naturally wicked heart? I can do all things through Christ strengthening me. Christ has changed and renewed the hearts of millions. The way in which He accomplishes this important change is worthy of attention. First He sends His Holy Spirit into the heart, whereby the sinner is enabled to take a view of that corrupt stream which flows from it, and upon an examination of the evil things spoken of in our text to feel its sinfulness, then acknowledge in prostrate humility those particulars which offend us most to the Lord Jesus Christ, not in the least palliating them, but laying them open to Him in all their fearful aggravations, till we abhor ourselves, and cry, Unclean! unclean! His next influence upon the heart is to make the sinner renounce himself as bankrupt in righteousness, and desire above all things the imputation of Christs righteousness as his only hope. From thence he is led to recognise Christ as greater in his behalf than he who seeks his destruction. These feelings grow with his growth and strengthen with his strength, until sin is hated and shunned; and though the remains of indwelling sin may tease and harass the Christian, yet it has altogether lost its supremacy in his heart. Thus is the poor sinner changed by the Holy Spirit from the power of Satan to the power of God, and from rejoicing in the perishing things of time and sense to rejoice in God his Saviour, who has done such great things for him: from that time, also his conversation is in heaven, from whence he also looks for the Saviour.M. J. Taylor.

Insincerity in worship.The great sin of hypocrisy, laid by our Saviour to the charge of the Jews in His time, had been charged, long before, upon the same people by Isaiah. A sin thus chargeable upon the same people at various periods of their history may justly be considered as a national sin. But then it must be borne in mind, that it was a sin on account of which it was not competent to the Gentile world, that is, to the great bulk of mankind, to reproach the Jewish nation, or, on account of their own exemption from it, to flatter or felicitate themselves. If the Jew satisfied himself with the outward confession of God and the lip-honour he paid Him, the Gentile world did not pay even that, but offered a debasing worship to idols. So far from being in a condition to look down upon the Jew, the Gentile had a great step to take to be even upon a level with him. The Jew was so far right that he believed in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. The Jews worship was, in form and externals, such as God Himself had appointed, and their notions of Himself such as He had taught them. How then is it spoken of with disapprobation instead of praise, both by Isaiah in his time and our Saviour in His? There was the outward shew, not the inward feeling; great professions, but little practice; long prayers, and cold hearts. A question then arises whether we of these times and this nation are concerned in our Lords remark. Now I hope there is neither flattery nor self-deceit in saying that it is not true of us in the same sense and degree as it was of the Jews. I find what I think to be error, wrongheadedness, an uncharitable and angry spirit, in the language and writings of men, on religious subjects, but little that I can presume to call insincerity. Then, again, the endeavour to make up by high professions and scrupulosity in little things for laxity in great things is a vain endeavour now. Men are disgusted by such attempts. They look with a more indulgent eye upon the open and avowed violator of Gods laws, than upon him who, by a shew of piety, would cover or make up for a selfish and licentious life. But although the sin of hypocrisy should not be chargeable, as a national sin, upon us at this time, in the same degree that it was upon the Jews in our Saviours time and in the time of Isaiah, it still remains for each man to ask himself whether it be chargeable upon him as an individual in any degree or sense. I fear we shall find that there is a sense in which it is chargeable upon us all.

1. I lay the case of the blasphemer out of consideration, as one that can consist only with an estranged state of the heart from God, and as one not falling within the range of our Lords observation, and I would ask whether we are not oftentimes forgetful of God, when engaged, not in things which He has forbidden, but even in things which He has commanded. When we pray, for example, are we then all of us, are we any of us, so attentive as we ought to be to the work we are about? It is the mind, the serious and attentive mind, that gives life to forms and effect to prayer. It is, no doubt, a difficult thing to keep the attention fixed upon the proper object of worship, and to prevent the intrusion of idle thoughts.
(1) One reason of this may be, that that object is invisible, and no man hath seen God at any time. It was, I presume, as an expedient to help attention, and as a resource against the difficulty we speak of, that image-worship came to be so much practised.
(2) Another reason is, that when we are engaged in our ordinary work-day business, we are wont, without ceasing from that business or neglecting it at all, to give the mind leave to range and wander through a variety of subjects. Practice has made us so perfect in those operations whereby we have long earned our bread, that we can perform them correctly with a degree of attention so slight that we are hardly conscious of exerting it. Now this is not only pleasant, but innocent, if the thoughts be employed upon things innocent. But this will not do in worship. If the mind is not in this work it cannot prosper. We can say our prayers, no doubt, as we can do other familiar things, with little exertion of attention, and give the thoughts leave to settle on other subjects; but when we do so we pray in vain, or, more properly speaking, do not pray at all. That is wanting which is essential to prayeran attentive mind and an awakened heart. It has been recommended to those who lament their proneness to this wandering inattention in prayer not to clothe their private addresses to God with any wordsnot to say, but as it were to think their prayers to God. This advice proceeds upon the supposition that the method of using thought alone, unclothed in words, may prevent self-deceit, and make us at once perceive that if we are not praying internally, with the understanding and the feelings, we are doing nothing.
2. Again, we may be said to worship God in vain, and to draw nigh to Him with our lips while our hearts are far from Him, if we continue in sin, or intend so to do. The principal subject of a good mans prayers is gracethe grace of God, and the help of the Holy Spirit to his naturally infirm endeavours to resist temptation. But such prayer is poisoned at its source, if it be not faithful, if it be not accompanied with a faithful and unreserved intention and willingness on the part of him who prays to part with his sins and with whatever causes him to sin.
3. These things make worship vain, and they spring from a defect in the heart, that is, in the disposition with respect to God, which it concerns us before all things to remove. It is to be removed by more positive and earnest endeavours than have yet been used to keep the mind intent upon its work, and by cries for the help of that Holy Spirit which is said to help our infirmities, especially in that work.A. Gibson.

Zeal and diligence in false worship no ground of comfort.

I. It is a vain and unprofitable sign to support and comfort ourselves by, that we are diligent in the worship of God, if not commanded by Him.

1. It lieth as a necessary duty upon all to worship and serve God. Now this worship and service may be either internal, or external, or mixed, compounded of both: internal consists in our love of God above all things, faith and hope in Him, obedience to His commands, which Scripture preferreth before all external worship; external is that of adoration and inclination of the body, kissing the hand, bowing the knee, dedicating temples, altars, and offering of sacrifices; mixed is compounded of both these, such as calling upon Gods name by petition and thanksgiving.
2. This worship and service of God is not given to God because He needs it or is made more happy thereby. God is no more better by our worship than the fountain is because a man drinks of it, or the sun because a man seeth by the light of it. Such do not advantage the fountain or the sun, but their own selves. So God hath appointed this worship, not that He might receive good from us, but communicate good to us.
3. Such is the infinite excellency and majesty of God, that we are to tremble and greatly to be ashamed of any worship or service we tender to Him. The angels, that are not conscious to the least sin in themselves, but are pure above the sun, that cannot call themselves dust and ashes, yet cover their faces before God.
4. God only may appoint that worship which He will accept of. The deformity of an ape lieth in being so like a man, and yet not a man; so doth the loathsomeness of all false worship lie in this, that it imitateth the worship of God, but indeed it is not so.

5. Our Lord briefly lays down what is acceptable worship unto Him (Joh. 4:22). To worship God in the spirit is to have a spiritual and holy inward frame of heart in all our addresses to Him. This is worshipping of God in a way the most of men are not acquainted with. Oh, it is a hard matter to have a spiritual man in prayer, hearing, and other worship! And indeed this is the soul and life of the service of God. The other way of worship is in truth, which by some is explained against hypocrisy and guile of spirit; for this God complaineth of, that they drew nigh with their mouths, but their hearts were far from God. Lastly, as a Father, they must worship, though humbly, yet not slavishly and servilely. Seneca speaketh of the superstitious, intimidated person, that while he worships God he provoketh Him.

6. Howsoever worship of God be commanded by Him, yet such is the nature of all moral duties that the obedience to them is required before any instituted worship. I will have mercy, and not sacrifice; go and learn what that meaneth, saith our Saviour: insomuch that comparatively to obedience God is said not to command these at all.
7. The heart of man is exceeding subtle and ingenious to palliate over all false worship: insomuch that there never were superstitious abuses of Gods worship, but that there have been learned men and wise men to plead for them.

II. Why men addicted to false worship, though they much admire themselves, yet are indeed vain men, and lean upon vain props.

1. Because always such persons have the bitterest enmity against true godliness.
2. Here is no ground of confidence in these, because they are consistent with the ordinary practice of gross and sinful courses.
3. If a man may not rely or trust on the instituted worship of God, yea, nor on the graces wrought by Gods Spirit in us, then much less in a worship of his own. If thy own graces are not helmet strong enough to repel Gods wrath, then thy own voluntary worship is but as so many cobwebs, when a furious tempest bloweth upon them.
4. These are not to be relied upon, which are vain and unprofitable, and so frustrate of that end we expect. Now the text saith, In vain do they worship Me; other duties commanded by God, though they are not pillars to be leaned on, yet they are not vain. God saith not to Jacob, to seek His face in vain, but all this service is lost labour: Who hath required all these things at your hands? Now of all things to labour in vain in religious matters is the saddest expense of all. After all that zeal thou art never a whit the nearer heaven, thou art no more endeared to God. Thy state is noways spiritually advantaged: yea, though it be a fruitless labour one way, yet it is not another way; for there is a fruit of these labours, but it is bitterness and wormwoodGod is more provoked by thee.
5. That which is a sad curse and fruit of former sins, that can be little comfort to any man that rightly considereth of things. Thus we say it is an absurd thing to be proud of clothes, for in that thou needest clothing it is an argument thou art fallen from integrity and innocency. But in this matter the curse of God is more wonderful upon thee, for all that admiration and applause of false worship is inflicted upon thee as a punishment, because thou hast not received the truth in the love of it.
6. These of all men are in a most unsafe estate (notwithstanding their security), because they are in a most absolute contrariety and indisposition for receiving of Christ, in whom only our souls have rest. Publicans and harlots went to heaven before the Pharisees. Why so? Because the former were sooner convinced of their sin, their undone estate, and so more willingly flying unto Christ.A. Burgess.

OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES

Mar. 7:1-2. Fault-finding.Those see most faults in others who have most themselves. None are such critics of small faults as those guilty of grave ones. Beware of fault-finding. He that censures others cures not himself.R. Glover.

We must not always follow great men.Those who for their place and calling should be greatest friends and favourers of Christ and His followers are often greatest enemies and readiest to oppose them.

1. See how unfit it is to tie ourselves to the example of great men in the Church in matters of religionnot safe always to follow them, for so we may with them become the worst enemies of Christ and His Church. 2. Admonition to great men in high place in the Church to use their dignity, place, and office to the honour of Christ and good of His Church.G. Petter.

Mar. 7:3-4. Lessons.

1. It is the manner of hypocrites to tie others to their own practice and example in matters of religion, and to censure all uncharitably who do not conform to them even in trifles.
2. Hypocrites put religion and holiness in outward rites, ceremonies, and superstitious observances, and think that by performance of these they become holy and acceptable before God.
3. Superstition makes wise men become foolish, absurd, and childish, in busying and troubling themselves about trifles and toys.Ibid.

Rabbinical washings.The legal washing of the hands before eating was especially sacred to the Rabbinist; not to do so was a crime as great as to eat the flesh of swine. He who neglects hand-washing, says the book Sohar, deserves to be punished here and hereafter. He is to be destroyed out of the world, for in hand-washing is contained the secret of the Ten Commandments. He is guilty of death. It was laid down that the hands were first to be washed clean. The tips of the ten fingers were then joined and lifted up, so that the water ran down to the elbows, then turned down so that it might run off to the ground. Fresh water was poured on them as they were lifted up, and twice again as they hung down. The washing itself was to be done by rubbing the fist of one hand in the hollow of the other. When the hands were washed before eating, they must be held upwards; when after it, downwards, but so that the water should not run beyond the knuckles. The vessel used must be held first in the right, then in the left hand; the water was to be poured first on the right, then on the left hand; and at every third time the words repeated, Blessed art Thou who hast given us the command to wash the hands.C. Geikie, D.D.

The tradition of the elders was an after-growth of the Captivity, originating not improbably with the Great Synagogue, out of which the Sanhedrin was developed. The reverence and care for Holy Scripture, revived by Ezra, and fostered by later scribes, were handed down from generation to generation, and treated with so much honour that the highest authority was sought for their origin. Some Rabbi, bolder than his predecessors, put forward the theory that God had given to Moses not only the Ten Commandments, but also at the same time a full explanation, even in the minutest detail, of all their applications. This Oral Law, he said, had been revealed by Moses to Aaron and his sons, and the memory of it was cherished and handed on without any loss or diminution in the progress of transmission. As soon as such a view of its origin had gained acceptance with the people, its authority became equally binding upon the conscience with that of the Written Law, and the estimation in which it was held even higher. In lapse of time it received its interpretation at the hands of the Rabbis, and the disquisitions, illustrations, and additions grew into a great body of doctrine; and after the Jewish motto Commit nothing to writing had been forgotten, these were all combined in a vast collection, under the title of Gemara, or Talmud. The publication in writing of the Mishnah itself, as the Oral Law was called, had preceded it by two hundred years. It was issued authoritatively by Rabbi Judah, the Holy, at the close of the second century of the Christian era.Dean Luckock.

There were two familiar sayings among the later Jews which enable us to understand how widely traditionalism must have conflicted with the teaching of Christ. The words of the elders, they said, are of more weight than the words of the prophets; and, even more startling than this, The Mosaic Law is as water, the Mishnah as wine, and the Gemara as hippocras (a richly spiced drink, most highly esteemed).Ibid.

The traditions of the elders were all, without exception, the product of the later ages of the Jewish dispensation in the time of its decay and fall, when it was at its worst; whereas the opinions and practices which are invidiously called traditions in these days, i.e. the opinions and practices of the earliest Fathers of the Christian Church, are the products of the earliest ages of the Christian religion, when it was at its best, and was least contaminated with the influence of the world from without, and kept most pure by godly discipline from within. The opinions of the Fathers on the interpretation of Scripture, when they can be ascertained, are far more likely to be in accord with its real meaning than any opinions or practices of later ages.M. F. Sadler.

Mar. 7:6-9. The external preferred.It may seem almost incredible that men should leave the simple principles of righteousness for a region so barren and burdensome as that of external observances. But the secret is not difficult to find.

1. External acts can be seen and felt by oneself, and so can give complacency.
2. They can be seen by others, and thus can gain credit.
3. They are easier than walking with God. To approach Him needs the courage of purity and penitence; and to take His guidance requires perpetually the self-denial and consecration of faith.R. Glover.

The abuse of ceremonies.It cannot be too carefully noticed that no condemnation is passed upon these rites of purification in themselves. Had the Pharisees recognised their symbolism and deep moral significance, had Jesus been certain that when they washed their hands they thought of or prayed for purity of heart and life, He would have been the last person to rebuke them, however much they multiplied external forms and ceremonies. These are useful as stepping-stones to higher things; but the moment they begin to satisfy in themselves they become snares and lead to superstition.Dean Luckock.

Mar. 7:6-7. The whole Old Testament history was prophetic of Christ and of those around Him in this respect, that everywhere in the continually recurring contest between light and darkness, between truth and error, there were displayed the types of that which, in its highest energy, developed itself in and around Christ.H. Olshausen, D.D.

Mar. 7:9. Irony sometimes lawful.In that Christ here, by this sharp irony or taunting speech, derides the gross superstition of the scribes and Pharisees, we may gather that it is lawful to deride and scoff at the sins and unlawful practices of others, especially at the gross and notorious sins of the wicked and ungodly. See 1Ki. 18:27; Isaiah 44. Yet some cautions are to be observed for the lawful use of such ironical reproofs of sin.

1. They must proceed from a holy and upright affection in such as use them, viz. from zeal for Gods glory, and hatred of sin, and not from private malice or revenge.
2. They must tend to the right end, viz. Gods glory, and the good of the party reproved, that by such a sharp and taunting reproof he may, if possible, be brought to be ashamed of his sin, and to be touched with remorse for it, as also to grow in dislike and hatred of it: not the disgrace of the person is to be sought, but the disgrace of the sin reproved, and the reformation of the person.
3. Such taunts and ironies are to be used against sin in due manner, i.e. after a grave and serious manner, not with shew of lightness or vanity.G. Petter.

Mar. 7:15. The heart the seat of defilement.

1. Material processes cannot produce spiritual effects.
2. The true source of spiritual pollution is the heart. The internal translates itself into the external.

3. But the principle itself implies that the body may be defiled. See 1Co. 3:16-17. The sins enumerated by our Lord (Mar. 7:21-23) shew themselves in words and deeds, and defile the tongue, the eye, the hand, etc. They who commit them yield their members as servants of iniquity unto iniquity (Rom. 6:19).

4. Our Lord did not sanction indifference to the use and abuse of food and drink, to habits of personal cleanliness and filthiness. The principle He lays down witnesses to the contrary. These matters are under our control, and indicate our tastes and tendencies, our desires, choice, willin one word, our character.
5. No man, however, can put his heart right, or keep it right. For the first is needed the converting, for the second the sustaining and restraining grace of God. True morality needs a supernatural foundation and continuously bestowed Divine energy. The very idea of inward purity points us to the Holy Spirit and the new birth.J. R. Gregory.

Mar. 7:16. An important rule.This rule must needs be of very great importance to Christians. For our Great Master

1. Calls the people unto Him on purpose to tell them only this.
2. He requires of them a particular attention.
3. He requires it of every one of them without exception.
4. He exhorts them to endeavour thoroughly to understand it.
5. He lets them know that in order to do it they have need of a singular grace and a particular gift of understanding. It was for want of understanding this rule that the Jews still remained Jews, adhering to a mere external way of worship. It is for the very same reason that numbers of Christians, even to this day, serve God more like Jews than Christians.P. Quesnel.

Mar. 7:17. Dulness in spiritual matters.

1. See here how great dulness and slowness of capacity there is, even in the best Christians, to conceive spiritual and heavenly matters when they are taught them.
2. The best should not be ashamed to acknowledge their own ignorance in spiritual matters to such as are able to teach them, that so they may be better informed and instructed.
3. It is commendable in Christians to move profitable questions unto their teachers or others.G. Petter.

Mar. 7:18. The Saviour refers to the material things that enter into a man through his mouth. His principle, however, is applicable, on a higher plane of reference, to spiritual things too which come in from without. These, however noxious, cannot of themselves defile a man. The man within the breast must act in reference to them before guilt can be contracted.J. Morison, D.D.

Mar. 7:19. Lessons.

1. The wisdom of God shewn in the frame of mans body, ordaining every part for necessary ends and uses. See how it should be in the body of the Church: there should be no unprofitable member, but even the meanest should so live as to further the good of the whole (1Co. 12:25).

2. Howsoever the belly serves for necessary use in mans body, yet it is for such use as is base and vile in comparison of most of the other parts of the body. See then the sin of those who serve and worship their belly, as if they were born for no other end but to eat and drink.G. Petter.

Mar. 7:20-23. Heart-defilement.This is a hard saying, but our conscience acknowledges the truth of it. We are not the toy of circumstances, but such as we have made ourselves; and our lives would have been pure if the stream had flowed from a pure fountain. However modern sentiment may rejoice in highly coloured pictures of the noble profligate and his pure-minded and elegant victim; of the brigand or the border ruffian full of kindness, with a heart as gentle as his hands are red; and however true we may feel it to be that the worst heart may never have betrayed itself by the worst actions, but many that are first shall be last,it still continues to be the fact, and undeniable when we do not sophisticate our judgment, that all these evil things proceed from within. It is also true that they further defile the man. The corruption which already existed in the heart is made worse by passing into action; shame and fear are weakened; the will is confirmed in evil; a gap is opened and widened between the man who commits a new sin and the virtue on which he has turned his back.Dean Chadwick.

Mar. 7:20. Inward corruption.That which St. James saith of the tongue (Mar. 3:6) is much more true of mans corrupt heart, without the sanctifying grace of God renewing and changing it, and purging it from this natural filthiness and corruption of sin.

1. Labour to see and bewail this great corruption of our own heart. To this end examine and view our own heart often in the glass of Gods law. And we must deal thoroughly in searching out the corruptions of the heart, remembering how deceitful it is, and how hard to know it.
2. See what need for us to get our heart purged and cleansed from this sink and puddle of sin which is in it.
(1) By the power and efficacy of Gods sanctifying Spirit.
(2) By the ministry of the Word.
(3) Get true faith, apprehending Gods saving love and mercy in Christ.
3. See by this how great a work is the work of regeneration and sanctification, whereby the heart must be purged from such a world of wickedness and sea of filthiness. Such a work is not easily done, or soon. The whole time of our life is too little for doing it thoroughly.G. Petter.

The thoughts.Nothing seems of less consequence than a thoughtso silent, swift, subtle, is it, and yet in that lightning-flash of the brain, in that throb of the heart, in that fiat of the will, in that airy nothing, all the vast things of mans history, its grandeur and its grief, have their birth. The heart of man is the gateway of strange worlds, and through it are ever gliding thoughts fraught with infinite consequence to the individual and to the race. Let not the Church of God abandon that appeal to reason, to conscience, to the hearts of men, which is the true preaching of the gospel of Christ.W. L. Watkinson.

Imagination.Says Jacob Boehme in a deep passage, All now depends on what I set my imagination upon. Setting his imagination upon the kingdom of God, upon the highest objects, patterns, and callings of the spiritual universe, the believer conquers successively all selfishness and sensuality, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. All depends upon what we set our imaginationupon the ideals we choose. upon the vivid realisation of those ideals, upon the daily striving toward those ideals, upon the faithful, confiding surrender of the soul to those ideals.Ibid.

Inward renewal needed.We need all the faculties and powers of our inward being renewing. We need our conscience to bear us witness in the Holy Ghost; our imagination to eye supremest ideals of light and beauty, and urge its flight thitherto as the eagle seeks the sun; our will by virtue of a Divine strengthening to become imperative and invincible; our affections to be filled, dominated, by the sovereign love of God. Nothing but this new heart and right spirit will meet the case. Let us begin here, and all will be well. Out of the heart shall proceed good thoughts, and out of them all fair and noble characteristics and actions.Ibid.

Mar. 7:21-23. The things that defile.At the head of the list Christ places the evil disputings so fresh in His memory from His encounter with the Pharisees; then adulteries and fornications, the outcome of a corrupt imagination; murders, which proceed from anger; thefts and covetousness, from secret promptings to overreach others and gain more than one has a right to; knaveries and fraud; lasciviousness or reckless insolence, which outrages the decencies of life; the malicious glance and slanderous tongue; the proud and haughty bearing which bespeaks the self-centred man; and last in the list, the comprehensive sin of foolishness, which embraces every senseless, wicked act.Dean Luckock.

Mar. 7:21. Evilthoughts.Evil thoughts in the heart are like internal diseases of the body, very dangerous and very difficult of cure. Stealthy in effecting a lodgment, but most tenacious in maintaining their hold; singly appearing of little consequence, mere specks of human infirmity upon the soul, but soon spreading and leavening the whole being with their corruption, constituting our character and deciding our eternal state,we cannot afford to make light of these enemies of our peace. A constant watchfulness against their approach, promptitude in repressing their incursion; the diligent study, the conscientious practice of every method that may help against their power,this is the bounden duty of every Christian who sincerely desires to keep himself unspotted from the world, or to recover himself from the dominion of past sin. St. Paul speaks of God as a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, and declares that all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. In the prophet we have God asserting this prerogative (Eze. 11:5). And so the psalmist appeals to His omniscience (Psa. 139:1). And thus we are told on the eve of the Deluge, Gen. 6:5-6. The indulgence of an evil thought is as much an offence against God as an injurious speech or a blow is an offence against our neighbour. Even under the Old Testament we have the wise man declaring, Pro. 24:9. And in the New Testament, in the Sermon on the Mount, our Saviour still more expressly declares that the gospel law reaches to the thoughts and intents of the heart (Mat. 5:22; Mat. 5:28). And by this law shall we give account in the end. And it is just that it should be so. The prevailing character of our thoughts is the best index of our spiritual state. For it is not always what we actually do, but what we would do, if we could, what we wish for, and think about, and take delight inthis it is which constitutes our moral character for good or evil, and decides our state before God. Evil thoughts are the beginning and source of all iniquities. We think we are safe. We mean to draw back in time. But some sudden impulse takes us; our resolution gives way, and we fall headlong. And though, by mercy above our deserts, we do stop short of any flagrant act of sin, yet the mere indulgence of evil thoughts imprints a character and stamp upon the heart which years of sorrow and conscientious striving will often fail to obliterate. The soul becomes engrained with evil, and evil becomes connatural to the soul. It acquires a sad facility for uncharitable suppositions. It becomes wonderfully apt at finding fuel for its vanity in the most indifferent circumstances. It will contract fresh stains from objects upon which a purer mind would rest without experiencing any affection of evil; while grosser suggestions will fall upon such a diseased soul like sparks upon tinder, and inflame it into evil passions at once. And this will last on, when those sins have been utterly renounced, when the soul has checked itself in its wilfulness, and has turned sincerely to God, and is striving to walk daily in His fear, and to cleanse itself from iniquity; still will the shadows of his past life darken the repentant sinners path, and embarrass his efforts in religion; and in his holiest moments, even upon his knees, before the altar, will some train of evil thought start up suddenly, and take possession of that soul which has been used formerly to delight in them.

1. The most general, perhaps, are vain thoughts. Young people are most open to them, but they are congenial enough to all. We are all too apt to dwell with complacency upon the thing we excel in; we long for an opportunity of displaying our abilities; we please ourselves by imagining how much better we could have acquitted ourselves than a neighbour has done; we plan all sorts of schemes for the future, abandon ourselves to the most extravagant reveries, picture imaginary scenes and positions, and fancy how we should act in them. The habit of indulging such thoughts is weak and foolish indeed, but it is more, it is sinful. It is an artifice for gaining food for our vanity out of an imaginary future, when the ordinary tenor of our daily life yields too humble materials to please us. It dissipates our energies, it injures our religion, and estranges us from God.
2. In close connexion with vain thoughts we must place discontented thoughts. By overrating his ability, and by dreaming of the future, a man gets dissatisfied with his present lowly position, and thinks himself equal to something much more trying and important.
3. Next I may name uncharitable thoughts. We are all too apt to take dislikes, to impute motives, to rehearse over to ourselves the affronts we have received, to take pains to make out that we have been ill used, and be glad when we have fixed upon some reasonable ground for being angry.
4. But I have yet to name the most evil of all those evil thoughts which proceed out of the heart and defile a man; I mean impure thoughtsthe most dangerous and the most difficult to conquer of all our inward corruptions; and yet one, it is to be feared, in which too many indulge without much compunction, thinking it enough so long as they abstain from grosser acts of shame. It is to this sort of evil thoughts that Bishop Beveridges words seem particularly to belong, when he recalls the experience he had had of the devils temptations, and the working of his own corruptions; by which he says: I find that there is no sin I am betrayed into but what takes it rise from my froward thoughts. These are the tempters that first present some pleasing objects to my view, and then bias my understanding and pervert my will to comply with the suggestions. So that though the Spirit of God is pleased to dart a beam into my heart at the same time, and shew me the odious and dangerous effect of such thoughts, yet, I know not how or why, I find a prevailing suggestion within that tells me it is but a thought, and that so long as it goes no further it cannot do me much hurt. Under this specious colour and pretence I secretly persuade myself to dwell a little longer upon it; and finding my heart pleased and delighted with its natural issue, I give it a little further indulgence, till at last my desire breaks out into a flame, and will be satisfied with nothing less than the enjoyment of the object it is exercised upon.

5. There are other evil thoughts less under our control. We are liable to be afflicted by blasphemous thoughts, by unbelieving thoughts, and by desponding thoughts, which may indeed owe their origin to past sins, but which may be injected by Satan, or induced by bodily weakness, or arise from ignorance or misapprehension of revealed truth. When our minds are thus disordered, we are not fit judges of our own estate, and our remedy is to have recourse to some discreet and learned minister of Gods Word, and to open our grief.
6. Against the other evil thoughts I mentioned our remedy lies more within our reach, and various rules may be given for resisting them. The first and most obvious is prayerpainstaking, earnest prayer. Avoid all occasions of sinning. Avoid the great snare of having time on your hands. Avoid vicious books. Forbear to read the details of crime in the public prints: they can do you no good; they may corrupt your mind with suggestions of evil. And when evil thoughts assail you, flee them at once. I do not advise any one to argue against them. Your plan is to turn your attention at once to something else; to go and do something, to think of something, different. And accordingly we must store our minds with subjects of meditation; we must get hymns and psalms by heart, or favourite pieces of Scripture; and directly an evil thought assails us, we must begin and say to ourselves one or other of these, and we shall so succeed in foiling the enemy of souls. And when we have sinned in thought, we should take notice of it in our nightly examination, and humble ourselves for it before God. We must strive, we must hope, and we shall overcome. We have the Spirit of God pledged to us to transform our affections and desires, to make us new hearts and new spirits, and bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.C. F. Secretan.

Mar. 7:22. An evil eye.Oh, how can we hope with Job to see our Redeemer, with these eyes so vain, so proud, so wanton, so polluted, so prostitute! They had need be well washed with the eye-water of penitent tears, and then with the blood of Christ (Mat. 5:8; Psa. 119:37; 1Jn. 3:3; Job. 31:1).Bishop Gauden.

The eye the window of the soul.The mind looks through the eye; so does the heart. Lactantius beautifully compares the eyes to glazed windows, through which the mind beholds. And therefore, adds he, the mind and will are often discerned from the eyes. Salvianus uses the same comparison of windows, but adds that hence all wicked desires enter into the heart through the eyes, as through their natural avenues. But the Saviour unfolds here a far profounder philosophy, when He says that the evil desires arise in the heart, and come looking out wistfully at the eyes.J. Morison, D.D.

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 7

Mar. 7:6-7. Externalism in religion.How many striking examples might be cited where men have united the form of godliness with the mystery of iniquity, under the manifest impression that their great zeal for religious observances atoned for their moral delinquencies, or that the latter were entirely overlooked on account of the approbation they earned by the former! We are told that Ivan the Terrible retired sometimes to a monastery which he had built, for his religious improvement. He rang the bell for matins himself at three oclock in the morning. During the services, which lasted many hours, he read, chanted, and prayed with such fervour that the marks of his prostrations remained on his forehead. But at intervals he went to the dungeons to see with his own eyes his prisoners tortured, and always returned, it was observed, with a face beaming with delight. What a mingling it was of diabolical cruelty with religious service! Christianity, in its corrupt branches, abounds in such absurdities. That is the way they became corruptby setting up a false standard of righteousness, by accepting zeal and fidelity in the observance of the forms of worship as a substitute for genuine piety.

Lip-service.Panchcowrie, a Hindoo convert, thus spoke one day in the market: Some think they will avert Gods displeasure by frequently taking His name on their lips, and saying, O Excellent God! O Ocean of Wisdom! O Sea of Love! and so on. To be sure, God is all this; but whoever heard of a debt being paid in words instead of rupees! God says to such people, Ye hypocrites, why do you honour Me with your lips when your heart is far from Me?

Routine service.Go out with me into the woods, where the white oak is, and where the beech is. Their leaves died last November, but they all hang on the trees yet. The trees have not strength enough to slough them. They always make me think of a great many people. Sap does not run in them any more, but their duties hang on them like dead leaves all over. They would not like to drop their dutiesthey are not quite in that state yet; but those duties are dry, sapless, and enforced.

Mar. 7:9. Gods commandments and human rules.The experience is a universal one, that Gods commandments suffer from the competition of human rules. The great precepts of God have only an unseen God behind them, but behind the human rules there is generally a class whose pride is gratified by their observance and incensed by their neglect. Accordingly, whenever small rules of outward conduct begin to flourish, the great principles of religionfaith, love, honourfall into the background. It is so to-day. The Thug in India who confessed to having killed three hundred and twenty people had no pangs of conscience for killing them, but was somewhat distressed on account of having killed a few of them after a hare had crossed his path or a bird whistled in a certain direction. Murder was no crime in his opinion, but the neglect of an omen from Bowany was a grave one. In Hindooism, which is ceremonial throughout, a man may be a most religious man, and yet very wicked. Many in our own country would unscrupulously commit great crimes, and yet be very careful to avoid eating flesh on Good Friday. It seems as if we only had a certain amount of power of attention in us, and, if it goes to little rules, there is none left for great principles.

A hypocritical regard for ceremonial.A traveller in Russia tells the following of a lady who, leaving a party of companions in St. Petersburg, called a hack and directed the driver to take her home. Instead of following her directions, he drove her to a deserted part of the city, murdered her, and, taking her jewels, threw her body into the canal. As he returned to the city he was arrested. The murdered lady had with her a basket of pie; when asked why he did not eat that, the murderer replied, It was Lent. How could I think of eating thatit may contain meat; and I am, thank God, a good Christian. We sometimes express an abhorrence of insignificant things when our hearts are set on the vilest of sins.

Mar. 7:10. Honouring parents.We call the Chinese heathen, and yet they have some customs that would do credit to a Christian people. On every New Year morning each man and boy, from the emperor to the lowest peasant, pays a visit to his mother. He carries her a present, varying in value according to his station, thanks her for all she has done for him, and asks a continuance of her favour another year. They are taught to believe that mothers have an influence for good over their sons all through life.

Mar. 7:15. A self-evident truth.Christ does not stop to prove that these things come out of the heart. He asserts it, and asserts it because it is self-evident. When you see a thing coming forth, you are clear it was there first. One summer I noticed hornets continually flying from a number of decayed logs in my garden. I saw them constantly flying in and out, and I did not think myself at all unreasonable in concluding that there was a hornets nest there. And so, if we see the hornets of sin flying out of a man, we suppose at once there is sin within him.

Mar. 7:20. Concupiscence.A gentleman was once extolling loudly the virtue of honesty, saying what a dignity it imparted to our nature, and how it recommended us to the favour of God. Sir, replied his friend, however excellent the virtue of honesty may be, I fear there are very few men in the world who really possess it. You surprise me, said a stranger. Ignorant as I am of your character, was the reply, I fancy it would be no difficult matter to prove even you to be a dishonest man. I defy you. Will you give me leave, then, to ask you a question or two, and promise not to be offended? Certainly. Have you never met with an opportunity of getting gains by unfair means? I dont say, Have you taken advantage of it? but, Have you ever met with such an opportunity? I, for my part, have; and I believe everybody else has. Very probably I may. How did you feel your mind affected on such an occasion? Had you no secret desire, not the least inclination, to seize the advantage which offered? Tell me without any evasion, and consistently with the character you admire. I must acknowledge I have not always been absolutely free from every irregular inclination; but Hold! sir, none of your salvos; you have confessed enough. If you had the desire, though you never proceeded to the act, you were dishonest in heart. This is what the Scriptures call concupiscence. It defiles the soul; it is a breach of that law which requireth truth in the inward parts, and, unless you are pardoned through the blood of Christ, it will be a just ground for your condemnation, when God shall judge the secrets of men.

Mar. 7:21. Origin of sin.When a young man consulted John Newton touching the origin of evil, the divine replied that he was more anxious to get sin out of the world than to know how it came into the world. But really this saying is not so wise as it seems, for to know where sin takes its rise is of first consequence in attempting its extirpation. In the soul Christ declared that it took its origin, and in the soul Christ sought to deal with it, supplying a spiritual antidote for a spiritual plague.

Sin has its source in the heart.At present there are two theories in the field to explain the origin of contagious diseasesthe parasitic theory, and the theory of the innate character of diseases. The parasitic theory assumes that diseases are originated by microbes first diffused in the atmosphere, and then taken into the system by the air we breathe, the water we drink, the things we touch. The advocates of the innate character of diseases hold, on the contrary, that the disease is spontaneously developed in the patient; the first cause is in morbid changes which are purely chemical, changes produced in the actual substance of the tissues and secretions without any external intervention of microbesthe microbes, where they really exist, being only a secondary phenomenon, a complication, and not the scientific cause which actually determines the disease. Now, whatever may be the exact truth in this biological controversy, it is evident that the first cause of such disease must be sought in a defect of life, a feebleness, a certain untoward disposition and receptivity in the organism itself. The phylloxera devastates the French vineyards because the vines have been exhausted by excessive cultivation; tuberculosis fastens upon man because of obscure conditions of bodily weakness and susceptibility; vigorous plants and robust constitutions defying the foreign destructive bodies which may fill the airextrinsic influence and excitement counting for little where the intrinsic tendency does not exist. Revelation assumes that the man morally occupies much the same position. Environment brings the opportunity for evil, the solicitation or provocation to evil, so far do evil communications corrupt good manners; but the first cause of all must be found in the heart itself, in its lack of right direction, sympathy, and force; in a word, the scientific cause of sin is the spiritual cause.

Evil thoughts.A quaint preacher says, Beware how ye tarry in the painting-chamber of the devil, by which he warns the young Christian to be on his watch against the way in which Satan seduces the imagination. When evil thoughts and unholy desires intrude into the soul, it is like a fiery dart finding its way into a powder magazine. The only safety is to stamp it out at once. If we let the spark of fire smoulder on, soon all will be wrapped in flames.

The commencements of evil to be rejected.It is true that no man can determine who shall knock at his door, but every man can determine who shall come in through his door. It is true that no man can say, I will not have wrong thoughts; such thoughts will come into a mans mind without his permission; but it is within the power of every man to say whether or not he will entertain them. If, however, a man entertains evil thoughts, he cannot tell whether the conflagration will or will not spread. A man sits down upon a prairie upon an autumnal day, when everything is dry and parched, and sets fire to the leaves and grass, saying, I will stamp it out; I merely want a little blaze here for my own use; but when he attempts to stamp it out, the fire is quicker-footed than he. Though he rushes from side to side and does the best he can to extinguish it, it is not stamped out, but gains on him right and left, and by-and-by it opens its wings and flies all over the prairie, destroying insects, and beasts, and human beings, and property of every kind, travelling like a whirlwind.

Bias of the heart.The bowl runs as the bias inclines it; the ship moves as the rudder steers it; and the mind thinks according to the predominancy of vice or virtue in it. The heart of man is like the spring of the clock, which causes the wheels to move right or wrong, well or ill. If the heart once set forward for God, all the members will follow after; all the parts, like dutiful handmaids, in their places, will wait on their mistress. The heart is the great workhouse where all sin is wrought before it is exposed to open view. It is the mint where evil thoughts are coined, before they are current in our words or actions. It is the forge where all our evil works as well as words are hammered out. There is no sin but is dressed in the withdrawing-room of the heart, before it appears on the stage of life. It is vain to go about a holy life till the heart be made holy. The pulse of the hand beats well or ill, according to the state of the heart. If the chinks of the ship are unstopped, it will be to no purpose to labour at the pump. When the water is foul at the bottom, no wonder that scum and filth appear at the top. There is no way to stop the issue of sin but by drying up the matter that feeds it.G. Swinnock.

A bad heart:A certain little boy in Kansas, only eleven years old, strove hard to be a Christian. Once he stood watching his sister paring the potatoes for dinner. Soon she pared an extra large one, which was very white and very nice on the outside, but when cut into pieces it shewed itself to be hollow and black inside with dry-rot. Instantly Willie exclaimed, Why, Maggie, that potato isnt a Christian! What do you mean? asked Maggie. Dont you see it has a bad heart? was the childs reply. This little Kansas boy had learned enough of the religion of Jesus to know that, however fair the outside may be, the natural heart is corrupt.

Mar. 7:22. Beware of covetousness, for, under the guise of being a mere harmless indulgence of natural feeling, it is really the imbibing a dangerous gas, which will eventually choke our spiritual life. Whilst we revel in the chambers of our covetous imagery, and paint the fond desires of our evil hearts in every detail, we accustom ourselves to the growth of sinful longings, we construct an easy gradient, down which we may pass from unholy wishes to wicked deeds. The serpents egg may become the venomous reptile.Dr. Hardman.

Covetous men are condemned to dig in the mines for they know not whom. The spirit of covetousness, which leads to an overvalue and overlove of money, is independent of amount. A poor man may make an idol of his little, just as much as the rich man makes an idol of his much. The Duke of Marlborough, when he was in the last stage of life and very infirm, would walk from the public room, in Bath, to his lodgings on a cold, dark night to save a sixpence in chair hire. At his death he left more than a million and a half sterling, which was inherited by one of his greatest enemies.

Avarice.It was a true instinct which led Dante to picture avarice as an invincible foe. In his pilgrimage he passed safely by the leopard of pleasure; he feared, yet was not vanquished by, the lion of ambition; but the lean wolf of avarice drove him step by step back to the darkness. Such is the power of covetousness. It is a vice which renews its strength and is tenacious and remorseless.

Evil eye.There are evidences of the prevalence in Ceylon of that most ancient of all superstitions, the belief in the evil eye, which exists in all countries in the universe from China to Peru. Is there any mysterious connexion between the prohibition to covet contained in the Decalogue and the horror of the evil eye so often alluded to in the Bible?Sir J. E. Tennant.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

10. CONFLICT WITH PHARISEES 7:1-23.

a. Conflict over washings 7:1-8

TEXT 7:1-8

And there are gathered together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which had come from Jerusalem, and had seen that some of his disciples ate their bread with defiled, that is, unwashen, hands. For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands diligently, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders: and when they come from the marketplace, except they wash themselves, they eat not: and many other things there be, which they have received to hold, washings of cups, and pots, and brasen vessels. And the Pharisees and the scribes ask him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with defiled hands? And he said unto them, Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written,

This people honoureth me with their lips,
But their heart is far from me.
But in vain do they worship me,
Teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men.

Ye leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men.

THOUGHT QUESTIONS 7:1-8

318.

Did these Pharisees and scribes make a special trip from Jerusalem just to criticize Jesus? Discuss.

319.

What is meant by unwashen, or defiled hands?

320.

Are we to understand from Mar. 7:3 that all the Jews observed the tradition of the elders?

321.

Who were the elders? What is meant by tradition?

322.

Why bathe after going to the marketplace?

323.

Is the word baptize here used i.e. in Mar. 7:4 the same as used in reference to baptizing people? If so how could it be applied to couches?

324.

In what sense were the hands of the disciples common?

325.

Wasnt it unkind for Jesus to call these men hypocrites?

326.

In what sense had the Pharisees honored God with their lips?

327.

Just what is vain worship?

328.

Please show just how such persons left the command of God.

329.

Is Jesus saying such persons prefer the precepts of men to the commandments of God? Why?

COMMENT 7:1-8

TIMESummer A.D. 29.
PLACEIn or near Capernaum.

PARALLEL ACCOUNTSMat. 15:1-2; Matthew 7-9.

OUTLINE1. Gathering for criticism, Mar. 7:1-2. 2. The ceremonial carefulness of the Pharisees, Mar. 7:3-4. 3. Criticism offered and answered, Mar. 7:5-8.

ANALYSIS 7:1-8

I.

GATHERING FOR CRITICISM, Mar. 7:1-2.

1.

Composed of Pharisees and scribes from Jerusalem.

2.

They were there to criticize the lack of ceremonial washing.

II.

THE CEREMONIAL CAREFULNESS OF THE PHARISEES, Mar. 7:3-4.

1.

Never ate until they were ceremonially cleani.e. according to traditionno law of God required it.

2.

Never returned from the marketplace or used cups, pots, pans without ceremonial washings.

III.

CRITICISM OFFERED AND ANSWERED, Mar. 7:5-8.

1.

Why do your disciples fail to keep the tradition of the elders?

2.

You are fulfilling Isaiahs prophecy of the hypocrites who speak one thing and do another.

3.

Your worship is vain.

4.

You neglect the command of God for the traditions of men.

EXPLANATORY NOTES

14. The place is still Capernaum. Which came from Jerusalem. Literally, having come. The scribes and Pharisees who are mentioned here are probably Galilaeans who had been at Jerusalem and had just returned thence. The definite article is wanting before the participle. Its presence would indicate that they were a delegation from the capital; but probably these were Galilaean religionists, who, returning from Jerusalem, perhaps after consultation there, made it their first work to come together to Jesus and see what he was doing.They saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiledliterally, with commonhands, With hands in the ordinary state. Not with dirty handsthat was not the point of objectionbut with hands unwashen, not ceremonially purified according to their ideas of necessity.Some of his disciples were doing thus, not all of theman indication that he had given them teaching that would render them indifferent to the practice of the Pharisees in this matter, but that only a part of them had yet been freed from their scruples on the subject.Mar. 7:3-4 are parenthetical, and the best manuscripts insert an and at the beginning of Mar. 7:5, which disturbs the grammatical construction and makes a broken sentence. This led copyists to add they found fault in Mar. 7:2, to complete the structure; but the addition is cancelled by all the chief editors of the text.

The parenthetical passage (Mar. 7:3-4) is wholly peculiar to Mark and is devoted to the explanation, for the benefit of Gentile readers, of the custom of the Pharisees, shared by the Jews in general, about ceremonial cleansings. The Pharisees, and all the Jews, A loose popular expression to show that this custom of the Pharisees was widely received; not to be pressed, as if it declared absolute unanimity. Many, of course, had no time for these practices, and the Pharisees despised all who neglected them for that reason or for any other, and thought there was scarcely a hope for them. (See Joh. 7:49 for an utterance of this feeling.)Except they wash their hands oft, or diligently, pugme. Literally, with the fist. Probably descriptive of the washing of one hand by rubbing it with the other. The Sinaitic Manuscript alone has pukna, frequently, which Tischendorf alone among editors adopts.And when they come from the market, where in the crowd defilement might most easily be contracted.Except they wash, they eat not. The word is baptizo, ean me baptisontai. So in Luk. 11:38 the Pharisee wondered that Jesus had not first bathed himself (ebaptisthe) before dinner. It is not the baptizing of their hands, but of themselves, or, strictly, the being baptized or bathed, that was thus insisted upon. The word baptize is used precisely as in 2Ki. 5:14, where it is said of Naaman, He dipped himself seven times in Jordan. From the strict literal signification, to immerse or submerge, it comes naturally in certain connections to acquire the sense to wash by immersing, to cleanse, of course only in cases where the dipping is into clean water. So Grimm, N. T. Lexicon.) Bathe is an admissible translation in this connection, and any difficulties about giving the word its proper meaning here are purely imaginary. In Mar. 7:4 the word for washings, in washings of cups, etc., is from the same root, baptismous, a derivative of baptizo. But it is not the word that is used to denote the Christian rite, which is a neuter word, baptisma, while this is masculine, a form that is found only here and in Heb. 6:2; Heb. 9:10. Its signification is properly given by Liddel and Scott in their Greek and English Lexicon, a dipping in water. It indicates sometimes, in certain connections, a thorough cleansing by water, which would naturally be made, in the case of the objects here mentioned, by dipping, according to the literal signification of the word. The cups (poteria) were drinking-cups.As for the pots, the Greek word xestai is a corruption of the Latin sextaurius, a pot that held about a pint. These were ordinarily wooden vessels.The brasenor properly bronzevessels were for similar purposes with the wooden. The law provided, at least in certain cases of defilement, that earthen vessels should be broken, and that wooden ones should be rinsed in water (Lev. 15:12).The word translated tables (klinon) cannot possibly mean that; it is beds or couches, and may refer to the platforms on which they reclined around the table, which must often be thoroughly washed for fear of defilement, or to the cushions, which would need washing quite as much, and very likely would be washed oftener. But the words and of tables are omitted by some good manuscripts, by Tishendorf, and by the revisers.

The greater part of these minute requirements lay outside of the Mosaic law. These things, Mark says, they have received to hold; and they do them holding the tradition of the elders, the interpretations and supplements of the law, brought down orally from the men of an earlier time. Tradition was the ecclesiastical version of the lawthe law as it came out of the hands of the great teachers. It was regarded as equally authoritative with the written law itself, and, by some, more so. It was the very life and mission of the Pharisees to keep the traditional interpretations in full force. (See Farrar, Life of Christ, 2. 471.) Whoever reads such descriptions as are given by Farrar and Geikie of the ingenious wickedness with which this was attempted will not wonder at the denunciations of our Lord or be surprised that the Pharisees were his natural enemies. This was a part of the bondage from which he came to set men free.

Mar. 7:5-7. Of course they must call him to account, and not the disciplesthe rabbi, not the pupils. He and they were reproved oftener for neglecting the traditions than for departing from the genuine law. His quotation in reply is almost verbally exact from Isa. 29:13 in the LXX., the sole variationteaching for doctrines the commandments of men, instead of teaching doctrines and commandments of menbeing identical in Matthew and Mark. Traditionalism has met him in its extreme form, and he does not miss his opportunity to scorch it with the fire of his wrath.Perhaps the tone of indignation is even stronger in Matthew than in Mark. Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocritesi.e. concerning such hypocrites as you, in his own age or in any other. He condemned outward worship without heart, the profession of the lips with no inward devotion or obedience.Isaiah was full of such denunciations (as chap, Mar. 1:11-20), and so were all the prophets. Often, as here, they declared that it was in vain; it was empty, fruitless work; it went for nothing, Besides the heartlessness, and as another reason for rejecting such worship, God condemns the foisting upon his religion of human traditions and commandments. His worship must be upon the basis of his own requirements, and no human arrangement may take its place beside what he has appointed. The introduction of human tradition was the point in which the passage from Isaiah was directly applicable to the Pharisees.

Mar. 7:8. For should be omitted at the beginning of this verse, and so should as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do, at the end. So this strong statement stands alone: laying aside (or leaving) the commandment of God, ye hold the traditions of men. He charges them, not with addition, but with substitution. They have forsaken command for tradition, God for men. The elders are their chief authority, not Moses or Jehovah; they are not serving God. So, in spirit, Jer. 2:12-13. The rebuke is there for idolatry; but in the sight of God the sin of the Pharisees was as heinous as that. (W. N. Clarke)

FACT QUESTIONS 7:1-8

354.

What record does Luke give that is very much like this?

355.

Who were these scribes and Pharisees?

356.

Why conclude this was not an official delegation?

357.

Did the disciples have dirty hands?

358.

What has been said earlier about the lack of time for eating?

359.

For whose benefit were Mar. 7:3-4 placed in the text?

360.

Read Joh. 7:49 and show how it relates.

361.

What is the literal meaning of wash their hands oft.?

362.

Is there some connection with what Naaman the leper did (2Ki. 5:14) and what these Pharisees did? Explain.

363.

How is the word washing or baptismous different than the word used for the action of Christian baptism?

364.

Show how immersion is a perfectly natural thought in the washings here described.particularly with the tables or couches.

365.

How did the bondage of tradition become a yoke too heavy to bear?

366.

Why speak to Jesus and not to His disciples?

367.

Do you imagine the Jews who heard the rebuke of Jesus believed it? Did it make them angry? Was it fair? Was it loving?

368.

Jesus did not charge them with addition to the law of God but with what? Read Jer. 2:12-13.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

SUMMARY 6:17:23

The testimony for Jesus furnished by the preceding section, is based chiefly on the opinions which men formed concerning him. The disciples, though slow and hard of heart to realize his true nature, were constrained by the continued demonstration to acknowledge his inherent divine power. The masses of the people who had witnessed his miracles were wild with excitement wherever he went, and they brought to him their sick from every quarter, a practice which could not possibly have been kept up had not his cures been real and unfailing. His enemies, though they differed in opinion as to the source of his miraculous power, with one consent acknowledged its reality, and none of them counted him less than a prophet. The strange conceit that he was John the Baptist, or that he was one of the old prophets raised to life again, attests the struggle of unbelieving minds in trying to solve the problem of his power and of his being. Even the Nazarenes, who, of all his enemies, knew him most intimately and rejected him most scornfully, were constrained to wonder whence he obtained his wisdom and his mighty works. There was only one solution of the problem which was satisfying to the mind, and those alone were satisfied with their own conclusion and rested in it, who believed him to be the Christ and the Son of God. And to this day the men who have rejected this conclusion and have tried to account for the career of Jesus in some other way, have been driven to conceits as baseless and as unreasonable as any of those adopted by the Jews.McGarvey.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

VII.

(1-23) Then came together unto him.See Notes on Mat. 15:1-20.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

Chapter 7

CLEAN AND UNCLEAN ( Mar 7:1-4 )

7:1-4 There gathered together to Jesus the Pharisees, and some of the experts in the law who had come down from Jerusalem. They saw that some of his disciples ate their bread with hands which were ceremonially unclean, that is to say hands which had not undergone the prescribed washings; for the Pharisees, and all the Jews, who hold to the traditions of the ciders, do not eat unless they wash their hands, using the fist as the law prescribes; and when they come in from the market-place they do not eat unless they immerse their whole bodies; and there are many other traditions which they observe which relate to the prescribed washings of cups and pitchers and vessels of bronze.

The difference and the argument between Jesus and the Pharisees and the experts in the law, which this chapter relates, are of tremendous importance, for they show us the very essence and core of the divergence between Jesus and the orthodox Jew of his time.

The question asked was, Why do Jesus and his disciples not observe the tradition of the elders? What was this tradition, and what was its moving spirit?

Originally, for the Jew, the Law meant two things; it meant, first and foremost, the Ten Commandments, and, second, the first five books of the Old Testament, or, as they are called, the Pentateuch. Now it is true that the Pentateuch contains a certain number of detailed regulations and instructions; but, in the matter of moral questions, what is laid down is a series of great moral principles which a man must interpret and apply for himself. For long the Jews were content with that. But in the fourth and fifth centuries before Christ there came into being a class of legal experts whom we know as the Scribes. They were not content with great moral principles; they had what can only be called a passion for definition. They wanted these great principles amplified, expanded, broken down until they issued in thousands and thousands of little rules and regulations governing every possible action and every possible situation in life. These rules and regulations were not written down until long after the time of Jesus. They are what is called the Oral Law; it is they which are the tradition of the elders.

The word elders does not mean, in this phrase, the officials of the synagogue; rather it means the ancients, the great legal experts of the old days, like Hillel and Shammai. Much later, in the third century after Christ, a summary of all these rules and regulations was made and written down, and that summary is known as the Mishnah.

There are two aspects of these scribal rules and regulations which emerge in the argument in this passage. One is about the washing of hands. The Scribes and Pharisees accused the disciples of Jesus of eating with unclean hands. The Greek word is koinos ( G2839) . Ordinarily, koinos ( G2839) means common; then it comes to describe something which is ordinary in the sense that it is not sacred, something that is profane as opposed to sacred things; and finally it describes something, as it does here, which is ceremonially unclean and unfit for the service and worship of God.

There were definite and rigid rules for the washing of hands. Note that this hand-washing was not in the interests of hygienic purity; it was ceremonial cleanness which was at stake. Before every meal, and between each of the courses, the hands had to be washed, and they had to be washed in a certain way. The hands, to begin with, had to be free of any coating of sand or mortar or gravel or any such substance. The water for washing had to be kept in special large stone jars, so that it itself was clean in the ceremonial sense and so that it might be certain that it had been used for no other purpose, and that nothing had fallen into it or had been mixed with it. First, the hands were held with finger tips pointing upwards; water was poured over them and had to run at least down to the wrist; the minimum amount of water was one quarter of a log, which is equal to one and a half egg-shells full of water. While the hands were still wet each hand had to be cleansed with the fist of the other. That is what the phrase about using the fist means; the fist of one hand was rubbed into the palm and against the surface of the other. This meant that at this stage the hands were wet with water; but that water was now unclean because it had touched unclean hands. So, next, the hands had to be held with finger tips pointing downwards and water had to be poured over them in such a way that it began at the wrists and ran off at the finger tips. After all that had been done the hands were clean.

To fail to do this was in Jewish eyes, not to be guilty of bad manners, not to be dirty in the health sense, but to be unclean in the sight of God. The man who ate with unclean hands was subject to the attacks of a demon called Shibta. To omit so to wash the hands was to become liable to poverty and destruction. Bread eaten with unclean hands was not better than excrement. A Rabbi who once omitted the ceremony was buried in excommunication. Another Rabbi, imprisoned by the Romans, used the water given to him for handwashing rather than for drinking and in the end nearly perished of thirst, because he was determined to observe the rules of cleanliness rather than satisfy his thirst.

That to the Pharisaic and Scribal Jew was religion. It was ritual, ceremonial, and regulations like that which they considered to be essence of the service of God. Ethical religion was buried under a mass of taboos and rules.

The last verses of the passage deal further with this conception of uncleanness. A thing might in the ordinary sense be completely clean and yet in the legal sense be unclean. There is something about this conception of uncleanness in Lev 11:1-47; Lev 12:1-8; Lev 13:1-59; Lev 14:1-57; Lev 15:1-33, and in Num 19:1-22. Nowadays we would talk rather of things being tabu than of being unclean. Certain animals were unclean ( Lev 11:1-47). A woman after child-birth was unclean; a leper was unclean; anyone who touched a dead body was unclean. And anyone who had so become unclean made unclean anything he in turn touched. A Gentile was unclean; food touched by a Gentile was unclean; any vessel touched by a Gentile was unclean. So, then, when a strict Jew returned from the market place he immersed his whole body in clean water to take away the taint he might have acquired.

Obviously vessels could easily become unclean; they might be touched by an unclean person or by unclean food. This is what our passage means by the washings of cups and pitchers and vessels of bronze. In the Mishnah there are no fewer than twelve treatises on this kind of uncleanness. If we take some actual examples we will see how far this went. A hollow vessel made of pottery could contract uncleanness inside but not outside; that is to say, it did not matter who or what touched it outside, but it did matter what touched it inside. If it became unclean it must be broken; and no unbroken piece must remain which was big enough to hold enough oil to anoint the little toe. A flat plate without a rim could not become unclean at all; but a plate with a rim could. If vessels made with leather, bone or glass were flat they could not contract uncleanness at all; if they were hollow they could become unclean outside and inside. If they were unclean they must be broken; and the break must be a hole at least big enough for a medium-sized pomegranate to pass through. To cure uncleanness earthen vessels must be broken; other vessels must be immersed, boiled, purged with fire–in the case of metal vessels–and polished. A three-legged table could contract uncleanness; if it lost one or two legs it could not; if it lost three legs it could, for then it could be used as a board and a board could become unclean. Things made of metal could become unclean, except a door, a bolt, a lock, a hinge, a knocker and a gutter. Wood used in metal utensils could become unclean; but metal used in wood utensils could not. Thus a wooden key with metal teeth could become unclean; but a metal key with wooden teeth could not.

We have taken some time over these scribal laws, this tradition of the elders, because that is what Jesus was up against. To the scribes and Pharisees these rules and regulations were the essence of religion. To observe them was to please God; to break them was to sin. This was their idea of goodness and of the service of God. In the religious sense Jesus and these people spoke different languages. It was precisely because he had no use for all these regulations that they considered him a bad man. There is a fundamental cleavage here–the cleavage between the man who sees religion as ritual, ceremonial, rules and regulations, and the man who sees in religion loving God and loving his fellow-men.

The next passage will develop this; but it is clear that Jesus’ idea of religion and that of the scribes and Pharisees had nothing in common at all.

GOD’S LAWS AND MEN’S RULES ( Mar 7:5-8 )

7:5-8 So the Pharisees and the experts in the law asked him, “Why do your disciples not conduct themselves as the tradition of the elders prescribes, but eat bread with hands that are unclean?” He said to them, “Isaiah did well when he prophesied about you hypocrites, as it stands written, ‘This people honour me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. This so-called reverence of men is an empty thing, for they teach as doctrine human rules and regulations.’ While you hold fast the tradition of men you abandon the command of God.”

The scribes and Pharisees saw that the disciples of Jesus did not observe the niceties of the tradition and the code of the oral law in regard to the washing of hands before and during meals, and they asked why. Jesus began by quoting to them a passage from Isa 29:13. There Isaiah accused the people of his day of honouring God with their lips while their hearts were really far away. In principle Jesus accused the scribes and Pharisees of two things.

(i) He accused them of hypocrisy. The word hupokrites ( G5273) has an interesting and revealing history. It begins by meaning simply one who answers; it goes on to mean one who answers in a set dialogue or a set conversation, that is to say an actor; and finally it means, not simply an actor on the stage, but one whose whole life is a piece of acting without any sincerity behind it at all. Anyone to whom religion is a legal thing, anyone to whom religion means carrying out certain external rules and regulations, anyone to whom religion is entirely connected with the observation of a certain ritual and the keeping of a certain number of tabus is in the end bound to be, in this sense, a hypocrite. The reason is this–he believes that he is a good man if he carries out the correct acts and practices, no matter what his heart and his thoughts are like.

To take the case of the legalistic Jew in the time of Jesus, he might hate his fellow man with all his heart, he might be full of envy and jealousy and concealed bitterness and pride; that did not matter so long as he carried out the correct handwashings and observed the correct laws about cleanness and uncleanness. Legalism takes account of a man’s outward actions; but it takes no account at all of his inward feelings. He may well be meticulously serving God in outward things, and bluntly disobeying God in inward things–and that is hypocrisy.

The devout Mohammedan must pray to God a certain number of times each day. To do so he carries his prayer mat; wherever he is, he will unroll the mat, fall upon his knees, say his prayers and then go on. There is a story of a Mohammedan who was pursuing a man with upraised knife to murder him. Just then the call to prayer rang out. Immediately he stopped, spread out his prayer mat, knelt, said his prayer as fast as he could; then rose and continued his murderous pursuit. The prayer was simply a form and a ritual, an outward observance, merely the correct interlude in the career of murder.

There is no greater religious peril than that of identifying religion with outward observance. There is no commoner religious mistake than to identify goodness with certain so-called religious acts. Church-going, bible-reading, careful financial giving, even time-tabled prayer do not make a man a good man. The fundamental question is, how is a man’s heart towards God and towards his fellow-men? And if in his heart there are enmity, bitterness, grudges, pride, not all the outward religious observances in the world will make him anything other than a hypocrite.

(ii) The second accusation that Jesus implicitly levelled against these legalists was that they substituted the efforts of human ingenuity for the laws of God. For their guidance for life they did not depend on listening to God; they depended on listening to the clever arguments and debates, the fine-spun niceties, the ingenious interpretations of the legal experts. Cleverness never can be the basis of true religion. True religion can never be the product of man’s mind. It must always come, not from a man’s ingenious discoveries, but from the simple listening to and accepting the voice of God.

AN INIQUITOUS REGULATION ( Mar 7:9-13 )

7:9-13 He said to them, “You make an excellent job of completely nullifying the command of God in order to observe your own tradition. For Moses said, ‘Honour your father and your mother.’ And, ‘He who speaks evil of his father or mother shall certainly die.’ But you say, that, if a man says to his father or mother, ‘That by which you might have been helped by me is Korban,’–that is to say, God-dedicated–you no longer allow him to do anything for his father and mother, and you thereby render invalid the word of God by your tradition which you hand on. You do many things like that.”

The exact meaning of this passage is very difficult to discover. It hinges on the word Korban ( G2878) which seems to have undergone two stages of meaning in Jewish usage.

(i) The word meant a gift. It was used to describe something which was specially dedicated to God. A thing which was Korban ( G2878) was as if it had already been laid upon the altar. That is to say, it was completely set apart from all ordinary purposes and usages and became the property of God. If a man wished to dedicate some of his money or his property to God, he declared it Korban ( G2878) , and thereafter it might never again be used for any ordinary or secular purpose.

It does seem that, even at this stage, the word was capable of very shrewd usage. For instance, a creditor might have a debtor who refused or was unwilling to pay. The creditor might then say, “The debt you owe me is Korban ( G2878) ,” that is to say, “The debt you owe me is dedicated to God.” From then on the debtor ceased to be in debt to a fellow-man and began to be in debt to God, which was far more serious. It may well be that the creditor could discharge his part of the matter by making a quite small symbolic payment to the Temple, and then keeping the rest for himself. In any event, to introduce the idea of Korban ( G2878) into this kind of debt was a kind of religious blackmail transforming a debt owed to man into a debt owed to God.

It does seem that the idea of Korban ( G2878) was already capable of misuse. If that be the idea behind this, the passage speaks of a man declaring his property Korban ( G2878) , sacred to God, and then when his father or mother in dire need comes to him for help, saying, “I am sorry that I cannot give you any help because nothing that I have is available for you because it is dedicated to God.” The vow was made an excuse to avoid helping a parent in need. The vow which the scribal legalist insisted upon involved breaking one of the ten commandments which are the very law of God.

(ii) There came a time when Korban ( G2878) became a much more generalized oath. When a person declared anything Korban ( G2878) he entirely alienated it from the person to whom he was talking. A man might say, “Korban ( G2878) that by which I might be profited by you,” and, in so doing, he bound himself never to touch, taste, have or handle anything possessed by the person so addressed. Or, he might say, “Korban ( G2878) that by which you might be profited by me,” and, in so saying, he bound himself never to help or to benefit the person so addressed by anything that belonged to himself. If that be the use here, the passage means that, at some time, perhaps in a fit of anger or rebellion, a man had said to his parents, “Korban ( G2878) anything by which you may ever be helped by me,” and that afterwards, even if he repented from his rash vow, the scribal legalists declared that it was unbreakable and that he might never again render his parents any assistance.

Whichever be the case–and it is not possible to be certain–this much is sure, that there were cases in which the strict performance of the scribal law made it impossible for a man to carry out the law of the ten commandments.

Jesus was attacking a system which put rules and regulations before the claim of human need. The commandment of God was that the claim of human love should come first; the commandment of the scribes was that the claim of legal rules and regulations should come first. Jesus was quite sure that any regulation which prevented a man from giving help where help was needed was nothing less than a contradiction of the law of God.

We must have a care that we never allow rules to paralyse the claims of love. Nothing that prevents us helping a fellowman can ever be a rule approved by God.

THE REAL DEFILEMENT ( Mar 7:14-23 )

7:14-23 He called the crowd to him again and said, “Listen to me, all of you and understand. There is nothing which goes into a man from outside which can render him unclean; but it is the things which come out of a man which render the man unclean.” When he came into the house, away from the crowd, his disciples asked him about this hard saying. He said to them, “So, then, are you too unable to grasp things? Do you not understand that everything that goes into a man from outside cannot render him unclean, because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and it is then evacuated from him by natural bodily processes?” (The effect of this saying is to render all foods clean.) But he went on to say, “What comes out of a man, that is what renders the man unclean. it is from within, from the heart, that there come evil designs, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, covetous deeds, evil deeds, guile, wanton wickedness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they render a man unclean.”

Although it may not seem so now, this passage, when it was first spoken, was well-nigh the most revolutionary passage in the New Testament. Jesus has been arguing with the legal experts about. different aspects of the traditional law. He has shown the irrelevance of the elaborate handwashings. He has shown how rigid adherence to the traditional law can actually mean disobedience to the law of God. But here he says something more startling yet. He declares that nothing that goes into a man can possibly defile him, for it is received only into his body which rids itself of it in the normal, physical way.

No Jew ever believed that and no orthodox Jew believes it yet. Lev 11:1-47 has a long list of animals that are unclean and may not be used for food. How very seriously this was taken can be seen from many an incident in Maccabean times. At that time the Syrian king, Antiochus Epiphanes, was determined to root out the Jewish faith. One of the things he demanded was that the Jews should eat pork, swine’s flesh but they died in their hundreds rather than do so. “Howbeit many in Israel were fully resolved and confirmed in themselves not to eat any unclean thing. Wherefore they chose rather to die, that they might not be defiled with meats, and that they might not profane the holy covenant; so then they died.” ( 1Ma_1:62-63 .) Fourth Maccabees (chapter 7) tells the story of a widow and her seven sons. It was demanded that they should eat swine’s flesh. They refused. The first had his tongue cut out, the ends of his limbs cut off; and he was then roasted alive in a pan; the second had his hair and the skin of his skull torn off; one by one they were tortured to death while their aged mother looked on and cheered them on; they died rather than eat meat which to them was unclean.

It is in face of this that Jesus made his revolutionary statement that nothing that goes into a man can make him unclean. He was wiping out at one stroke the laws for which Jews had suffered and died. No wonder the disciples were amazed.

In effect Jesus was saying that things cannot be either unclean or clean in any real religious sense of the term. Only persons can be really defiled; and what defiles a person is his own actions, which are the product of his own heart. This was new doctrine and shatteringly new doctrine. The Jew had, and still has, a whole system of things which are clean and unclean. With one sweeping pronouncement Jesus declared the whole thing irrelevant and that uncleanness has nothing to do with what a man takes into his body but everything to do with what comes out of his heart.

Let us look at the things Jesus lists as coming from the heart and making a man unclean.

He begins with evil designs (dialogismoi, G1261) . Every outward act of sin is preceded by an inward act of choice; therefore Jesus begins with the evil thought from which the evil action comes. Next come fornications (porneiai, G4202) ; later he is to list acts of adultery (moicheiai, G3430) ; but this first word is a wide word–it means every kind of traffic in sexual vice. There follow thefts (klopai, G2829) . In Greek there are two words for a robber–kleptes ( G2812) and lestes ( G3027) . Lestes ( G3027) is a brigand; Barabbas was a lestes ( G3027) ( Joh 18:40) and a brigand may be a very brave man although an outlaw. Kleptes ( G2812) is a thief; Judas was a kleptes ( G2812) when he pilfered from the box ( Joh 12:6). A kleptes ( G2812) is a mean, deceitful, dishonourable pilferer, without even the redeeming quality of a certain audacious gallantry that a brigand must have. Murders (phonoi, G5408) and adulteries come next in the list and their meaning is clear.

Then comes covetous deeds (pleonexiai, G4124) . Pleonexia comes from two Greek words meaning to have more. It has been defined as the accursed love of having. It has been defined as “the spirit which snatches at that which it is not right to take,” “the baneful appetite for that which belongs to others.” It is the spirit which snatches at things, not to hoard them like a miser, but to spend them in lust and luxury. Cowley defined it as, “Rapacious appetite for gain, not for its own sake, but for the pleasure of refunding it immediately through all the channels of pride and luxury.” It is not the desire for money and things; it includes the desire for power, the insatiable lust of the flesh. Plato said, “The desire of man is like a sieve or pierced vessel which he ever tries to, and can never fill.” Pleonexia ( G4124) is that lust for having which is in the heart of the man who sees happiness in things instead of in God.

There follows evil deeds. In Greek there are two words for evil–kakos ( G2560) , which describes a thing which in itself is evil, and poneros ( G4190) , which describes a person or a thing which is actively evil. Poneriai ( G4189) is the word used here. The man who is poneros ( G4190) is the man in whose heart there is the desire to harm. He is, as Bengel said, “trained in every crime and completely equipped to inflict evil on any man.” Jeremy Taylor defined this poneria ( G4189) as “aptness to do shrewd turns, to delight in mischiefs and tragedies; loving to trouble our neighbour, and to do him ill offices; crossness, perverseness and peevishness of action in our intercourse.” Poneria ( G4189) not only corrupts the man who has it; it corrupts others too. Poneros ( G4190) –the Evil One–is the title of Satan. The worst of men, the man who is doing Satan’s work, is the man who, being bad himself, makes others as bad as himself.

Next comes dolos ( G1388) ; translated guile. It comes from a word which means bait; it is used for trickery and deceit. It is used for instance of a mousetrap. When the Greeks were besieging Troy and could not gain entry, they sent the Trojans the present of a great wooden horse, as if it was a token of good will. The Trojans opened their gates and took it in. But the horse was filled with Greeks who in the night broke out and dealt death and devastation to Troy. That exactly is dolos ( G1388) . It is crafty, cunning, deceitful, clever treachery.

Next on the list is wanton wickedness (aselgeia, G766) . The Greeks defined aselgeia ( G766) as “a disposition of soul that resents all discipline,” as “a spirit that acknowledges no restraints, dares whatsoever its caprice and wanton insolence may suggest.” The great characteristic of the man who is guilty of aselgeia ( G766) is that he is lost to decency and to shame. An evil man may hide his sin, but the man who has aselgeia ( G766) sins without a qualm and never hesitates to shock his fellow-men. Jezebel was the classic instance of aselgeia ( G766) when she build a heathen shrine in Jerusalem the Holy City.

Envy is literally the evil eye, the eye that looks on the success and happiness of another in such a way that it would cast an evil spell upon it if it could. The next word is blasphemia ( G988) . When this is used of words against man, it means slander; when it is used of words against God, it means blasphemy. It means insulting man or God.

There follows pride (huperephania, G5243) . The Greek word literally means “showing oneself above.” It describes the attitude of the man “who has a certain contempt for everyone except himself.” The interesting thing about this word, as the Greeks used it, is that it describes an attitude that may never become public. It may be that in his heart of hearts a man is always secretly comparing himself with others. He might even ape humility and yet in his heart be proud. Sometimes, of course, the pride is evident. The Greeks had a legend of this pride. They said that the Giants, the sons of Tartarus and Ge, in their pride sought to storm heaven and were cast down by Hercules. That is huperephania ( G5243) . It is setting oneself up against God; it is “invading God’s prerogatives.” That is why it has been called “the peak of all the vices,” and why “God opposes the proud.” ( Jas 4:6.)

Lastly comes folly (aphrosune, G877) . This does not mean the foolishness that is due to weakness of intellect and lack of brains; it means moral folly. It describes, not the man who is a brainless fool, but the man who chooses to play the fool.

It is a truly terrible list which Jesus cites of the things that come from the human heart. When we examine it a shudder surely passes over us. Nonetheless it is a summons, not to a fastidious shrinking from such things, but to an honest self-examination of our own hearts.

THE FORECAST OF A WORLD FOR CHRIST ( Mar 7:24-30 )

7:24-30 He left there and went away into the regions of Tyre and Sidon. He went into a house and he did not wish anyone to know about it, but he could not be there without people knowing about it. When a woman whose daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him, she immediately came and threw herself at his feet. The woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth. She asked him to cast the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, “First of all you must let the children eat their fill; it is not right to take the bread that belongs to the children and to throw it to the dogs.” “True, sir,” she answered, “but even the dogs below the table eat some of the bits of bread that the children throw away.” He said to her, “Because of this word, go your way! The demon has come out of your daughter!” She went away and found the child thrown upon her bed and the demon gone.

When this incident is seen against its background, it becomes one of the most moving and extraordinary in the life of Jesus.

First, let us look at the geography of the incident. Tyre and Sidon were cities of Phoenicia, which was a part of Syria. Phoenicia stretched north from Carmel, right along the coastal plain. It lay between Galilee and the sea coast. Phoenicia indeed, as Josephus puts it, “encompassed Galilee.”

Tyre lay 40 miles north-west of Capernaum. Its name means The Rock. It was so called because off the shore lay two great rocks joined by a three-thousand-feet-long ridge. This formed a natural breakwater and Tyre was one of the great natural harbours of the world from the earliest times. Not only did the rocks form a breakwater, they also formed a defence; and Tyre was not only a famous harbour, she was also a famous fortress. It was from Tyre and Sidon that there came the first sailors who steered by the stars. Until men learned to find their way by the stars, ships had to hug the coast and to lay up by night; but the Phoenician sailors circumnavigated the Mediterranean and found their way through the Pillars of Hercules until they came to Britain and the tin mines of Cornwall. It may well be that in their adventuring they had even circumnavigated Africa.

Sidon was 26 miles north-east of Tyre and 60 miles north of Capernaum. Like Tyre it had a natural breakwater, and its origin as a harbour and a city was so ancient that no man knew who had founded it.

Although the Phoenician cities were part of Syria, they were all independent, and they were all rivals. They had their own kings, their own gods and their own coinage. Within a radius of 15 or 20 miles they were supreme. Outwardly they looked to the sea; inland they looked to Damascus; and the ships of the sea and the caravans of many lands flowed into them. In the end Sidon lost her trade and her greatness to Tyre and sank into a demoralised degeneracy. But the Phoenician sailors will always be famous as the men who first found their way by following the stars.

(i) So, then, the first tremendous thing which meets us is that Jesus is in Gentile territory. Is it any accident that this incident comes here? The previous incident shows Jesus wiping out the distinction between clean and unclean foods. Can it be that here, in symbol, we have him wiping out the difference between clean and unclean people? Just as the Jew would never soil his lips with forbidden foods, so he would never soil his life by contact with the unclean Gentile. It may well be that here Jesus is saying by implication that the Gentiles are not unclean but that they, too, have their place within the Kingdom.

Jesus must have come north to this region for temporary escape. In his own country he was under attack from every side. Long ago the scribes and Pharisees had branded him as a sinner because he broke through their rules and regulations. Herod regarded him as a menace. The people of Nazareth treated him with scandalized dislike. The hour would come when he would face his enemies with blazing defiance, but that was not yet. Before it came, he would seek the peace and quiet of seclusion, and in that withdrawal from the enmity of the Jews the foundation of the Kingdom of the Gentiles was laid. It is the forecast of the whole history of Christianity. The rejection of the Jews had become the opportunity of the Gentiles.

(ii) But there is more to it than that. Ideally these Phoenician cities were part of the realm of Israel. When, under Joshua, the land was being partitioned out, the tribe of Asher was allocated the land “as far as Sidon the Great…and to the fortified city of Tyre” ( Jos 19:28-29). They had never been able to subdue their territory and they had never entered into it. Again is it not symbolic? Where the might of arms was helpless, the conquering love of Jesus Christ was victorious. The earthly Israel had failed to gather in the people of Phoenicia; now the true Israel had come upon them. It was not a strange land into which Jesus came; it was a land which long ago God had given him for his own. He was not so much coming amongst strangers as entering into his inheritance.

(iii) The story itself must be read with insight. The woman came asking Jesus’ help for her daughter. His answer was that it was not right to take the children’s bread and give it to dogs. At first it is an almost shocking saying.

The dog was not the well-loved guardian that it is to-day; more commonly it was a symbol of dishonour. To the Greek, the word dog meant a shameless and audacious woman; it was used exactly with the connotation that we use the word bitch to-day. To the Jew it was equally a term of contempt. “Do not give dogs what is holy.” ( Mat 7:6; compare Php_3:2 ; Rev 22:15.)

The word dog was in fact sometimes a Jewish term of contempt for the Gentiles. Rabbi Joshua ben Levi had a parable. He saw the blessings of God which the Gentiles enjoy; he asked, “If the Gentiles without the law enjoy blessings like that, how many more blessings will Israel, the people of God, enjoy?” “It is like a king who made a feast and brought in the guests and placed them at the door of his palace. They saw the dogs come out, with pheasants, and heads of fatted birds, and calves in their mouths. Then the guests began to say, ‘If it be thus with the dogs, how much more luxurious will the meal itself be.’ And the nations of the world are compared to dogs, as it is said ( Isa 56:11), ‘The dogs have a mighty appetite’.”

No matter how you look at it, the term dog is an insult. How, then, are we to explain Jesus’ use of it here?

(a) He did not use the usual word; he used a diminutive word which described, not the wild dogs of the streets, but the little pet lap-dogs of the house. In Greek, diminutives are characteristically affectionate. Jesus took the sting out of the word.

(b) Without a doubt his tone of voice made all the difference. The same word can be a deadly insult and an affectionate address, according to the tone of voice. We can call a man “an old rascal” in a voice of contempt or a voice of affection. Jesus’ tone took all the poison out of the word.

(c) In any event Jesus did not shut the door. First, he said, the children must be fed; but only first; there is meat left for the household pets. True, Israel had the first offer of the gospel, but only the first; there were others still to come. The woman was a Greek, and the Greeks had a gift of repartee; and she saw at once that Jesus was speaking with a smile. She knew that the door was swinging on its hinges. In those days people did not have either knives or forks or table-napkins. They ate with their hands; they wiped the soiled hands on chunks of bread and then flung the bread away and the house-dogs ate it. So the woman said, “I know the children are fed first, but can’t I even get the scraps the children throw away?” And Jesus loved it. Here was a sunny faith that would not take no for an answer, here was a woman with the tragedy of an ill daughter at home, and there was still light enough in her heart to reply with a smile. Her faith was tested and her faith was real, and her prayer was answered. Symbolically she stands for the Gentile world which so eagerly seized on the bread of heaven which the Jews rejected and threw away.

DOING ALL THINGS WELL ( Mar 7:31-37 )

7:31-37 He went away again from the regions of Tyre and came through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the regions of the Decapolis. They brought to him a man who was deaf and who had an impediment in his speech, and they asked him to lay his hands on him. He took him aside from the crowd all by himself. He thrust his fingers into his ears, and spat, and touched his tongue. Then he looked up into heaven, and sighed, and said to him, “Ephphatha!” which means, “Be opened!” And his ears were opened, and the bond which held his tongue was loosed, and he spoke correctly. He enjoined them to tell no one; but the more he enjoined them the more exceedingly they proclaimed the story of what he had done. They were all amazed beyond measure. “He has done all things well,” they said. And he made the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak.

This story begins by describing what is on the face of it an amazing journey. Jesus was going from Tyre to the territory around the Sea of Galilee. He was going from Tyre in the north to Galilee in the south; and he started by going to Sidon. That is to say, he started going due south by going due north! As one scholar has put it, it would be like going from London to Cornwall via Manchester; or like going from Glasgow to Edinburgh via Perth.

Because of that difficulty some have thought that the text is wrong and that Sidon should not enter into it at all. But almost certainly the text is correct as it stands. Another thinks that this journey took no less than eight months, and that, indeed, is far more likely.

It may well be that this long journey is the peace before the storm; a long communion with the disciples before the final tempest breaks. In the very next chapter Peter makes the great discovery that Jesus is the Christ ( Mar 8:27-29), and it may well be that it was in this long, lonely time together that this impression became a certainty in Peter’s heart. Jesus needed this long time with his men before the strain and tension of the approaching end.

When Jesus did arrive back in the regions of Galilee, he came into the district of the Decapolis, and there they brought to him a man who was deaf and who had an impediment in his speech. As Tyndale vividly translates it the man was “deffe and stambed in his speech.” No doubt the two things went together; it was the man’s inability to hear which made his speech so imperfect. There is no miracle which so beautifully shows Jesus’ way of treating people.

(i) He took the man aside from the crowd, all by himself. Here is the most tender considerateness. Deaf folk are always a little embarrassed. In some ways it is more embarrassing to be deaf than it is to be blind. A deaf person knows he cannot hear; and when someone in a crowd shouts at him and tries to make him hear, in his excitement he becomes all the more helpless. Jesus showed the most tender consideration for the feelings of a man for whom life was very difficult.

(ii) Throughout the whole miracle Jesus acted what he was going to do in dumb-show. He put his hands in the man’s ears and touched his tongue with spittle. In those days people believed that spittle had a curative quality. Suetonius, the Roman historian, tells of an incident in the life of Vespasian, the Emperor. “It fortuned that a certain mean commoner stark-blind, another likewise with a feeble and lame leg, came together unto him as he sat upon his tribunal, craving that help and remedy for their infirmities which had been shown unto them by Serapis in their dreams; that he should restore the one to his sight, if he did but spit into his eyes, and strengthen the other’s leg, if he vouchsafed only to touch it with his heel. Now when as he could hardly believe that the thing any way would find success and speed accordingly, and therefore durst not so much as put it to the venture, at the last, through the persuasion of his friends, openly before the assembly he assayed both means, neither missed he of the effect.” (Suetonius, Life of Vespasian 7. Holland’s translation.) Jesus looked up to heaven to show that it was from God that help was to come. Then he spoke the word and the man was healed.

The whole story shows us most vividly that Jesus did not consider the man merely a case; he considered him as an individual the man had a special need and a special problem, and with the most tender considerateness Jesus dealt with him in a way that spared his feelings and in a way that he could understand.

When it was completed the people declared that he had done all things well. That is none other than the verdict of God upon his own creation in the very beginning ( Gen 1:31). When Jesus came, bringing healing to men’s bodies and salvation to their souls, he had begun the work of creation all over again. In the beginning everything had been good; man’s sin had spoiled it all; and now Jesus was bringing back the beauty of God to the world which man’s sin had rendered ugly.

-Barclay’s Daily Study Bible (NT)

Fuente: Barclay Daily Study Bible

66. DEBATE WITH THE PHARISEES AND SCRIBES IN REGARD TO TRADITIONS, Mar 7:1-23 .

(See notes on Mat 15:1-20.)

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

1. Scribes, which came from Jerusalem It does not certainly appear, as Olshausen remarks, whether the scribes from Jerusalem really belong to Jerusalem, or are scribes of the north, just returned from the passover, full of the temper caught at Jerusalem, and ready to raise a dispute.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘And there gathered together to him the Pharisees and certain of the Scribes who had come down from Jerusalem.’

The fact that these men approached in a body demonstrated the official nature of the investigation. They were there to test His orthodoxy and to find out more about the new expansion of His ministry. The Pharisees, who were relatively few in number but had an importance beyond their numbers as ‘observers and teachers of the Law’ (there were altogether around six to seven thousand of them), had called in these Doctors of the Law to support their case against Him. They wanted to discredit Him in front of the people (Mar 7:14), and who better to do it than the experts from Jerusalem.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Jesus Faces Up To The Scribes From Jerusalem And Warns Them Against A False Emphasis On Their Traditions Instead Of On The Commandment of God (7:1-8).

Here Jesus makes clear that ‘the traditions of the elders’ are not binding on men because they are not a part of the Scriptures, but are the traditions of men. All societies build up traditions, but all need to recognise that in the end they have no binding force, and do not apply to all. It is otherwise with the word of God.

Analysis.

a And there are gathered together to Him the Pharisees, and certain of the Scribes, who had come from Jerusalem, and had seen that some of His disciples ate their bread with defiled, that is, unwashed, hands (Mar 7:1-2).

b For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands diligently, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders (Mar 7:3).

c And when they come from the marketplace, except they bathe themselves, they eat not; and many other things there are, which they have received to hold, washings of cups, and pots, and brass vessels (Mar 7:4).

b And the Pharisees and the Scribes ask him, “Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with defiled hands?” (Mar 7:5).

a And He said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honour me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship me, Teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men. You leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men” (Mar 7:6-8).

Note that in ‘a’ the Pharisees and Scribes grumble because His disciples do not follow the traditions of men, and in the parallel Jesus cites Scripture demonstrating that the traditions of men lead men away from the commandments of God. In ‘b’ the Pharisees and all the Jews wash their hands, holding the traditions of the elders, and in the parallel they ask why His disciples do not do so. Central in ‘c’ is the list of some of the things that they do.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

The Scribes from Jerusalem Return To Learn Some Home Truths (7:1-16).

Jesus’ continued impact is now brought out by the reappearance of the Doctors of Law from Jerusalem who have come down to investigate Him again. It may well be that they had heard of the new widespread preaching activity. They recognised that this was becoming something serious. This incident brings out vital differences between Jesus’ approach and the approach of ‘the Scribes’. They were concerned with ritual detail, and much of that ritual detail was with respect to non-Scriptural ritual based on men’s promulgations. Jesus was more concerned with men’s inner hearts. In the end it was all a question of where the emphasis should be laid.

And it was a burning issue, both for the people who lived in Galilee in the time of Jesus, who were mainly looked down on by the Pharisees but in their hearts were desirous of knowing God, and by the church of Mark’s own day which was constantly under harassment by Judaisers who claimed that their way was the way of Jesus.

We must not be unfair to these Doctors of the Law. By their own light and in their own way they were desirous of serving God, and they were seeking to be obedient to the covenant made through Moses. But Jesus’ point was that they were putting the emphasis in the wrong place, and thereby in danger of missing the main point of the Law. They believed indeed that God had chosen them to be His example to the world, and the best of them strove to be just that. But they had become so hidebound in their attempts to interpret it, that they had become slaves to the ritual which they themselves had set up in such a way that other more important things became overlooked. For being sure that eternal life could be received by faithfulness to the covenant as the Old Testament had said, they gave their whole lives to its fulfilment. But then in seeking to understand it they laid their emphasis on the ritual rather than the moral, something which has always been attractive because it gives a sense of security, however false, while not making huge moral demands. So they built up ritual rules to enable its fulfilment, in order to provide a clear way of doing so. But this had sadly led them away from the heart of their religion as found in true worship and compassion and mercy, and it had resulted in the building up of a religious system which, although they had convinced themselves it would help to ensure their fulfilment of the covenant, sadly prevented their true fulfilment of it, because it made them concentrate on inessentials. And one of those inessentials was to do with ritual washing. Ritual had become overwhelmingly important. They could look with equanimity on a man’s greed and pride, but not on his failure to ‘wash his hands’.

Thus this incident was centrally important because it was a challenge to how the Kingly Rule of God was to be seen, what lines it was to follow and what should be considered as central to its message. Having begun the establishment of the Kingly Rule of God a crisis point had been reached. The question was, on what basis were the rules of the new kingdom to be determined? (The writer knew that this was a challenge for the church as well. They too needed to be certain about the basis of their behaviour). Was it to be based on Pharisaic rules, or was it to be based on Old Testament principles and Jesus’ reinterpretation of them in, for example, the sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7)?

We must not misinterpret this confrontation. There were many points of agreement between them. Jesus was not arguing about the maintenance of rules of cleanness and uncleanness as found in the books of Moses. He was not trying to establish that the laws of uncleanness no longer applied. Indeed He scrupulously observed these requirements Himself. What He was seeking to look at was the fundamental question of what really made men defiled in the light of the particular demands made by these Legalisers, and to establish the fact that men’s ways under the Kingly Rule of God could not be determined by the rules that the Pharisaic teachers had made. It was the whole basis of living under the Kingly Rule of God that was at stake, and on what men should set their hearts. The old was passing away and the new had come.

But because Mark was writing to Gentiles he had first of all to try to demonstrate to them what the problem was, for many of them had little knowledge of the regulations that covered Jews.

The placing of this passage here after the success described in the previous passages can be compared with the placing of Mar 6:1-6 after the successes of chapter 5. It was a coming down to earth. It was always necessary to remind those who read or heard these words that the way was not totally smooth, for after all it led to the cross. It is also an important passage in that it explains in some depth precisely why Jesus disagreed with the Scribes and Pharisees.

But this passage is also preparatory for what is to come, for from this time onwards Jesus’ ministry will reach out into Gentile territory. Many a Jew would have frowned at the thought of a Jewish prophet wandering among the Gentiles (in spite of the example of Jonah) and would have been concerned about the fact that He would become ‘unclean’. Thus Mark makes clear from the start that far from that being so, it really marks a new beginning in understanding. He is indicating here that for Jesus what really mattered was not outward conformity to religious requirements, but the transformation of the inner hearts of men. And that was why He could move freely among the Gentiles, and was His purpose for them. He was not going among them in order to turn them into Jews, but in order to transform their inner lives.

The passage slits into two sections, the first dealing with the question of tradition (Mar 7:1-8), the second with the way in which the Scribes sometimes misused the Law (Mar 7:9-13).

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

SECTION 3. Jesus’ Ministry Throughout Galilee and In The Surrounding Regions (4:35-9:32).

After the initial opening up of the story of Jesus with its continual emphasis on His unique authority, Who He was and what He had come to do (Mar 4:1-3), and the series of parables which have indicated how the Kingly Rule of God was to expand (Mar 4:1-34), Mark now indicates how this expansion continued to occur through the ministry of Jesus in Galilee and the surrounding regions. At the same time he continues to expand on the glory and authority of Jesus Christ Himself as revealed in His activities. This last which lead up to the disciples’ recognition that He is the Messiah (Mar 8:29-30), in His subsequently being revealed in glory on a mountain in the presence of Peter, James and John (Mar 9:2-8), and in Jesus reinterpretation of His Messiahship in terms of the suffering Son of Man (Mar 8:31; Mar 9:9; Mar 9:12; Mar 9:30-32).

The emphasis on the suffering Son of Man will be the final emphasis of this section (Mar 9:30-32), and must therefore be seen as one of its primary aims. In view of the power and authority that He constantly revealed, it must have seemed totally contradictory. But Mark makes quite clear that it was so. In the midst of His powerful activity Jesus constantly made clear that He had come to die.

Meanwhile Mark totally ignores any ministry of Jesus in Judaea, together with His regular visits to Jerusalem for the feasts (as described by John). These would undoubtedly have taken place. No pious Galilean Jew would have failed over a period of time to make regular pilgrimages to Jerusalem for the different feasts. But Mark rather wants the concentration on His ministry to be seen as taking place in Galilee, with Jerusalem seen as the place which will reject and crucify Him. He is thus concerned to present a full picture of the glory of Christ, while facing his readers and hearers up to the fact that it will finally result in suffering and death, although always as leading on to His resurrection.

Analysis of 4:35-9:32.

Jesus leaves the regions around Capernaum (Mar 4:35).

a Sailing across the sea of Galilee alone with His disciples Jesus stills a mighty storm with His powerful word, while His disciples reveal their unbelief and ask, ‘Who is this?’ (Mar 4:35-41).

b He reveals His power over unclean spirits by healing a demoniac and commands the healed man to ‘go and tell’ (Mar 5:1-20).

c He reveals His power over uncleanness by healing a woman who is constantly losing life sustaining blood, thus making her ritually ‘unclean’, but above all over death by raising Jairus’ daughter. It is a manifestation of His glory to the three who have come apart with him to witness His glory and there are also two other witnesses to His glory (the child’s father and mother) (Mar 5:21-43).

d His own townsfolk do not know Who He is. He reveals His powerful words and mighty works so that His own townsfolk reveal their unbelief and ask ‘Where did this man get all this?’ (Mar 6:1-6 a).

e He sends out His disciples to teach and with authority over unclean spirits, and they reveal their faith and are successful (Mar 6:6-13).

f Herod executes John the Baptist, and offers his head on a dish, revealing the ways and the type of ‘food’ of the kingly rule of man on earth, while fearing his resurrection (Mar 6:14-29).

g The disciples return from their mission telling Him of the signs that they have accomplished and are called aside to be alone with Jesus. They are fulfilling the ministry that should have been the Pharisees had they but believed (Mar 6:30-32).

h Jesus feeds five thousand with five loaves and two fish, revealing the provision of heavenly food in the Kingly Rule of God on earth (Mar 6:33-44).

i Jesus walks to His disciples on the water, and they cry out in their unbelief and reveal their failure to hear and speak clearly because their hearts are hardened and they do not understand. They are spiritually deaf (Mar 6:45-52).

j The people gather to Him and He heals all who come to Him (Mar 6:53-56).

k Jesus challenges the Pharisees and Scribes with the fact that they pay more heed to tradition than to the word of God, and points out to the crowds that it is not outward things that defile a man but what is within the inner man (Mar 7:1-22).

j The Syro-phoenician woman comes to Him and He heals her stricken son (Mar 7:24-30).

i He heals the deaf and speech impaired man, a picture of the need of the disciples, and of Israel (Mar 7:31-37).

h He feeds the four thousand in Gentile territory and gives them bread from God’s table (Mar 8:1-10).

g The Pharisees reveal what is within them by seeking a sign, upsetting Jesus deeply and He declares that no sign will be given, which reveals why their ministry is barren so that they can have no part in His work (Mar 8:11-13).

f Jesus tells His disciples to beware of the leavened bread (the teaching) of the Pharisees and of Herod (or of the Herodians), and to hear and understand (Mar 8:14-21).

e The blind man’s eyes are gradually opened (Mar 8:22-26).

d The disciples do recognise Who Jesus is and learn that He must suffer. (They have learned from where He had ‘got all this’) (Mar 8:27 to Mar 9:1).

c Jesus is transfigured in such a way that His glory is revealed before the chosen three. The three come apart with Jesus and two other witnesses (Moses and Elijah) bear witness to His glory (Mar 9:2-13).

b The demon possessed boy is remarkably healed (Mar 9:14-29).

a The disciples are alone with Jesus and learn that spiritual storms lay ahead for Him and for themselves, receiving the fuller revelation of Who He is (Mar 9:30-32).

Jesus returns to Capernaum (Mar 9:33 a).

Note firstly how this whole section is sandwiched within visits to Capernaum, which had become a kind of headquarters for Jesus and His disciples. All therefore that takes place in this section radiates out from Capernaum. The section begins in ‘a’ with Jesus’ power revealed over nature in the stilling of the storm, while in the parallel Jesus tells His disciples of the ‘storm’ that yet awaits Him in the future to which He must submit. Nature He can control, but man must be allowed to perform his evil will to the utmost if mankind are to be saved. In ‘b’ He heals the demoniac, and in the parallel He heals the demon possessed boy. Both are extreme cases of possession. In ‘c’ He takes Peter, James and John apart and, in the presence of two witnesses (the girl’s father and mother), raises a young girl from the dead, revealing that He is the Lord of life, and in the parallel He takes Peter, James and John apart and is transfigured before them in the presence of two witnesses, Moses and Elijah, revealing that He is the Lord of glory. In both cases what has been seen is not to be spread abroad. In ‘d’ Jesus’ own townsfolk fail to recognise Him and ask ‘Where did this man get all this?’. while in the parallel His disciples do recognise Him and recognise where His power does come from, it is of God. In ‘e’ He sends out His disciples to teach and to have authority over unclean spirits, and they reveal their faith and their growing awareness, and are successful, and in the parallel we have the picture of the blind man whose eyes are gradually opened, a picture of what is happening to the disciples (it comes before the incident where the eyes of the disciples are known to have been opened when they confess His Messiahship). In ‘f’ Herod executes John the Baptist, and offers his head on a dish, revealing the ways and the type of ‘food’ offered under the kingly rule of man on earth, while in the parallel Jesus warns His disciples to beware of the leaven of Herod. In ‘g’ the disciples return from their mission telling Jesus of the signs that they have accomplished and are called aside to be alone with Jesus, while in the parallel the Pharisees are vainly looking for signs and He leaves them. In ‘h’ Jesus feeds five thousand Jewish believers with five loaves and two fish, revealing the provision of heavenly food in the Kingly Rule of God on earth, and in the parallel He feeds four thousand Jewish and Gentile believers with seven loaves and some fish, revealing the same. In ‘i’ Jesus walks to His disciples on the water, and in their unbelief they cry out and reveal their failure to hear and speak clearly, a result of the fact that their hearts are hardened so that they do not understand. They are spiritually deaf. And in the parallel a man who is deaf and stammering in his speech is healed. In ‘j’ the people gather to Him and He heals all who come to Him, and in the parallel the Syro-phoenician, typical of the Gentiles, comes to Him and He heals her daughter. Centrally in ‘k’ Jesus challenges the Pharisees and Scribes with the fact that they pay more heed to tradition than to the word of God, and points out to the crowds that it is not outward things that defile a man. It is what is within the inner man.

This larger section is divided up into smaller subsections of which the first is Mar 4:35 to Mar 6:6 a.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Jesus begins To Reach Out To Gentiles (7:1-8:21).

At this stage in His ministry Jesus begins to reach out further afield, for from this point on He spends much time preaching in territory which is mainly Gentile, although still containing many Jews. He prepares His disciples for it by His words to the Scribes and Pharisees, and then to the people, on what is truly essential, and then moves on to Tyre and Sidon where a Syro-phoenician woman’s simple faith brings home the right of Gentiles to partake of God’s table. The result is that He begins a campaign in Gentile territory. While this may partly have been due to pressures in Galilee, it is a clear expansion of His ministry.

Analysis of 7:1-8:21.

a Jesus challenges the Pharisees and Scribes with the fact that they pay more heed to tradition than to the word of God (Mar 7:1-13).

b He points out to the crowds that it is what is within the inner man that defiles a man (Mar 7:14-22).

c Jesus gives the Syro-phoenician woman bread from God’s table and heals her stricken son (Mar 7:24-30).

d He heals the deaf and speech impaired man, a picture of the need of Israel (Mar 7:31-37).

c He feeds the four thousand in Gentile territory and gives them bread from God’s table (Mar 8:1-10).

b The Pharisees reveal what is within them by seeking a sign, upsetting Jesus deeply (Mar 8:11-13).

a Jesus tells His disciples to beware of the leavened bread (the teaching) of the Pharisees and of Herod (or of the Herodians), and to hear and understand (Mar 8:14-21).

Note that in ‘a’ Jesus exposes the teaching of the Scribes and Pharisees, while in the parallel He warns His disciples to beware of it. In ‘b’ He points out that it is what comes from within that defiles a man, and in the parallel we have an example of this in the sign-seeking Pharisees. In ‘c’ Jesus gives the Syro-phoenician woman ‘bread from God’s table’, and in the parallel He gives bread from God’s table to four thousand who gather in Gentile territory. Centrally in ‘d’ He heals a man who is deaf and speech impaired, a picture of the failure of Israel, and of the world, which He is now here to remedy.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Sermon: Jesus Rebukes the Pharisees and Scribes for their Traditions ( Mat 15:1-20 ) In Mar 7:1-23 Jesus rebukes the Jews demonstrating His resistance to the traditions of the Jews and their increasing persecutions.

Comparison of Parallel Passages – Mar 7:1-23 gives us the account of Jesus rebuking the Pharisees and scribes because of their traditions. When we compare Mark’s account of this story to the parallel account in Mat 15:1-20, we clearly see Mark adding some explanatory notes regarding the customs of the Jews (Mar 7:3-4; Mar 7:11 b). He explains the Jewish tradition of washing hands and other prescribed items. He also explains that the Hebrew word “corban” means “a gift.” These notes are added by Mark because his readers were initially Roman Gentiles, while Matthew initially addressed Jewish converts and had no such need to add explanatory notes.

Mar 7:11 Word Study on “Corban” Strong says the Greek word (G2878), which is of Hebrew and Aramaic origin, means, “a votive offering, and the offering, a consecrated present.” He says the Hebrew word ( ) (H7133) means, “something brought near, a sacrificial present.” He says the words or later came to refer to the Temple treasury itself. The TDNT says comes directly from the Hebrew word, while is its Grecian Aramaic derivative. BDAG tells us that the word refers to “a gift consecrated to God, to be used for religious purposes.” BDAG says the word means, “the temple treasury.” The word is used only one time in the New Testament (Mar 7:11) and is used once (Mat 27:6). We find the Greek word used in the LXX (Lev 2:1; Lev 2:4; Lev 2:12-13) when speaking of the gifts offered to the Sanctuary. In addition, Josephus uses the word and in his writings:

“Let no one blaspheme those gods which other cities esteem such; nor may any one steal what belongs to strange temples, nor take away the gifts that are dedicated to any god.” ( Antiquities 4.8.10)

“This is declared by Theophrastus, in his writings concerning laws; for he says that ‘the laws of the Tyrians forbid men to swear foreign oaths.’ Among which he enumerates some others, and particularly that called Corban; which oath can only be found among the Jews, and declares what a man may call “A thing devoted to God.” ( Against Apion 1.22)

“After this he [Pilate] raised another disturbance, by expending that sacred treasure which is called Corban upon aqueducts, whereby he brought water from the distance of four hundred furlongs. At this the multitude had great indignation.” ( Wars 2.9.4)

Comments In defining the words and , the TDNT suggests that Mar 7:11 reflects a Jewish tradition of offering a gift or even oneself to God according to the laws of making vows in Leviticus 27, while neglecting the needs of one’s own parents.

Mar 7:21-22 Comments Thematic Scheme for List of Vices We can imagine these list of vices given by Jesus Christ having a progressive order if we read them in reverse order. For example, foolishness is bound in the heart of a child (Pro 22:15), leading to pride of the heart and an outbreak of blasphemy against all authority, progressing and culminating into sexual sins, which is an outward expression of one who is given over to evil thoughts and a godless lifestyle. Paul the apostle often mentions sexual sins first in his list of vices (1Co 6:9-10, Gal 5:19-20, Eph 5:3-7, Col 3:5-9), and if not listed first, Paul includes them in such lists (1Ti 1:9-10, Rev 21:8). Perhaps the reason is that sexual sins express the culmination of those who are given over to rebellion against God. For example, Paul’s passage on the depravity of mankind reveals that men fall into sexual depravity and homosexuality when God gives them over to a reprobate mind (Rom 1:16-32).

1Co 6:9-10, “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.”

Gal 5:19-21, “Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.”

Eph 5:3-7, “But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints; Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks. For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no man deceive you with vain words: for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore partakers with them.”

Col 3:5-9, “Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry: For which things’ sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience: In the which ye also walked some time, when ye lived in them. But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth. Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds;”

1Ti 1:9-10, “Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine;”

Rev 21:8, “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.”

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

The Preaching Ministry of Jesus Christ Mar 1:14 to Mar 13:37 describes the preaching ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ as well as the miracles that accompanying the proclamation of the Gospel. His public ministry can be divided into sections that reflect God’s divine plan of redemption being fulfilled in Jesus’s life.

Outline Here is a proposed outline:

1. Indoctrination – The Preaching of Jesus Christ in Galilee Mar 1:14 to Mar 4:34

2. Divine Service Training the Twelve in Galilee Mar 4:35 to Mar 6:13

3. Perseverance: Preaching against Man’s Traditions Mar 6:14 to Mar 7:23

4. Perseverance – Beyond Galilee Mar 7:24 to Mar 9:50

5. Glorification – In Route to and in Jerusalem Mar 10:1 to Mar 13:37

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

Perseverance: Preaching in the Midst of Offences – In Mar 6:14 to Mar 7:23 the emphasis moves from divine service through preaching the Word of God to perseverance in the midst of persecutions, where Jesus begins to train to His disciples in the midst of rising unrest among the Jews.

Outline Here is a proposed outline:

1. Narrative: Persecutions Arise Mar 6:14-56

2. Sermon – Jesus Preaches Against Tradition Mar 7:1-23

Fuente: Everett’s Study Notes on the Holy Scriptures

Concerning Ceremonial Washings.

The Pharisees find fault:

v. 1. Then came together unto Him the Pharisees and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem.

v. 2. And when they saw some of His disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say, with unwashen, hands, they found fault.

v. 3. For the Pharisees and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders.

v. 4. And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brazen vessels, and of tables.

v. 5. Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Him, Why walk not Thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands?

An instance of typical pharisaic pedantry, of deliberate, unwarranted faultfinding. Jesus had returned to Capernaum for a few days after the exciting and wearying experiences of a strenuous week. Here He finds a company of His enemies assembled; the contrast between the Lord’s popularity during the last few days and the hostility of the Jewish religious leaders is brought out very strongly. It may be. that this delegation of Pharisees and scribes was the same one that was dogging Christ’s footsteps since the casting out of devils, chapter 3:22; or the authorities may have sent down even more learned and disputatious men than at first, as they were learning to respect the clear arguments and the sharp tongue of the Galilean Rabbi. The purpose of their coming was frankly not to hear the Word of Life, but to provoke disputes. Their opportunity came very soon. They saw some of Christ’s disciples eat with common, with unwashed hands. This was their cue for an attack upon Jesus. Note: Not the question of sanitation caused them concern, but one which they considered affecting the standing of a believing Jew in the sight of God. Mark explains the difficulty on account of his Roman readers. It was the custom of the Pharisees and of all the strict Jews that observed the traditions of the elders religiously to perform certain washings, especially before partaking of food. The original purpose of this precept had undoubtedly been to promote sanitary conditions among the Jews, a fact which often shielded them against epidemics,” But the Pharisees and elders at the time of Jesus emphasized such outward observances to the detriment and exclusion of the more important things, the factors of real religion. They washed their hands most diligently before eating, with their fists, to insure thoroughness or to prevent the soiling of one hand from the palm of the other. They were careful, at the same time, to have the washing extend at least to the wrist, according to others to the elbow. It must be vigorous and thorough, and be done just so, otherwise a person became guilty of not clinging firmly to the tradition of the elders, a most heinous offense in the sight of the orthodox Pharisee. When coming back from market especially, where they might unknowingly have touched something unclean, the strict Jews were most inexorable and oppressive in their demands for cleanliness, a thorough washing of the hands and arms, if not of the whole body, being a prime requisite at that time. This care had become so excessive that it extended to the dishes and the furniture of the house as a matter of Levitical purification. They had received, and adhered most firmly to, the tradition regarding the washing of drinking-cups, of wooden and brazen vessels, and even of couches or sofas. The word used here for utensils of brass is really a Latin word, meaning a Roman measure equal to about 1 pints. Earthen vessels are not mentioned, since they had to be broken if defiled, Lev 15:12. Thus the whole life of the Jews, down to the most minute performances of every-day life, was governed by such laws and precepts. Having explained the Jewish custom, Mark returns to his story. The Pharisees attack Jesus, finding fault both with His disciples and therefore with Him for transgressing the traditions of the elders, which were thus represented as just as sacred and inviolable as the commandments of God.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

EXPOSITION

Mar 7:1, Mar 7:2

These verses, according to the Greek construction, should run thus: And there are gathered together unto the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which had come from Jerusalem, and had seen that some of his disciples ate their bread with defiled, that is, unwashen, hands. The word () translated in the Authorized Version, “they found fault,” does not appear in the best authorities. It seems to have been interpolated to help the construction. St. Mark explains the meaning of the word (literally, common), by the word () “unwashen.” The disciples, doubtless, washed their hands, but they abstained from the multiplied ceremonial washings of the Pharisees, which they had received by tradition and punctiliously observed. The scribes and Pharisees, who had come from Jerusalem, were doubtless sent as spies, to watch and to report in no friendly spirit the proceedings of the great Prophet of Nazareth.

Mar 7:3

Except they wash their hands oft. The Greek word here rendered “oft” is : literally, with the fist, i.e. with the closed hand, rubbing one against the other. This word has caused a vast amount of criticism; and the difficulty of explaining it seems to have led to the adoption of a conjectural reading ( or ) rendered “oft;” crebro in the Vulgate. But the Syriac Peshito Version renders the Greek word by a word which means “diligently,” and it is interesting and helpful, as a matter of exegesis, to know that it also renders the Greek word () in Luk 15:8 by the same Syriac synonym, “diligently.” The “clenched fist” implies vigor and resolution, and points to “diligence,” and there are very high authorities in favor of this rendering, as, Epiphanius, Isaac Casaubon, and Cornelius a Lapide, to say nothing of our best modern expositors. It is also adopted in the Revised Version. Holding the tradition of the elders. The Pharisees pretended that this tradition had been orally delivered by God to Moses on Mount Sinai, and then transmitted orally down to their time. These oral precepts were afterwards embodied in the Talmud.

Mar 7:4

And when they come from the market ( ); literally, and from the market-place; there is no verb in the principal manuscripts, although the Cambridge Codex has , and the old Latin gives redeuntes. In the market-place there would be every kind of men and things, clean and unclean, by contact with which they feared that they might be polluted; and so they considered that they had need to cleanse themselves from this impurity by a more careful and complete ablution. Another Greek word is used here, namely, . In the former verse the word is , a more partial and superficial kind of washing than that implied in . It should, however, be added that two of the great uncials, Vatican and Sinaitic, have , “sprinkle themselves,” instead of an authority sufficient to justify the Revisers of 1881 in putting it into the margin. The washing of cups, and pots, and brasen vessels, and of tables. The words ( ) wrongly rendered, “and of tables”because they could only mean “couches”have not sufficient authority to be retained in the text. “Cups” () mean “drinking vessels.” The “pot” () is a Roman word, sextarius, a small liquid measure, the sixth part of a congius, corresponding nearly to the English gallon, so that would be rather more than a pint measure. Brasen vessels. These would probably be copper vessels, such as are still used in Syria for cooking purposes. These are particularly mentioned. Earthenware vessels would be broken. Which they have received to hold ( ); literally, which they received to hold: observe the aorist.

Mar 7:5

The Law of Moses prohibited contact with many things deemed to be unclean; and if any one had touched them he was counted unclean, so that he might not approach the temple until he had cleansed himself by the washing prescribed in the Law; the design being that by means of these ceremonial and bodily washings the Jews might be awakened to the necessity of spiritual cleansing. Hence the Jews, and especially the Pharisees, who wished to be esteemed more righteous than others, placing their whole religion in these external ceremonies, frequently washed themselves before their meals, and even at their meals. At the marriage feast in Cana of Galilee we read that there were placed “six waterpots of stone ( )” for these purifying purposes; so that if any Jew had by accident come into contact with any unclean thing, and so had contracted any ceremonial impurity, he might remove it. This, however, was only a custom, and not a thing of legal obligation until it was exalted into a law by the Pharisees. Now, this punctilious observance of traditions by the Pharisees and other Jews yielded little or no religious profit; for it occupied their time with external purifications, and so drew away their attention from the duty of far greater momentthe cleansing of the soul from sin. They made clean “the outside of the cup and platter,” but neglected the inward cleansing of the heart. Therefore our blessed Lord, who came to put an end to the old ceremonial law, and to these vain and frivolous traditions which now overlaid it, and who wished to direct all the care of his disciples to the making of the heart clean, cared not to enforce these external washings upon his disciples, although he did not say this in so many words to the Pharisees, lest he should provoke their envy and their malice. He therefore meets their question in another way.

Mar 7:6, Mar 7:7

Our Lord quotes against them a prophecy of Isaiah (Isa 29:13), This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship me, teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men. The prophet here gives the cause of the blindness of the Jews, because they honored God with their lips, while their heart was far from him; and their worship of him (for that is the meaning of “their fear”) was the commandment of men, which they had been taught; that is, they worshipped God, not according to that spiritual worship which he had commanded, but after the traditions of men and of their own scribes, partly futile, partly perverse, and contrary to God’s Law. So he says, Well did Isaiah prophesy of you. The word is , “excellentlybeautifullydid he prophesy concerning you ( ), the hypocrites.” Not that the prophet had the hypocrites of our Saviour’s time in his mind when he uttered these words, but that the Spirit of God which was within him enabled him to describe accurately the character of those who seven centuries afterwards would be doing the same things as their forefathers. And observe how they were punished. For as they gave a lip-service only to God, praising him with their mouth indeed, but giving their heart to vanity and the world; so God on his part would give them the words onlythe shell, so to speak, the letter which killeth; but take away from them the kernel the spirit and the life, so that they might not lay hold of it nor taste it.

Mar 7:9

Here the word is repeated. Full well () do ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your tradition. It is as though our Lord said, “Your traditions are not instituted by God, or by his servants the prophets, but they are modern inventions, which you desire to defend, not out of love or reverence for them, but because you are the successors of those who invented them, and arrogate to yourselves the power of adding to them and making similar new traditions.

Mar 7:10

Our Lord now gives an example of one of these human traditions. Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother;that is, obey and love them, and succor them, if they need it; for here “honor” means not only reverence and love, but support, as is clear from Mar 7:12and, He that speaketh evil of father or mother, let him die the death; that is, let him “surely die,” without any hope of pardon. Our Lord means this: “That if he who by words only speaks evil of his father or his mother is, by law, guilty of death, how much more is he guilty of death who wrongs them by deed, and deprives them of that support which he owes them by the law of nature; and not only so, but teaches others so from Moses’ seat, as you scribes and Pharisees do when you say, ‘It is Corban.'”

Mar 7:11-13.

But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or his mother, That wherewith thou mightest have been profited by me is Corban, that is to say, Given to Godthese words, “that is to say, Given to God,” are St. Mark’s explanation of “corban”ye no longer suffer him to do aught for his father or his mother; making void the word of God by your tradition, which ye have delivered. Now, this the scribes and Pharisees did for their own covetous ends. For most of them were priests, who received offerings made to God as his ministers, and then converted them to their own uses. In this they greatly erred; because the obligation of piety by which children are bound to support their parents when they need it, is a part of the law of nature, to which every vow, every oblation, ought to yield. Thus, if any one had devoted his goods to God, and his father or his mother became needy, those goods ought to be given to his parents and not to the temple. The word “corban” is a Hebrew word, meaning “that which is brought near,” “a gift or offering to God.” Hence, figuratively, the place where these offerings were deposited was called the “corbanas,” or, “sacred treasury” (see Mat 27:6, ). Hence to say of anything, “It is Corban,” was to say that it had a prior and more sacred destination. And when it was something that a parent might need, to say, “It is Corban,” i.e. it is already appropriated to another purpose, was simply to refuse his request and to deny him assistance, and so to break one of the first of the Divine commandments. Thus the son, by crying “Corban” to his needy parents, shut their mouths, by opposing to them a scruple of conscience, and suggesting to them a superstitious fear. It was as much as to say, “That which you ask of me is a sacred thing which I have devoted to God. Beware, therefore, lest you, by asking this of me, commit sacrilege by converting it to your own uses.” Thus the parents would be silenced and alarmed, choosing rather to perish of hunger than to rob God. To such extremities did these covetous scribes and Pharisees drive their victims, compelling a son to abstain from any kind offices for his father or his mother. St. Ambrose says, “God does not seek a gift wrung out of the necessities of parents.” Making void (); literally, depriving it of its authority, annulling. In Gal 3:17 the same word is rendered “disannul.” By your traditions; the traditions, that is, by which they taught children to say “Corban” to their parents. Observe the words, “your tradition” ( ); your tradition, as opposed to those Divine traditions which God has sanctified, and his Church has handed down from the beginning. And many such like things ye do. This is added by St. Mark to fill up the outline, and to show that this was only a sample of the many ways in which the commandment of God was twisted, distorted, and annulled by these rabbinical traditions.

Mar 7:14, Mar 7:15

In the Authorized Version the beginning of this verse runs thus: “And when he had called all the people unto him, he said.” But according to the best authorities, the adverb should be inserted, and the words will run as follows:And he called to him the multitude again. It is probable that he had waved them from him while he held this discourse with the scribes from Jerusalem. But now he calls the people near to him again, that all might hear that which concerned all alike. It is probable, indeed, that this discussion with the scribes may have taken place in the house, into which he again returned after having made this authoritative declaration to the multitude. The words are given with more emphasis here than as recorded by St. Matthew. Every one was solemnly invited to hearken and understand, while he announced a principle of the highest importance. Our Lord did not intend to disparage the difference between clean and unclean meats as it had been laid down in the Levitical Law. His object rather was to clear that teaching from the obscurities in which it had been involved by the scribes and Pharisees, who laid stress only on external acts. His object was to show that all impurity springs from the heart; and that, unless the heart is cleansed, all external washings are in vain. It is as though he said, “The scribes teach you that it is not lawful to eat with unwashen hands because unwashen hands make the food clean, and unclean food defiles the soul. But in this they err; because not that which enters from without into the mouth, but that which proceeds from within through the mouth, and so from the heart, if it be impure,this defiles the man;” as he more fully explains at verse 21.

Mar 7:16

This verse has some good authority, but not sufficient to be retained in the text. The Revisers of 1881 have placed it in the margin.

Mar 7:17

Our Lord, having proclaimed this great principle to the multitude in the presence of their teachers, the scribes and Pharisees, returned into the house (the true reading is here , without the article). It means, of course, the house where he was lodging. And then his disciples asked of him the parable. St. Matthew (Mat 15:15) says that the question was put to him by St. Peter speaking in the name of the other disciplesanother instance of the reserve main-rained in this Gospel with reference to this apostle.

Mar 7:18, Mar 7:19

Our Lord had already, in his sermon on the mount, taught his disciples fully wherein purity or impurity of heart consists, and he might, therefore, with good reason, ask them how it was that they, even they who had been so favored by being constantly with him, had forgotten or misunderstood him. Our Lord’s illustration is physically accurate. The portion carried off is that which by its removal purifies what remains. The part which is available for nourishment is, in its passage through the system, converted into chyle, the matter from which the blood is formed. What is not available for nourishment passes away into the , or draught, Purging all meats. The most approved reading here is undoubtedly the masculine (), and not the neuter (). This change of reading compels a somewhat different construction. Accepting, therefore, the masculine as the true reading, the only possible rendering is that which makes this last clause a comment by the evangelist upon our Lord’s previous words, in which he indicates to the reader that our Lord intended by this illustration to show that no food, of whatever kind, when received with thanksgiving, can make a man unclean. The clause must, therefore, be connected with the preceding words, by the introduction of the words, in italics, “This he said, making all meats clean.” The passage, thus rendered, becomes a very significant exposition of what has gone before. It is well worthy of notice that this explanation is to be found in St. Chrysostom (Homily on St. Mat 15:1-39.): : “But Mark affirms that he said these things, making the meats clean.” It may be added that this explanation agrees finely with the words in Act 10:15, “What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common.”

Mar 7:20-23

From within, out of the heart of men; that is, from the reason and the will, of which the heart is the symbol and the labouratory. For the heart ministers the vital fore to the intellect to enable it to understand, and to the will to enable it to live, although the seat of the intellect is in the brain. St. Mark’s enumeration of evil things is in a somewhat different order from that of St. Matthew; and he adds to St. Matthew’s list (), foolishness, showing how all evil terminates in the loss of all moral and intellectual illumination. All these evil things proceed from within: and defile the man. Dr. Morison, in his admirable commentary on St. Mark, well observes here that “these things have an inward origin, and are vomited forth from the crater of the heart or soul;” and further on he says, “In a little sphere of things, and as regards acts, though not as regards substances or essences, men may be spoken of as creators. Men, that is to say, are the efficient causes of their own choices. If they were not, they would not be really free. If it was not so, there would be no real responsibility.” St. Matthew (Mat 15:20) adds here, “But to eat with unwashen hands defileth not the man.” This is the end and scope of the parable, which is to show that unwashen hands and unclean meats defile not a man, but only an impure and depraved will. It seems almost needless to observe that our Lord does not condemn the washing of the hands before meats as a thing in itself in any way wrong. All nations approve of ablutions as tending to cleanliness and health.

“Dant famuli manibus lymphas, Cereremque canistris

Expediunt, tousisque ferunt mantelia villis.”

“It was thought sordid and mean to sit down to meals with unwashen hands. Whence not the clergy only, but the people, washed their hands before prayer.” The moral of all is this, how carefully is the heart to be guarded, instructed, and adorned, seeing that it is the instrument and labouratory of all evil and all good, of all vice and all virtue! “Keep thy heart with all diligent,” so that nothing may enter therein and nothing go out therefore and you not be conscious of it, and your reason may not approve; “for out of it are the issues of life.”

Mar 7:24

Our Lord now passes out of Galilee into a heathen country, Syro-phoenicia, into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, that he might begin to impart his miracles and his doctrine, which the scribes and Pharisees had rejected, to the Gentiles. There is not sufficient authority for omitting “Sidon” from the text. Both these cities were renowned for their extensive commerce and for their wealth. It is probable that the true reading in Mar 7:31, which will be noticed presently, may have led to the omission by some authorities of “Sidon” here. But there is really no inconsistency in retaining the words “and Sidon” here; and accepting the reading” through Sidon” there. Tyro, which was the capital of Phoenicia, lay to the south, bordering on Judaea; Sidon to the north: and multitudes flocked to Christ from these parts. He entered into a house, and would have no man know it: and he could not be hid. He would have no man know it, partly for the sake of quiet, and partly lest he should rouse the Jews more bitterly against him, and give them occasion to cavil that he was not the Messiah promised to the Jews, because, having left them, he had turned to the Gentiles. St. Mark (Mar 3:8) has already informed us that his fame had spread to those about Tyro and Sidon.

Mar 7:25-27

The construction of this verse is Hebraistic (see Act 15:17). Instead of , the approved reading is : But straightway a woman, whose young daughter literally, little daughter; St. Mark is fond of diminutiveshad an unclean spirit. All ages were liable to this incursion of unclean spirits. The woman seems to have come from a distance. She was a Greekthat is, a Gentilea Syro-phoenician by race, as distinguished from the Libyan Phoenicians, of Carthage. She was a descendant from those seven nations of Canaan which had been driven out by God’s command. They were called in their own language “Canaanites,” And she besought him (); literally, asked him. St. Matthew (Mat 15:22) says that “she cried (), have mercy on me, O Lord, thou Son of David.” Aristotle says that “parents love their children more than their children love them; because love descends, and because parents desire that their children should survive them, that they may live on in their children, as it were, after death; that they become, so to speak, immortal through their children, and possess that eternity, which they cannot have in themselves, in their children and their children’s children.” St. Matthew (Mat 15:23) tells us that at first “he answered her not a word,” and he does not record the remarkable saying, Let the children first be filled, which in St. Mark precedes the words, it is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it to the dogs. Dogs abound in Palestine and the surrounding districts, but they are not cared for. They go about in packs, with no particular masters and no particular homes. They seem to be chiefly useful as scavengers. Nevertheless, the dog of the East is amenable to kindness shown him by man, and there, as in England, children and young dogs soon become friendly. It is of () “little dogs” that our Lord here speaks. Our Lord here speaks after the manner of the Jews, who called the Gentiles dogs, as distinguished from themselves, the children of the kingdom. Let the children first be filled. Suffer me first to heal all the Jews who need my help. Our Lord makes at first as though he would refuse her request; and yet it is not an absolute denial. There might be hope for her when the children were filled. Thus Christ oftentimes deals with holy souls, namely, by humbling and mortifying them when they desire anything at his hands, in order that with yet greater importunity and humility they may seek and obtain it. St. Chrysostom says, “Whether we obtain that which we seek for, or whether we obtain it not, let us ever persevere in prayer. And let us give thanks, not only if we obtain, but even if we fail to obtain. For when God denies us anything, it is no less a favor than if he had granted it; for we know not as he does what is most expedient for us.”

Mar 7:28

In this verse there is a slight change of reading, causing a change of rendering; namely, thus: Yea, Lord: even instead of the dogs the little dogsunder the table eat of the children’s crumbs. Observe the antithesis: “the children” (the little daughter) sitting at the table; the “little dogs” under the table. It is as though she said, “Give me, most gracious Lord, only a crumb (a small mercy compared with thy greater mercies), the healing of my little daughter, which may fall as it were obiter from thee upon us Canaanites and Gentiles, and be gratefully picked up as one of thy lesser benefits.” Cornelius a Lapide enlarges beautifully upon this: “Feed me, then, as a little dog. To me, a poor Gentile, let a crumb of thy grace and mercy be vouchsafed; but let the full board, the plentiful bread of grace and righteousness, be reserved for the Jewish children. I cannot leave the table of my Lord, whose little dog I am. No; if you spurn me away with your foot, or with a blow, I will go away; but I will come back again, like a little dog, through another door. I will not be driven away by blows. I will not let thee go until thou hast given me what I ask of thee.’ For this Canaanite constrains Christ, arguing her case from his own words, prudently, modestly, forcibly, and with a humble faith which perceives that he is not unwilling to be overcome by petition and by reason. Indeed, she entangles him in the meshes of his own words. So great is the plenteousness of his table, that it shall abundantly suffice for her if she may but partake of the crumbs which fall from the table of his children.”

Mar 7:29

St. Matthew says here (Mat 15:28), “O woman, great is thy faith: be it done unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was healed from that hour.” If we suppose St. Mark’s words to come in after St. Matthew’s words “be it done unto thee even as thou wilt,” the two narratives are perfectly consistent. Our Lord could no longer restrain himself, or resist these wonderful appeals of faith. Overcome by the skillful reasoning and importunity of the Canaanite, he gives her that which she asks, and more. tie heals her daughter, and he sets a crown of gold upon her head. It is here obvious to remark that this child vexed by the unclean spirit represents the soul tempted by Satan and polluted by sin. In such a condition we must distrust our own strength, and rely only on Christ, and call upon him with humility and repentance; acknowledging ourselves to be but as dogs in his sight; that is, miserable sinners; yet not such as that we should despair of pardon, but rather that we should hope for the mercy of Christ the greater we feel our misery to be. For it is worthy of a great Saviour to cleanse and save great sinners. Again, this Gentile daughter represents the Church of the Gentiles, which, shut out from salvation by the justice of God, enters the kingdom of heaven through the door of mercy. Here was a great conversion indeed; for now the Jews through their unbelief change places with the Gentiles, and, like them, can only be admitted through the same gate of Divine mercy.

Mar 7:30

There is an inversion in the order of the clauses in this verse, according to the best authorities. The words should run thus: And she went away unto her house, and found the child ( ) laid upon the bed, and the devil gone out. She found her little daughter set free from the possession, but exhausted by the convulsions which he caused in departing from her; weary with the violence of the struggle, but restful and composed. So the sinful soul, set free from sin by the absolution of Christ, rests upon the couch of a conscience pacified by the blood of Christ, and at peace with God.

Mar 7:31

According to the most approved authorities this verse should be read thus: And again he went out from the borders of Tyre, and came through Sidon unto the sea of Galilee, through the midst of the borders of Decapolis. St. Matthew (Mat 15:29) simply says that he “departed thence, and came nigh unto the sea of Galilee.” But from the more full statement of St. Mark we learn that he made a circuit, going first northwards through Phoenicia, with Galilee on his right, as far as Sidon; and thence probably over the spurs of Libanus to Damascus, mentioned by Pliny as one of the cities of the Decapolis. This would bring him probably through Caesarea Philippi to the eastern coast of the Sea of Galilee. Here, according to St. Matthew, he remained for a time in the mountainous district above the plain; choosing this position apparently for the sake of quiet and retirement, as also that, being conspicuous to all from the mountain, he might there await the multitude coming to him, whether for instruction or for healing.

Mar 7:32

They bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech ( ). The radical sense of (from ) is “blunt” or “dull;” and so it is used to represent both deafness and dumbness. But in St. Mark it means deafness as distinguished from dumbness. This patient, however, was not absolutely, but , i.e. he spoke with difficulty. Long-continued deafness is apt to produce imperfect utterance.

Mar 7:33

And he took him aside from the multitude privately. This was done, no doubt, to fix the attention of the afflicted man upon himself, and upon the fact that he was about to act upon his ears and his tongue. And he put ()literally, cast or thrusthis fingers into his ears. The action was very significant. It was as though he said, “I am about to open a passage for hearing through these ears.” And he spat, and touched his tongue; that is, he touched his tongue with saliva from his own sacred lips. These symbolical actions must have had a great meaning for the afflicted man. They were a tableau vivant, an acted metaphor, teaching him what he might expect from the mercy of Christ. The analogy of the miracle recorded in St. John (Joh 9:6) should be noticed here. It is an interesting circumstance (noticed in the ‘Speaker’s Commentary’) that, in the Latin Church, the officiating priest touches the nostrils and ears of those who are to be baptized, with saliva from his own mouth. We may be assured that, in the case before us, these signs used by our Lord were intended to awaken the afflicted man’s faith, and to stir up in him the lively expectation of a blessing.

Mar 7:34, Mar 7:35

And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. He looked up to heaven, because from thence come all good thingswords for the dumb, hearing for the deaf, healing for all infirmities; and thus he would teach the infirm man by a manifest sign to what quarter he was to look for the true source of his cure. he sighed (); literally, he groaned. Why did our Lord sigh at such a moment? We know indeed that he was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief;” hut now we might almost have expected a momentary smile of loving joy when he was about to give back to this afflicted man the use of these valuable instruments of thought and action. But he sighed even then; for he was touched with the feeling of human infirmity, and no doubt his comprehensive eye would take in the vast amount of misery, both bodily and spiritual, which has come upon the world through sin; and this, too, immediately after having looked up to heaven, and thought of the realm of bliss which for a time he had left “for us men, and for our salvation.” Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. This word is, of course, addressed to the man himself; and the evangelist has retained the original Syro-Chaldaic word, as he has retained “Talitha cumi” elsewhere: so that the actual word which passed through the Saviour’s lips, and restored speech and hearing to the afflicted, might be handed on, as doubtless it will be, to the end of time. The word applies of course, primarily, though not exclusively, to the ear; for not only were his ears opened; but the bond of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.

Mar 7:36, Mar 7:37

He charged them (). The word is a strong one: “he gave them clear and positive orders.” The injunction seems to have been given, both to the deaf and dumb man, and to those who brought him. And it was given partly, no doubt, for his own sake, and for reasons connected with his gradual manifestation of himself to the world, and partly for the instruction of his disciples, and to show that he did not desire by his miracles to win the vain applause of men. St. Augustine says that “our Lord desired, by putting this restraint upon them, to teach how much more fervently they ought to preach him, whom he commissions to preach, when they who were forbidden could not be silent.” He hath done all things well. He did nothing that the Pharisees, captious and envious as they were, could reasonably find fault with. St. Matthew (Mat 15:30, Mat 15:31) intimates that at this time our Lord exhibited a vast number of miracles, a bright galaxy of wonders, amongst which this shone out conspicuously, as a very prominent and instructive one. But, indeed, “he went about doing good.” His whole life on earth was one connected, continued manifestation of loving kindness.

HOMILETICS

Mar 7:1-23

Ceremonialism and spirituality.

The teaching of our Lord Jesus was often in opposition to that of the religious leaders of his age and nation. The Pharisees and scribes were most religious, but their religion was of a bad type. They themselves practiced, and they inculcated upon the people, the observance of religious forms and ceremonies; whilst, generally speaking, they were negligent of the weightier matters of the Law. They laid great stress upon the outward, but they were careless of the spiritual. Our Lord’s teaching, on the contrary, exalted the spiritual, and insisted upon the supreme importance of a true, a pure, a reverent heart. The contrast between ceremonialism and spirituality is exhibited in this passage in several particulars.

I. CEREMONIALISM SUBSTITUTES WASHING WITH WATER FOR PURITY OF HEART. Ablutions occupied an important place in the system of ritual. In addition to the washings and sprinklings required by the Law, many others were invented by the superstitious. It was a religious duty to wash the hands before eating and upon returning from market; to sprinkle and cleanse ceremonially cups and pots, vessels and furniture. In contradistinction from all these ritual purifications, our Lord laid stress upon the true baptism, the washing and purifying of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

II. CEREMONIALISM SUBSTITUTES THE TRADITIONS OF THE ELDERS FOR THE COMMANDS OF GOD. The Jews were a nation highly conservative in character and habit. They cherished their history, they revered the memory of their heroes, they treasured and superstitiously honored their sacred books, and any doctrines or practices which came down from antiquity were, by that fact, commended to their respect. Their fault here was in magnifying the precepts of men rather than the commands of God. Human interpretations, human additions, human corruptions of the Word, were put in the place of the Word itself. The Lord Jesus came not to destroy, but to fulfill the Law; yet with mere tradition he would have no truce.

III. CEREMONIALISM SUBSTITUTES THE WORSHIP OF THE LIPS FOR THE WORSHIP OF THE HEART. This was an old error and fault. The prophet Isaiah had seen reason to complain of its prevalence among the Hebrews of his time; and, as it is the product of sinful human nature, it need not surprise us if we meet with instances of the working of the principle of formality in any nation and in any age. Our Lord Jesus had frequent occasion to censure the vain repetitions, the prayers in the market-places, which he knew were in many cases the proof, not of a devout but of a hypocritical nature. “God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

IV. CEREMONIALISM SUBSTITUTES A SUBTLE EVASION FOR FILIAL DUTY. Natural piety concurs with the revealed commandment, in requiring of children honor and reverence towards their parents. To support them when in old age and poverty has ever been deemed a plain duty and, indeed, a true privilege. The way in which the unrighteous but religious Jews evaded this obligation is characteristic. Whatever a parent needed, the son declared to be dedicated to God, and therefore not applicable to the relief of the parent’s wants. Such a device was hateful in the eyes of the holy and affectionate Saviour, who not only condemned unfilial conduct, but still more the mean hypocrisy which could use religion for its cloak.

V. CEREMONIALISM SUBSTITUTES AVOIDANCE OF UNCLEAN FOOD FOR AVOIDANCE OF IMPURE AND MALICIOUS THOUGHTS. Even Christ’s disciples found it difficult to understand their Master’s position with regard to clean and unclean food. The distinction was in itself recognized by the Law, but additions were made by human ingenuity, and the distinction itself was exaggerated, so as to imply more than was divinely intended. In the exercise of his authority, he “made all meats clean.” He taught that sin works not from without inwardly, but from within outwardly; that the heart of man needs to be guarded against sinful thoughts and desires, in order that the life may be just, peaceful, and pure.

APPLICATION. It is possible to be, in a sense, religious, and yet, in a deeper sense, sinful, and out of harmony with the mind and will of God. It is a temptation from which none is wholly free, to substitute the external, the formal, the apparent, for what God requiresthe faith, love, and loyalty of the heart. Hence the need of a good heart, which must be a new heartthe gift and the creation of God by his Spirit. The religion of the New Testament both enjoins this and provides for its acquirement. He who is “in Christ” is a new creation; and having the fountain cleansed, sends forth pure and purifying streams.

Mar 7:24-30

The alien’s faith.

In quest of repose and retirement, the Lord Jesus often, even during the busiest periods of his ministry withdrew from crowded cities and busy shores to some accessible seclusion. On this occasion he traveled to the borders of Phoenicia, but though so far from his accustomed resorts, he was known and sought and followed. From Tyre and Sidon people had already, attracted by his fame, found their way to the neighborhood of Capernaum, to hear his discourses and to behold his works. No wonder that now, even in these distant regions, though desiring retirement, the Divine Prophet “could not be hid.” Hence the application recorded in this touching and encouraging narrative. We observe here

I. FAITH ARISING IN UNFAVOURABLE CIRCUMSTANCES. A womandescribed as a Canaanite, a Gentileappealed to Jesus for help. Probably a heathen, she yet had confidence in the power of the Hebrew Rabbi and Prophet to bring her some relief. It is singular that two conspicuous instances of faith in Christ during his ministrythis, and that of the centurionshould be displayed by Gentiles. And this when many of cur Lord’s own countrymen despised and rejected the Son of David! Yet every preacher of the gospel has met with cases which show us that faith springs up where it is least expected, and in circumstances the least favorable. An inducement this for the Christian sower to “sow beside all waters.”

II. FAITH PROMPTING TO INTERCESSION. Personal faith will lead to pleading prayer. This was the faith of a mother, concerned for her afflicted daughter, possessed by an unclean spirit. Maternal love incited to the appeal, and sustained under discouragement and rebuffs. True faith will ever lead to action, and will impel the anxious soul to lay its anxieties before a mighty and compassionate Lord. We cannot be satisfied to come to Christ for ourselves alone; for those dear to our hearts some true request will be preferred, some petition will be urged. The heart’s compassionate impulse the Lord of the heart will not despise.

III. FAITH REPULSED AND SORELY TRIED. The language addressed by Jesus to this woman was certainly unlike what he was wont to address to suppliants. His mission was to Israel; the bread he brought for Israel’s sons; Canaanites and all Gentiles were but as dogs, having no claim upon the provision made for the household of the favored. It is mysterious, yet it is unquestionable, that it seems good to God to “try ‘ the faith of men. So Jehovah had tried Abraham, and so Jesus now tried this poor, pitiable woman. He will try your faith; but misunderstand not his treatment of you.

“Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take;

The clouds ye so much dread

Are big with mercy, and shall break

In blessings on your head.”

IV. FAITH TRIUMPHANT. The woman neither resented the Lord’s comparison nor did she, disheartened by the reception she met with, turn away without a blessing. She took the Lord at his word, and followed out his figure. “Be it so; let the bread, the loaf, be for the children; let the dogs keep their proper place; yet, even there, surely there is some provision even for them. There are crumbs, and with these the dogs may be content; for these the dogs may be grateful.” This is the way to plead with Heaven. God will have earnestness and persistency and perseverance in prayer. Christ’s grace is ever for those who seek, and who seek not fitfully, but resolutely and enduringly.

V. FAITH RECOGNIZED AND REWARDED. Christ was pleased because the applicant cast herself upon his compassion, because she was willing to receive the boon desired upon his own terms. “For this saying go thy way.” It was a saying expressing so much humility, so much earnestness, so much faith, that the heart from which it came might not remain unsatisfied, unblest. The evangelist tells, in a way very picturesque and affecting, how, upon her return to her house, the poor woman found that the power had been exercised, that the demon had departed, and that her daughter was healed.

APPLICATION. The narrative

(1) affords encouragement to offer intercessory prayer;

(2) shows the value of humility in our approach to Jesus; and

(3) assures us that persevering faith shall not be unrewarded.

Mar 7:31-37

The deaf hears; the dumb speaks.

In this incident is much of the dramatic. It could not well be otherwise. Our Lord’s teaching was usually by speech, but this was a case in which oral language was needless and useless. Christ accordingly employed the language of gesture and action. He thus adapted himself and his ministry to the necessities of this poor man, who was doubly afflicted with privation of hearing and of speech. The condition of the sufferer and the conduct of the Healer are alike symbolical of spiritual facts and suggestive of spiritual lessons.

I. A PICTURE OF THE SINNER‘S STATE.

1. Here is an insight into the nature of human depravity. It is a distortion of, a departure from, the proper, the higher, and original nature. Man, in his true bodily constitution, possesses hearing and speech, and in his true spiritual constitution he has faculties which bring him into communion with the Divine. The privation of such capacity by sin is pictured by the state of this sufferer.

2. Here is insensibility to Divine realities. Voices, music, thunder, are all to the deaf as though they were not. So with the sinner; he hears not the tones of the Divine voice; the Word of God is nothing to himhas neither authority nor charm. The dumb cannot speak or sing; whatever the occasion for utterance, the occasion appeals to him in vain. So with the sinner; he has no witness to offer to the God of creation, providence, and grace.

3. Here is deprivation of the highest joys. How much of happiness is inaccessible to those who are afflicted with deafness! Nature, art, and friendly voices have no message for their ears. And, similarly, sin closes the approaches of highest spiritual joys to the spiritual nature of the children of sinful men.

4. Here is helplessness and hopelessness. It is not a pleasant or a flattering picture; but is it net true?

II. A VIEW OF THE SAVIOUR AND OF THE PROCESS OF SALVATION. Remark:

1. The individual character of salvation. As Jesus took this deaf man apart from the crowd, that he might deal with him privately and by himself, so the Lord ever singles out each individual whom he saves. Sometimes he lays such a one aside by affliction, quietly to converse with him and work upon his nature.

2. Salvation is through Christ‘s personal contact with the soul. When Jesus put his fingers into the man’s ears and anointed his tongue with spittle, this was a striking and effective lesson to one who could not be reached by the usual channel of articulate speech. It was the touch of Christ, and the communication of his virtue, that healed. A lesson to us flint restoration to spiritual capacity and health is the effect of an immediate contact of the soul with Christ, the soul’s Saviour.

3. A profoundly compassionate Saviour. “He sighed;” not simply because of this instance which he encountered of human misery and need, but doubtless also because of all the world’s sin and misery. His was a heart moved at the spectacle of the wretchedness of this fallen race. His work of redemption was inspired by pity and by love.

4. An authoritative Saviour. The word of Jesus, “Be opened!” reminds us of the original and authoritative utterance of the Creator, “Let there be light!” It is thus that the Lord of light and vision ever speaks: he utters his royal command as one who is certain to be obeyed.

III. A REPRESENTATION OF THE RESULTS OF SALVATION. Simple as is the record of the mandate and summons of Immanuel, equally simple is the record of the success which attended his word. The response to the command was immediate. Similarly with the release which it is the prerogative of our Redeemer to effect for the soul of man. The nature which Christ renews becomes sensitive to those heavenly voices to which it has so long been deaf, and finds delight in holy and grateful utterances to which it has before been utterly strange.

IV. AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE IMPRESSION PRODUCED BY THE EXERCISE OF CHRIST‘S POWER.

1. Astonishment; for who but he can work such marvels?

2. Publication; for the healed, and the beholders of the spiritual change, are unable to restrain them-selvesare impelled to tell the story of redemption and deliverance.

3. Witness and praise; for such must needs be offered to him of whom it is said, “He hath done all things well.”

HOMILIES BY A.F. MUIR

Mar 7:1-23

Externalism versus righteousness.

In Mar 7:3, Mar 7:4 of this chapter we are furnished with an interesting piece of antiquarianism. The daily life of the devout Jew is set before us in its ceremonial aspect; not as Moses had originally ordered it, but as custom and human casuistry had gradually transformed it. The light thrown upon several questions is very searching and full of revelation, viz. the various senses in which baptism seems to have been understood by the contemporaries of Christ, and the punctilio, vigor, and detail with which ceremonial purifications were carried out. It is only as we realize the background of daily Jewish life, against which the life to which Jesus called his disciples stood out so prominently, that we are in a position to appreciate the current force of the objections raised by Pharisee and scribe. We have here

I. CHRISTIANITY CRITICIZED FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF RELIGIOUS TRADITION.

(Mar 7:1-5.) The exaggerated form the latter assumed brought out the more strikingly the peculiarity and essential character of Christ’s teaching.

1. It was an age in which Jewish ceremonalism had reached its highest. The doctrine of Pharisaism had penetrated the common life of the people. They might be said to have fallen in love with it. The distinctions are artificial and super-refined, e.g. between “common,” “profane,” or “defiled“ hands, and hands ceremonially clean. They washed “diligently“ (a paraphrase of the original substituted by our revisers for “oft” of the Authorized Version, and apparently the best rendering of the difficult word in the original), “carefully,” or the “many other Amongst the respectable Jews ceremonial strictness and nicety held a place very similar to what “good manners,” or polite behavior and refinement, occupy with ourselves, having, of course, an additional supernatural sanction from association with the Law. Thus to-day the customs and observances of nations amongst whom civilization has long existed might equally serve as a foil for the Christian moralist; and all casuistries or secondary, customary moralities.

2. The objectors were the leaders and representatives of the religious life of the time. “Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which had come from Jerusalem.” They were the leaders and teachers of metropolitan fanatical ritualism. It is well when Christianity is judged that such men appear on the bench; there can then be no question as to the representative and authoritative character of the criticism. It would be a splendid thing if the representatives of modern political, social, and ecclesiastical life could be convened for such a purpose.

3. What, then, is the objection thus raised? It concerned an observance of daily life. Christians are now judged on the same arena. In small things as in large the difference will reveal itself. It depended upon an abstract distinction: the hand might be actually clean when it was not ceremonially so. It was, in the eyes of those who made it, the worst accusation they had it in their power to make. The moral life of the disciples was irreproachable; they “had wronged no man, corrupted no man, taken advantage of no man.” The Christians of to-day ought to emulate this blamelessness; infidels can then fire only blank cartridge.

II. THE TABLES TURNED. (Mar 7:6-23.) The critics are themselves reviewed. Trifling captiousness must be summarily dealt with, especially when it wears the garb of authority. The character of the objectors is of the first consequence in judging of Christ’s tone. Grave issues were at stake. The ground of the fault-finding was superficial and untrustworthy, and a truer criterion must be discovered. “Deceivers may be denounced, that the deceived may be delivered” (Godwin). The essential nature of rectitudethe grand moral foundations must be laid bare.

1. Christ begins with an appeal to Scripture. He is careful to show that the distinction between righteousness and ritualism is a scriptural one, and not of his own invention. At the same time, he gives the reference a satirical or ironical turn by making a prophetic identification! We don’t know how much is lost in ignoring the written Word of God. It is “profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness.”

2. He next pointed out the opposition that existed between their traditions and the Law. The instance selected is a crucial one, viz. that of the fifth commandment”the first commandment with promise.” Others might have been given, but that would be sufficient. Family obligations are the inner circle in which religion most intensely operates; if a man is wrong there, he is not likely to be very righteous elsewhere. To prove their opposition to the Law was to strip them of all pretense to religion.

3. Lastly, common sense and conscience were appealed to as regarded rites and ceremonies. The “multitude” is here addressed; it is a point which the common man is supposed able to decide. There are many weapons that may thus be supplied to the evangelical armoury. If philosophy was rescued from barrenness by this method in the hands of a Socrates or a Reid, may we not hope for greater things with regard to a common-sense religion? The great foundation of all religious definitions and obligations is the true nature of man. The essential being of man is spiritual; the body is only the garment or case in which he dwells. Purity or its opposite must therefore be judged of from that standpoint. If the soul, will, spirit, inner thought of a man is pure, he is wholly pure. Spiritual and ceremonial cleanness must not be confounded. Religion is not a matter of forms, ceremonies, or anything merely outside; but of the heart. Yet the thought and will must influence the outward action, habit, and life. The spiritual is the only eternal religion (Joh 4:23, Joh 4:24). The private question of the disciples is worthy of notice. A “parable” seems to have been their common name for a difficult saying of Christ’s. Their incapacity was not intellectual but spiritual. Professed Christians themselves often require to be more fully instructed. The progressive life of the true Christian will itself solve many problems. “Had our Saviour been speaking as a physiologist, he would have admitted and contended that many things from without, if allowed to enter within, will corrupt the functions of physical life, and carry disorder and detriment into the whole fabric of the frame. But he was speaking as a moralist, and hence the antithetic statement of the next clause” (Morison).M.

Mar 7:24-30

The prayer of the Syro-phoenician woman.

An atmosphere of publicity about Christ: crowds follow him wherever they hear of his presence, and even in strange regions his fame anticipates him. The many who took advantage of his power to heal are forgotten in the special ease which now presented itself. This may have been the spiritual result of many unsatisfactory cases in which the cure only affected the body; the rumor of them awoke at least one heart to a new sense of spiritual power. Speaking about Jesus and his work in this place or that, to one soul or another, may be a blessing in unthought-of quarters. Jesus “could not be hid” for other reasons; his disciples were with him, and, more than all, he carried about in himself a revelation of love and pity that spoke to every heart. Spiritual influence is a mysterious thing, and yet there are some conditions of its exercise which are only too plainly declared. Matthew has a fuller account, but our evangelist gives us the chief details. The Saviour was touching the great world outside of Judaism, the scene of his greater ministry in the future through the Holy Spirit. The incident is remarkable, as suggesting this universal relation of him who as yet was but a Jewish Rabbi. It tells us the nature of the limitation which hemmed in his work, and how that limitation was to be removed, when he “should open the door of faith to the Gentiles.”

I. AT THE DOOR OF MERCY. (Verses 25, 26.)

1. The motive. It was not for herself, but her child, whose distress she sought to relieve. The nature of this “unclean spirit.” Moral parallels. A mother’s instinct: how near the human affections and family obligations bring us to the gospel! The instinct is a natural one, but tending to the spiritual. She was in the school of sorrow, noble and unselfish sorrow, which searches the heart and awakens the latent forces of the spiritual nature. How many have been brought by such sentiments and experiences to the cross!

2. The attraction. She had heard of him and his merciful works. We all stand in need of mercy, and are insensibly affected as we hear of its exercise upon others. Make known the Saviour, and proclaim his saving grace! The most unlooked-for will come. “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.” But now she saw and heard himself. Her great yearning, grieving heart read the lineaments of his countenance, and the character they expressed. “He will not turn me away.” Christ, by his spiritual presence in the Word, ever touches human hearts thus, awaking by what he is the deepest longings and most instinctive trust.

II. THE DOOR AJAR. (Verse 27.)

1. It sounds like a rebuff. What claims has she upon him? But:

2. Is really a trial of her faith. It sounds logically conclusive, yet is it intended to call forth the inmost spiritual nature. Delays and adverse experiences in prayer should not all at once be accepted as final Prayer is not a mere asking; it is a discipline. Remember Abraham’s importunity.

3. Encouragement is given even under the appearance of refusal. Matthew: tells us of a silence that preceded this; for Christ to speak was itself an omen not to be despised. “First” is a word that hints at postponement, not ultimate rejection. And the picture he sketches is not to be taken literally, but is for the spiritual imagination. As the reasoner, in making an induction, introduces an clement into his reasoning that is not in the facts in themselves, so the petitioner at Heaven’s throne must learn to interpret his experiences, and to sift the rejections that he may discover the elements of hope. Here the petitioner answers the objection by completing the picture in which it is couched. True, it would be wrong to cast the children’s “loaf” to the dogs; but that is not the only conceivable way in which the dogs may be fed. Her Greek experience comes to her assistance. Whilst the Jews hated dogs as “unclean,” and could not tolerate them in their houses, the Greeks had a peculiar affection for them, and tamed and trained them to feed from the band. In many a Greek home the dog had its place beside the table or beneath it. And the “crumbs‘ found their way there in various ways, either by intention or accident. The term she uses is a diminutive of endearment. The twenty-eighth verse is full of dimmutives”little dogs,” “little children’s,” and “little crumbs”which are full of subtle, tender appeal. This is her argument, then. It is a self-humiliating one, for she is willing to take the dogs’ place. She is not a Jewessa “child;” she is only a Gentile, and her daughter is “a little dog.” And here is the children’s loafthe Bread of lifeat the very edge of the table. May not some “little crumbs” fall over? To such humility, such faith, there can be no refusal; and there was never intended to be one. This is how we must all come to Heaven’s doorvile, miserable sinners, with no claim save upon the mercy of God!

III. THE DOOR OPENED. (Verses 29, 30.)

1. It is opened to faith. “For this saying.” It was an inspiration of faith. She had found the master-key for all time, and as she used it the door flew open. If we but “ask in faith, nothing wavering,” all our petitions will be granted.

2. It is opened by Divine grace. We are not to suppose the request granted because the feeling of Christ was wrought upon. The yielding has only a superficial appearance of being due to constraint. In reality the delay was but interpolated that the faith of the woman might be developed in her own soul and manifested to the Jewish spectators; and so the final answer would be justified on every hand, and prove a blessing to others beside the recipient. The cure is already effected when she returns home.

3. It stands open for ever to such petitioners. The ground of assent to her appeal having been “evidently set forth,” she becomes a precedent for all believers to plead. She is the pioneer of all who, not being Jews according to the flesh, are nevertheless children of faithful Abraham according to the spirit. To all who thus believe the invitation is given, “Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”M.

Mar 7:31-37

“Ephphatha.”

A rest, then a fresh journey (“again”). How long the interval we cannot determine. To free him from embarrassment, perhaps danger, and allow time for spiritual meditation. “Tyre and Sidon.” The best manuscripts have “through Sidon,” which was north of Tyre. “Decapolis:” ten cities, east and southeast of Sea of Galilee; named by the Romans b.c. 65. A favourite scene of our Lord’s labours (cf. Mat 4:25). In Mat 15:29-31 a multitude of cases is mentioned. Here one is singled out as an illustration.

I. THE CASE. Familiar and ordinary; comparatively helpless; difficult to educate, mentally and spiritually.

II. THE CURE.

1. The manner of the great Physician. “They beseech him to lay his hand upon him“a grand expression.

(1) With respect to the people. He does not like the publicity, etc., and so he withdraws the poor man from the excited crowd.

(2) With respect to the patient. This step was full of consideration and delicacy. He sought to gain the confidence of the man. How deliberate and thoughtful was his mercy!

2. The means employed.

(1) Of what kinds. Physicaltouch, saliva. Devotionala heavenward look, a heavenward sigh. Authoritativea word, “Ephphatha!” Not used as a charm, but plainly intended to be otherwise understood; a word of the vernacular.

(2) He spoke to the man through signs, as he could not understand words. The means were only morally necessary; that the man might have some basis for confidence, intelligence, and faith. He ever desired to be understood.

III. THAT WHICH IS SYMBOLIZED. The shut heart of the world, dead to spiritual things. Which is worse? Only the compassion of Christ can save us.M.

HOMILIES BY A. ROWLAND

Mar 7:24 (first part)

The seclusion of Jesus.

Our Lord, during his ministry, frequently sought retirement, and the text mentions one of these occasions. Seclusion is sometimes coveted by his disciples from improper motives, but these found no lodgment in the heart of the sinless One. We sometimes withdraw from active service for God because a feeling of indolence creeps over us, but he constantly found it to be his meat and drink to do the will of his Father in heaven. We sometimes shrink back from suspicions and reproaches in a spirit of cowardice, whereas in Christ there was no trace of the fear of man, that brings a snare. Nor did he ever exhibit the slightest indication of the selfishness which leads us to shut ourselves up in the narrow circle of our petty personal interests. On the contrary, his whole life, the fact of his living here at all, the death which he could easily have averted, conclusively showed that he “came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.” We may at once and confidently set aside any explanation of Christ’s withdrawal from a place or people which is drawn from some supposed imperfection in him who was absolutely sinless. At the same time, we must remember that we cannot always discover with certainty the reasons for our Lord’s actions, not only because these are not mentioned by the evangelists, who never try to explain or justify what may be open to misrepresentation, but also because his nature transcended ours, and his acts had issues not only here but in an unseen world. So that whenever we suggest explanations of his conduct, we must say to ourselves, “Lo, these are parts of his ways: but how little a portion is heard of him!”

I. OCCASIONAL SECLUSION WAS GOOD FOR THE LORD HIMSELF. He was as truly the Son of man as the Son of God. His life would not have been complete, it would not have touched ours at so many points, if he had always worked and never waited. Hence, though he had to do a work so stupendous that it would affect the destinies of the world, and of the unseen universe of God, there are no signs in his life of bustle or impatience. He waited thirty years before he preached the gospel; and although he allowed himself only three short years for public ministry, he broke off from it again and again; and when at work he was so unhurried that he could stop in his progress to Jerusalem to heal a blind beggar, or halt on his way to save a dying child in order to heal and teach a poor woman in the crowd that thronged him. What a lesson to us in this fast-living age! What a rebuke to our feverish anxiety and excitement! Doubtless we should have to sacrifice something to break off from work as our Master did; indeed, this is one modern form of taking up our cross to follow him. It will be a fatal mistake to let business hustle prayer out of our life. The busy Christ could sometimes be alone, and he could not have been all he is to us if he had not been so. In the wilderness of temptation he was alone, and the real struggle of every human life is fought out and won in the presence of him who sees in secret. The greatest agony of Christ was endured in solitude; and in our Gethsemane friends fail us, but our God is near. It is good to be alone, if only we are alone with God, as Jesus was.

II. THE OCCASIONAL SECLUSION OF OUR LORD WAS GOOD FOR OTHERS. It was well for the disciples that they should be sometimes withdrawn, with their Master, from circumstances in which they would be harmed by men’s applause or overwrought by nervous excitement; but besides this, Christ’s withdrawal would benefit some who were not his disciples.

1. It was a possible means of grace to his foes. When the rage of the Pharisees was intensely aroused (and no anger is more unreasoning and devilish than that which professedly bases itself on religious conviction), it was well for them that the object of their wrath should disappear for a time. Christ’s withdrawal saved them again and again from the awful crime which they committed at last on Calvary; it allowed for the subsidence of hasty excitement, which prejudiced them, and gave them time and opportunity for recovering better and wiser thoughts about the Lord. The loving Saviour would fain have helped even those who hated him.

2. It was for the advantage of the mass of his hearers. They saw his miracles, marvelled at them, discussed them, crowded to see morewithout the least perception of their spiritual significance; so that if the series of miracles had been unbroken they would have failed of their purpose.

3. It was for the good of those who needed him that he should be sought. This is clearly exemplified in the experience of this woman of Syro-phoenicia. The disciples tried to drive her away. But Jesus meant her to come, had gone thither partly that she might come, gave her rebuffs which aroused yet more her apprehension of want; and so tested and developed her faith as to make her ready to receive the great blessing he longed to give. If Christ does not reveal himself so unmistakably to us as we wish, it is because he sees that we may win a higher benediction when we obey his command, “Seek, and ye shall find.”A.R.

Mar 7:24 (latter part)

He could not be hid.

On several occasions when Jesus sought retirement it was denied him, either by the enthusiastic zeal of his followers or by the pressing need of those who had heard of his fame. Still he seems to hide himself, and yet from no earnest seeker can he be hidden. In respect to many things besides the saving knowledge of Christ, it may be said they can only be discovered by diligent search. Our present knowledge of the physical world has come to us through those who would not be denied in their eager exploration. The forces of nature, too, have not obtruded themselves in their various uses, but have been won to our service by costly experiments and diligent thought. Speaking broadly, all life is an experimenta discovery. A child learns to judge distances by trying to grasp what is within reach; he discovers the limit of strength by falls and hurts; he prattles before he talks. Very little of what we know has come intuitively. It sought to hide itself, but because we could not do without it we strove after it, and from us it “could not be hid.” If in regard to other good things these words are true, it is not unreasonable that they should be true of him who is the highest good our souls can have or eternity can reveal. Our text implies, what other verses explicitly assert, that Christ, in the full plenitude of his salvation, does not come to us when we are spiritually inert, but that when the Holy Spirit has shown us that we need him, and when we seek him, he must be found of us. But if we spurn him he will hide himself, till he will have to say of us, concerning the things that would give us peace, “But now they are hid from thine eyes.” The truth on which we wish to lay stress is thisthat even in the days of his earthly ministry, whether Jesus was found as a Saviour or not depended on the condition of those who sought him. It was not a question of place, but of purpose. Contrast this story with the incident narrated in the first part of the preceding chapter. There we read of his visit to Nazareth, his own city, where we should expect he would be most eagerly sought after and most rich in blessings; but he could not reveal himself there as he wished to do, “because of their unbelief.” Now, on the borders of a heathen district, the inhabitants of which had been shut out from the blessings of the covenant, there was a certain woman, a Gentile by birth, a heathen by religion, who wanted to find him, and from her “he could not be hid.” Character may be, but circumstances cannot be, a barrier between the soul and Christ.

I. CHRIST CANNOT BE HID, BECAUSE GREAT NEED WILL SEEK HIM OUT. It was so with her who, poor and ill, crept into the crowd and touched the hem of his garment; with the sisters of Bethany, who sent the message, “He whom thou lovest is sick;” with the woman who was a sinner, who ventured into the Pharisee’s house to find him; and with this Canaanite, who made her way to the Jewish Teacher, who, so far as she knew, had never before blessed one outside the house of Israel. It is God’s design in our bodily illnesses, in our bereavements, in our grief about children going wrong, to lead us to the feet of him who never has said, “Seek ye my face in vain.”

II. CHRIST CANNOT BE HID, BECAUSE TRUE LOVE WILL SURELY FIND HIM. True love in a parent or lover will give persistence and hope in the search for one who is lost. So will love to him who is worthy of the highest affection lead us to his presence.

III. CHRIST CANNOT BE HID, BECAUSE EARNEST FAITH WILL EVER LEAD TO HIM. The shepherds of Bethlehem who heard the angels’ song believed its message, and found the holy Child. The wise men from the East, being faithful to the light they had, at last bowed at the feet of the Light of the world. Let us not suffer our doubts to prevent the outgoings of our soul to the Lord.

IV. CHRIST CANNOT BE HID, BECAUSE HIS OWN HEART WILL BETRAY HIM. Recall the pathetic story of Joseph. When He was the lord of Egypt, and his brethren came as suppliants to him, his heart could scarce contain itself, and at last the strength of his love forced him to avow himself and to welcome them to his heart. But that is only a faint emblem of the nobler love which filled the heart of the Son of God. Heaven could not hold it; the cross could not check it; the grave could not keep it back from his people. All through his life you see the outgoings of that mighty love. If his disciples are toiling in rowing, He will walk right over the raging waves to comfort them. If after his resurrection He stands as a stranger beside Mary, it can only be for a moment, for, like the good shepherd, he will soon call her by name, that she may be glad in his love. Still he stands among his disciples, and there his heart bewrays itself.

V. CHRIST CANNOT BE HID, BECAUSE HIS DISCIPLES WILL MAKE HIM KNOWN. In spite of the unfaithfulness of many, he has never been without his witnesses. The healed demoniac went hack to his home to tell what Jesus had done for him; Andrew no sooner found the Messiah than he went to tell his own brother Simon. So the witness-bearing is to continue till the whole earth is filled with his glory.A.R.

Mar 7:32

Deaf and dumb.

Christ’s acts of healing were very often performed while He was passing from place to place. This occurred on his way from the borders of Tyre and Sidon to the eastern side of the Lake of Galilee. His life was like a river, which not only, when it reaches the sea, bears mighty fleets on its bosom, but carries blessings all along its course through secluded pastures and quiet corn-fields. The case of this man was one of physical infirmity and not of demoniac possession. He was deaf, and had an infirmity in his speech. In considering the spiritual significance of a miracle, we must not overlook or underrate the physical blessing. Such an act of healing as this is the germ whence innumerable good works have come. Institutions for the deaf, hospitals for the sick, homes for the crippled, are the smiling harvest arising from this scud-sowing; and the signs by which the deaf and dumb are now taught find their principle in the signs which our Lord, in loving condescension, used in dealing with this afflicted man. The spirit of Christ reigns over and blesses the bodies of men still. If we have the use of all our faculties, and know nothing of the irritability of the deaf, the loneliness of the blind, and the agony of the dumb, let us not only be thankful, but let us remember our responsibility for their use, lest we fall into condemnation because we close our ears against the truth and refuse to move our lips in prayer. Let us also learn to cultivate pity for those who are not so richly endowed, allowing for the irritability of those who can only partly hear, and the cynicism to which the dumb and blind are tempted, and seeking to become eyes to the blind and cars to the deaf. “Be merciful, as your Father in heaven is merciful.” Be pitiful and gentle, as he who sighed over and then blessed the sufferer. The spiritual significance of this act of healing is the more important, because deafness to God’s voice and dumbness in his praise are more general, and less manifest to others than the physical privations which are their counterparts. In this light regard the sufferer and observe

I. THAT HE WAS DESTITUTE OF TWO OF OUR NOBLEST FACULTIES. In those days there existed none of the mitigations of such distress with which we are familiar, and which are the products of patient and skillful training. He could not hear his children’s voices, nor the cry of warning, nor the whisper of love. All that transpired in the synagogue was but dumb-show to him. He could not take refuge from loneliness in reading, as we can do. His wants he could not articulately express. when we see a child as yet unable to talk we are glad that his wants are limited, simple, well known, and easily supplied. But this sufferer had the thoughts and feelings of a man, yet could not utter them. In our congregations, and outside them, multitudes fail to hear God’s voice. The preacher speaks of sin, but there is no consciousness of it stirred in their hearts; he proclaims free pardon, yet there is no sense of grateful acceptance. Voices around are eloquent of the Father’s love to a Christian, but by these they are unheard. Meanwhile their voices are inarticulate on God’s side. If a word of warning ought to be spoken, if the cause of Christ is to be defended, if there are vices which a God of sobriety and purity would destroy, these are dumb, or are as men who have an impediment in their speech.

II. THAT THESE FACULTIES WERE MUTUALLY DEPENDENT. He was not absolutely dumb, but was inarticulate in utterance; therefore, after his cure, it is said “he spake plain.” It is true he had some physical defect, for we read, “the string of his tongue was loosed;” but it is evident that he could not speak aright, partly because he could not hearperversion of speech being a general accompaniment of total deafness, for a deaf person cannot detect and alter his malpronunciations. There is a connection in spiritual life between the similar faculties of the soul. If we try to teach others, we must be taught of God. The ears must be opened before the mouth speaks plainly, and unless they be, the fluent talker is but a poor stammerer in spiritual utterance. Right speaking is conditioned by right hearing. If, therefore, the habit of evil or foolish talk has been acquired, it is not enough to vow that it shall be broken off, for it is “out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaketh.” The fountain wants change, not the channel. Such a one must give up light reading for a time of earnest reflection, must keep clear of vain and idle companionships, and, above all, cultivate fellowship with God, the Source of all wise and holy thought.

III. THAT HE WAS BROUGHT TO THE TRUE PHYSICIAN. Satan is the great destroyer and damager, and Christ is the great Repairer and Redeemer. Let us bring our friends to him by counsel, by sympathy, and by prayer.

IV. THAT HE LEFT HIMSELF IS THE LORD‘S HANDS. Friends asked the Lord to lay his hands on the sufferer, probably because they had seen him do this before. But Christ was divinely free, was far broader in method than their expectations, and he took him by the handnot to cure him by that touch, but to lead him apart; and with this Stranger the helpless man was satisfied trustfully to go. Let us leave our Lord to do with us and with our dear ones as seems good to him. Though he may deal with us differently from his dealing with others, his choice is wisest and best.A.R.

Mar 7:33-35

A typical cure.

In our Lord’s different acts of healing there were markable variations of method. We should expect this of the Son of the Creator, whose variety in nature is infinite. No two leaves in the forest are alikeno two faces in a flock of sheep; and even the same sea changes in its aspect from hour to hour. This variety is greater as we go higher in the scale of creation, and is most conspicuous in man, whether considered individually or collectively. And Christ Jesus was the Image of the invisible God, who is omniscient. He knew the avenue to every heart, and how best to win affection or arouse praise. If there was one string in the harp which could be made tuneful, he could touch it. Hence the variety in his method of dealing with those who came to him. One was called upon for public avowal, and another was charged to tell no man; one was cured by a word, another by a touch; the servant of the centurion was healed at a distance, but of the lunatic boy Jesus said, “Bring him hither unto me.” Bartimaeus was suddenly restored, but this man was gradually given his speech and hearing. This change in merle was not from outward hindrance to the Lord’s power, nor because that power was intermittent, but because he put restraint on himself for the sake of the sufferer or of the observers. Mark appears to have taken special interest in cases of gradual restoration. It is not because he would minimize the miraculous element, as some suggest, but possibly because, seeing in all miracles types of what was spiritual, he saw his own experience more clearly in these. He had been brought up under holy influences. As a lad he had heard the Word in the house of his mother Mary, and had been gradually enlightened, like the blind man at Bethsaida; or like this man, without abrupt suddenness, had his ears opened and his tongue loosed to glorify the God of Israel. The method of this sufferer’s cure is given in detail, and deserves consideration.

I. JESUS LED HIM APART FROM OTHERS, dealing with him as with the blind man, whom he also took by the hand and led out of the town. This, we think, was not “to avoid ostentation,” nor to prevent distraction in his own prayer, but for the man’s good. Christ would be with him alone, and so concentrate attention on himself. He took him into solitude that he might receive deeper spiritual impressions, and that the first voice he heard might be the voice of his Lord. It is always good for men to be alone with God, as was Moses in Midian, David watching his flock at Bethlehem, Elijah in the cave at Horeb, and others. Our quietest times are often spiritually our most growing timesillness, bereavement, etc.

II. JESUS BROUGHT HIM INTO VITAL CONTACT WITH HIMSELF. “He but his fingers,” etc. We must remember that the man could not speak nor hear, but he could feel and see, and therefore what was done met the necessities of his affliction. With his finger Jesus touched his ear, as if to say, “I am going to cure that;” then, with finger moistened with saliva, he touched his tongue, to show that it was a going out of himself which would restore him. The man was brought into vital contact with Christ, as the child was brought close to the prophet who stretched himself upon him. Our Lord seeks that personal contact of our spirit with his, because the first necessity of redemption is to stir faith in himself. The man yielded to all the Saviour didwatched his signs and expected his word of power; and it is for that expectant faith he so often waits.

III. JESUS RAISED HIS THOUGHTS TO HEAVEN. He looked up to heaven. Watching that loving face, the sufferer saw the Lord look up with ineffable earnestness, love, and trust; and the effect of this would be that he would say to himself, “Then I also should pray, ‘O God of my fathers, hear me!'” We are called upon, in the light of Christ’s example, to look above the means we use for discipline or instruction, and away from ourselves and outward influences to the heavenly Father, who is neither fitful nor indifferent to our deepest needs.

IV. JESUS MADE HIM CONSCIOUS OF PERSONAL SYMPATHY. “He sighed.” It was not a groan in prayer, but a sigh of pity, that escaped him when he gazed on this sufferer, and realized, as we cannot do, the devastation and death wrought by sin, of which this was a sign. Even with us it is the one concrete case of suffering which makes all suffering vivid. With that feeling we must undertake Christian work. Sometimes we are busy, but cur hands are cold and hard; and when our heads are keen to devise, our hearts too often are slow to feel. But when we, followers of Christ, lock on those deaf and indifferent to God, who never repent or pray, and who are sinking into irreligion and pollution, we should yearn over them and pray for them with sighs and tears. If our hearts are heavy with pity, God will make our hands heavy with blessings. After the sighing and prayer came the word of power, “Ephphatha!”” Be opened!” and the sealed ear opened to his voice and the stammering tongue proclaimed his praise. See Keble’s lines

“As thou hast touched our ears, and taught

Our tongues to speak thy praises plain,

Quell thou each thankless, godless thought

That would make fast our bonds again,” etc.

CONCLUSION. Henceforth this man would be a living witness to Christ’s power. Though it was expressly forbidden to blaze abroad his cure, all who saw him at home or at work would say, “That is the man whom Jesus healed.” So let us go forth to live for Jesus, resolving that our words shall utter his praise and that our lives shall witness to his holiness, till at last another “Ephphatha!” shall be heard, and we pass through the golden gates, into the land where no ears are deaf and no tongues are mute.A.R.

HOMILIES BY E. JOHNSON

Mar 7:1-23

The ritual and the reality of purification.

I. THE MOST NATURAL ACT MAY BE PERVERTED INTO A RITUAL SIN. The disciples were seen eating with unholy hands, that is, unwashed! How this came about we are not told; probably it was a case of necessity: there was no water to be had. Probably it was a choice between going without food and being ritually correct, or being ritually incorrect and supplying the wants of nature.

II. THE MEANING AND USE OF RITUAL IS CONSTANTLY LOST SIGHT OF BY SMALL MINDS. “The Pharisees and all the Judaeans, unless for a pygmy’s length they wash the hands and arms, do not eat.” The Talmud (Lightfoot) directs that the hands be washed to the elbowa rule like that here hinted at; “pygmy” denoting the arm and hand. The custom went beyond what the original ritual required. And so the associations or the market-place were thought peculiarly profane. They carried the rule out in application to cups, jugs, copper vessels, and couches; things which cannot feel, which are not spiritual, and which therefore are no subjects of “baptism.“ The root of the error was:

1. Blind respect for custom. Custom commands our respect; but a blind respect defeats its end and meaning.

2. The reversal of the spiritual order. That order is: first the spiritual, then the material; the body for the soul. The Pharisaic order was: first the material, and the spiritual through the material.

3. The postponement of the present to the past. What tradition of the fathers can make it a duty to neglect the welfare of the sons? The rules of the past conserved the privileges of the present; if they block the way and tend to hurt human life, they must give way. We must study the perspective of duties if we do not desire to become narrow in intelligence, and defeat the spirit of law.

III. ATTACHMENT TO RITUAL MAY ACTUALLY OBSCURE THE VIEW OF RELIGIOUS DUTY. Religion begins in the heart. Unless we love our God and our fellow-man, we shall miserably blunder in our construction of duties. Great teachers have always placed us at this moral center; face to face with God, in immediate relation to his universal imperative.

1. Isaiah (Isa 29:13). He taught that the lips might readily be made to do duty for the heart; and that invented obediences might distract from the genuine, natural obedience of the right and loving heart.

2. Moses. To go back further in the stream of sacred tradition: no name more honored than that of the great lawgiver of the desert. He distinctly enunciated the duty of filial reverence, founded on the instincts of the heart. How were the Pharisees carrying this out? The way in which Christ refers to this is keenly ironical.

3. Christ himself. The Pharisees can and do actually evade the great command of filial piety under the show of obedience to the ceremonial Law. “By a general consecration to the temple of whatever might be useful to parents, it was made sacrilege to give anything to them, because whatever was given to them was included in the vow.” A miserable trickery, cheating God of his due while seeming to obey him! Tradition may be so followed as to subvert its very essence; for there is no tradition respectable which does not enshrine Divine commands.

IV. THE TRUE VIEW OF PURITY RESTORED.

1. Impurity is not from without but from within. The external defilement may be cleansed away. It is not part of the man. The moral impurity is. It is only what the imagination conceives and the will affirms that is real for us. “In morals and in religion the conscious mind is everything” (Godwin).

2. This true view may require an effort to attain. Strange! the disciples “could not quite see it!” “And he said to them, Are you also so inconsiderate?” And Christ must explain to them the lesson as to a class of tyros. Want of thoughtfulness in the mind is like want of stirring and raking to the garden-ground. The weeds and mosses soon creep. The man’s thought is soon overrun by the trash of opinion and empty practice, if he will not think for himself.

3. The human source of evil. It lies in the thought, the fancy, or imagination. Lust “conceives “a thought of pleasure, clashing with the thought of right. The conception germinates, and brings forth a deed. But a splash of mud that we receive on our garments in crossing the street has no effect on our conscience. And generally, what we do not adopt as part of ourselves, cannot be imputed to us as sin. “What does not affect the moral character, cannot affect the relation of man to God” (Godwin).J.

Mar 7:24-30

The heathen mother.

I. THE HEATHEN AND THE JEW.

1. In general, no relation could be more bitter; no estrangement more wide. No modem analogy can well enable us to realize this. They were “wide as the poles asunder.”

2. Jesus the Reconciler. In him there is neither Jew nor heathen. This sublime truth was first to be made clear by his own conduct. All truths must be represented in practice if the world is to receive them. Christ did not deal in the sentiment of unity. He did not propound a theory of humanity, nor of enthusiasm for humanity; he took the hand of the sufferer; he healed the sickness; he made reconciliation a fact. “Go thou and do likewise!”

II. THE IRONY OF CHRIST. We have all heard of the irony of Socrates. It was the jesting way the great master had of hinting the truth to the mind, which was concealed in words. Irony is often the disguise of sensitive and keenly truth-loving minds. Here he conceals tenderest compassion for the poor woman under the mask of sarcasm. It has the effect of eliciting her deep feelingprofound humility and trust. All methods of the teacher are good which love prompts, and which subserve the ends of love. “Faith always finds encouragement and obtains reward” with Christ. To take the remark of Jesus in Mar 7:27 as seriously meant, would be contrary to his spirit. It is the echo of the harsh feeling of the bigoted Jew, and really illustrates by implicit contrast the tenderness and benignity of Christ.J.

Mar 7:31-37

The deaf and dumb.

I. THE GREAT PRIVATION OF SUCH A SUFFERER. Deafness cuts the person off from society more than blindness. He is not blessed by that music which expresses the soul of things. He cannot hear that sound of the human voice, which is the most delicious of all music. One sense needs the sisterly help of another. Sight tantalizes without hearing. To be full of thought and feeling, yet not to be able to speak,than this sense of restraint upon the noblest part of our nature, nothing may seem more hard.

II. THE CURE IS SYMBOLIC OF THE NATURE OF CHRIST‘S MISSION.

1. The mode of the cure. The symbolic action was appropriate. Ordinary language could not be understood by the sufferer. Jesus employs gesture instead. There are special institutions for teaching the deaf and dumb. Consider how holy a work it is, and how consecrated by his example. The up-looking denoted internal prayer. So let prayer be the soul of all our action on others and for others (Mar 6:41; Joh 11:41; Joh 17:1).

2. The cure itself as symbolic. Christ’s love entering the heart enlarges the intelligence, opens the world of music and harmony. As love opens the gate into a sphere of unearthly beauty to the lover, so to the soul captivated by the love of God all things have become new. There is a “sacred silence, offspring of the deeper heart;” and dumbness has its sanctity, for here is “the finger of God.” But sacred is the eloquence of the tongue, set free by the larger life of mind and heart. God made us for utterance, as he made the streams to flow.J.

HOMILIES BY R. GREEN

Mar 7:1-23

The tradition of men in competition with the commandments of God.

Pharisees and scribes of Jerusalem had detected some of the disciples of Jesus eating bread “with defiled, that is, with unwashen, hands.” “Holding the tradition of the elders” with great tenacity themselves, they demand of the new Teacher a reason for his disciples’ departure from the old paths. It was a favorable opportunity for exposing the error of substituting human for Divine precepts, and for placing the external in its right relation to the internal and spiritual. Christ here appears as the authoritative Interpreter of the Divine commands; and, as a true Teacher, discriminating between the “commandment of God” and “the tradition of men.” Of old time it was well said, “Man looketh on the outward appearance, but God looketh on the heart.” Here the men who “sit on Moses’ seat,” alike in what they “bid” and in what they “do,” lay great stress on the “washings of cups, and pots, and brasen vessels,” and of hands. Truly great matters! But the searching eye Divine discerns the hidden “heart“ that is “far from” God, and whose many evils send forth a thick stream of pollution in unholy practices, defiling not merely the hands but the whole life. Jesus rebuts their accusation against his disciples, first by a justly merited rebuke, and then by readjusting the relative authority of the commandment of God and the tradition of men, which, in the practice of these accusers, through their selfish, grasping covetousness, had been so greatly distorted. He teaches once and for ever that no commandment of men, no tradition of elders, must be allowed to make “void the Word of God.” Thus Jesus, who is so often erroneously spoken of as despising “mere commands,” redeems the very “word,” and pays his utmost tribute to the letter of the command. In the conflict between the Church and the sacred relationships of common life, to the latter must be assigned the pre-eminence. The necessities of the temple, of its services or its servants, must not be met at the expense of filial faithfulness. The sin of the Pharisees and scribes was

I. A GROSS PERVERSION OF THE RELATIVE CLAIMS OF THE PARENT AND THE CHURCH.

II. A WICKED INTERFERENCE WITH THE FIRST COMMANDMENT WITH PROMISE.

III. A CRUEL UNDERMINING OF FILIAL AFFECTION AND FIDELITY, AND AS CRUEL AN EXPOSURE OF THE AGED AND ENFEEBLED PARENTS TO A FALSELY JUSTIFIED NEGLECT. And it was

IV. AS UNWARRANTED USURPATION OF AUTHORITY TO WEAKEN THE OBLIGATION OF A DIVINE LAW. Christ’s words, whilst correcting these errors,

(1) traced the tradition to its true source”your tradition, which ye have delivered;”

(2) reduced it to its proper place of inferiority; and

(3) exalted the Divine command, “Honour thy father and thy mother,” to its unassailable supremacy. So he prepares the way for a correction of the “many such like things” which were done by these “hypocrites,” who taught “as their doctrines the precepts of men.”G.

Mar 7:14-23

The real and the imaginary defilement.

The question of “the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes which had come from Jerusalem,” yet remains to be answered, Jesus having turned aside to weaken the force of “the tradition of men.” The answer is given in the ears of “the multitude.” It is simple. “There is nothing from without the man that can defile him:” defilement is of that which proceeds “from within out of the heart of man.” The man’s heart is the fountain of evil; it is his heart, not his hands, that needs washing. No wonder that “the Pharisees were offended, when they heard this saying.” Then, having “entered into the house from the multitude,” the disciples “asked of him” what is to them as yet “the parable;” for so are they “without understanding also.” In few words he distinguishes the true nature and source of defilement from the untrue, leaving for all time these lessons hidden in his words

I. ALL POLLUTION IS MORAL POLLUTION. From this all mere ceremonial defilement must be distinguished. Such uncleanness is not moral impurity, nor is ceremonial correctness to be regarded as the testimony of moral purity. The stainless externalist may harbour “within“ all “evil things.” The perversion of a wise teaching on the necessity for personal cleanliness and of instructive ceremonials had led to the foolish supposition that a touch of the dead, or the diseased, or the decaying matter, conveyed moral impurity. This is once for all contradicted. Whatsoever is “without the man” conveys not the defilement. It is a moral condition. The heart can defile all things. As that which is from without the man cannot defile, so let it be known “there is nothing from without the man that going into him can” cleanse “him.”

II. THE SOURCE OF ALL IMPURITY IS NOT IN GOD‘S WORKS, BUT IN MAN‘S HEART. “All these evil things proceed from within.” Thus Jesus, with his just judgment, traces evil to its hidden source. The heart, not the flesh, is the seat of defilement. This is the fountain which can corrupt God’s good and pure gifts. How marked a contrast does he make between a possible ceremonial uncleannessa very trifle at most (as to moral uncleanness it is nil)and the greatness, the multiplicity, and the foulness of the “evil things which proceed from within”! Material things cannot in themselves convey moral impurity. Even the excess in the use of the food, which destroys life, comes from within. That the good things of God may be turned into occasions of evil all know, but it is only the heart that can so turn them. Whatsoever is “without the man cannot defile him, because it goeth merely into his body, not into his heart; “and the heart, not the body, is “the man,” the true man, the very man.

III. FROM THE THRALDOM OF A FALSE CEREMONIALISM CHRIST REDEEMS HIS DISCIPLES, “MAKING ALL MEATS CLEAN.” How needful not only to say what is sin, but to say also what is not sin! From many a yoke which the fathers were not able to bear Christ sets his people free! From child’s play to serious work he calls them. From a mere adjustment of articles of dress and of furniture; from punctilios of ritual observance having in themselves no moral significance, and liable to withdraw men from great works and great truths, he turns them aside. He exposes the true evilness in the long catalogue of “evil things” of which the heart, not the flesh, is capable; and be, without many words of exhortation, directs men to seek the cleansing of their unholy hearts, that their lives, their whole man, may be clean also.G.

Mar 7:24-30

The Syro-phoenician woman.

Now, in prudence, not in fear, Jesus withdraws from the districts under Herod’s jurisdiction, where he had created sufficient excitement to expose him to hindrance both by friends and foes. He fain would hide himself in secret. “He entered into a house, and would have no man know it;” but it was unavailing”he could not be hid.” One at least sought him out with an eager intrusiveness which was only justified by the greatness and pressing nature of her need”a little daughter grievously vexed with a devil”and the brilliancy of her faiths which, while it wrought so great good for her home, secured so high commendation from her Lord. On that faith our eye must be fixed.

I. The DEMAND for faith on the part of the stranger was very great. Not one of “the children,” but one of “the dogs,” she had not been trained in the hope of Israel; though, living in neighbourly relation with the Jews, she was not wholly uninformed. Yet the very name given to the “Lord,” of whom “mercy” is sought”thou Son of David “was an excluding term for her who could claim no relationship to the sacred family. She belonged not to the house; she was a village dog. Truly it needed great faith on her part to burst through the barriers and ask for “the children’s bread.” But she shared the common humanity; she had heard of the many healingseven “as many as touched but the border of his garment,” though no appeal were made; and the keen eye of need and maternal anxiety saw the largeness of the compassion of him who had not yet denied any.

II. Strangely, however, that faith is TESTED by absolute silence, by apparent indifference. “He answered her not a word.” The disregarded prayer, even though she “besought him” to help her, returned to chill the heart of hope and faith. Her continued appeal, “she crieth after us,” engages the intercession of the disciples, who, evidently for their own relief, add their beseeching to hers. Still the appeal is unavailing, and on high and unassailable grounds, with which no personal consideration mingles. “I was not sent” to the heathen. But the struggling faith braves difficulties, and casts this mountain into the sea. Prostrate at his feet she fails with the plea, soon to be effectual, “Lord, help me.” Yet even this appeal fails to conquer. He who always acts according to what is right and just declares, “it is not meet”it is contrary to all propriety and right” to take the children’s bread and cast it to dogs.”

III. The parabolic or figurative argument has its weak place, which quick-sighted faith, untiring and unfainting, detects and thereby secures its TRIUMPH. “‘Yea, Lord.’ Yea, it is true; they are the children; yea, I am but a dog; truly it is not right to give the children’s bread to dogs; yet in every house the dog is not wholly forgotten.” The argument has its (intended) flaw, for God cares for dogs; and from every well-supplied table something goes to them. Give me that”the crumbs that fall.” Give me “the children’s crumbs;” what they need not, what they despise, what I may have without robbing them.

IV. It is enough; the patient, triumphant faith at length finds its REWARD. It shall be written for future generations of needy ones to learn how to succeed in presence of difficulties and hindrances and impossibilities. The Lord’s honor is upon thee. “Great is thy faith.” And more, thy suit is gained, thy word is mighty. For “this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter.” It was even so. Let every suffering one, even though outcast from the holy, happy community, and every one within that community, learn from this little story that it men have faith as a grain of mustard seed, it shall be even as they will. And let every timid, unbelieving child bend lowly before this “dog,” and learn the power of living, hopeful, resolute faith.G.

Mar 7:31-37

The healing of the deaf and dumb man.

Another case of healing, the record of which is peculiar to St. Mark, throws into prominence both the pitifulness of men and the power of the Lord. It is that of one unable to speak for himself, and unable to hear of the many wonderful works which are being done around. “They bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to lay his hand upon him.” Ah, they have gained faith in the power of that hand. Jesus “took him aside from the multitude privately.” Thus the man, at least, would know the work was the work of Jesus only. Then, for reasons that are not assigned, possibly as signs to him who could not hear, he “put his fingers into his ears, spat, touched his tongue,” and looked “up to heaven,” and “sighed“ and spake, and “saith”saith “to him” the first word he should hear, “Ephphatha!” Then “his ears were opened, and the bond of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.” Thus is presented to us a typical example of the redemption of the disorganized life.

I. One of the disorganizing effects of evil is that it closes the ear. It stops the avenues to the soul by which the word of truth and love may enter. The wicked man is deaf to the appeals of righteousness. Its gentle, winning tones fall unheeded on the inattentive, unmoved heart, which is as insensible to them as is a stone. How great is the injury thus inflicted! The man is shut out from the elevating, ennobling, the satisfying, sanctifying influence of truth. The words which minister grace to the hearers can convey none of their treasures to his heart; the way is not open. The human or Divine voice, so rich in its ministries to the ignorant, to the inquirer, to the hungry, is powerless here. The corrections of wisdom, the lofty motive, the noble aim, the calming, comforting voice of truth, guiding and blessing wherever it is heard, has no power here. All is lost. Not more is he to be pitied who, by physical infirmity, hears not the voice of friends, the songs of birds, the harmonies of sweet sounds. Sin robs the life of its truest, its highest enrichment. Christ’s greatest ministries to the world were by his lips. Though the words were of earth, they were vessels holding heavenly treasure. But the deaf hear them not. So truly is a state of sinfulness typified in deafness.

II. But sin equally impedes the free and profitable service of the life of its victim. It closes his mouth. The mouth, which may be a fountain of wisdom, if unsealed. The life, which might be a spring of blessing to many, is as a dry and parched land, or as a well having no water. That beneficent ordination by which one lifeeven every lifeis designed to be a source of blessing to every other, is, by evil, frustrated; and it becomes, instead, a cause of injury.

III. It is here Christ appears to bless the race by opening the eyes of the blind, by unstopping the ears of the deaf, by loosing the tongue of the dumb. His holy work stands over against the evil of sin. He unstops the deaf ear. Awaking the attention of the sleeper, he gives to the receiving soul the words of eternal life. His heavenly teaching renews, exalts, ennobles. The ignorant one becomes wise in his school. His truth raises the beggar from the dunghill. Righteousness puts the soul en rapport with all that is good, and beautiful, and wise, and holy. It makes a man to be at one with all the kingdom of God, with all truth and all life.

IV. But the redeemed life becomes a source of blessing to othersa fountain of living waters. The unsealed lips speak forth the heavenly wisdom. The psalm of praise, the song of thanksgiving, the word of truth, of peace, and of blessing, and the activities of the good life, are all serviceable. The life now becomes an active power for good. Each, when he has “turned again,” is able to strengthen his brethren. The first effect of the eviction of evil from the life is that the eyes are opened, that all that surrounds may enter to enrich the life. The second effect is, the lips are opened, the life becomes a center of useful influence. It is a new acquisition to the world, a new joy. So from without flows into the redeemed life all that is calculated to minister to it, to nourish, to purify, to exalt, to gladden and perfect it; while back again from the nourished, purified, and gladdened life, new sentiments, new emotions, new aims, and new efforts proceed. The effect of which reciprocal influence is that each becomes a point of light, a form of loveliness; each a stream of holy, useful influence, refreshing this weary desert and making it glad. Truly, of him who” maketh even the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak,” it may be said, “He hath done all things well.” It is no less well said, “And they glorified the God of Israel.”G.

HOMILIES BY J.J. GIVEN

Mar 7:1-23

Parallel passage: Mat 15:1-20.

Exposure of Pharisaism: its errors and evils.

I. DOCTRINE OF DEFILEMENT.

1. Contents of this chapter. This chapter contains three principal sections. The first section treats of defilement; the second gives an account of a demon being expelled from the daughter of a Syro-phoenician woman; and the third narrates the cure of a deaf mute. The first section, again, contains the following:The charge of defilement which the Pharisees preferred against the disciples; the evangelist’s digression for the purpose of explaining to his Gentile readers the Jewish notions and usages in this matter; Christ’s applying to the Jews of his day a description of their fathers by Isaiah; the reason of this application in the displacement by them of God’s Law to make room for the traditionary teachings of man; a much graver delinquency in nullifying the Law of God not merely with respect to ceremonial washings, but in regard to moral duties; a specific example of this in a glaring and most culpable neglect of filial obligation; our Lord’s exposition, publicly in the presence of the assembled people and privately to the disciples, of the true nature of real, that is, moral defilement; and a reference to the distinction of clean and unclean in the matter of meats, which formed a main partition between Jews and Gentiles. The way was thus prepared for, and an easy transition made to, the subject of the second section, which narrates our Lord’s only recorded visit to the Gentile world, and the miracle there wrought in the case of the Gentile maiden who was dispossessed under singularly interesting circumstances. The third section records a miracle which is only mentioned by St. Mark, and so peculiar to his Gospel. Our Lord, having just returned from the cities of Phoenicia, was making his way through the midst of the region of the Ten Cities, when he cured the dent’ mute or dumb man of Decapolis in a very remarkable manner, and by a method of external application not employed hitherto in the miracles wrought by our Lord.

2. Linguistic peculiarities in the first section.

(1) The first peculiarity of the kind indicated is the use of the Greek word , which is a hapax legomenon, and qualifies the verb “wash.” In our English version it is translated

(a) oft, and in the margin

(b) diligently, which is adopted in the Revised Version. The former is supported by the Vulgate, which has crebro, and depends on the analogy of similar but not really related words, such as or ; while the marginal rendering has the support of the Peshito Syriac b‘tiloith. Some of the older interpreters understand it as

(c) a measure of length, and so Euthymius has , “as far as the elbow;” and Theophylact similarly, adding that it is the space from the elbow to the knuckles; the water poured out into the hollow of the hand would thus, by the elevation of the same, flow down to the elbow. The more natural explanation seems to be that which takes it

(d) in the primary signification of the word, which is clenched hand or fist; not in the sense of the closed hand being raised so as to allow the water to flow down to the elbow; nor yet in the sense of rubbing the closed hand or fist with the hollow of the other hand, which, as Fritzsche suggests, would require the words to be ; but in the sense of washing the hand with the fist, that is, by rubbing one hand with the other closed or clenched or with the fist, in the sense of vigorously. This explanation, which corresponds with that of Beza, amounts to the idea of diligence conveyed by the Syriac. This verb , it may be observed in passing, generally refers to “washing the hands or feet,” as signifies to “wash clothes,” and to “wash,” usually the body, and therefore in the middle voice “to bathe.”

(2) Again, in verse 4, a different kind of washing must be meant by . Olshausen and others refer the washing which it implies, not to the Pharisees themselves, but to the articles of food bought in, and brought from, market; and explain the middle voice consistently with its usual meaning, that is to say, in the signification of washing for themselves. This rendering scarcely deserves the serious consideration given to it, and is to be rejected unhesitatingly. It must, as we think, refer to the men themselves. The washing of verse 3 is partial, only including the hands; it was the ordinary custom with the Jews of that day before partaking of food; but in case they had been to the market or bazaar, and had come into contact with the crowd that resorted thither, it was scarcely possible to escape defilement of some kind in mixing with that motley multitude, and therefore a more general washing, extending to the whole body, became a ceremonial necessity. The other reading (), denoting “to sprinkle” or “cleanse by sprinkling,” is properly regarded as a gloss; the word , in the absence of regimen, is quite unrestricted as to mode, signifying “wash themselves,” as it is rendered in the Revised Version. There is

(3) a slight diversity about the connection of the words , which are joined by Krebs and Kuinoel to , in the sense of eating of things bought in the market, like the construction which occurs in Verse 28 of this same chapter, where the dogs are said to eat of the crumbs ( ); while is admitted to have in the classics the signification of provisions bought in the market, as in the phrase . This, however, appears a straining both of the sense and construction, the plain rendering being “alter market,” or, as the English has it, “when they came from the market;” thus means “after supper.”

3. Additional baptisms. These washings, which the Pharisees and indeed all the Jews practiced, were not confined to their hands or whole persons; but, besides such personal ablutions, there were baptisms of cups and pots, of brazen vessels, and of couches. Of these domestic utensils the first are named from the use to which they are applied, namely, for drinking, as is expressed by its root; the second, corresponding to the Roman sextarius, from which, and not from , to polish, is the word derived, are named from their size, and contain a pint, or sixth part of a congius (somewhere about a gallon); the third are called from the material copper of which they are made; the fourth get their name like the first, from their use, to wit, of reclining on, either for the purpose of sleep or at meals.

4. The origin of these washings. Several chapters of Leviticus (12-15.) contain a tolerably full account of the ablutions enjoined in the Law, and employed for Levitical purifications. These purifications were resorted to for the purpose of ceremonial cleansing. They had generally respect to certain states or conditions of the body, symbolical of the defiling nature of sin. In some of these cases we read that the person to be cleansed “shall wash his clothes, bathe his flesh in running water, and shall be clean.” But Pharisaism extended these washings far beyond the limits of the Lawapplied them to cases neither contemplated by, nor comprehended in, the Law, and multiplied them to an absurd amount. Persons, before engaging in the commonest acts of domestic or social life, were compelled to a strict observance of such washings; nay, the very articles of household furniture, including those here enumerated, had to be subjected to them. God had, for good and wise purposes, instituted certain temporary means of ceremonial cleansing; but man perverts and pollutes, or, when he does not pollute, he perverts the wisest means to the worst ends. The perversions in the case before us, besides being excessively burdensome and extremely inconvenient from their multiplicity, were perfectly contemptible from their very puerility and triviality, and positively sinful from the seemingly magical efficacy with which they invested mere mechanical operations.

5. Ceremonialism. Ceremonies of human invention, especially when multiplied and perverted from their legitimate or appointed use, like the ablutions referred to, instead of being helps, become hindrances to devotion. They promote irreligion at the same time that they foster pride. Their tendency is to put outward purifying in the place of inward purity, to substitute external cleansing for internal cleanness, to prefer clean hands to a clean heart, and to rest in “the righteousness which is of the Law” instead of “the righteousness which is of God by faith.” True religion, under whatever dispensation, beans with the heart. Thus the psalmist prays so beautifully, “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” The promise here is limited to such, as when it is said, “Truly God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart;” the prospect hereafter is for them, and for them alone; for it is only “the pure in heart” that shall “see God.” No amount of outward observances or ceremonial ablutions could constitute real religion or supply its place, nor entitle the person that performed them to the privileges of a true child of God. The apostle insists on this when he says, “He is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh: but he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.”

6. Tradition. Tradition in general is that which is handed down from father to son, or from one generation to another. The word is sometimes used in a good sense, and signifies instructions, whether relating to doctrine or duty, faith or practice, and whether the delivery be oral or written; but, and this is the main thing, consisting of truths immediately delivered by inspired men. Such is its signification in 1 Corinthins Lev 11:2, where the apostle commands or exhorts the Corinthians to “hold fast the traditions, even as I delivered them to you;” also in 2Th 2:15, “Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle;” and again in the same Epistle (2Th 3:6), “Withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us.” But it has another sense also in Scripture, and is employed to denote what is merely human and untrustworthy, as when St. Paul speaks of himself as he was in his original sinful, unconverted state, and says, “I profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers;” and again, when he warns the Colossians, saying, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” It is in this latter sense that it is used in verse 6 of the present chapter, when “the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders?” The Jewish theory of tradition was that, along with the written Law, Moses received at Sinai a second or oral law, and that this latter law was handed down through succeeding generations. This law, consisting of traditional interpretations and gradual additions, was at length embodied in the text of the Talmud, called “Mishna,” or “second law.” This oral law held a higher rank, and was more highly esteemed than the written Law. It not only supplemented the written Law by large additions, but was employed as the key to its interpretation. Thus in the end it was used in instances innumerable to supplant, or supersede, or set aside, the written Law at pleasure. We do not despise tradition in the proper and legitimate sense which, as we have seen, the word sometimes has, nor in its present ordinary sense of something handed downordinance or ceremonypro-vided it be agreeable to the Divine Word; but we must not set up tradition side by side with the written Word of God, nor bring God’s Word into conformity with tradition; on the contrary, whenever God’s Word and human tradition clash, the latter must be corrected by the former. One example of this kind we have in relation to the Apostle John, about whom the saying went abroad that he should not die. Jesus had said, “If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?” This was in the first instance misinterpreted, then the misinterpretation spread from mouth to mouth as a regular tradition, till the apostle himself felt called upon to correct it by the specific statement, “Yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die; but, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? follow thou me.”

7. Isaiah‘s prediction as applicable to the Pharisees as to their fathers. The statement of Isaiah, though not in the strict and specific sense a prediction concerning our Lord’s contemporaries, was a description so all-embracing and so pregnant with meaning, that it exhibited with striking exactness the chief features of their religious life, or rather of their irreligious, soulless formality. Isaiah foretold it ( aorist) in the past, but it stands written from then till now, and so our Lord, in this case, uses the perfect () What was said then, so long before, was equally true in the Saviour’s day; it was as true of the children, or remote descendants, as of their ancestors, as though the traits of character referred to had become stereotyped.

(1) He charged them with hypocritical lip-service, saying, as though with withering scorn, “Ye hypocrites, ye honor me with lip-service, but without sincere heart-worship!”

(2) with vanity or empty form in worshipping according to the commandments which human tradition taught; and

(3) our Lord, in stating the ground of the application which he makes of the prophet’s words, brings home the charge, asserting that by those human precepts they displaced the commandments of God; and then

(4) he backs his assertion by an example of most glaring and flagrant criminality as the natural result of such Pharisaic teaching.

8. Practical remarks on the preceding. We cannot fail to notice

(1) the depth of meaning in the Divine Word; of this characteristic of Scripture we have here a notable illustration. What Isaiah spoke in his moral portraiture of his contemporaries, applied to their children’s children many centuries after, as accurately and as exactly as if he had had the latter solely in view, or rather as if the distant ancestors and the remote posterity both sat together before this great spiritual limner. Such apt and felicitous delineation was not the result of human intuition or prophetical sagacity, but of Divine inspiration; it was the Spirit that gave the prophet such foresight, and thus testified the truth beforehand. The word “hypocrite”

(2) originally meant one who answered in a dramatic dialogue, and thus an actor; and further, one who wore a mask as actors did. It denotes one who assumes a character which does not really belong to him, or acts a part that is unreal, or feigns virtues not possessed. The persons to whom the word is here applied approached God with their lips, while their heart was far distant from ( , “holds far aloof from”) him. They were acting the part of true worshippers, but were not so in reality; they were wearing a mask of profession~ which they put on to conceal their real character. They pretended to be honoring God, but the honor which they gave him did not proceed from the heart; it was only in outward seeming, or for external show. This worship

(3) was confined to the utterances of their lips as the main instrument employed in such worship; but the understanding and its faculties, the heart and its affections, were not engaged, and took no part in it. It was hollow-hearted and false-hearted; it was vain. It was meant as worship, no doubt, but it was fruitless, being worship that God could not accept. The vanity

(4) of this worship, however, did not arise so much from the manner of itheartless as that was, and spiritless as it wasbut from the matter of it. All worship presumes certain doctrines and duties, and proceeds in accordance with these. Every time we open our lips in praise or prayer, or other act of worship, doctrines or duties of some sort are involved, implied, or referred to. But the doctrines which these Pharisaic formalists taught were the commandments of men; they had no higher source and no better origin. If we would worship God aright, we must worship according to the way and means which God himself has prescribed; if we teach acceptably, we must teach the doctrines which God directs. Not so the Pharisees: their doctrines were human commandments; their teaching, therefore, was often false, always fallible, often puerile, and not unfrequently pernicious. But worse still, their teachings were not merely negative, in so far as they did not teach what God commanded, but only what men invented; they were positively subversive of the commandment of God in any given case, and hence the word here is singular (); as our Lord himself affirms, when in verse 8 he states the ground on which he applies to the Pharisees of his time the words spoken by Isaiah in relation to their ancestors. Ye give up or let go the commandment of God, but hold fast the tradition of men in the matter of ceremonial washings, and of many other things of like kind. Not only so; ye set aside the commandment of God (not by, as in the Authorized Version, but) for the sake of your tradition ( , St. Matthew), or, as St. Mark more fully expresses it, “in order that ye may keep your own tradition.” Thus there is a climax; for, first, they let go or dismiss the commandment of God, while they hold with obstinate tenacity human tradition; then, secondly, they set aside or displace, putting something else in its room, or reject with something akin to contempt, the commandment of God; from omission they proceeded to commission as usual, and all this in order to guard, observe, or maintain their own tradition. Isaiah had finely () described them beforehand, and now they finely (, the same word, but used ironically in this second instance, and not with the meaning of “entirely”) act up to that description.

9. Moral obligation set aside through Pharisaism. Our Lord proceeds to expose the practical and pernicious effect of Pharisaic traditionalism in the domain of ethics. He had shown the hollowness of its teaching in cases of ceremonial cleansings; but he now advances from the ceremonial to the moral. For this purpose he selects the fifth commandment, and proves that the antagonism between the written Law, or Law of God, and the oral, or human law, in respect to this commandment, is complete. He quotes the prescriptive part of the commandment, and omits the promissory as not required by the object he has in view; instead of the promissory clause attached to obedience, he substitutes the punitive sentence pronounced on the person guilty of a breach of the commandment in question. “Moses said”and here it will be observed that the commandment of God, who spake by Moses, is identified with the commandment of his inspired servant, so that what was really said by God is here attributed by our Lord to his servant Moses”Honour thy father and thy mother.” These words were graven by the finger of the Almighty on the stone tablet at Sinai, and the precept thus solemnly delivered at first was enforced by the awfully severe sanction which follows:”Whoso curseth”that is, speaketh ill of or revileth”father or mother, let him die the death.”

(1) In the “precept” the possessive pronoun and article are used with both words, “father” and “mother,” as if to individualize, and point out specifically to every reader or hearer of the Law, the duty as individual and personal; but, in the penalty clause, the pronoun and article, though expressed both in the original Hebrew and Septuagint Version, are omitted in the record of both evangelists, as if to generalize or treat as a class, and present the duty in the abstract, thus denoting unfaithfulness to such a relationshipsuch a sacred object of affection as a father and a mother. The omission of the article by itself draws attention to the quality, character, or nature, rather than the substance, of the thing thus spoken of.

(2) The original Hebrew expression is a peculiar idiom of that language, implying intensity by means of an infinitive mood joined to the finite verb of the same signification, and denoting, “Let him be surely put to death”literally, “dying, let him be put to death.” The Septuagint Version has two ways of expressing this Hebrew idiom, either by the verb and cognate noun in the dative, or by the verb and its participle; the former is the mode not exactly adopted, but only approximated in this instance, with merely an insignificant variation, by the evangelist, namely, “Let him end with death.” But

(3) the words “he shall be free” of the common version are supplied in order to make out the sense. If the reading of the received text, which begins the next verse with , be retained, the verse before us may be regarded

(a) as an instance of the figure aposioposis, by which our Lord, as if with inexpressible indignation at the thought of conduct so unnatural and reprehensible, breaks off without completing the sentence; while the supplied words of the English version express the acquittal conceded in the case by Pharisaic casuistry. Another way

(b) of evading the difficulty was suggested by Fritzsche, who supplies here the closing words of verse 10 with a negativethat is, so that this verse would read as follows:”But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatseover thou mightest be profited by me, let him not die the death.“ The Revised Version,

(c) however, cuts the knot by adopting the reading which excludes from the beginning of verse 12; thus, “But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or his mother, That wherewith thou mightest have been profited by me is Corban, that is to say, Given to God; ye no longer suffer him to do aught for his father or his mother.”

10. Farther development of our Lord‘s retort. The word “corban” meant anything brought near to the altar or to the God of the altar for presentation, and applied, like the cognate verb hikrib, to bring near, to any offerings, whether bloody or unbloody, animal or vegetable. The evangelist, as is his custom, explains it by a Greek word denoting a glint in general, but more particularly, according both to Homeric and Hellenistic usage, a gift to God, or a votive offering. It is thus a correct equivalent of the word which the evangelist explains by it. When, then, a Jewish child wished to discard, and entirely free himself from, filial obligation, he had only to pronounce this mystic word of potent meaning, and the traditional law of Pharisaism gave him a full release. whenever a man said of any part of his property or of his whole possessions, “It is Corban,” that is,” given to God,” he was bound by his vow, and the property was devoted to the service or support of the altar or temple or national religion; it was made over for religious purposes, though the time of fulfilling such vow was left to his own option, and so its fulfillment because discretionary, or was evaded. To revile or curse father or mother was surely bad enough and wicked enough; but to refuse to supply the wants of a parent when reduced to poverty, or to support a parent in old age and when needing such support, or to withhold from an indigent parent the necessaries of life, on the plea that the means or resources out of which such could be supplied were devoted to religious uses, was a refinement of unnatural and inhuman wickedness almost incapable of being expressed in words. And thus, as the next verse informs us, they suffered him no longer to do anything for his parents, even if he would; or, if he would not, they suffered him to have his way, conniving at his sin and overlooking his shame, nay, putting words into his mouth to enable him to perpetrate in the name of religion such abominable villainy. If, from a spirit of greedy avarice, or miserable meanness, or detestable stinginess I or in a fit of spiteful passion; or under the influence of superstition, a wicked Jew pleased to say to either parent suffering from disease, or labouring under age and poverty,” That whereby I might have helped, or relieved, or in any way benefited,, you, is devoted to the service of God and religion, and cannot now be withdrawn, the oral law of the Pharisee granted full liberty to do so, taught him its formula for that very purpose, and salved his conscience that he might withal feet at ease. Now, to those censorious Pharisees who watched our Lord and his disciples with such lynx-eyed vigilance and malign intent, and who had seen, not all the disciples, but some of them, partaking, not of a regular repast, but eating a morsel of bread with hands common, that is, in the ordinary or general stateclean, it may be, but not ritually cleansedour Lord may be supposed to say, Ye blame my hungry disciples for snatching the fragment of a hurried meal without ceremonial ablution, and censure them for neglecting a silly ceremony enjoined no doubt, by your traditional law, which is only of human origin, and, in such a case as that just referred to, of most nefarious tendency; but ye teach your disciples to violate, not a trivial ceremonial observance for which only human authority can be pleaded, and from which no benefit can be derived, but a moral duty, based on closest human relationship, written by God’s own finger, recorded in his written law, and enforced by the most solemn sanction! Is not this to establish man’s law and set aside God’s Law; to adhere punctiliously to the miserable tradition of miserable or wicked men, but to invalidate and even abrogate the Law of an infinitely pure and holy Goda Law, too, like its Author, holy and just and good! To wash the hands before a regular meal, or any meal, may be proper enough as a custom, or for cleanliness, or as a matter of delicacy, yet can never be exalted into a religious act or rite; but to trifle with or trample underfoot the law of natural affection, of filial piety, of common humanitya law specially honored with a most gracious promise, and sternly hedged in with the severest sanctionmust bring down the vengeance of Heaven on the guilty head of its transgressor. Thus our Lord left them to look at this picture and on that.

II. DISTINCTION BETWEEN CLEAN AND UNCLEAN.

1. Statement of a principle. After our Lord had put to silence and covered with confusion these intermeddling, faultfinding, censorious, and cavilling Pharisees, he proceeds to state a great and fundamental principle, which covered the whole ground and went to the very root of the matter. Before doing so, he requests the particular attention of the multitude. Whether they had withdrawn to a respectful distance during our Lord’s interview with the Pharisees and triumphant answer to their objection, or whether, from indifference to their obtrusive questionings the malevolent intention of which was obvious, they had sunk into a state of listless inattention, does not appear. They required, from whatever cause, to have their attention stimulated. For this purpose he calls on all and each, not only to listen attentively, but to reflect, with intelligence wide awake and active, on the great principle he is about to enunciate. Having thus gained their intelligent attention and roused their powers of reflection, he states the important distinction that “there is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.” After making this statement, he again appeals to them to give it their careful consideration.

2. Important distinction. Our Lord, in the principle stated, distinguishes between the physical and spiritual natures of man, as also between ceremonial and moral defilements; between positive regulations and moral requirements; and thus between precepts given for a particular purpose and obligations for a limited time, and those laws that were unvarying in their nature and perpetual in their obligation. The principle in question our Lord propounds in the form of an antithetic paradox. The first part of it seemed to collide with the distinction between meats clean and unclean, which God himself had appointed and minutely specified; and, if taken in a ceremonial sense, so it did; but understood morally, as our Lord had intended, it pointed not obscurely to the purpose for which such distinctions had been instituted. That purpose was temporary in its duration, and for the segregation of the chosen people from the mass of mankind, as well as for the symbolic intimation of the difference that should exist between ‘the holiness to which the people of God were! called, and the heathenism that prevailed around. Our Lord meant to correct an injurious error under which the people of the Jews in general then laboured. He had rebuked their superstitious punctiliousness about certain ceremonial washings, and their sinful regardlessness of moral obligations. This naturally leads him to expose the grave mistake they made when they foolishly supposed that meats of themselves exercised any moral efficacy or possessed any moral potency. That they defiled ceremonially, and exposed to disabilities of a ceremonial kind and entailing purification, was not doubted; but that they had any power of themselves either to cleanse or purify is here most positively denied. The cause of defilement was man’s fallen nature; the source of it was within; the seat of it was the heart; the stagnant pool from which such polluted waters issued was deep down in the very depths of his being. Thence proceeded defilements of speech through the mouth, defilements of work in the conduct, defilements of thoughts in the character and conversation. The disciples had shared the errors and prejudices of their race to a very large extent, and not understanding the strange paradoxical statement, sought an explanation in private. After a gentle reprimand for their dulness of apprehension, they were favored by their Master with a full explanation.

3. Moral impurity. The belly is the stomach and viscera, or organs of digestion generally; the heart is used for both the intellect and affectionsthe whole soul. These are totally distinct; what enters the former does not and cannot reach the latter. There is no connection between these parts of man’s nature, and no compatibility between the objects that affect them. Meats only enter the stomach and intestines, and minister to man’s life and strength; even the exclusion, of their refuse tends to purification rather than defilement. But the things that do defile proceed out of the heart; and they are sins against God’s Law, or dispositions that incline to those sins, and incentives that prompt to them. Those sins are against the commandments in the so-called second table of the Law. According to a rough classification that has been made, some are sins against the sixth commandment, as murders, wickedness, and an evil eye; some against the seventh, as fornication, adultery, and lasciviousness; some against the eighth, as theft and deceit; some against the ninth, as blasphemies, or evil-speaking, and false witness (in St. Matthew’s enumeration); and some against the tenth, as covetousness, or, literally, “reachings after more.” But of the evil dispositions that lead to overt acts of sins, the chief place is occupied by evil thoughts, whether the reference is to evil thoughts in general, or to such vicious reasonings as those in which the Pharisees were accustomed to indulge. While such inward thoughts or reasonings () are the seminal principles from which sinful actions proceedthe bitter roots from which they shoot up and growa leading motive to sin is specified: it is pride (, a desire to appear above others), the wish for conspicuous elevation. In pride itself the predominant clement is selfishnessthat selfishness that prompts men to seek the pre-eminence in all things, and to prefer self to all other persons or interests, in contrariety to the scriptural precept which directs us” in honor to prefer one another.” Pride implies that overbearing demeanour and haughtiness of carriage that make men look down on others, supposing themselves so much superior. Pride centres all in self, disregarding others’ interests whenever they seem to stand in the way; at the same time proud persons, male or female, “sacrifice to their own net, and burn incense to their own drag.” Pride is thus a most powerful motive to sin, to selfish indulgence, to self-aggrandizement, to supercilious speech in regard to others, and to self-interest, whatever form it may assume, and however much detriment may be done to the rights of others. Further, one characteristic of all sin, and a name frequently used in Scripture as synonymous with “sin,” is “folly” (). This senselessness denies God the glory that pertains to him, for “the fool has said in his heart, There is no God.” While it thus robs God, it refuses to man his due. In the cud it ruins the individual himself. “This their way is their folly.” Oh, the folly of sin! The enumeration of the things which defile a man, as given here by St. Mark, is fuller than that given by St. Matthew. The latter mentions only seven; while St. Mark specifies thirteen. The cause of this additional number by the latter may be found in the vices that commonly prevailed among the Romans, for whom in the first instance St. Mark wrote, as compared with those to which the Jews, whom St. Matthew more especially kept in view in his Gospel, were addicted. A comparison also of the catalogue of crimes, which St. Paul, in writing to the Romans, gives at the close of his first chapter, will probably confirm the same conclusion, that the cause of the difference in the enumeration is connected with the different classes of sins to which persons belonging to these different nationalities were respectively addicted. Judaism at its worst, if this theory be correct, had greatly the advantage of paganism; so the lowest type of Christianity is superior to heathenism.J.J.G.

Mar 7:24-30

Parallel passage: Mat 15:21-28.

Daughter of a Syro-phoenician woman healed.

I. OUR LORD‘S WITHDRAWAL INTO THE REGION OF TYRE AND SIDON, Our Lord’s retirement at this time into the region indicated was probably occasioned by a desire to avoid the further attention and inquiries of Herod, and perhaps his presence also there in his tetrarchy, which comprised Galilee and Peraea; while it may have been a symbolic intimation of the mercy in store for, and ere long to be extended to, Gentile lands; or it may have been simply for the purpose of seclusion and rest after a time of toil, and to escape from the cavils of scribes and Pharisees. The territory here described as “the borders of Tyro and Sidon” was not a district interjacent between Tyre and Sidon, as Erasmus understood it; nor yet the territory proper of Tyre and Sidon, as Fritzsche explained it; or the neighborhood of the former city, as Alford took its meaning to be; but originally a tract of border-land or neutral ground which separated Palestine from Phoenicia, subscquently ceded by Solomon to the King of Tyre and incorporated with Phoenecia, yet still retaining its ancient name of borderland.

II. THE APPLICANT, AND HER WRETCHEDNESS. This applicant is called by St. Matthew a Canaanitish woman, and by St. Mark a Syro-phoenician. Phoenicia, in which the old and famous commercial, cities, of Tyre (from Tzor, “a rock,” now Sur) and Sidon (from Tsidon, “fishery,” now Saida, twenty miles further north) were situated, was part of ancient Canaan, and so inhabited by a remnant of that doomed race. But, as the Phoenicians were the great seafarers and colonizers of ancient times, they had sent out and founded many settlements. One of these was in Africa, and the colonists were distinguished by the appropriate name of Liby-phoenicians, from the parent stock which went by the name of Syro-phcenicians. Horace has the expression,” Uterque Poenus servint uni,” and Juvenal twice employs the word “Syro-phoenix.” It is probable that, while the coast-line retained the name Phoenicia, the more inland parts, where Syrian and Phoenician intermingled, got the name of Syro-phoenicia. But, while this woman was a Syro-phccnician by race, she was a Greek, that is, a Gentile: for the name Greek was used generally for all Gentiles, as distinguished from Jews, just as Frank is employed in the East for all Europeans; thus, we read in Rom 1:16, “To the Jew first, and also to the Greek.” Thus Greek was the same as Gentile, and the inhabitants of the world were distributed into Greeks and Jews. The applicant, then, in the narrative under consideration, belonged to a different nationality from the Jews, for she was a Syro-phoenician, and to a different religion, for she was a heathen. This poor woman, born and bred amid the darkness of heathenism, with little to sustain and comfort her in this world, and without hope for a better, had her full share of the miseries of mortal life. She appears from the narrative to have been a widow, as there is no mention or notice of her husband. If soand we have no reason to doubt itshe had to bear the hardships and fight the battle of life alone, without the head of her little household, without the bread-winner of her family, and without a partner to share and so divide the current of her grief. She had a daughter, probably an only daughter, mayhap an only child; but that one daughter, that only child, instead of being a source of comfort or support to the widowed mother, was the cause of the great grief that pressed upon and crushed her heart. That beloved childthat dear daughter, round whom alone, in the absence of other objects, the mother’s affections were now all entwinedwas an invalid, and an invalid whom no medical skill and no human power could relieve. It was not merely disease under which she laboured; if that had been all, however bad the case or severe the distemper, it might, even after medical appliances had proved unavailing, have exhausted itself, as is sometimes known to happen, or even the vis medicatrix naturae might have effected a cure. But no, it was something worse, much worse, than any ordinary disease, however Virulent; it was demoniac powerdiabolical possession. The girl had “an unclean spirit,” and was “grievously vexed with a devil,” so that the case was taken out of the common category of diseases, and entirely hopeless. The poignancy of the mother’s grief, the bitterness of her sorrow for a daughter so dear to her, and yet so hopelessly, helplessly afflicted, we can well imagine. Indeed, we seem to hear the echo of her wail in the pathetic cry for mercy: “Have mercy upon me, O Lord, thou Son of David!”

III. HER APPLICATION. What led her to think of Jesus at all? In the first instance, no doubt, it was her misery on account of her daughter’s distressed condition. She had, we are persuaded, tried many means before this; she had left nothing undone, we are very sure; but all was in vain! Her wretchedness had found no relief; her misery remains without alleviation. She is now ready to do or to dare anything that may hold forth the slightest hope of relief. But while it was the feeling of misery in the first instance, and that strong maternal affection which the sufferings of her daughter roused into such active exercise, there was, besides, a rumor that had somehow reached her ears of the great Jewish Teacher, who was Prophet and Physician both in one. His fame had reached that distant heathen land. He wished, indeed, that no man should know of his journey thither or of his being there; he meant to travel incognito. But that he soon found to be impossible, for, as the evangelist expresses it, “he could not be hid;” there was that about him, conceal it as he might, which revealed his majesty and bespoke the greatness and dignity of his person. This Canaanitish woman has heard, moreover, that this powerful Healer has quitted the holy city, and left the Galilean hills, the flowery slopes, the glancing waters of the lovely lake; and that he is at present travelling in that remote north-west. Now she feels that her opportunity is come, that the time for trying another remedy has arrived, and that a Physician, greater than any she had ever applied to or heard of before, is now accessible. A load is lifted off her heart; her hopes are raised, and with buoyant, spirit she sets out to where she heard he was. But she has not been long on the road till hope and fear begin to alternate. Had she not been buoyed up with similar hopes before, and yet those hopes had ended in disappointment? May it not be so again? May it not be so now? Still she feels that the object of all this solicitude can scarcely be worse, and may perhaps be better. At all events, she is determined to make the trial, if it should be the last. She has heard of multitudes of cures he has performed, of wonderful curescures of demoniacs as well as those afflicted with diseases; and so she plucks up heart anew, and again resumes her journey. Here were two strong motives impelling her to take the course she was doingher sense of misery, and the reports about Jesus. And yet there was, we think, a third impelling power; for what suggested the resolution she came to in view of the wretchedness of her own and her daughter’s condition, and on the ground of the reports that had reached her? What or who empowered her to make up her mind at once and form the resolution? What it was we are not told in so many words; it is not expressly stated, perhaps not even dearly implied; and yet such an impulse must have been given to her will. We speak of God putting this or that thought into the heart; and so we believe that it was God that opened her eyes to see her real condition, that opened her ears to hear the reportthe good news about One who was mighty to heal and cure; that quickened the seed of thought thus sown in her soul, making it fructify, blossom, and bear fruit; in other words, that produced the resolution and prompted to action in carrying it out. It is exactly thus with the sinner; his eyes are opened to see his sin and consequent misery; his ears are opened to hear, and his heart to believe, the report of a Saviour; and he is persuaded and enabled to form the right resolution of applying at once to Jesus for pardon and peacemade willing, in fact, in the day of God’s power.

IV. HER RESPECTFUL ADDRESS, The respectful mode of her address, and the earnest petition which she prefers, are calculated to surprise and even astonish us. We must presuppose some knowledge of the Saviour, from whatever source it came. She had obtained in some way, and to some extent, knowledge of Jesushow or whence we have not sufficient information to enable us to say. The terms of her address, when we consider her heathen antecedents and surroundings, are truly wonderful. “O Lord, thou Son of David”these are marvellous words to come from heathen lips; “have mercy on me!” are words easily read between the lines of her misery, and easily accounted for by the sympathetic chord which her daughter’s affliction had touched in her heart. The former words are not so readily accounted for. “O Lord,” she said, and thus she acknowledged his power and his providence. She confesses her faith in his power as almighty, and in his providence as universal; she owns a providence which extends to, and is employed about, all the affairs of the world and men, and a power that regulates and controls all events. Nor are we sure that this term, as it was uttered by the lips of this woman, did not embrace more than matters of mundane interest. But whether or not it comprehended authority over things in heaven as well as things on earthcelestial as well as terrestrial concernsone thing is certain, that the expression immediately following clearly embraced Messianic hopes and prospects. “Son of David” is a name or title of Messiah in Old Testament Scripture. He was to be the Son of David according to the flesh, as well as “the Son of God with power;” David’s Son as well as David’s Lord, according to the Saviour’s own words. She thus acknowledged him as Lord, and so possessed of unlimited power over all beings, human, angelic, and demoniac; over all agencies of every order; and over all ailments, whether diseases proper or diabolic possession. She acknowledged him also as the Christ of God, whose very mission was to impart prophetic instruction, to make priestly satisfaction, and to exercise kingly authority in, over, and on behalf of his people. There was thus a whole creed, at least in germ, contained in the words of this woman’s address to the Saviour. How had she attained such knowledge? Had the Spirit of God enlightened her? Had the Saviour been made known to her, as afterwards to Saul, by direct and special revelation? We believe that there was the agency of the Spirit in making application, but that there had been human instrumentality in conveying instruction. We read in the third chapter of this Gospel, at the eighth verse, that, in addition to the great multitude that followed Jesus from Galilee, Judea, Jerusalem, Idumaea, and beyond Jordan, also “they about Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude, when they had heard what great things he did, came unto him.” Was it not most likely that from some of these, on their return home, this woman had heard something about the Saviourwho he was, what he was, as well as about the great things he was doing? The Spirit’s agency was needed to make application to her heart of the fragmentary truths she may have gleaned in the way indicated. Here, again, the sinner’s case is similar. He hears about Christ, he reads about him, he is taught many facts in relation to his life, death, resurrection, ascension, saving power, and second coming to judgment; but yet “no man can call Jesus Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.” We need the instruction, it is true, but we require also the illumination of the Spirit. That we may derive real benefit from Scripture truth, and spiritual profit from the facts of Christ’s history, the Spirit must “guide us into all truth,” even the “truth as it is in Jesus.”

V. HER EARNEST PLEADING. In her earnestness she makes her daughter’s ease her own; she regards the affliction of so near a relative as personal; in her daughter’s affliction she was afflicted. “Have mercy on me!” she saidon me, who feel myself so identified with my daughter, who suffer in her suffering, who am distressed in her distress, whose life is bound up in her life. Again,” Have mercy on me!”a wretched woman, a sorely tried and almost broken-hearted mother. Then she repeats the petition with a slight variation, saying, “Lord, help me!” How touching this repeated request! how pathetic! How eloquent as well as earnest! It is, indeed, this earnestness that forms the chief element of its eloquence.

VI. THE TRIAL OF HER FAITH. She had been sorely afflicted, and now her faith is sorely tried. In the Gospel of St. Matthew the recital is fuller, and these trials stand out more conspicuously. The first trial of her faith is our Lord’s silence. “He answered her not a word.” What can this strange silence mean? Is it indifference or neglect? Is it want of sympathy with her own distress and her daughter’s affliction? Or is it dislike and contempt for a descendant of a sinful and accursed race? And yet she must have heard of his compassionate kindness and tender pity, as also of the ready relief he was in the habit of granting to every son and daughter of affliction. She must have heard, from all who told her of him, that no applicant had ever met with repulse or refusal at his hand. Is she to be an exception? Will he not condescend to take the slightest notice of her? Another sore discouragement arose from the inconsiderate and unsympathetic conduct of the disciples, who came forward and actually besought him to dismiss her. “Send her away,” they said, “for she crieth after us”send her away at once (, aorist imperative), and get rid of her annoyance; it is troublesome and even indecorous to have her following us, and painful to have to listen to her crying after us in this fashion. Either dismiss her summarily or grant her request, that, one way or other, we may get rid of her. Even if we understand the disciples in this latter sense, as asking their Master to give her what she wanted and let her go, it was a cold selfishness that prompted it, and an ungracious spirit that thus wished to be done with her importunity as speedily as possible. Their interference, however, had only the effect of drawing forth in reply a reason for refusal When our Lord did break silence, it was only to indicate the circumscribed sphere of his present mission, and thus to imply her exclusion: “I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” It appears to some that even in this refusal there was a faint gleam of hope, and that this despised woman of Canaan might have replied,Though not of the house of Israel, yet I am a lost sheep, and greatly need the Good Shepherd’s care; and though he has not come specially on an errand of mercy to my race or me, yet I am come in quest of him and to seek his favor. But another obstacle, seemingly more formidable, bars the way. There had been silence and seeming indifference; there had been a refusal, and that backed by a reasona strong reason, and one that did not admit of any questioning; and now there is reproachapparent reproach. This sorrowful woman, in this her direst extremity and the darkest hour of her misery, summoned up all her strength of resolution to make one final effort; and coming closer to the Saviour, and with still greater reverence as well as earnestness, she “worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me.” And yet, the reply to all this profound respect and unflagging importunity appeared at least to be of the most discouraging character, and in fact the unkindest cut of all: “It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and cast it to dogs.”

VII. HER PERSEVERANCE AND HUMILITY. Her perseverance was truly wonderful, and her humility was equal to her perseverance. She turns the seeming slight into an argument. Our Lord, in the similitude he employs, does not refer to the wild, ferocious, gregarious dogs of the East, that are owned by no master, but prowl about for food, and that supply, in some sort, the place of street-scavengers. He refers to young or little dogs (), and to children, or little children (), and the friendly relations that are well known to exist between them, denying the propriety of defrauding the children of food in order to feed even their canine potsto take their bread and cast it to dogs (where observe the paronomasia in and ). “Yes, Lord: for indeed the little dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs.” The proverbial expression implied

(1) the impatience of dogs desirous of food; and

(2) the impropriety of taking the bread intended for children and giving it to dogs before the children had got their portion; consequently

(3) the injury of conferring benefits on one to the detriment of others, and prematurely before the claims of those others had been properly met and fully satisfied. Such might be the feeling of the Jews, if the Gentile stranger should step into some privilege before they had received their proper place and promised share. The opinion of Theophylact, and of many besides, that the Gentiles are meant by the dogs, because they are looked upon as unclean by the Jews, or the narrower notion of Chrysostom, that this woman herself is stigmatized by the name of dog from her persistence and blandness of entreaty, are unnecessary, if not unwarranted. The appropriateness of the proverb, and of the mode of treatment it implied, is admitted by this woman who gives it a most felicitous turn and favorable interpretation on her own behalf. She frankly and fully admits the reasonableness of supplying food to the children first, but insists at the same time on the humane principle and considerate practice of allowing the little dogs to eat the crumbs that fell accidentally, or were let fall on purpose, beneath the table. She accepted the situation thus indicated; she was content to take the place of dogs under the table; she was satisfied with the crumbs that remained after the children had got their full share. It was as if she said,I own my inferiority; I am not a descendant of Abraham, nor a daughter of Israel; I do not claim equal privileges or equal dignity with one of that highly favored race. I only ask the position which a kind master allows his dog that is under the table, and the friendly treatment which such a master is in the habit of granting to his canine favourite; and that is to be fed from the children’s crumbs, as the source () of their nourishment. A crumb is all I crave. One crumb from my Master’s table will comfort me and cure my child.

VIII. THE REWARD OF HER PERSEVERANCE AS AN EXAMPLE AND ENCOURAGEMENT. we have seen how, in the face of what seemed contemptuous silence, of positive refusala refusal made more positive by the strong reason alleged in its supportof apparent reproach and depreciation, this woman kept to her purpose, converting a slight into a sound argument. By firmness of purpose, by strength of will, by great humility, by astonishing earnestness, above all by vigorous faith, she held on, and, like Jacob with the angel, she did not let the Saviour go until she obtained the blessing which she sought. What a pattern of faith and patience combined this woman exhibits! She had made probably a long journey, undergone much fatigue, spared no pains, shrunk from no toil, till she reached Jesus; and, after going so far and doing so much to reach him, she seems doomed to disappointment; and is treated with silence, with sternness, and with something like scorn; and yet by a quick instinct she makes that scorn helpful to her suit. And now at last she has her reward. Not only does she gain the object about which she was so earnestly solicitous, but she receives the cordial commendation of our Lord. “For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter;” or, as St. Matthew has it, “O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.”

IX. PRACTICAL LESSONS.

1. We learn from this most interesting and encouraging narrative the power of faith and its prevalence. If “all things are possible with God”and we are sure they are”all things are possible to him that believeth.” It was faith brought her to Christ; it was faith kept her close to Christ, in spite of so many and so great discouragements; it was faith obtained the blessing from Christ; it was faith called forth the commendation of Christ, for in that faith he recognized the gracious principle he had himself implanted in her soul. Accordingly, it was her faith he so commended. He did not say, “Great is thy humility,” and yet she displayed the grace of humility in an eminent degree; nor “Great is thy fervency,” and yet she was uncommonly fervent in her petitions; nor “Great is the love thou bearest thy child,” and yet she was a model at once of womanly tenderness and motherly affection; nor “Great is thy patience,” and yet her patience had few parallels; nor “Great is thy perseverance,” and yet her perseverance commands our admiration, even across the centuries. No; but “Great is thy faith.” It was the mother grace and parent of all the rest. Lord, grant each of us like precious faith!

2. Our duty to our children, and to the young in general, is strikingly taught us here. Taking this woman for a pattern, we should plead with God frequently, fervently, and faithfully on behalf of our children, until Christ be formed in their heart. And oh, if any of them should be a victim of the evil one, and possessed by some evil passion, some sinful propensity, some destructive lustin case any should be thus “grievously vexed with a devil”how anxious, how labourious, how perseveringly prayerful we should be on their behalf! and how we should imitate this woman’s importunity, and, like her, make their case our own until we obtain for them the blessing!

3. A further lesson is to go to Christ in every season of distress, nor despair, however long he is pleased to keep us waiting. Here are two lessons put together, for they properly go together. Whatever be our distresswhether personal affliction or domestic trial, whether the undutifulness of children or the godlessness of their lives, whether it be hostility of foes or the coldness of friends, whether it be worldly loss or sore bereavementwe should go and tell Jesus, acknowledging his all-sufficiency, spreading the whole case before him, confessing our great unworthiness, and pleading earnestly with him for mercy and help. And here another and a kindred lesson suggests itself, and that is firmness and freedom from despondency in trial. It pleased the Saviour to try the woman of Canaan severely and long; but it was for her good, for the glory of his grace in her, and for a pattern to ourselves. He proved her faith, but his object was to improve and strengthen it; he meant to exhibit its sterling qualities as a pattern to his disciples. Many a one, tried as this woman was, would have sunk down into sullen silence, or hurried off in a fit of passion, and given up her suit. It might have been so with some of ourselves; but he will humble us before he exalts us; he will have us trust in him, though he slay us. Some token will be vouchsafed for our encouragement, even in the sorest testing-time. It was probably so with this woman. She may have discerned a tenderness in the tone of the Saviour’s voice, or a gentleness in his look, that encouraged her to persevere. But, even in the absence of such, we must impress on ourselves the conviction that there “may be love in Christ’s heart while there are frowns on his face,” as it is quaintly expressed by an old divine. Further, we may be kept long waiting, but we shall not wait in vain, any more than this poor woman. Our prayers may not be favored with an immediate answer; but, though not answered at once, they will be accepted at once, and answered at the time most expedient for us, as well as most conducive to the Divine glory.

“For though he prove our patience,

And to the utmost prove,

Yet all his dispensations

Are faithfulness and love.”

J.J.G.

Mar 7:31-37

A miracle of restoration.

I. THE DEAF MUTE HEALED.

1. A difference of reading. According to the common text we learn that our Lord, “departing from the coasts [borders] of Tyre and Sidon, came unto the Sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts [borders] of Decapolis; but according to the best critical authorities “through Sidon” must be substituted for “and Sidon;” and then the sentence reads as it stands in the Revised Version: “Again he went out from the borders of Type, and came through Sidon unto the Sea of Galilee, through the midst of the borders of Decapolis.‘ This reading is unquestionably the more difficult, but exceedingly interesting, as it shows the extent of our Lord’s tour through those Gentile lands. Proceeding twenty miles northward from Tyre, he came to Sidon, the great seat of Phoenician worship and of the idols Baal and Astarte; and then passing along the foot of Lebanon, and crossing the Leontes or Litany, the largest river of Syria, he came to the sources of the Jordan, whence he descended along the eastern bank into the region of Decapolis. The probable object of this detour was to gain privacy, instruct more thoroughly his disciples, escape his enemies, and visit the many towns and villages dotting this rotate.

2. An interesting though practically unimportant question. Was the subject of this miracle deaf, with an impediment in his speech, or both deaf and dumb; in other words, a deaf mute? If he was deaf and had

(1) only an impediment in his speech, he had not been born deaf, for in that case he would have been destitute of speech altogether. He may have become deaf in early childhood, before the organs of speech attained their full development; or he may have been deaf for such a length of time that, through long disuse, his tongue had lost its power; or disease may have supervened, and inflammation or ulceration tied the lingual nerve. Whatever the cause of this impediment waswhether it was occasioned by rigidity of the membrane arising from long desuetude, or whether it was produced by the diseased state of the muscles, or whether it was the result of early deafnessthe impediment was so great that it differed little from the entire absence of the power of articulation. This poor man was thus little, if at all, better than a deaf mute. But

(2) several reasons induce the belief that this man was actually dumb as well as deaf. Among these we may mention the statement at Mar 7:37, where the Jews, who witnessed this miracle, said, “He maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb () to speak;” and the word is used in the LXX. Version of Isa 35:6 in the signification of dumb; also, in a reference by St. Matthew to this same journey of our Lord, and to the miracles performed at that time, the evangelist mentions the dumb speaking, ( ). It may be observed that, while , meaning” dull” or “blunt,” may be applied to either hearing or speech, the meaning of the word in St. Mark is always “deaf,” though the usual meaning of it is “dumb,” being synonymous with in the classics.

3. Nature of this privation. This affliction was twofold. Two Organs were virtually wanting, two senses were sealed, two channels of communication with the external world were closed. The case of this person, if not actually identical with that of a man deaf and dumb, is illustrative of it. And oh, how great this double privation! How difficult for those, whom God has blessed with the free use of all their bodily organs, to appreciate the privation of one who is deaf and dumb! These twin calamities are, it is true, physiologically reducible to one. They stand related as cause and effect. Deafness at birth, or loss of hearing soon after, usually involves dumbness. Deafness is the radical defect, dumbness is its natural result. This man is said to be , which expresses the primitive want; while (the root is equivalent to as in -, labour, equivalent to something great laid () on one) expresses the natural and necessary consequencethe great obstacle to speech. This latter word, therefore, is wrongly rendered “stammering,” and rather denotes one unable to utter articulate words. Hearing, like sight, and as much as sight, is an inborn faculty; but speaking is a learnt art. Man of himself can utter sounds, and that is all, but not speak words. The latter he learns by hearing; but how can he learn without hearing, and how can he hear if he is born deaf? Further, in deafness the organ is wanting or defective; in dumbness the organ is present, but it might as well be absent, as it is disabled and incapable of use. When the ear is stopped, silence seals the tongue. But, though the cause may thus be one, the calamity affects two senses, and debars the use of both.

4. Extent of this privation. On due consideration, it will be found that these “children of silence,” as they have been called, are doomed to as severe deprivations as any to be found in the whole catalogue of human woes. By nature they are excluded from all those pleasures which the ear drinks in and the tongue gives out. Nor do we refer merely or mainly to the melody of sweet soundsto the thrilling tones of harmony, to the witching spell of minstrelsy, to the rapturous delights of music, as it is heard from the birds that make the woodland vocal with their notes, or from the itinerant musicians that stay for a few moments’ space the step of the man of business, or cheer the spirit of the downcast; or as it swells in the concert, or sweeps so grandly in the oratorio, or is wafted aloft from a thousand voices on the open air of heaven. The deaf are excluded from other joys more homely, but not less hearty. They are shut out from the pleasant voice of childish prattle, from domestic or friendly converse, from intellectual interchange of thought, from literary amusement, scientific research, or political intelligence. From all these sources of information, instruction, and enjoyment they are by nature shut out. And here we come to the worst phase of their conditionthe blank it leaves the mind. When sound is shut cut, a chief entrance of knowledge is barred. The exclusion of sound is the exclusion of all that knowledge and of all that multitude of ideas that sounds convey or suggest to the mind.

5. Contrast between the respective privations of the deaf and blind. We deeply commiserate the condition of the blind, from whom the fair face of nature is shrouded in darkness, whose eyes are never gladdened by the light of the sun by day or of the moon and stars by night, from whom the beauty of the human countenance and the loveliness of the landscape scenery are alike hidden, while “the shadow of death” rests “upon their eyelids.” And yet the deaf mute is in a worse condition than even they. You can talk with that blind man, and tell him many things. He has an ear to hear, and learns much from your lips. You can read to him, and he listens, to the lessons of heavenly, wisdom, or human philosophy, or every-day experience, which you thus communicate. He is entertained at the same time that he lays up a store of useful knowledge. Not so the deaf mute; he is unimproved by all you say or read. Your speech does not instruct him, for he cannot hear. Books are useless to him, for he cannot read because he is ignorant of sounds made visible. He learns not, for thus the key of knowledge is taken away. Deaf mutes are, therefore, shrouded in deeper than midnight gloom; they grope in a “darkness that may be felt.” Thus one of the great inlets of knowledge is taken away; one of the main sources of enjoyment is hermetically sealed; one of the chief links that bind men in social intercourse is snapped; one of the silken bands that unite men in intercommunion is severed. Thus the deaf mute stands apart, and in lonely isolation from his fellow-men; thus one of the sweetest streams of human-happiness is frozen up. We have thus looked at the condition of the deaf mute of our own day, as closely resembling, if not quite the same with, that of the man that was brought to our Lord, as it is here written, “They bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech.”

II. THE SIGNS WHICH THE SAVIOUR USED.

1. What these signs were. After taking him aside, he “put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue.” These signs which he employed did in no way contribute to the cure he effected, and yet they were significant of what he was about to do. They were far from meaningless manoeuvres or purposeless displays of power. They were no empty make-believes. Our Lord meant to arrest the man’s attention and excite his expectations. He did so with the impotent man when he said, “Wilt thou be made whole?” He did so with the blind men when he asked them, “What will ye that I should do unto you?” and when he added, “Believe ye that I am able to do this?” He does the same in the case before us. But as this man knew nothing of the language of sounds, our Lord addressed him in the language of signs. He touched the parts affected to apprise him of his intention to reach the seats of the infirmities and remove the maladies. He put his fingers into the ears to signify that he would take away the obstructions that were therein, and open up the way for sound to enterthat he would penetrate every opposing barrier, and bestow a new acoustic power. He touched the tongue with moisture from his own mouth to lubricate the stiffened member, to loosen whatever impediment confined its and restore its agility of motion. Thus by signs he gave the man some indication of what he meant to do. But by these signs he taught him another lesson. The second lesson was one of faith in our Lord himself as the Author of his recovery, as the Source from which healing power flowed, and as able to do all and accomplish all fully and perfectly which he had signified. A third thing, perhaps, he meant to convey was that he sanctions the use of those means which he himself appoints. Here the means are all his own. His own fingers he inserted into the deaf man’s ears; with his own saliva he moistened his tongue. The power of healing is all his own. He can work without means, or against means, or by means; he here directs to the use of means, but only such means as he himself devises. These he sanctions, these he consecrates, sanctifies, and crowns with success. Further, our Lord adapts his sirens to the source of the ailment, and accomplishes a perfect cure. It might seem sufficient to insert his finger into the deaf ear without touching the tongue with saliva; and likewise, in the account of the cure, it might be thought enough to say “his ears were opened,” without adding that “the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.” The touching and consequent opening of the ear would undoubtedly have reached the origin of the ailment, and cured the defect at its source; but there would not have been a complete cure. The sufferer would only have been put into the condition of one learning to speak; but the cure, in the very mode of it, was meant to save him this trouble, and to secure to him the ability to speak at once. Hence it is not only said of him , “he spake,” that is, had now the power of speaking, but the term is subjoined, from which we learn that, without any loss of time, and without any process of educating the ear, he spake correctly and normally, as if he had been accustomed to do so from his youth, and not as one exercising a power just bestowed. The distinction between the sense of hearing and the organ of heating in this passage is noticeable: the former is , and the latter .

2. Symbolic actions. Another and a different symbolic action follows the signs we have been considering. The Saviour turned his eyes to heaven. By this time the Saviour had familiarized the sufferer to the use of signs, and accustomed him to the language which they conveyed. He guards him against any misinterpretation of the fore-mentioned signs. He turns his mind from those signs, as though by themselves they were in any way conducive to his cure. He raises his thoughts to heaven, to remind him that all relief was to be looked for from thence; that the blessing which made the means effectual came from above; that every good gift and every perfect boon is from above, coming down from the Father of lights;” that the power to cure in this case was Divine; and that, as the Lord from heaven, he himself had brought that power down to earth. While, on the one hand, he showed that the power emanated from himself, he, on the other hand, acknowledged the Father who had sent him to put forth such power. While he was manifesting by certain signs or one kind of symbolic action that power proceeded from his own person, he was proving by another kind that in that person divinity was shrined; that “it pleased the Father that in him”the Son”should all fullness dwell; “that “all power in heaven and on earth” was entrusted to his hands. He was indicating, moreover, the unity of purpose and of plan that subsisted between the Father and the Son; that he was doing the will of the Father, and accomplishing the work with which he had been commissioned. “The Father,” he said, “worketh hitherto, and I work;” “It is my meat and my drink to do the will of him that sent me.” He sought thereby the Father’s glory, as he himself said, “Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him;” and again he says, “I have glorified thee on earth: I have finished the work that thou gavest me to do.” Thus here and now, as always) he sets forth his mediatorial dependence on the Father, and the eye he had to his praise: “My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me;” “He that speaketh of himself seeketh his own glory; but he that seeketh his glory that sent him, the same is true, and no unrighteousness is in him.”

3. Duty of imitating the Master. As it was with the Master, so in measure is it with the disciple still. Ever and anon we must turn our eyes to heaven. While our hands are duly employed in the daily occupations of our calling upon earth, our hearts must mount upward on the wings of faith, in praise for mercies received and in prayer for the blessing to be bestowed: “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.” Otherwise our most strenuous efforts will be frustrated, our most fondly cherished hopes blasted, and our highest aspirations doomed to disappointment; for “except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.” While we thus lean on an Almighty arm, and depend for everything on God, we must have a single eye to his praise, ever keeping his glory as our chief end in view, and ever seeking from himself grace and strength and steady purpose to do his will.

“To do thy will! take delight,

O thou my God that art;

Yea, that most holy Law of thine

I have within my heart.”

4. The significance of the Saviour‘s sigh. “He sighed;” and no wonder, when he thought of the ruin that sin had wrought, and of the wreck which man had in consequence become. The Saviour sighed when he looked abroad on suffering humanity, when he reflected on the miseries of a fallen race, and when especially he contemplated the living example of that misery that then stood before him. He sighed in sympathy with our sufferings, “for we have not an High Priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities.” Blessed be God for such “a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God.” He sighed in sorrow for our sins. In them he saw the cause of all; in them he saw the bad and bitter fountain-head; in them he saw the fruitful source of so much woe; in them he saw that fearful thing that darkened heaven above us, opened hell beneath us, and cursed the earth on which we tread; in them he saw that fell infection that has disordered, in a certain sense and to a certain extent, all the members of the body and all the faculties of the soul, so that “the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint;” in them he saw the prolific germ of all those “ills that flesh is heir to,” and of all those pangs that make the heart of humanity ache: for “by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin,” and not only death, but with it all our woe; in them he saw, too, the grievous load he was himself one day to bear, when he” bare our sins in his own body on the tree,” so that it has been truly as tersely said

“With pitying eyes, the Prince of peace

Beheld our helpless grief;

He saw, and oh! amazing love!

He came to our relief.”

He sighed when he thought of the works of the devil and his malice against man, and how human weakness had given him power to deform the body by disease, and deface the image of the Creator in the soul of his creature. Perhaps, too, he sighed when, as has been shrewdly suggested by an old divine, he saw the new temptation to sin that the man’s renewed powers would expose him tothe evil things the ear would hear, the idle things the tongue would speak, the wicked things in which both organs might be made instrumental. “Therefore,” said the psalmist, “I Will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue: I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while the wicked are before me.“ The explanation of the Saviour’s sigh by a German writer on the miracles, though ingenious, is not sufficiently comprehensive, when he traces its cause to” the closed ear of the world” of which the deaf man was the symbol,” which does not perceive his Word, and therefore does not receive it;” and thinks his view commended, if not confirmed, by St. Mark’s numerous exhortations to spiritual hearing by maxim, parable, and symbol. The maxim is, “If any man have ears to hear, let him hear;” and connected with it is the parable of the earth’s producing fruit after the reception of the seed, or salvation attained by right hearing of the word, while the present symbol corroborates the same truth.

“The deaf may hear the Saviour’s voice,

The fettered tongue its chain may break;

But the deaf heart, the dumb by choice,

The laggard soul, that will not wake,

The guilt that scorns to be forgiven
These baffle e’en the spells of Heaven:
In thought of these, his brows benign
Not e’en in healing cloudless shine.

The correct explanation, while not exclusive of this view, is inclusive of much more.

5. The single word spoken by the Saviour. “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened,” was the single utterance after the heavenward look and inward sigh. The root of this word is the Hebrew pathach, to open; from a similar Syriac root comes ethpatach, the imperative of the passive conjugation Ethpael; then, by assimilation of theta and aspiration, we get ephphatha. And no sooner had he spoken that word than its omnific power appeared. The dull ear was endowed with a power it had never known before, or to which it had been long a stranger. The hindrance that prevented the free passage of the air, or deadened its undulations, was removed; the defect in its organism was remedied. The pleasure of drinking in sweet sounds and of listening to the music of human speech came with all the freshness of a new faculty. The man felt as though he had found himself in a new world, or had entered on a new and improved existence, or had risen many steps higher in the scale of being. And so, in truth, he had. But this was not all; the tongue was freed completely and at once from whatever it was that had fettered it, the impediment was quite gone, and the articulation was, notwithstanding the long disease, immediately perfect. He could now tell to all around the happy change he had undergonethe perfect nature of the cure, the pleasure that filled his soul, the gratitude that glowed in his heart and which then flowed from his lips.

6. The cure a cause of adoring wonder. Here we must admire, and, while we admire, adore, the power of Christ, for it is the power of God. Nothing short of Almighty power could have accomplished this wonder-work of mercy, for “Who hath made man’s mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the Lord?” And none, surely, save the Lord could thus unmake what sin and Satan had marred, removing all deficiencies, and renewing the afflicted with more than original powers. Here, too, we trace distinct proofs of his Messiahship. Blind as the multitude so frequently were, they could not shut their eyes on this fact.; they were so astonished that they could not help admitting it. They said, “He maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak;” they evidently had an eye to the words of the prophet, and the works he predicted the Messiah would do, when he said, “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing.”

III. PRACTICAL INSTRUCTION.

1. Inferences. This miracle, like others of our Lord’s miracles, warrants three inferences:

(1) his superhuman power, and by consequence his Divine commission;

(2) a glorious coming day foreshadowed, when all physical disabilities shall be finally and for ever removed; and

(3) what is of personal and practical importance, the inference of the Saviour’s ability to do for the soul what he so often and so effectually did for the body. The impediments of the body are but dim shadows of the worse impediments of the soul. By nature the ear is deaf to the Divine commands, the tongue dumb when it should celebrate his praise; while the heart is hard, the affections frozen, the mind shrouded in darknessthe man in a state of isolation, without fellowship with God or communion with the saints. Christ says, “Ephphatha,” and oh, what a change ensues! The ear is opened to hear God’s Word, the heart, like Lydia’s, to receive his grace, the tongue untied to praise his name and call upon him in prayer.

2. His due need of praise. In view of all this we must join with the multitude and say,” He hath done all things well.” It was well for the man that was healed, because in his case it was next to life from the dead; it was well for his relations, for their trouble was all but over; it was well for his friends, because their enjoyment of him and pleasure with him were unspeakably increased; it was well for mankind, that the Son of man had authority to exercise such power upon earth; it was well for each of us, because herein we have an earnest of what he will do for the soul, a pledge of the renovation of soul and body, an assurance of the future and final perfection of both. He did all things well, for he “did no iniquity, neither was guile found in his mouth;” he did all things well, for he went about continually, doing good. More particularly, he did all things well, for whatever he did he did largely and liberally, modestly and humbly, generously, graciously, gratuitously, and yet gloriously. Like the first creation, when God saw everything that he had made, “behold, it was very good;” so, when the works of Christ are contemplated, the concurrent testimony of heaven and earth will be, that “he hath done all things well.” Saints on earth will say it, for they are the trophies of his mercy, the triumphs of his grace, the memorials of his goodness, and the monuments of his power; saints in heaven will say it, adding, He opened our ears by his power, our hearts by his spirit, our tongues by his grace; he washed us from our sins in his blood, making us kings and priests unto God. Multitudes when he was on earth said it; multitudes yet unborn will say it. We ourselves are entitled to say it, for his healing power has reached us; he has removed our maladies, renewed our souls, made us to delight in his Word and rejoice in his love.

“He speaks, and, listening to his voice,

New life the dead receive;

The mournful, broken hearts rejoice,

The humble peer believe.

“Hear him, ye deaf; his praise, ye dumb,

Your loosened tongues employ;

Ye blind, behold your Saviour come;

And leap, ye lame, for joy.”

J.J.G.

Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary

Mar 7:1-16 . See on Mat 15:1-11 . The occasion of the discussion, only hinted at in Matt. Mar 7:2 , is expressly narrated by Mark in Mar 7:1-2 , and with a detailed explanation of the matter, Mar 7:3-4 . Throughout the section Matthew has abridgments, transpositions, and alterations (in opposition to Hilgenfeld and Weiss).

] is simply: there come together , there assemble themselves (Mar 2:2 , Mar 4:1 , Mar 5:21 , Mar 6:30 ). The suggestion of a procedure of the synagogue (Lange), or of a formal deputation (Weizscker), is purely gratuitous.

] applies to both; on the notice itself, comp. Mar 3:22 .

With the reading , Mar 7:5 (see the critical remarks), a full stop is not to be placed after Mar 7:1 , as by Lachmann and Tischendorf, but the participial construction, begun with , runs on easily and simply as far as , where a period is to be inserted. Then follows the explanatory remark, Mar 7:3-4 , which does not interrupt the construction, and therefore is not, as usually, to be placed in a parenthesis. But with in Mar 7:5 a new sentence begins, which continues the narrative.

] not in Jerusalem (Lange), but on their present arrival, when this gave them a welcome pretext for calling Jesus to account.

] Mark explains for his Gentile readers (for whom also the explanation that follows was regarded by him as necessary) in what sense the is meant. Valckenaer, Wassenbergh, and Fritzsche without ground, and against all the evidence, have declared the words a gloss. [103] See, on the other hand, Bornemann, Schol. in Luc. p. xl. The (Hom. Il. vii. 266; Hesiod, Op. 725; Lucian. Rhet. praec. 14) stands in contrast with the prescribed washing. Theophylact well says: .

Mar 7:3 . .] A more popular expression not to be strained indicating the general diffusion of the Pharisaic maxims among the people.

] Vulg.: crebro (after which Luther: manchmal ); Gothic: ufta (often); Syr.: diligenter [104] translations of an ancient reading (as in ) or ( heartily ), which is not, with Schulz and Tischendorf (comp. Ewald), to be regarded as original, but as an emendation (comp. Luk 5:33 ), as indeed itself cannot be made to bear the meaning of (in opposition to Casaubon). The only true explanation is the instrumental one; so that they place the closed fist in the hollow of the hand, rub and roll the former in the latter, and in this manner wash their hands ( ) with the fist . Comp. Beza, Fritzsche. Similarly Scaliger, Grotius, Calovius, and others, except that they represent the matter as if the text were . The explanations: (Theophylact, Euthymius Zigabenus), and: “ up to the wrist ” (Lightfoot, Bengel), correspond neither with the case nor with the signification of the word. Finally, had some peculiar ritual form of washing been meant (“in which they take the one fist full of water, and so pour it over the other hand held up, that it runs off towards the arm ” (Paulus); comp. Drusius, Cameron, Schoettgen, Wetstein, Rosenmller), Mark would with the mere have expressed himself as unintelligibly as possible, and a ritual reference so precise would certainly have needed an explanatory remark for his Gentile readers.

Mar 7:4 . ] The addition in D, , is a correct interpretation: from market (when they come from the market) they eat not . A pregnant form of expression, which is frequent also in classical writers. See Kypke and Loesner; Winer, Gr. p. 547 [E. T. 776]; Fritzsche in loc. In this case . is not to be understood of washing the hands (Lightfoot, Wetstein), but of immersion , which the word in classic Greek and in the N. T. everywhere denotes, i.e. in this case, according to the context: to take a bath . So also Luk 11:38 . Comp. Sir 31:25 ; Jdt 12:7 . Having come from market, where they may have contracted pollution through contact with the crowd, they eat not, without having first bathed . The statement proceeds by way of climax ; before eating they observe the washing of hands always , but the bathing, when they come from market and wish to eat. Accordingly it is obvious that the interpretation of Paulus, Kuinoel, Olshausen, Lange, Bleek: “they eat not what has been bought from the market, without having washed it ,” is erroneous both in linguistic usage (active immersion is always , not ) and in respect of the sense, to which the notion of special strictness would have required to be mentally supplied .

] is likewise to be understood of the cleansing of things ceremonially impure, which might be effected partly by immersion , partly ( ) by mere sprinkling ; so that . applies by way of zeugma to all the four cases.

By the cups and jugs are meant vessels of wood , for mention of the copper vessels ( ) follows, and earthen vessels, when they were ceremonially defiled, were broken into pieces (Lev 15:12 ). See Keil, Archol. I. 56; Saalschtz, Mos. Recht, I. p. 269.

] not couches in general (de Wette), for the whole context refers to eating ; but couches for meals , triclinia (Mar 4:21 ; Luk 8:16 ; Xen. Cyr. viii. 2. 6; Herod, ix. 16), which were rendered unclean by persons affected with haemorrhage, leprosy, and the like (Lightfoot, p. 620 f.).

Mar 7:5 . With . a new sentence begins. See above on Mar 7:1-2 .

Mar 7:6 . Mark has not the counter-question recorded in Mat 15:3 , and he gives the two portions of Christ’s answer in inverted order, so that with him the leading thought precedes, while with Matthew it follows. This order of itself, as well as the ironical prefixed to both portions, indicates the form in Mark as the more original. Comp. Weizscker, p. 76. The order in Matthew betrays the set purpose of placing the law before the prophets. The agreement of the quotation from Isa 29:13 with Mat 15:8 f. is wrongly adduced in opposition to this view (Hilgenfeld); it is to be traced back to the collection of Logia, since it belongs to the speech of Christ .

Mar 7:8 . and (2Th 2:15 ) are intentionally chosen as correlative.

] Such accumulations of homoeoteleuta were not avoided even by classical writers. See Lobeck, Paralip. p. 53 f. defines as respects the category of quality.

Mar 7:9 . ] Excellently, nobly , ironical. 2Co 11:4 ; Soph. Ant. 735; Arist. Av. 139; Ael. V. H. i. 16. Not so in Mar 7:6 .

] “vere accusantur, etsi hypocritae non putarent, hanc suam esse intentionem” (Bengel).

Mar 7:11 . ] = , namely, to the temple. [105] See on Mat 15:5 .

The construction is altogether the same as that in Matt. l.c. , so that after . there is an aposiopesis ( he is thus bound to this vow ), and Mar 7:12 continues the reproving discourse of Jesus, setting forth what the Pharisees do in pursuance of that maxim.

Mar 7:12 . ] no more , after the point of the occurrence of the ; previously they had nothing to oppose to it.

Mar 7:13 . .] quam tradidistis . The tradition, which they receive from their predecessors, they have again transmitted to their disciples.

. . .] a repetition of solemn rebuke (comp. Mar 7:8 ).

Mar 7:14 . (see the critical remarks) has no express reference in the connection. But it is to be conceived that after the emergence of the Pharisees, Mar 7:1 , Jesus sent away for a time the people that surrounded Him (Mar 6:56 ); now He calls them back to Him again . Comp. Mar 15:13 .

Mar 7:15 . There is no comma to be placed after .

] emphasizing the contrast to that which is . Observe, further, the circumstantiality of the entire mode of expression in Mar 7:15 , exhibiting the importance of the teaching given.

[103] Wilke holds the entire passage, vv. 2 4, as well as , ver. 13, to be a later interpolation.

[104] Some Codd. of the It. have pugillo , some primo , some momento , some crebro , some subinde . Aeth. agrees with Syr.; and Copt. Syr. p. with Vulgate.

[105] The following is Luther’s gloss: “is, in brief, as much as to say: Dear father, I would gladly give it to thee. But it is Korban; I employ it better by giving it to God than to thee, and it is of more service to thee also.”

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

2. Contest with the Pharisees and Scribes from Jerusalem concerning Traditions respecting Eating. Mar 7:1-23.

(Parallel: Mat 15:1-20.)

1Then came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem. 2And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled [common ], that is to say, with unwashen hands, they found fault.1 3For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the 4elders. And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, 5and pots, brasen vessels, and of tables. Then2 the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands? 6He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart 7is far from me. Howbeit, in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments 8of men. For, laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do.3 9And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. 10For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth [revileth] father or mother, let him die the death: 11But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou 12mightest be profited by me; he shall he free. And4 ye suffer him no more to do aught for his father or his mother; 13Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye. 14And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them [again5], Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand: 15There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him, can defile him: but the things which come out of him,6 those are they that defile the 16, man. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear.7 17And when he was entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable. 18And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him; 19Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging8 all meats? 20And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. 21For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications. murders, 22Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: 23All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Comp. the parallel place in Matthew. The occurrence before us took place in the summer of the year 782: in the midst of the year of persecutions. The combination of the Pharisees of Galilee and the Pharisees of Judea in their opposition to Jesus had already been concerted and entered upon. They had begun to institute against Him ecclesiastical proceedings in Galilee, and to watch His every step. The basis of the conspiracy consists of the preceding Galilean crisis, Mark 2, 3, and the confederacy against Jesus at the Feast of Purim in Jerusalem, 782 (John 5). The progress and the conclusion of the scheme appear in Mar 8:11. From the time of the Feast of Purim a common action and combination of the Sanhedrim in Jerusalem and the Galilean synagogue was inaugurated. The Sanhedrim were in constant connection and correspondence with the synagogues of the provinces, and even with those of foreign lands (see Act 9:2). Some, therefore, appointed by them, diligently visited the provinces; and watched especially those teachers whose doctrines declined from the principles of Pharisaism, at the head of which stood that of tradition (Ammon, Leben Jesu, ii. 264). There were two official transactions or interferences. And there were two retreats on the part of Jesus: the first time, as far as the borders of the Gentile territory; the second time, into the solitude of the mountain beyond the sea, and even to the borders of the other world (transfiguration);and all for the preparation of the new Church. (See my Leben Jesu, ii. 2, 858.)Between the narrative of the first feeding, the walking of Christ upon the sea, and our present narrative, there are many things to be interposed, which Mark has already communicated. Among these are the heretication of Jesus in the cornfield; the healing the man with a withered hand; the allegation of the Galilean Pharisees, that the works of Christ were done in the power of Beelzebub, etc. (See the Table of Contents, Leben Jesu, ii. 2, 14.)Peculiar to Mark is the expression, , in which we cannot fail to see reference to an official interference of the Sanhedrim with our Lord. Also the exact account of the religious washings of the Jews; the detailed characterization of the conflict between the Pharisaic traditions and the commandment of God, including the Corban; the striking and profound sentence concerning the purging all meats; and the perfect description of those evil things which proceed out of the heart. Also, in the following section, which may be glanced at here, the design of Christ to remain concealed in a house (belonging to a friend) on the borders of Phnicia, during the time of His sojourn there; and the Lords return to the Sea of Galilee through the Sidonian territory and that of Decapolis. It is observable that Peter must have communicated the account of these remarkable travels, having faithfully preserved the individual details. On the other hand, this Evangelist omits the intercession of the disciples on behalf of the woman of Canaan, and the declaration of Christ that He was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

Mar 7:2. And when they saw.Probably on the appearance of the disciples in Jerusalem at the Passover, which He did not attend in the year 782. The spiritual impulse of freedom which actuated the disciples might at that time have led them into the commission of certain acts of thoughtlessness.With common, that is to say, with unwashen hands.So Mark explains for Roman readers. We must particularly define the idea of unwashen hands by that of unwashen in the sense of a religious ceremony prescribed by tradition; and the idea of common by that of ecclesiastically profane, unclean, and defiling. Those who persisted in this uncleanness, which had for its result excommunication, must at last draw down upon themselves the decisive ban.

Mar 7:3. With the fist; oft. [Margin of Eng. Ver. diligently.] .Among the many explanatory translations which have missed the meaning of the difficult expression are these: Vulgate, crebro; Gothic, ufta (oft); Syriac, diligenter. See in De Wette and Meyer the various exegetical methods adopted. Probably it was part of the rite, that the washing hand was shut; because it might have been thought that the open hand engaged in washing might make the other unclean, or be made unclean by it, after having itself been washed (Leben Jesu, 2:2, 858). The expression might mean a vigorous and thorough washing.

Mar 7:4. And from the market.Codex D. has the addition, , when they come; which Meyer, De Wette, and others regard as a sound interpretation. According to this view the progression would be this: 1. Before every meal the washing of hands; 2. but, after the return from market, where there was so much danger of coming into contact with unclean men, the bath was used as a washing of the whole body; hence . But that which followsthe requires still another degree in the progression, and proves that must be understood in a wider sense. Therefore we interpret it, with Paulus, Kuinoel, and Olshausen, of that which came from the market. De Wette, on the contrary, observes that this was everywhere customary. But it was not customary as a religious ceremony of washing, or as a kind of baptism, like that of the pots and cups, or the Romish baptism of bells. And, moreover, the same held good of the washing of hands; for the washing of hands before eating was generally customary amongst the Persians, Greeks, and Romans. Thus, in our view, there was a triple washing at meals: 1. That of the persons; 2. that of the victuals; 3. that of the vessels.Cups and pots.Made of wood, in contrast with those of brass, which follow; or, it may be, considered as earthen. [Pots, , perhaps from , to polish; or else from the Latin sextus or sextarius, denoting the sixth part of a larger measure.Ed.] Meyer says, indeed, Earthen vessels, when they were Levitically unclean, were broken to pieces, according to Lev 15:12. But the case supposed there was that of positive desecrations; and it is not to be supposed that the Jews, after or before every meal, broke all the earthen vessels which they used. [Tables (in the margin beds), i.e., couches, anything on which men recline, whether for sleep, or, according to the later use of the ancients, to partake of food,which accounts for the word used in the text of our Bible. That these couches were immersed in every instance of ceremonial washing, can be thought probable, or even possible, only by those who are under the necessity of holding that this Greek word not only means to dip or plunge, originally, but, unlike every other word transferred to a religious use, is always used in that exclusive and invariable sense, without modification or exception; to those who have no purpose to attain by such a paradox, the place before us will afford, if not conclusive evidence, at least a strong presumption, that beds (to say no more) might be baptized without immersion. Alexander, in loco.Ed.]

Mar 7:9. Full well, .Ironically, as among ourselves.Your own tradition, .

Very strong and deep. At the bottom of all rigorous enforcement of traditional observances there is an unconscious or half-conscious repugnance to submit perfectly to the law of God. Bengel: Vere accusantur, hanc suam esse intentionem. Not only unconsciously, but with the fullest purpose, the Rabbis exalted their precepts above the law of Moses. In the Talmud we read: The words of the scribes are more noble than the words of the law; for the words of the law are both hard and easy, but the words of the scribes are all easy (to be understood).He who deals with Scripture, it is said in the Bava Mezia, does a thing indifferent; he who reads the Mishna has a reward; but he who devotes himself to the Gemara is most meritorious of all. Sepp, Leben Jesu, ii. p. 345.

Mar 7:11. Corban.Comp. on Mat 14:5; as also, for the ellipsis in Mar 7:11, Luthers marginal note: Corban means an offering, and it was as much as to say, Dear father, I would willingly give it to thee, but it is Corban: I count it better to give it to God than to thee, and it will help thee better.

Mar 7:14. He said again.The significant the reading we adoptthrows light upon the whole preceding occurrence; and, together with the at the beginning, gives it the appearance of a judicial process of the synagogue.

Mar 7:17. His disciples asked Him.Comp. Matthew, where Peter is marked out as the questioner; and observe here, as elsewhere, his modest suppression of himself in the Gospel which sprang from himself. And here, again, there is emphatic prominence given to the disciples want of developed spiritual vigor and insight of faith, and their slow advancement in knowledge.

Mar 7:19. Purging all meats.Meyer: might be connected with the as an appositional expression. The apposition, however, would not be connected with the , but with its subject, that is, meat; and that could not be tolerated. is rather the substantival definition of , as being a general means of purification for all the external impurities of meats: the better supported reading , on the other hand, expressed the same thought adjectivally.The makes all meats clean, not because it simply takes away all impurities, but because the uncleanness or impurity of the object consists in its being out of its place, and therefore defiling something else. It is therefore a place of filth for all the house; a place of cleansing, on the contrary, for the great household of nature. Not without irony does Christ make prominent this ideal significance of the external means of cleansing for meats, addressing as He did the men of traditions, who strove to ensure a prophylactic external purity to their food.

Mar 7:21. Evil thoughts.In relation to the distribution here, we must notice the change between the plural and the singular forms; or, 1. predominant actions, and 2. dispositions. The acts in the plural are arranged under three categories: a. lust; b. hatred; c. covetousness. They then combine into wickednesses (), by which the forms of evil dispositions are then introduced: deceit and lasciviousness indicate, in two contrasts, the concealed and the open wickedness of self-gratification; whilst the evil eye and blasphemy indicate concealed and open enmity (blasphemy against God and man). Pride or self-exaltation, and foolishness (), are the internal and the external side of the one ungodly and wicked nature. The evil eye is notorious in the East; here it is the description of an envious look.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. See the parallel passage in Matthew.

2. The Jews have fallen through their Sabbath or Rest-day traditions into eternal unrest, through their law of purification into moral defilement, through their many baptisms into an abiding lack of baptism, through their service of the letter into Talmudist fables, through their separation into dispersion all over the world, through their millenarian Messiahship into enmity to Christ, through their trifling with the blessing into the power of the curse. The irony of the Spirit, that He punishes extremes by extremes.

3. The prophecy of Isaiah (Isa 29:13) pronounces a condemnation, always in force, upon all dead and fanatical zeal, and upon all mere ceremonial worship and work.

4. Zeal for traditional observances in its abiding conflict with the eternal commandments of God and laws of humanity. The conflict between false ecclesiasticism and morality. The contradiction of fanaticism has for its foundation an evil bias towards externalizing the inner life. The worm of superstition is unbelief; the worm of fanaticism is religious death or atheism; the worm of hypocritical outside religion is impiety. For the conflict between human fanatical ecclesiasticism and the divine fundamental commandments of morality, see the history of By-zantism and Romanism.

5. Tradition and human ordinances identical. Tradition needs continual reform through the law of God; and human ordinances, through the living development of this law.
6. Contrast between external and internal fellowship; i.e., between being excommunicated, and being out of the Church.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

See on Matthew.Christ in judgment upon human tradition.Christ the Deliverer of His disciples: 1. The Originator, 2. the Defender, 3. the Guardian, 4. the Director and Consummator, of their freedom.Christ and Christianity a hundred times exposed to spiritual censure: 1. The censure of school-learning (theology); 2. of the tradition of the elders (clerical office); 3. of the synagogue (popular assembly).Christ and tradition: 1. He is the foundation or kernel of all true internal tradition; 2. therefore He unites in one and renews all external tradition; 3. and He is the Judge of all externalized and impious tradition.The conflict between the law and human ordinances, or between ecclesiasticism and morality. It Isaiah , 1. an unnatural conflict, for true ecclesiasticism and true morality can never come into collision. 2. It is a light conflict, when false morality contends with true ecclesiasticism. 3. It is a critical conflict, when false ecclesiasticism fights against true morality. 4. There is a frightful doom upon both, when false ecclesiasticism and false morality struggle with each other.The old conflict between fanaticism and humanity Ecclesiastical systems which bury piety (household relations, filial obligations, etc.) condemn themselves.The indivisible unity of faith and love, of piety and duty.The fearful perversion of the conflict between divine revelation and human sin into a contradiction between the divine and the human nature.The triumph of human ordinance is always upon the ruins of the law of faith.To enjoy with thankfulness, is the sanctification of enjoyment, 1Ti 4:4.In the place of the washing of hands before meat, has come in the folding of hands. Therefore we must mind the reality of the symbol, even in this latter case.Isaiah, Christ, and the Reformation, agreeing in their judgment upon what is true and what is false worship of God.The right process of a true reformation: 1. It distinguishes between spirit and flesh, between the internal and the external. 2. It fights against the false intermixtures of the two, in which the spirit is made subservient to the flesh, and the internal to the external. 3. It seeks to connect the two aright, so that the spirit may make the flesh its own and glorify it. 4. It therefore contends also against a false and unnatural separation between the two.The purity and the purifying power of the great divine economy of nature.Christianity has consecrated even natural infirmity; or, a beam of the glorification which shines upon the dark natural ways of men.The decisive objection against human ordinances, that they vainly attempt to effect symbolically a purity which actual life better provides for: 1. Holy water, Gods Streams; 2. arbitrary penances, divine burdens; 3. ecclesiastical purgatory fires, Gods salting fires.The evil things which proceed from the heart and defile the man. See Critical Notes on Mar 7:21.

Starke:Majus:As Christ and His disciples were not without their slanderers, so the devout are never without their accusers and rebukers, 1Pe 2:12.Nova Bibl. Tub.:From Jerusalem hypocrisy went forth into all the land.Hedinger:What is the dross to the pure gold? what the inventions of men to the truth of God? what superstition to faith?Quesnel:As man may dishonor God by overmuch caring for beauty and external purity, Isa 3:16, so God is honored by the neglect of these things, when that neglect springs from humiliation of self and true mortification, Jon 3:6-10.We must wash the heart after having been defiled by the world; that is, we must test ourselves and cleanse ourselves of sin, Job 1:5.Majus:With hypocrites, regard to man and human ordinances has more weight than the commandments of God.The hypocrisy of hypocrites must be revealed.Cramer:The enemies of the truth must be confounded by the word of God.Canstein:The true worship of God is the union of the heart with Him.Men commonly do willingly and cheerfully all things that do not set them about changing their own hearts.Self-love, or the selfish mind, is so mad, that it prefers expending its care upon pots and cups rather than upon itself.Many external ceremonies and human ordinances are not good in the Church of God; for, those who are bent upon rigidly observing them easily come to forget, or postpone to them, the true commandments of God.Quesnel:The openly impious do not dishonor the truth of the divine law so much by their evil life, as those do who give themselves out to be lovers of the law of God, and yet falsely interpret it.After God, our parents are most important; and them their children should honor as the channel of the first gifts of Godnature, life, nourishment, and education.Bibl. Wirt.:Christian children should learn well the fourth and fifth commandments.Quesnel:Man may disguise his godlessness under the fairest show of piety, but God sees it nevertheless; and, as He condemns it now, He will hereafter make it manifest to all the world.Majus:Vows against the honor of God are sinful, and must not be paid.Bibl. Wirt.:He who departs from Gods word in one point, and in that point prefers the ordinances of men, may become so thoroughly entangled as not again to escape, Tit 1:15.In the New Testament, the making distinctions of meats is classed among the works of the devil, 1Ti 4:1-3.Canstein:All depends upon the state of the heart: as that is, we are.As the heart is the source of all evil, we should carefully watch its issues, Jer 17:9.

Schleiermacher:This was the sense in which the Lord Himself said that His yoke was easy and His burden light; for He contrasted Himself, and the fellowship which He would found upon His own name, with the yoke and the manifold external burdens which the elders were never weary of imposing upon the Jews.Those who rest wholly on external things have always the same vain labor as the Pharisees; and this has its ground in a lack of confidence. It springs from the fact that man can never have so much firm assurance concerning that which is not the truth as he can concerning that which is the truth; and this unrest manifests itself in looking anxiously at the letter, and in seeking after external uniformity. The greater the number, the greater their hope of internal confidence: of that which is strictly internal they have nothing.This also He would say, that whosoever contributes to confirm such notions in the minds of men, and make their notions of Gods service purely external, leads them thereby away from the true worship of God in spirit and in truth, and seeks to give their ideas of God such a direction and such a form, that they no longer represent to themselves that God who will be worshipped in spirit and in truth, but an imaginary Being, such as the Gentiles frame in their imaginations.The same feeling which leads to the honor of father and mother leads to the honor of our Father in heaven.Gossner:Manifestly, wicked human ordinances do not injure the divine doctrine so much as specious and seemingly holy superstitious inventions and false interpretations, which are received with confidence by the weak devout, and held fast with stubborn pertinacity.

Footnotes:

[1]Mar 7:2.The addition (after ) has slight support; and the (after ) of Cod. D. is equally weak. The former arose from undervaluing the emphatic , which itself suggests an act of the synagogue. Hence we cannot, with Tischendorf, take Mar 7:3-4 as a parenthesis, and Mar 7:5 as the conclusion.

[2]Mar 7:5.The is a continuation of the former misunderstanding: Codd. B., D., L., Lachmann, Tischendorf, Meyer, &c., read .The , instead of , is sanctioned by B., D., Versions.

[3]Mar 7:8. to is wanting in B., L., ., &c. It is bracketed by Lachmann, struck out by Tischendorf. Meyer defends it.

[4]Mar 7:12.The is omitted by Lachmann and Meyer, after B., D. It disturbs the connection of thought.

[5]Mar 7:14.The reading , recommended by Griesbach and adopted by Lachmann, Tischendorf, and Meyor, following B., D., L., ., is important. It shows, that is, that the previous incident must be regarded as an examination by the synagogue, in which Christ was separated from the people.

[6]Mar 7:15.

[7]Mar 7:16.This verse is wanting in B., L. Omitted by Tischendorf, it is retained by Lachmann and Meyer. An interpolation here is not probable. The connection requires this point.

[8]Mar 7:19.A., B., E., F., G., ., Chrysostom, Lachmann, Meyer, read , not ; D. reads .

Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange

CONTENTS.

The Pharisees assemble to contend with CHRIST. JESUS reproves them. He heals a poor child, and cures one that was deaf and dumb.

THEN came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem. (2) And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say, with unwashen, hands, they found fault. (3) For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders. (4) And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brazen vessels, and of tables. (5) Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands? (6) He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. (7) Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. (8) For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. (9) And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. (10) For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother: and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: (11) But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free. (12) And ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father or his mother; (13) Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.

It will be highly profitable to the Reader, to observe the awful character of those Scribes and Pharisees, and to attend to what the LORD hath said of them. In the midst of their hatred and malice to Jesus, who appears equal to them for professions of holiness? Washing of hands and cups, and pots, were harmless things in themselves, if they had been led therefrom to see the necessity of washing the heart. But, in the midst of this outside godliness, JESUS, who knew their inside corruption, represents it as most awful. The LORD hath indeed traced it to its source, and shewn, that they were of that seed which could not but sin. Joh 8:44 ; Mat 23:15 . It would have been well for the peace, yet not for the exercise of the LORD’s people, if the Pharisee and Scribe generation had ceased with them. But though the Church hath been disturbed in all ages with such, yet it is to the profit of the LORD’s household. For when at any time the LORD JESUS, and his great salvation, are by this Pharisaical generation, slightly regarded, (as in the present day) it tends the more, under grace, to endear CHRIST to the heart.

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Mar 7:13

In his declaration to the Irish people, in 1650, Cromwell assails the Roman clergy thus: ‘How dare you assume to call these men your “flocks,” whom you have plunged into so horrid a Rebellion, by which you have made them and the country almost a ruinous heap? You cannot feed them! You poison them with your false, abominable, and anti-christian doctrines and practices. You keep the Word of God from them; and instead thereof give them your senseless Orders and Traditions.’

References. VII. 13. Bishop Percival, Sermons at Rugby, p. 32.

The Sphere Not Prohibited

Mar 7:14-15

It is not often that Jesus ‘calls the people unto Him’ for the purpose of giving an address. He commonly finds the people already gathered, and the address is a matter of accident. But here is a solemn exception. I say solemn. If Christ called the people to give them a message, He must have thought it a very important message.

I. ‘Nothing from without can defile a man.’ It is the sweepingness that startles us. ‘Nothing from without’ What! nothing? Not the theatre, not the opera, not the concert-room, not the public dancing-hall? No not in so far as these are things outside. These buildings are all right until they are painted and it is the soul that paints them. All the tarnish they ever get is from the brush of the soul.

II. You go to walk on a Sunday because other people are at church; you will show them how you are emancipated from superstition. The walk makes you feel atheistic, reckless, disdainful of sacred things. Have you got harm, then, from the outside landscape? No, it is the landscape that has got harm from you. Why did you go out with the belief that your Sunday walk was prohibited! It was that belief which poisoned the whole air.

III. If you had only made your walk a worship, if you had gone, not to repel man but to meet God, the outside world would have smiled upon you. The roses would have been radiant; the grass would have been green; the thrush would have been thrilling; the woods would have waved their welcome. The soul that feels God’s presence in the garden will be hurt by no plant of Eden.

G. Matheson, Messages of Hope, p. 269.

Reference. VII. 17. S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year (2nd Series), vol. ii. p. 66.

Mar 7:20

We can run up nearly all faults of conduct into two classes faults of temper and faults of sensuality; to be referred, nearly all of them, to one or other of these two instincts. Now Jesus not only says that things coming from within a man’s heart defile him, He adds expressly what these things that, coming from within a man, defile him are. And what He enumerates are the following: evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, stealings, greeds, viciousnesses, fraud, dissoluteness, envy, evil-speaking, pride, folly. These fall into two groups; one, of faults of self-assertion, graspingness, and violence, all of which we may call faults of temper; and the other, of faults of sensuality…. This was the method of Jesus; the setting up of a great unceasing inward movement of attention and verification in matters which are three-fourths of human life, where to see true and to verify is not difficult, the difficult thing is to care and to attend. And the inducement to attend was because joy and peace, missed on every other line, were to be reached on this.

M. Arnold, Literature and Dogma.

The Genesis of Evil

Mar 7:20-23

Our Lord here declares the human heart to be originative; that the vices which darken the world take their rise within us; in the mystery of the soul He teaches us to seek for the mystery of iniquity.

I. Let us Observe Several Theories of the Origin of Evil which are Condemned by the Text.

1. The theory which finds the origin of evil in the physical world is thus condemned. Several sins mentioned in the text have nothing whatever to do with the body, and when fleshly sins are specified they are imputed to interior causes. Sin, then, can never be treated adequately whilst it is treated only medicinally.

2. The text condemns the theory which finds the origin of evil in the intellectual nature of man. Intellectual culture does not touch the inertia, the blindness, the ingratitude, the selfishness, the cruelty, the wilfulness, which bring our acutest sense of guilt, our bitterest experiences of woe. And careful observers are beginning to see that the redemption of the intelligence is not the redemption of the heart; that the race will not be saved by intellect; and that it is easy to expect too much from the spread of knowledge.

3. The text condemns the theory which finds the origin of evil in the power of circumstances.

Christ taught that human character is a question of soul and not of situation. He taught us to look into the infinite depths of the heart for the reasons of good and evil doing. And sin will not be cured by circumstances.

II. Christ’s Treatment of Evil. In the soul Christ declared that it took its origin, and in the soul Christ sought to deal with it supplying a spiritual antidote for a spiritual plague. He sets before us the highest thoughts and ideals; He creates within us strong faith in these thoughts and ideals; He strengthens us in the inner man that we may scale the heights thus unveiled. The Cross is the symbol of pure thought; it is the truth, love, righteousness of God, appealing to the reason, heart, and conscience of the race. The New Testament is filled with this idea the renewal of all things through the renewal of the soul.

1. We must remember the inwardness and spirituality of Christ’s treatment of sin in the culture of our personal life.

We see here the necessity for that regeneration upon which Christ insists. The heart is the fountain of evil; it must be changed and become the fountain of good. ‘Marvel not that I said unto you, ye must be born again.’

The perfecting of character throughout must be from within must be worked out in sanctified thought, feeling, and will. Says Jacob Boehme in a deep passage, ‘All now depends on what I set my imagination upon’. Setting his imagination upon the kingdom of God, upon the highest objects, patterns, and callings of the spiritual universe, the believer conquers successively all selfishness and sensuality, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Let us set our thought on Christ, who is the Sum of all beauty, and that beauty shall dawn in us.

2. We must remember the spirituality of Christ’s treatment of sin as we attempt the renovation of the world. It is the habit of some reformers to think very slightingly of what they are pleased to consider the sentimentalism of Christianity. But was not Christ right in trusting everything to the power of sanctified thought and feeling? The history of the world is the history of thought. The catastrophe of the race arose in thought in a thought from beneath. ‘And when the woman saw.’ Out of that look, imagination, desire, arose the vast tragedy. The great redeeming system began in a thought in a thought from above. ‘It came into His heart to visit His brethren.’ Out of that generous thought arose the whole magnificent history of Israel.

W. L. Watkinson, The Transfigured Sackcloth, p. 25.

Reference. VII. 20-23. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxii. No. 1911.

Mar 7:22

A slave unto mammon makes no servant unto God. Covetousness cracks the sinews of faith; numbs the apprehension of anything above sense; and, only affected with the certainty of things present, makes a peradventure of things to come; lives but unto one world, nor hopes but fears another; makes their own death sweet unto others, bitter unto themselves; brings formal sadness, scenical mourning, and no wet eyes at the grave.

Sir Thomas Browne, Christian Morals.

In Peking captured concessions were bragged about as the Indians used to pride themselves on the number of scalps they had made. Nowhere as in China have I been so conscious of the infiniteness of space, yet nowhere as in Peking did it seem as if the wide world were not sufficient for the demands of men. The battle of existence was carried on there with that envious jealousy which would rather see a country waste and barren than leave it to the hands of others. However rich and big the world is, the weak will always be empty-handed, for the covetousness of the strong is larger than the largest space.

The Letters Which Never Reached Him, pp. 9, 10.

The Mystery of Christ’s Fame

Mar 7:24

I. There is a great peculiarity about the fame of Jesus: it came to Him through shut doors. For one thing, His own will shut the door against it. He wanted to be hid to do good by stealth and escape the praise of it; He was afraid lest Divine Majesty should crush human love. When He performed a benevolent action He charged His followers that they should not make it known; when He was accidentally revealed in glory He said, ‘Tell the vision to no man until the Son of Man be risen’ removed from human sight.

II. The men who win fame in this world are usually the men who strive for it. But the peculiarity of Jesus is that worldly fame beset Him when He was striving to avoid it. That is the paradox which Paul points out in the Epistle to the Philippians. He says that God gave Him a name that is above every name at the very time when He was performing an act of self-burial when He was emptying Himself, assuming the form of a servant, wearing the fashion of human poverty, taking a lowly place, carrying the burden of the Cross, closing His career by a premature death.

III. And then, every natural circumstance in the life of Jesus was unfavourable to His fame His birth was humble, His surroundings poor, His home isolated, His youth toiling, His brothers adverse, His era prosaic, His country a Roman province, His auditors unlettered, His enemies influential, His ideal unshared. Is anything conceivable more opposed to fame! And yet, in spite of all, ‘He could not be hid’. He has broken through the thickest cloud in the universe the cloud of social obscurity. Truly was it written ‘at midnight there was a cry heard, “Behold, the bridegroom cometh!”‘ His sunshine was unheralded by dawn; it flashed from a rayless sky. It was by night that Bethlehem’s plains were flooded with His glory. His light shone from darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not never has comprehended it. It has been the mystery of mysteries how a bad world has glorified a great soul. If there had been physical ornaments round that soul, we could have understood it; but it passes human knowledge to explain how in a field consecrated to materialism a life of spiritual beauty ‘could not be hid’.

G. Matheson, Messages of Hope, p. 277.

The Ever-evident Christ

Mar 7:24

I. Christ’s Personality Prevents His being Hid.

How could or can such a personality be hid? He was evidently man, but He was all but as evidently God. He was more than ‘Rabbi’ to those who were in the secret of His presence. He was ‘the Christ’ and ‘Lord’ and ‘God’.

This is an eternal circumstance. Jesus Christ never has been and never can be absolutely hid. Jesus may have been, but Jesus Christ never. The Saviour was the Saviour or ever He was historified. Before His Incarnation He could not be hid. He was not hid from prophets and kings and priests and psalmists and lowly souls in the dispensation of imperfect times.

As in Old Testament times and as in New Testament times, so now, in these times, Jesus Christ cannot be hid. Here is the Christ’s future history as well as His past history ‘He could not be hid ‘. My text is prophecy, and not history alone. In heaven Christ cannot be hid. He never was hidden there.

II. Some Things in Christ are Hid. Being man we can perceive much of His personality, but being God-man we realize that there is in Him much we cannot discern. Christ becomes less and less ‘hid ‘to His followers as they follow on to know Him. He discovers Himself to them. They see Him in His own light.

III. Sometimes Christ Seeks to be Hid. There is a sense in which Christ can and will be hid. He wills to be hid from those who have grieved Him, but He longingly awaits their penitence that He may disclose Himself to them again. He at times seeks to be hid that He may save and help. He did thus to His disciples when He was here. Often He hides Himself in events. He hides Himself in persons. Christ hides Himself in influences.

IV. There are Those who Cause Christ to be Hid. They who do not preach Him are such. The pulpit may extinguish the Saviour it was built to uplift. When Christ is not lived He is hid. They who obey Him reveal Him.

V. There are Hallowed Spheres in which Christ cannot be Hid. In a truly Christian Church He cannot be hid. In a truly Christian life Christ cannot be hid. There are few scenes in which it is more impossible to hide Christ than a Christian home. In a Christian sick chamber Christ cannot be hid. In the death of a saint Christ cannot be hid.

Dinsdale T. Young, The Crimson Book, p. 190.

References. VII. 24-30. W. M. Taylor, The Miracles of Our Saviour, p. 295. Archbishop Trench, Notes on the Miracles of Our Lord, p. 280. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture St. Mark I.-VIII. p. 268. John Laidlaw, The Miracles of Our Lord, p. 247. VII. 24-37; VIII. 22; IX. 29. W. H. Bennett, The Life of Christ According to St. Mark, p. 99. VII. 26-28. C. Holland, Gleanings from a Ministry of Fifty Years, p. 258. VII. 27, 28. Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxii. No. 1309. VII. 28, 29. ‘Plain Sermons by contributors to the Tracts for the Times, vol. vii. p. 28. VII. 31. John Laidlaw, The Miracles of Our Lord, p. 258 VII. 31-37. W. M. Taylor, The Miracles of Our Saviour, p. 187. Archbishop Trench, Notes on the Miracles of Our Lord, p. 288. VII. 32. R. W. Hiley, A Year’s Sermons, vol. ii. p. 100. W. C. E. Newbolt, Church Times, vol. lviii. 1907, p. 229. A. G. Mortimer, One Hundred Miniature Sermons, vol. ii. p. 76. VII. 33, 34. A. Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture St. Mark I.-VIII. p. 273.

Does God Suffer?

Mar 7:34

I. Jesus sighed when He said ‘Ephphatha’ He sighed at the new possibilities of temptation, suffering, and sin that He was conferring by opening channels to a mind that had hitherto been closed, and empowering a tongue hitherto silent, but in spite of the sigh He spoke the Ephphatha. Whatever the risk, the gift must be given that the end may be attained.

I think that we have in this consideration the assurance of the unconditional responsibility of Almighty God for the final consummation of His purpose upon each one of us. He knew how much the gift of life would cost us. He did not give it frivolously and carelessly. He gave it because of the magnificent result that He purposes from it And this knowledge, in our higher moods, should encourage us in unquestioning submission to His blessed will, even when it seems most sharply to cross our human will.

II. Jesus is unceasingly saying ‘Ephphatha’ to every human soul. He is saying, ‘Be opened’ to those dormant faculties of our spiritual nature which we have overlaid with the flesh. The circumstances of the daily life of each one of us provide the medium through which the call comes. But we are not automata, we are not machines; and constantly the sigh of the Divine Humanity is intensified by our miserable human perversity, which enables us to go on hardening ourselves year after year against the influence of the God within us.

Human goodness, or character, is like the beauty that you admire in a flower; it is from within and not from without. You cannot make a flower beautiful by paint and enamel; you cannot make a life beautiful by external moralities and austerities, and the like the beauty that is on the flower was in the flower first. The sun shining in its power speaks the ‘Ephphatha, Be opened,’ to the bud, and it obeys. And when that bud opens, when that Divine potentiality begins to spring within you, when those aspirations are felt struggling, when the heart, half-shrinkingly, turns Godward, when it recognizes fitfully the truth of Divine Sonship, when it begins to say, ‘My Jesus, I love Thee, I know Thou art mine,’ must not its capacities be stimulated and its life be fed? If you could see through a very powerful microscope the surface of a leaf, you would find that it was covered with tiny mouths, with lips like human lips seizing the invisible carbonic acid gas from sunbeam and air, and incorporating it into itself. It is as though the sunbeam had said to the flower, ‘He that eateth me, the same shall live by me’. Similarly, the will, forcing the spirit upwards, drinks in and absorbs the life of God.

III. Finally, every opened flower speaks its Ephphatha to all that is around it; it appeals to the sense of beauty and to the sense of smell. And so every opened heart must be lifted above timidity, fear of criticism, moral cowardice, and must strive to help others. The first law of a converted soul is effort for the brethren.

Basil Wilberforce. Sermons Preached in Westminster Abbey, p. 30.

The Conditions of Successful Work

Mar 7:34

Having regard to the text and to our Lord’s actions we discern three things.

The first is, fellowship with God. ‘Looking up to heaven.’

Second, sympathy with man. ‘He sighed.’ Third, these are the conditions of successful work.

He spake the word of power. ‘Be opened.’

I. Fellowship with God. ‘ He looked up to heaven.’ It is a way our Lord had. When He felt that any work required to be done, or when He had to make a fresh departure in His work, He always looked up to heaven. He felt He was doing the Father’s work, and as He did the work He looked to the Father for help and guidance.

Heaven was always open to Jesus. It was His home, and its presence was always felt To other men the atmosphere of heaven seems strange. ‘If a flower fell now and then from heaven,’ says Mrs. Browning, ‘we soon would catch the trick of looking up.’ There is intercourse between earth and heaven, or there may be. Moment by moment the thoughts and prayers of man may ascend to God, and swiftly the answers of God may return to man. The example of habitual fellowship is one to follow. The example of looking up to heaven when any work has to be done, or when we are thinking of any new undertaking, is also one to follow.

II. Sympathy with Man. ‘He sighed.’ It is the outcome of the deepest sympathy with the wretched, miserable condition of man. This pity finds expression in that natural sign of an oppressed spirit the sigh. It is also the expression of compassion, and of the hope that in some way they may be able to remove the causes of misery. But this feeling of compassion does not rest in mere feeling. With our Lord it is always the prelude to action for the removal of the causes of sorrow. Observe, however, that the conditions of successful work always go together. Fellowship with God and sympathy with man are the two conditions of successful work.

III. The man who has fellowship with God and sympathy with man can speak the word of power, and say to the darkened eye, ‘Be opened,’ and to the stammering tongue ‘speak’. This is no mere expectation, no mere enthusiastic expression of hope. It is a fact which is as well attested as any fact within human experience. It is a fact guaranteed to us many times and often in the history of Christ’s Church.

J. Iverach, The Other Side of Greatness, p. 203.

Mar 7:34

See Keble’s lines on ‘The Twelfth Sunday after Trinity’.

The Saviour’s Sigh

Mar 7:34

It would seem that while our Lord was doing acts of mercy publicly, intending them to impress the minds of the people as the prophetic marks of the Messiah (Isa 35:5-7 ), this miracle He reserved to be a private act of charity. He took the poor afflicted man aside from the multitude, and so effected his cure in private. The friends of the afflicted man entreated our Lord to ‘put His hands upon him’. This our Lord did not do; perhaps there was superstition in their request. They may have attributed a magical charm to this particular action, instead of ascribing the cure of disease to the Divine power acting through the visible sign. But though our Lord would not perform this cure precisely in the manner dictated, yet nevertheless, on this as on other occasions He had recourse to an outward and visible sign. As in the Sacraments of His Church, which He instituted, our Blessed Lord seems to have kept in view a congruity between the outward and visible thing signifying, and the inward and spiritual gift signified, so, in this miracle, we may discern a propriety in putting His fingers into the man’s ears, when He intended to pierce them; and in loosening the tongue, which had so long cleaved to the dumb man’s mouth, by moisture taken from His own. The ceremonies were alike suggestive to the man himself, and must have awakened in him that degree of faith in Christ of which he was capable.

And now we come to what is very striking in this miracle: ‘Looking up to heaven, He sighed’.

I. It may be that He sighed because there was some struggle or exhaustion in His human nature, and whenever He exerted His omnipotence He felt the virtue to go out of Him. But, passing by this consideration, may we not suppose that the sigh was occasioned by His foreknowledge of the abuse of that good gift He was about to bestow an abuse which could scarcely fail to happen when the blessing was conferred upon a fallen man?

It is a cause of sadness at all times that no good can be done without its being mingled and clogged with evil. When, for instance, a child is baptized, there is joy and gladness in the Church. But, alas! that very child may, in after years, sin away baptismal grace, may crucify afresh the Lord of Life, and become twofold more the child of hell than before. Beyond all other thoughts, consider when God the Son became Incarnate, while the angels were praising God; was there not, think you, something of sadness in the praises of Simeon? Surely he must have sighed whilst, looking up to heaven in thanksgiving, he said: ‘Behold this Child (our Incarnate God) is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel’. It was given him to foreknow that what would be ‘a savour of life unto life’ to some, would be to others ‘a savour of death unto death’.

II. Our Saviour sighed, then, to think how the gift He was conferring might be abused. He sighed at contemplating the various temptations to wrong with which the blessing could not fail to be attended. But He looked to heaven, to have the comfort of seeing there the joys awaiting all the blessed, who, having been redeemed by His Blood, shall have passed faithfully the time of their probation here, and so, through much tribulation, have entered into glory.

What was present to the omniscient Saviour is still future to us; and, when that future comes, God grant that we may be among the redeemed, and bear our parts in the celestial song. Let us pray to our gracious Lord that He will open our ears to hear His commandments; that He will write His laws upon our hearts; and that out of the fullness of the heart our lips may speak words of devotion to Him, and of brotherly kindness to our neighbour.

References. VII. 34. H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, Sunday Sermonettes for a Year, p. 109. C. S. Robinson, Sermons on Neglected Texts, p. 281. W. Boyd Carpenter, The Burning Bush, p. 111.

Christ the Good Maker and Doer ( Epiphany )

Mar 7:37

I. St. Mark probably saw in the saying of the multitude an unintended likeness to the language which the book of Genesis uses about the finishing of the work of Creation. ‘God saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very good.’ The words as given by St Mark are nearly the same, though not obviously so in English: He hath made all things in a good manner: but the later saying goes further than the earlier.

For who is the ‘He’ in each case? In the book of Genesis we are told that God saw everything that He had made God therefore was the maker. In St. Mark when the multitude said, ‘He hath done all things well,’ they were speaking of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of Mary. Jesus therefore was the maker and the doer. We have all been taught not only that Jesus of Nazareth was Himself God, but that the Creation was especially His work. We, who already believe that He who restored speech and hearing to that poor man was the Son of God Himself, may gather from it much that we ought never to forget both about creation and about the work of Christ on earth, that is, the very substance of the Gospel itself.

II. Creation, in the way we usually think of it, cannot appear otherwise than a very cold and distant thing. But the Gospel brings near to us Him who once was afar off, and with Him all His works. When He in whom the world was made became man, every man might henceforth feel that the world belonged to himself in a way that was impossible before. All Christ’s acts as man were so many signs that the powers which so plainly and wonderfully obeyed Him had in truth been obeying Him from the time they came into being.

III. ‘God saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very good;’ ‘Christ hath done all things well ‘ is the Gospel comment upon His miracles. In the time between these two sayings the fall of man had come to pass. In some way or other men fancied that the fall had touched God and His dealings with us men. But no. The Son of God doth all things well now no less than before man had fallen. He knows of man’s fall and all the miseries that it has brought on body and spirit far better than man can do. Therefore He came from heaven to become a suffering man Himself. The virtue which went forth from His hands to cure those diseases of ear and tongue was but a faint token of the virtue which should hereafter go forth from His Cross to heal the more grievous hurts which sin had brought upon men’s spirits. F. J. A. Hort, Village Sermons (2nd Series), p. 73.

References. VII. 37. C. Parsons Reichel, Sermons, p. 277. H. Scott Holland, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lviii. 1895, p. 200. S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year (2nd Series), vol. ii. p. 99. C. W. Furse, Sermons Preached at Richmond, p. 121.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

Mar 7:31

Any one associated with Lord Aberdeen might always rest assured that he was safe in his hands. When our law did not allow prisoners the benefit of counsel, it was commonly said that the judge was counsel for the prisoner. Lord Aberdeen was always counsel for the absent. Doubtless he had pondered much upon the law, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. It had entered profoundly into his being, and formed a large part of it.

Gladstone, quoted in Morley’s Life, II. pp. 639, 640).

References. XII. 33. W. Brock, The Religious Difficulty in the Schools and the Education Bill, Sermons, 1900-1902. C. Silvester Home, Christian World Pulpit, vol. lxxi. 1907, p. 355.

Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson

The Rebukes of Christ

[An Analysis]

Mar 7

This paragraph shows Christ’s method of rebuking. The paragraph which immediately succeeds shows Christ’s method of instructing. The paragraphs may be taken together in a discourse upon the outward and inward relations of Jesus Christ: his relations to the Pharisees and the general body of the people, and his more secret and spiritual relations to his disciples.

In the case of the Pharisees, there was (1) something right; (2) something incomplete; (3) something wrong. Let this be shown:

(1) There was something right. The Pharisees noticed that a few plain men who had no right, so far as their social standing was concerned, to lead the fashion or custom of society, had treated with neglect, perhaps with contempt, a well-established custom. Men who introduce new eras, or teach revolutionary ideas, or set aside the traditions of the elders, have no claim to exemption from rigorous questioning. Social life should be more than a mere collection of personal fancies. There should be law and discipline in social habit. There is a line up to which personal independence should be claimed: beyond that line men should consider one another, and maintain a common order. In this case, the traditional discipline had been set aside, and the question, Why? is a proper one. We should make inquiries about each other, and show a religious concern about each other’s habits.

(2) There was something incomplete. Ceremonialism is always incomplete. It is impossible that ritual can be final, because the moral must exceed the formal. The discipline of “the Pharisees and all the Jews” was no easy matter after all. Do we sufficiently consider that the men whom we hold in contempt put themselves to far greater trouble in maintaining their religious duties and scruples than we do? Beware, lest contempt be mistaken for spirituality! This frequent washing of hands, this abstinence from meat until the hands had been washed, this washing of cups and pots, brazen vessels and tables, this tithing of mint, anise, and cummin, when put together, show that the religious habits of the Pharisees were such as required time, patience, and constancy, and not a little self-denial. We have escaped the trouble; have we within us the spirit of consecration of which all outward habits should be the sign? Are we satisfied with mere sentiment, or do we endure hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ?

(3) There was something wrong. They rejected the commandment of God, that they might keep their own tradition; they taught for doctrines the commandments of men; they honoured God with their lips, but their heart was far from him. Before God, life is not a question of washed hands, but of a washed heart; it is not a question of kneeling, but of praying. Religion may be a mere civility towards God, a courteous acknowledgment of his existence, and nothing more!

In rebuking the inquirers Jesus Christ seized upon their moral defects, and showed them that God pierced the heart. His tone was spiritual. He set up no technical argument about forms and ceremonies; he held the infinite light of divine righteousness over the secret corruption of the heart.

The point to be specially observed is, that a right spirit will make to itself right forms, and that it is no sign of heavenly-mindedness to sneer at Christian formalities. Public worship, open profession of Christ, family devotion, Christian services, may express the sanctity and love of the heart as before God.

14. And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them, Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand:

15. There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man.

16. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear.

17. And when he was entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable.

18. And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him;

19. Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats?

20. And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man.

21. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders,

22. Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness:

23. All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.

The doctrine was stated in the hearing of all the people: the explanation was given to the disciples alone. Truth is not always self-explanatory. We need the living teacher as well as the divine truth.

Amongst the lessons taught by this figure may be mentioned

(1) That men are corrupted by such outward things only as touch some corresponding quality in their own nature. Some men can make money without becoming covetous. Some men can dress handsomely without becoming vain. Some men can enjoy amusements without becoming frivolous. Other men, differently constituted, have to watch themselves in all these particulars as they would watch gunpowder. Hence the folly and injustice of judging one another!

(2) That words and actions reveal the true spiritual quality of the speaker and actor. “That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man.” There is a common saying that no man can injure a man but himself. It is not wholly true, yet largely so. Not what is said about a man, but what the man himself says, is the true standard. ( a ) This doctrine destroys the excuse that circumstances are blamable for our moral defilement. ( b ) This doctrine determines the bounds of social judgment. For example, you accuse a man of having attended a certain questionable class of amusements; now observe, the amusements may have done the man no harm, but the censoriousness of your spirit may have defiled you! Or, again: you suppose that because a man is prosperous he must of necessity be worldly-minded; now, the prosperity may have left him unspoiled, but the criticism may show you to be envious, ignoble, and spiteful, though it may have been offered with a pious sigh!

The 21st and 22nd verses give a picture of the human heart as presented by Jesus Christ.

Looking at this graphic, but most terrible and humiliating picture, four things are clear:

(1) That the heart is chargeable with foulest apostasy. Compare this picture with the heart as it came from God. “Let us make man in our image,” etc. “God hath made man upright,” etc. What forces are in man! What fury, what malevolence!

(2) That this apostasy shows itself in many ways. Read the black list! No one man may reveal his corruptness in the whole of these ways. A man may never commit “adultery,” yet his mind may be full of “evil thoughts”: he may resent the charge of having committed “thefts,” yet he may be degraded by the spirit of “covetousness”: he may shudder at the thought of “murder,” yet he may be mad with “pride.” We are all somewhere in this list of devils!

(3) That such apostasy has no power of self-recovery. “The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” In a case so desperate the help must come from the outside.

(4) That the nature and scope of the apostasy includes the whole race in one condemnation. “There is none righteous.” “All we like sheep have gone astray,” etc. “Where is boasting?” “Let him that thinketh he standeth,” etc.

Spiritual diseases require spiritual remedies. It is not thine hand, O man, but thine heart of hearts that is wrong! “Though thou wash thee with nitre and take much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord.” The day of heart-trying is at hand. “Who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner’s fire, and like fuller’s soap.” “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.”

24. And from thence he arose, and went into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, and entered into an house, and would have no man know it: but he could not be hid.

25. For a certain woman, whose young daughter had an unclean spirit, heard of him, and came and fell at his feet:

26. The woman was a Greek, a Syrophenician by nation; and she besought him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter.

27. But Jesus said unto her, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.

28. And she answered and said unto him, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs.

29. And he said unto her, For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter.

30. And when she was come to her house, she found the devil gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed.

(1) Some things which are evil in themselves may be the occasion of good. The unclean spirit was the occasion of this mother hearing of Jesus Christ! But for the unclean spirit her interest in the great stranger might never have been awakened. So with all bad, unfortunate, painful things, they should lead to Christ. Affliction, loss, weakness, etc. On the other hand, whoever has heard of Christ should publish him to those who have never heard of him.

(2) The mere hearing of Jesus Christ may be without profit to the hearer. This woman not only heard of Christ, “she came and fell at his feet, and besought him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter.” Remark upon the tremendous responsibility of forming part of a Christian congregation, and yet not going to Christ. Does hearing of water quench thirst? Does hearing of medicine heal disease? Show that men should be as sensible in religious questions as in ordinary affairs.

(3) The prayer of the heart never fails. Its particular object may often be denied, but the heart itself is comforted and quieted by divine ministries. In this incident the heart does two things: ( a ) it shows the superiority of the human over the national; ( b ) it excites intellectual energy, how sublime the reply of the woman! The mind is strongest and brightest when under the dominion of the heart. Sorrow makes the poorest lips eloquent. Under such circumstances the pleading mother might have ( a ) pronounced herself insulted; ( b ) resented the terms in which she and her child were described; ( c ) denounced the inability of Christ to meet a case so desperate as hers. She did none of these things. She shot back Christ’s own arrow from the bow of her heart.

The whole incident gives, first, a lesson to mothers, pray for your children; second, an encouragement to intercessors, urge upon God the desires of the inmost heart; third, a sublime view of divine sufficiency, the crumbs of God’s table are better than the luxuries of all other tables; the poorest, dimmest conceptions of Christian truth are more to be prized than the fullest revelations of truth that are merely introductory or subordinate; fourth, a hint as to the limitation of the highest services, the child was healed apart from any action of her own: the mother plucked this fruit of the highest branch, and gave it to her little daughter. There is a time when the child’s own will may set itself against God. The child becomes more than a child. Whilst children are wholly yours, beseech God much in their behalf.

31. And again, departing from the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, he came unto the sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis.

32. And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him.

33. And he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue;

34. And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha , that is, Be opened.

35. And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.

36. And he charged them that they should tell no man: but the more he charged them, so much the more a great deal they published it;

37. And were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well: he maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak.

(1) Christ sighed, his view of human nature touched his heart. ( a ) His natural sensibilities were touched by human suffering, and therefore he was a man of like passions with ourselves; ( b ) his sympathies ever responded to the necessities of human life, and therefore he had all the human qualifications needful for a Saviour of men.

(2) Christ looked up to heaven. He connected the divine with the human: he showed the unity of the great system of which what we see is but a part: he made even his physical work a spiritual exercise.

(3) Christ said, Be opened. He spoke authoritatively; the weakness of the sigh became changed into the strength of royalty.

See how these exercises follow each other in something more than a merely logical order. What an appeal to the minister of Christ! (1) Canst thou do any great work in the world without sighing? without tender sympathy? without having thy very heart pierced with sorrow for human sin and pain? (2) Canst thou work without looking heavenward? Is the battle there? Dost thou not need to bring down God to thy side? O man, self-trusting, thou hast failed in thy ministry, because in the midst of work no time was found for an upward glance, for the look which is prayer. (3) Hast thou spoken feebly, hesitatingly, apologetically? Dost thou speak the word as if begging pardon for an intrusion? Or, with clearness, power and authority? How?

Markk 7:37 shows what the whole world will say when Christ’s mediation is completed.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

I

SEASON OF RETIREMENT

PART I

Harmony, pages 76-89 and Mat 14:13-16:12 ; Mar 6:30-8:26 ; Luk 9:10-17 ; Joh 6:1-7:1 .

We now take up Part V of the Harmony, the general theme of which is “Season of Retirement into Districts Around Galilee.” The time is six months, i.e., from just before the Passover (Joh 6:4 ) to the Feast of Tabernacles. There are four of these retirements, found in sections 57, 61, 62, 63-67, respectively. The occasion of the first was twofold, (1) the hearing of the death of John the Baptist, and (2) the return of the twelve apostles for rest. The place of this retirement was Bethsaida Julias, which is referred to by Luke, as over against the Bethsaida mentioned by Mark, which was near Capernaum. The occasion of the second retirement was also twofold, (1) the fanaticism of the disciples in trying to make him king (Joh 6:15 ), and (2) the hostility of the Jewish rulers (Mat 15:1 ). The place of the second retirement was Phoenicia, about Tyre and Sidon. The occasion of the third retirement was the suspicion of Herod Antipas, who was a very wicked man and had much fear respecting Jesus and his great works. The place of this retirement was Decapolis. The occasion of the fourth retirement was continued Jewish hostilities, and the place was Caesarea Philippi, in the extreme northern part of Palestine on the east side of the Jordan. In every case he avoided Herod’s jurisdiction.

The first outstanding event of these retirements is the feeding of the five thousand, the account of which is prefaced by the report of the twelve apostles, who had just returned from their first missionary tour. This is a glowing account of their work and their teaching. The latter item of this report is unusual in a missionary report. Matthew says that Jesus withdrew to a desert place apart when he heard of the death of John the Baptist. In this desert place the multitudes thronged from the cities, and this excited the tender compassion of Jesus because they were like sheep without a shepherd. Mark says that he taught them many things. His work here continued until the day was far spent, upon which the disciples besought him to send the multitudes away to buy food. Here begins the beautiful story of “Feeding the Five Thousand,” which is told by all four of the evangelists and does not need to be repeated in this expression, but there are certain facts and lessons here that need to be emphasized. First, there is the test of his disciples as to what they were willing to undertake. Second, this furnished the occasion for the great discourse of Joh 6 on the Bread of Life. Third, it was the occasion of sloughing off unworthy disciples. Fourth, it supplied the physical wants of the people. Fifth, there is here a most excellent lesson on order in doing things. Sixth, Christ is presented here as the great wonder-worker in supplying the needs of his people.

Following this miracle is the incident of Jesus walking on the sea. After feeding the five thousand Jesus retired to the mountain to pray and sent the disciples back across the sea in a boat. A storm arose and they were distressed, but on the troubled sea they saw Jesus walking and they were afraid. Out from the storm of their distress came the voice of Jesus: “It is I; be not afraid.” What a lesson for us! Jesus walks on the troubled sea. But Peter, impulsive Peter, must put the matter to a test and he receives the command to try his strength in walking on the sea, but the wind and the waves disturb his faith and he sinks, only to be rescued by the hand divine. Our Lord rebukes his “little faith,” as he does the “little faith” of others in two other instances in this division of the Harmony, (viz., on pp. 88, 95).

This incident made a profound impression on the disciples. Matthew says, “They that were in the boat worshiped him, saying, Of a truth thou art the Son of God.” Mark says, “They were sore amazed in themselves; for they understood not concerning the loaves, but their heart was hardened.” John says, “They were willing therefore to receive him into the boat.” There seems, at first sight, to be some discrepancy here, but these evangelists are speaking from different standpoints. Matthew seems to look at it from the standpoint of the effect in strengthening their faith in his divinity; John, from the standpoint of their scare when they first saw him, and Mark, from the standpoint of the preceding incident of “Feeding the Five Thousand.” Broadus says, “Mark (Mar 6:52 ) censures their astonishment at this miracle, for which the miracle of the loaves would have prepared them if their minds had not been stupid and dull. This language of Mark does not necessarily forbid the supposition that they were now convinced Jesus was divine; but it best falls in with the idea that they were at a lower standpoint.” They straightway landed at Gennesaret, according to Matthew and John, where the people came in great numbers to touch his garment that they might be healed. Mark’s description of this healing work of our Lord is most vivid, closing with the words, “as many as touched him were made whole.”

All this prepared the way for the great discourse of our Lord on the Bread of Life in Joh 6 (Harmony, pp. 81-82). This is a marvelously strong discourse on the spirituality of his kingdom. The introduction (Joh 6:22-25 ) explains the connection of this discourse with the miracle of the loaves and how the multitudes found Jesus after that event in Capernaum. In Joh 6:26-40 we have the first dialogue between them and Jesus in which Jesus reveals their purposes and exhorts them to seek the Bread of Life. Then they ask, “How?” and he explains that it is by accepting him whom the Father sent. Then they demand a sign, referring to the sign of the manna to the Israelites in the wilderness, upon which Jesus showed them the typical and spiritual import of the manna, explaining that it referred to him. In Joh 6:41-51 we have the second dialogue arising from their murmuring at his teaching, that he came down from heaven. Here he announced the great doctrine of God’s drawing in order to salvation, his relation to the Father and the nature of the salvation he brought as eternal, over against the perishable manna which their fathers ate in the wilderness. In Joh 6:52-59 we have the third dialogue arising from their strife among themselves about his teaching, in which Jesus shows them their utter hopelessness apart from him and his sacrifice. In Joh 6:60-65 we have the fourth dialogue, which was between Jesus and his disciples, growing out of their murmuring at his hard doctrine. Here he explains that the words which he had spoken were spiritual and life-giving, and then revealed the fact that one among them was an unbeliever. This he knew, says John, from the beginning. In Joh 6:66-71 we have the final effect of his discourse upon them, driving many of his disciples back, but confirming his immediate disciples in his divine mission as voiced by this first great confession of Peter: “We believe and know that thou art the Holy One of God.” But Jesus let them know that one of them was a devil. Note that this revelation of the betrayer was nearly a year before the revelation of Judas at the Passover supper (Joh 13 ), and shows that Jesus knew all the time that Judas would betray him. Note also that this discourse is progressive. Each dialogue brings a new revelation and the effect of this progress upon his audience is marked, finally driving them away from our Lord to walk with him no more, while the severity of the test brought forth from his disciples their strongest expression of faith in his divinity up to this time.

In section 60 (Mat 15:1-20 ; Mar 7:1-23 ; Joh 7:1 ) we have the account of another issue between Christ and the Pharisees at Capernaum. They sent an embassy to him from Jerusalem and asked why his disciples did not keep the tradition of the elders with regard to the washing of their hands, the full explanation of which is given by Mark and needs only a careful reading to be understood. To this Jesus responded with a charge of hypocrisy and quotes a prophecy of Isaiah which he applies to them. This prophecy has in it a double charge, (1) of emptiness, of heartlessness, in their service and (2) that they taught the doctrines and precepts of men. This applied to all their traditions, what a comment on the whole of the Jewish Talmud! Then he goes further and charges them with transgressing the commandment of God because of their tradition in respect to honoring parents. If they should say that their property was “Corban,” i.e., given to God, that exempted them, according to the Jewish tradition, which made void the word of God. Then he explained the fallacy of their tradition by showing that it was not what goes into a man that defiles him, but that defilement was an issue of the heart. But this offended the Pharisees, to which he replied to his disciples with the parable of the blind guides, which the disciples did not understand, as it applied to the matter under consideration. This called for a more elaborate explanation, that the heart and stomach of a man were vastly different and that sin issuing from the heart was the only true defilement of the man. Mark gives thirteen items in his list of sins coming out of the heart, and Matthew seven, but these are but illustrations of the principle that all sin issues from the heart.

Immediately following this issue with the authorities at Jerusalem, Jesus retired to the region of Tyre and Sidon, in the territory of Phoenicia, which is outside of the land of Israel. This retirement, as already explained, was caused by the fanaticism of his disciples in trying to make him king, and the hostility of the Jewish rulers. Phoenicia (see map) was located northwest of Palestine and contained two cities of importance Tyre and Sidon. It was in this territory and while on this retirement that Jesus healed the Syrophoenician, or Canaanitish woman’s daughter. The term “Canaanitish,” as used by Matthew, refers back to the time when the inhabitants of this section were called Canaanites. It is probable that the Jews continued to apply this name to the inhabitants of Phoenicia, though the after inhabitants may have been of later origin. To Matthew’s Jewish readers this word would show that she was a Gentile. (Broadus’ Commentary). But Mark says that she was a Greek, meaning a Gentile, and a Syrophoenician, meaning an inhabitant of the united countries of Syria and Phoenicia, a term used to distinguish this country from Libyphoenicia, or the Carthaginians. To Mark’s Gentile readers this name also would mean a Gentile. This country of Syria extended from the northern part of Palestine all the way up the Mediterranean coast to the headwaters of the Euphrates, following that river east to the great Syrian Desert, and thence south to the headwaters of the Jordan, including Antioch and Damascus, two cities well known to Bible history. This country has a vital connection with the Greeks. It was conquered by Alexander the Great, allotted to the Seleucids after his death, who built Antioch and ruled this country till it was taken by the Romans. This was in the fourth, third, and second centuries before Christ.

It was in this country Jesus sought retirement and rest for himself and disciples, but this rest was broken by the coming of the Syrophoenician woman to Jesus in behalf of her daughter. Jesus could not be hid because of his fame and his approachableness by those who were in distress. We find that, in every effort which he made at retirement, the people found him. So, this Canaanitish, Greek, Syrophoenician woman found him when he came into those parts. The facts of this case are as follows: This Syrophoenician woman had a little daughter who was grievsouly demonized. She heard of the presence of Jesus in those parts, came and besought him to cast forth the demon out of her. He made no answer. Then the disciples intervened and asked him to send her away, but he answered that he was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. The woman personally renews her petition and begs for help, but Jesus tells her that it is not meet to give the children’s bread to the dogs. She answered that she would be satisfied with the crumbs, and this brought forth from the Saviour the highest commendation of her faith.

Now let us look at this picture again and see if we can find in it the lessons intended for us. First, let us look for the proofs of this woman’s faith. There are four of these: (1) Her address in which she calls him the Son of David; (2) she worshiped him; (3) she recognized Jewish priority; (4) her humility and importunity.

This scene was, perhaps, on the road and not in the house, which helps us to understand better some of the points in the story. The seeming indifference of Jesus was only to test and develop her faith. The intervention of the disciples was not to ask that she be dismissed without help, but, rather, to give her the blessing and let her go. Evidently the woman did not hear Christ’s reply to the disciples. Being in advance of the woman on the road, this conversation was not understood by her, which explains the next statement that “she came and worshiped him.” The statement of Jesus to the disciples that he was not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel meant that he was unwilling to carry on a general ministry in Phoenicia, because his mission was to the Jews. The “crumb” idea here introduced by the woman and acted upon by Christ does not conflict with this idea of avoiding a general ministry in Phoenicia. This referred to the smaller blessing to a Gentile dog which would not take any of the children’s bread. She seems here to argue that Jesus is now away from the Jews and not feeding them. So a blessing in this isolated case would not interfere with the blessings for the Jews. The dogs here referred to were little dogs. The word in the Greek is diminutive and means the little house dogs allowed to run around in the house and under their master’s table. The woman was willing not only to be called a dog, but to be called a little dog and to have a little dog’s share of food. This incident is also an illustration of the scriptural teaching that we should pray for the salvation of others who are not even interested.

After the incident of the Syrophoenician woman Jesus hastened to return to the land of Israel. Going from the borders of Tyre and Sidon he passed through Sidon, thence across to the east side of the Jordan and down on the east side of the Sea of Galilee through the borders of Decapolis. This was intentional, to avoid the territory of Herod, who was suspicious of Jesus. As soon as he arrived they brought him a deaf and dumb man whom he healed, and charged not to tell it, but he published it the more, which resulted in their bringing the multitudes of the unfortunate to him for a blessing. He healed all of these and then fed four thousand, the circumstances and particulars of which are similar to the feeding of the five thousand.

Then, sending away the multitudes, he crossed over the Sea of Galilee to the borders of Magadan, where he was met again by the Pharisees demanding a sign, but sighing deeply in his spirit he rebuked them and left them, never to return to this part again to teach. This text illustrates the grieving of the Holy Spirit. On leaving here he went across the Sea of Galilee to Bethsaida, where he tarried a short time on his way to Caesarea Philippi. When they arrived at Bethsaida the disciples were reminded by a little parable of Jesus that they had forgotten to take bread with them. This parable referred to the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees, which was their doctrine, but the disciples did not understand it and thought that he referred to their forgetting the bread. Then he issued a sharp rebuke to his disciples as follows: (1) for hardness of heart; (2) for dimness of perception; (3) for a torpid memory; (4) for lack of faith. Then they understood that he referred to the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Does teaching, or doctrine, leaven? It seems to have leavened them. Does it make any difference what we believe? Certainly there is a moral quality of belief.

At Bethsaida was brought to him a blind man whom he carried out of the village. He healed him by the use of means; at least apparently, and gradually, thus illustrating the gradual perception of conversion. Then he sent him away and would not even permit him to go into the village. This case is very similar to the case of the deaf and dumb whom he healed in the borders of Decapolis. In each case he took the person out and healed him privately. In each case he also used means, apparently. Why this method in these two cases particularly? On the point of the “why” here we cannot be dogmatic. Perhaps it was to prevent excitement as far as possible by making it appear that he used means; that he was healing more in the natural way and thus avoid the excitement that usually followed his regular method.

QUESTIONS

1. What is the theme of Part V of the Harmony?

2. What was the time and what the time limits of this division?

3. How many retirements in this period and where are they found in the Harmony?

4. What was the occasion and place of each?

5. What was the first outstanding event of this period of retirements and how is it prefaced?

6. What, in order, are the events which led up to the feeding of the five thousand?

7. Tell the story of the feeding of the five thousand.

8. What are the lessons of this incident?

9. Give the story of Jesus walking on the sea and its lessons.

10. How do you harmonize Matthew, Mark, and John on this incident?

11. Where did they land and what incidents there?

12. What was the occasion and nature of the great discourse in Joh 6 ?

13. Give an analysis of this discourse, showing its introduction, its dialogues, the progress of the thought in these parts of the discourse, the progress of its effect on the enemy and its effect on the disciples of Jesus.

14. What issue raised between Christ and the Pharisees at Capernaum and how did Christ meet it?

13. Give an account of the progress of this issue and show the final outcome of it.

16. Bid Jesus ever leave the land of Israel? If so, why?

17. In what country were Tyre and Sidon?

18. State the geographical position of Phoenicia.

19. Explain the terms “Ganaanitiah,” “Greek,” and “Syrophoenician” as applied to the woman who approached Christ in these parts.

20. What is the extent of Syria?

21. What, briefly, was Syria’s connection with the Greeks, and how long since to this incident?

22. Why should Jesus desire to remain incognito here?

23. How was the rest broken?

24. Why could not Jesus be hid?

25. What are the facts of this case in their order?

26. What was the proofs of this woman’s faith?

27. Was this scene in the house or out doors?

28. Why did Jesus so act in this case?

29. Did his disciples ask that she be dismissed without help?

30. Why should Jesus avoid a general ministry in Phoenicia?

31. Explain how “crumbs” did not conflict with this idea.

32. What kind of dogs here referred to and what the import?

33. What is the lesson here on praying for others not interested?

34. Trace on the map the journey of Jesus from Tyre to the neighborhood of the Sea of Galilee. Why this course?

35. What were the events of his stay in this section?

36. Where did he go from there and what were the events at the next place?

37. Where then did he go, and what important lesson did he there teach his disciples and how?

38. What are the items of his rebuke here and what the importance of doctrine as here indicated?

39. Give the incident of the healing of the blind man here and its lessons.

Fuente: B.H. Carroll’s An Interpretation of the English Bible

1 Then came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem.

Ver. 1. See Trapp on “ Mat 15:1 “

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

1 23. ] DISCOURSE CONCERNING EATING WITH UNWASHED HANDS. Mat 15:1-20 . The two reports differ rather more than usual in their additions to what is common, and are not so frequently in verbal agreement where the matter is the same.

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

Mar 7:1-23 . Concerning ceremonial ablutions (Mat 15:1-20 ).

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

Mar 7:1 . connects what follows very loosely with what goes before: not temporal sequence but contrast between phenomenal popularity and hostility of the religious leaders of the people, in the view of the evangelist. ., etc., some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem. cf. Mar 3:22 , and remarks there.

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

Mark Chapter 7

Mar 7:1-23 .

Mat 15:1-20 .

In this chapter the scene is totally changed. It is no longer the accomplishment of promise, nor merely the retiring before the oppressive cruelty of him that was then in the place of outward authority. We have here the Lord morally dealing with, and judging, the religious chiefs of Jerusalem who, in their confidence and pride, undertook to blame His disciples and Himself with them. It was themselves, however, who had made the word of God of none effect through their tradition. Thus we are on ground of peculiar importance at this present time, and indeed at all times in Christendom. For there has never been a time in which this danger has not existed ever since the word of God was given, partially or completely, to the Church. Traditions began to multiply apace when the Apostles passed away. As the word of God, more particularly the New Testament, is not in the form of mere command, there was peculiar openness in Christendom to the influence of tradition. In the Jewish system all was ordered by rule. It was the natural and obvious fashion of the Jewish economy that God regulated all their intercourse, gave positive injunctions as to the whole policy, left scarcely anything open to His people, but prescribed their private and public obligations, whether individual, family, or social – their religious duties as well as their political. In fact, everything was made a matter of plain commandment, and yet even in that system, so inveterate is the heart of man in departing from the living God, that even there we find the leaders of the Jews taking away the people from these expressed commandments of God by putting them under the authority of their own tradition. How comes it that there is this continual tendency in the heart of man, and specially of those that take the place of guides of God’s people, no matter when or where you look at it, to supplant His word by their tradition? It is because tradition gives importance to man, leaves room for superiority to self. The consequence is that not merely the religious chiefs are thus fond of gratifying their self-importance by imposing rules of their own, but the people love to have it so. This painful fact is brought out in all the word of God. Thus, throughout the Old Testament, not only were the priests ever rebellious, but the people also: man never was subject to God, but has continually departed from God, in whatever way He might be trying him. This, then, came to an issue between the Lord and the Jewish religionists.

“And the Pharisees and certain of the scribes who came from Jerusalem are gathered together unto Him.” They had the highest authority as far as the earth was concerned; they came from the holy city of ancient religion, clothed with the credit of Divine law and authority. “And seeing some of His disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say, with unwashed, hands.” Now, there was clearly nothing moral in this – nothing that could touch the soul or that affected a man’s relationship with God; but it was contrary to their traditions, and therefore they found fault. It is easy to conceive that this tradition may have had a pious origin. There may have been in the minds of these leaders an idea of keeping up before the people the importance of personal purity; for washing the hands would be a very natural sign that God looks for and insists on holiness in the works of His people. At any rate, such was the custom expected from every professor, whether from that idea or any other of presenting to the minds of the Israelites their duty in the things of God. They may have pleaded indirectly. No doubt it was drawn from the word of God, because there were certain washings which men always practised. Thus, the priests were to wash the sacrifices presented to God, as they had been themselves washed at the time of their consecration, and had always to wash hands and feet before entering the tabernacle. It seemed a reasonable and meet inference that this rite, at once simple and expressive, ought to be observed by every man among the holy people in his ordinary dealings day by day. Who, in fact, could have the necessity of personal purity kept too much before his eyes? But there was precisely where man was in fault. The great principle of the word is that, God being infinitely wise and holy, where He does not lay down any positive injunction of His own, woe to him who infringes liberty. Man, on the contrary, takes advantage of the opening, and, where God has not laid down a law, he makes one of his own. But God has given no warrant thus to legislate; and half the disputes and schisms that have occurred in Christendom are due to this cause. The haste of man to solve a difficulty has recourse to such measures, and the desire of man to enforce his own will where God, instead of laying down anything positive, has left things as a test for the heart, and therefore has purposely abstained from a command. It cannot be surprising that what is thus introduced is almost always evil; but supposing the thing imposed might seem ever so desirable, the principle is always faulty.

I desire to press the immense importance of giving no authority to any rule except the word now written. To hear men of God, to be helped by servants of God, to value an exposition of the truth, is all well, but is a very different thing from an authoritative canon or creed which men impose as binding upon conscience. It is never right to accept thus what comes from man. God alone and His word bind the conscience. His servants may teach, but if they teach aright, it is the truth of God. They bring the word of God to bear upon the conscience, and therefore nobody that understands the place of God’s servant would wish to create a divided allegiance by imposing his own thoughts and words. His proper function as a servant is rather to maintain the undisguised supremacy of God’s word, so that the conscience may be put under a positive and increased sense of obligation. Whenever the work is well done, and blessed by God’s grace, further question is at an end. This is the true aim of such ministry as Scripture recognises. The truth is sufficiently brought out that men’s consciences should be called into action. The Spirit of God gives Divine force to it, so that souls are left without excuse. Even in the preaching of the Gospel every unconverted man is under the responsibility of receiving the testimony of God; but still more in Divine things, after we have received the truth and have discovered the inestimable place and value of the word of God. It is of all importance that our souls should hold fast and firm, that whatever the helps imparted through man, whatever the light of God that shines through the vessels He employs, still it is God’s light, God’s truth; nothing else than God’s word ought to be acknowledged as authoritative.

Assuredly the business of a Christian, of a servant of God, now is not to stand between man and God, which was the position of a priest in Judaism, but to put away the obstacles which act as veils, that man may face the truth, and, indeed, God Himself, without being permitted to escape; so that the light that comes from God may shine full upon the conscience and the heart of man. This does not suit man left to himself; it displeases the world, which prefers a distant reserve; and these Pharisees and scribes, though they came from Jerusalem, were really of the world. Hence they reasoned in Divine things, as men do now, from principles that are true enough in worldly things: the word was not mixed with faith in their hearts. No doubt, in the outward world, God has left man to himself in great measure, save that He keeps a certain providential check upon him. Government of the earth is committed to human hands, and man comes under the responsibility of exercising or observing that government here below. But still he is left to judge according to the means God has given. There may be certain landmarks God has laid down; for instance, the sacredness of human life, which God asserted before He called out Abraham, and which is a principle as obligatory now as ever it was. “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed.” This was what God instituted at the time of the Flood; but with such-like slight exceptions, man is left free to arrange, according to the circumstances, the various punishments and rewards in this world. But in Divine things the main point is God dealing, by His word and Spirit, with conscience, as immediately subject to Himself. And hence it is that everything which intercepts the direct application of the Scripture from God Himself to His children is the most positive injury. It is man stepping into the place of God. This at once furnishes a sure test for deciding what is of God and what is not. If you speak to me of helps for understanding the word of God, these exist and are given of God. Such is the object of ministry, which is the service that God has instituted for the purpose of giving effect to His word. But none the less is His word the means of dealing with sinners and of building up His children. True, it is the service of God in His word, not a rival or co-ordinate authority.

On the other hand, tradition is essentially different. It proceeds, not from God, but from man. We find the attempt to introduce it even in the New Testament, and while the Apostle Paul was in the midst of his labours. The Church at Corinth shows, perhaps, the first attempt of the enemy to insinuate human tradition. They had allowed women to preach in the public assembly, which the Apostle denounces. There was a good deal to be argued for it. People might have reasoned – if women had gifts, why should these not be used? If gifts were possessed suited to bring out the truth of God, why not turn these to the utmost account in the Christian assembly? The word of God positively interdicts this. It allows that a woman might prophesy; as, for instance, the four daughters of Philip, the evangelist, no doubt did prophesy. The question is, where and how? In the first place, they were not to prophesy to men, because that would be an inversion of God’s order. A woman is not suffered to teach or govern. Consequently, while they were allowed to bring out whatever light they had, even of the highest character, yet it was to be done in subjection to the word of the Lord. A man, as the Apostle shows, is the glory of God, whereas the woman is put under subjection. Man has the official place of superiority to the woman. It could, therefore, never be supposed that God would give a gift to a woman in such sort as to set aside, in so important a manner, the difference established from the beginning, and sanctioned and insisted upon in the New Testament. In the next place, within the public assembly woman’s speaking in any form, even asking a question, is forbidden. They are to ask their husbands at home. It was this very thing that drew out the Apostle’s condemnation of tradition. The Corinthians seem to have allowed and contended for liberty to be given to these gifted women to speak in the assembly. But the Apostle takes them to task, and urges that if any of them were spiritual or prophets they would be subject to the word of the Lord. On the other hand, if any of them were ignorant, let them be so. What a blow to the would-be-wise speculators to hear their theories treated as mere and wilful ignorance! “If any man be ignorant, let him be ignorant.” (1Co 14:38 ) These high-flown men were really ignorant of the mind of God.

This, it is evident, is exceedingly important, because it puts us in the presence of the great truth which the Church of God has forgotten and trampled under foot in all ages. The word is not to come out from ourselves. We want the word that comes from God to the Church, and not what the Church, so-called, pretends to utter. The Church never teaches nor rules. That which comes from man or from the Church has no authority whatever; on the contrary, the Church is called to be in the place of subjection to Christ: she is not in the place of the Lord, but of the lady. Jesus is Lord; He alone commands the Church, which is put by God in the place of the woman, as subject to the Lord. This at once becomes a very weighty difference in practice. For we can all remember the day when we thought that human rules in the things of God were right and necessary. It seemed to us as if the ecclesiastical state could not be held together without human regulations. We judged that the present state differs so from what existed of old that it is impossible to apply the word of God in its integrity to the Church now, and therefore new rules must be introduced to suit our days. In admitting such a principle, you do two things – you dishonour the word of God, for the word of God is not a dead letter, like man’s: the word of God is a living word now as then. Every Christian believes this for the salvation of his soul, but not for his walk and conduct every day, and, more particularly, not for the worship and government of the Church. Is it not, on the very face of it, a mischievous principle to allow the word of God to be a living authority in one thing and to treat it virtually as obsolete and dead in another? Is it not venturing near the fatal slide of infidelity? I do not say that the persons who speak and act thus are infidel; but it is an infidel principle to consign to the grave any part of God’s word, to maintain that all that part which dwells so largely upon the union and worship of Christians, the ways in which they are to walk together in the confession of their Lord, and in common subjection to the word and Spirit of God – that all this is out of date, and no longer obligatory on the saints. But you do another dishonour by such a course, for you not only dethrone the word of God from its supremacy in the conscience, but you exalt the commandments of man: you slight the true authority and recognise a mere usurper. It is evident I must have something that governs me If I am not simply subject to the word of God, I am sure to bow to the word of man. Some may prefer their own thoughts if they think their own wisdom is superior to their neighbour’s. But the general form taken is not so much an individual showing self-sufficiency, but rather the union of a number who encourage one another to join in this race of independence, which involves disobedience to the word of God. We are living at a time when Satan does all to lower Scripture, and when God has brought out its value and pressed its practical moment more home upon the conscience than in former days. There was a time when not one of us had ever been exercised upon this subject. It was taken for granted that a human supplement of rules is necessary. But any rule invented by man for the government of Christians is a tradition, and of the worst kind, because it is thus made a thing of positive authority for faith and practice.

The Pharisees in our chapter brought out this conventional washing of hands, and pressed it upon the disciples. The Spirit’s comment is that “the Pharisees and all the Jews, unless they wash their hands diligently,* eat not, holding the tradition of the ancients. And when they come from the market-place, unless they are washed, they do not eat. And many other things there are which they have received to hold, the washing of cups and vessels, brazen utensils, and couches.” Every spiritual man must feel the quick, cutting condemnation of the whole principle, root and branch, which breathes through the language of the Spirit of God. However subdued the tone may be, the whole thing is treated as utterly weak and childish. The washing of persons is classed with the washing of cups and vessels. Many like things they do. What a religion! “Then the Pharisees and scribes ask Him, Why do Thy disciples walk not according to the tradition of the ancients, but eat the bread with defiled hands?” It is remarkable how the Lord answers them. It is not by discussing the source of the tradition or showing its futility. He deals at once with its broad character and its moral effect on the obedience that is due to God. This is, doubtless, a most admirable pattern for every Christian man. The Lord lays bare the moral fruit of these traditions, and thus the simple escape the snare of the enemy. “He answered and said unto them, Well did Esaias prophesy concerning you, hypocrites,tid=36#bkm68- as it is written, This people honoureth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. But in vain they do worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” (Isa 29:13 )

*”Diligently” (or “frequently,” “with vigour,” or “with nicety”). The mass of authority [ABD, etc., followed by Edd.] sustains (D: ). Lit. “with the fist,” or “up to the elbow.” Tischendorf adopted from the Sinaitic copy, confirmed, perhaps, by the Latin (verse 9) and some other versions. St. Gall [as the Syrsin] has neither (B.T.). See, further, notetid=36#bkm67- .

“Defiled”: so Edd., after pmBD, 1, 33, Memph. Arm. “Unwashed” is found in corr AL, etc., Syr. Goth.

And this is His method of proof. He takes one of these noted traditions and shows that, plausible as it might seem, it was but the cunning slight of deceivers, led by one more cunning than themselves, and destructive of the true fear of God. It drew men into disobedience, and made excuse for sin, or, rather, denied it. Thus their zeal for tradition blinded them to what ordinary conscience must have felt, “for, leaving the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men.” He does not call it a wicked tradition; it was “of men,” and is not to be held. “And He said to them, Well do ye set aside the commandment of God, that ye may observe your own tradition.” There is the process: give up what is of God, and then you will fall into the hands of man. There is great importance in the principle. It is not a comparison of things as to whether this is better than that. The evil is laying aside the commandment of God, and preferring man’s tradition to it. The only thing that has claim upon the Christian heart is what comes from God. Whatever God wills, whatever is His revealed mind on any given subject, demands the believer’s reception and obedience. “For, leaving the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of vessels and cups: and many other such like things ye do.”

What is the harm of all this? It may not be wise, but is merely innocent, a person might argue. But the Lord does not judge so lightly of nullifying God’s commandments by the deference that men show to the will and word of man. “For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and he who speaks ill of father or mother, let him surely die.” There we have the plain revelation of God’s mind. To honour parents is right and of God, to make light of them unfits man to live in God’s estimate. How did tradition dissolve so plain a duty? “Ye say, If a man say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is, gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; and ye suffer him no more to do anything for his father or his mother, making void the word of Godtid=36#bkm69- through your traditions which ye have delivered: and many such like things ye do.” just consider what an issue this was. A man sees his father and mother in want; he has received in earthly goods that which would relieve them, but the tradition-mongers have invented a plan to benefit religion so called at the cost of filial duty. If one said “Corban” the duty was totally changed, and that which would have been due to the parent must now be devoted to the priest. No matter what the need of father and mother, that word “Corban”. estopped all action of heart or conscience. The leaders had devised the scheme to secure property for religious purposes, and to quiet persons from all trouble of conscience about the word of God.

But the judge and Lord of all meets this at once. Who had given them authority to say, It is Corban? Where had God warranted such a practice? and who were they that dared to substitute their thoughts for the word of God? It was God who called on man to honour his parents, and who denounced all slight done to them. Yet here were men violating, under cloak of religion, both these commandments of God! This tradition of saying “Corban” the Lord treats not only as a wrong done to the parents, but as a rebellious act against the express commandment of God.

For my part I never heard of a tradition introduced into any religious body, or imposed upon any individuals, that was not contrary to the word of God. Such are the rules made by man in the things of God. Indeed, all religious societies have a system, which they do not even profess to have derived from the word of God. There are those now in Christendom that cast themselves upon the word of God alone, but such one would not lower to the level of a religious society. I say, then, that wherever you find men who join together in these voluntary societies, large or small, they introduce a system of their own for the purpose of distinguishing themselves from others, and regulations that they consider necessary for the establishment or extension of the society. They invent and impose human rules, which not only differ from the Scripture, but contradict it. God’s word is a living reality, and a complete standard of truth and practice. Everything that man adds as a supplement is a deformity; it is that which, as it does not flow from God, is inconsistent with the light. Man is incompetent to regulate what belongs to God.

Thus persons say it is impossible to go on unless you have rules about ministry; it would not do to have everybody rising up and attempting to minister. It is freely admitted that if there were not the looking to the Holy Ghost there would be confusion, and that even where there is faith in Him there is always the need of self-judgment why one does this or seeks that, but God is equal to all the difficulty. If we submit to the word of God nothing can be more distinct or positive than that there is no such thing as a universal right to minister on one hand, and no such thing as a process or any human means of conferring a title to minister upon a man. Not the Church, but Christ; not the subject woman, but the risen man and Lord, can call to the work of teaching the saints or of preaching the Gospel. It surprises many to hear that there is no such thing as a human institution to warrant the preaching of the Gospel. A single text would destroy my statement if it were not true, but no Scripture can be brought forward. The general practice of Christendom has no Divine ground whatever for its justification. Hence they are obliged to take their stand upon tradition, which contradicts the plain word of God. For if any Christians have the power to preach, which comes only from the Lord, they are not only at liberty, but bound to preach. It is a question of positive responsibility to Him before whose judgment we must all be made manifest. The Lord, if He lights a candle, does not intend it to be put under a bushel, but to be set on a candlestick. It is at man’s peril if he attempt to hinder the going forth of the energy of God’s Spirit. Whoever has the power of the Spirit to preach should go forth and use it; woe to him if he does not.

Take another case. There is no such thing in the New Testament as a person set apart by any human mode simply to teach the Church. Whereas, when we look around, we see one and the same principle running through a vast variety of forms, from the Pope down to the ranting preacher. All have got their self-devised methods, by which none can be a minister in the denomination unless he go through their own human process. But such a routine is wholly unsound and contradicts the word of God, and every Christian person is bound to give effect to this by renouncing in every way what is contrary to the word of God. Do you think and say that this is too hard? Then it is you who are too bold, not I. For am I not asserting what I can prove? You have your Bibles, and can search for yourselves. But it may be said, Was there no such thing as ordaining? Certainly there was, when Apostles or apostolic men constituted elders, etc. But our Lord still sends, as He used to send, men out to preach the Gospel. But I contend that a human rite, before they permit souls to preach to the world or teach the Church, is a tradition of men and contrary to Scripture. You will find in Scripture that there were persons appointed by the Apostles to take care of tables, persons chosen by the Apostles or their envoys to a certain work of supervision. Some were called elders and others deacons, but neither the one nor the other was necessarily a preacher or teacher. It is nothing but a blunder to confound elders and deacons with ministers of the word as such. Those who were evangelists, or pastors and teachers, exercised their gifts, not because they were made elders or deacons, which they might not be, but because they had a capacity from God to preach, teach, or rule. To confound these gifts with eldership is a great mistake. When once the difference is seen it clears the way, and brings one either outside the traditional paths of Christendom, or, if disobedient, within the range of our Lord’s rebuke.

May we all bear in mind how deeply we need to watch against the spirit of tradition! Wherever we impose with absolute authority a thing that does not proceed from God Himself, it is a tradition. It is all very well to take counsel of one another, and it is not a happy feature to oppose others needlessly; but it is of all consequence that we should strengthen each other in this, that nothing but the word of God is entitled or ought to govern the conscience. It will be found that when we let go this principle, and allow a rule to come in and become binding, so that what is not done according to that rule is regarded as a sin, we are gone from the authority of the word of God to that of tradition, perhaps without knowing it ourselves.

The Lord here shows convincingly where these Pharisees and scribes were. They had never considered that their principle of Corban made void the word of God. But let us, too, bear in mind that after we have had any Divine truth pressed upon us we are never the same as before. We may have been simply and honestly ignorant then, but we are thenceforth under the increased yoke of God’s known mind, which we either receive in faith or reject, and harden ourselves by rejecting in unbelief. Therefore, let us look to the Lord, that we may cherish a good conscience. This supposes that we have nothing before us which we cleave to or allow inconsistent with God’s will. Let us desire and value nothing but what is according to His word, lest peradventure any of us be left where Christ leaves these Pharisees, under the terrible censure that they made void the word of God through their tradition. If but one example was taken up it was a sufficient sample of the things they were doing continually.

Now we turn to another subject – the condition of man. We are first shown that religion without Christ is but hypocrisy, and that man’s interference in Divine things ends in setting God’s word aside to keep his own tradition. The next thing we see is what man really is, religious or not. “When He had called again the crowd, He said to them, Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand.” The Lord here brings to light the broad principle which of itself would account for His sentence on all tradition. Does it come from man? It is enough. How is it that which springs from such a source is bad and untrustworthy? It concerns every soul, for it is no question of controversial strife. Protestant and Papist, beware of slighting the admonition of the judge of quick and dead. “There is nothing from outside a man, entering into him, can defile him; but the things which go out from him, those it is which defile the man.”tid=36#bkm70- This, if we apply the principle in all its extent, involves the character of tradition; for tradition comes out from man – not a word to man with the authority of God, but a human word that beggarly pride would fain invest with purple and gold to cover its nakedness. This may show the connection, for undoubtedly the Lord here judges the moral issues of the heart and all the ways of man. “If any one have ears to hear, let him hear.” The disciples could not understand Him. What a lesson for us! Christ’s servants could not understand Him. The very Apostles were slow to believe that man was utterly corrupt. Is there anyone here that doubts the thorough evil, not merely to be found among men, but of man? Does anyone think that human nature can be trusted? Listen to the Saviour – the Saviour of the lost. “If any one have ears to hear, let him hear.”

“When He entered indoors from the crowd His disciples asked Him concerning the parable. And He says unto them, Are ye also thus unintelligent? Do ye not perceive that all that is outside entering into the man cannot defile him, because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging* all meats? And He said, That which goeth forth out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, go forth evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickednesses, deceit lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness all these wicked things go forth from within, and defile the man.”tid=36#bkm71- There is nothing in the heart of man that so hinders his intelligence as the influence of religious tradition. Not only this, but tradition darkens a disciple wherever it works, and one effect and invariable accompaniment of it is specially insubjection to the humbling truth that there is no good thing in man. I do not deny that God can bring everything that is good into the heart. For He gives His Son, and in Him eternal life; He washes the believer in the precious blood of Christ, and gives the Holy Ghost to dwell in him. Neither do I speak of what is the fruit of Divine grace working in man; but I maintain that what comes out of man as such is invariably bad. As to this the disciples were dull of understanding, yet there was not one obscure word in what Christ uttered. Why is it that Divine truth seems and is so difficult to apprehend? Our obstacle chiefly lies, not in the head, but in the heart and conscience. It is not the bright or the powerful intellect that understands the word of God best; it is the man whose purpose of heart is to serve the Lord. Wherever there is a simple-hearted desire to do His will, “he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God.” “If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” It is not, If thine eye be keen or far-seeing, but “If thine eye be single.” (Joh 7:17 ; Mat 6:22 ) What a comfort to a poor soul that is consciously weak, ignorant, foolish, it may be! Such a one, nevertheless, may have a single eye, and consequently see farther, spiritually, than the brightest of men, whose heart is not unreservedly toward the Lord. What in this case hindered singleness of eye? Why were the disciples so undiscerning? Because they did not like to receive such a tremendous sentence on man. They had been accustomed to make conventional differences.

*”Purging” (). A serious italic supplement by the Revisers appears in verse 19, “This He said.” Here is the preliminary question of and , the former undoubtedly carrying much the most weight externally (AB, etc., 1, 69, and some other cursives [followed by Edd.]; , KM and most cursives), if one did not bear in mind how carelessly the best MSS. interchange and , which almost nullifies their suffrages on the point. The strange version of the Revised Version, “Making all meats clean,” seems due to Origen (Comm. in Mat 15:10 ). – K. usually is regarded, if in the neut., as in apposition with the sentence; if in the masculine, as appended in an independent construction, with the gender conformed to , the departure from formal grammar giving the more force to the participle (cf. Moulton’s “Winer,” p. 778, and Blass, 70, 10, on the anacoluthon). Indeed, and are found in some copies, all indicative of the difficulty presented by the construction (B.T.).

The Pharisees and scribes, the great men of Jerusalem, were still of a certain value in their eyes, just as you find the vulgar crowd gaping after the sounding titles of the religious world. How little are the mass of God’s children emancipated from the delusion that there is something in these names that guarantees or presupposes real intelligence! Never was it so, and never less than now. Can you point out a time since Christendom began when there was such a complete giving up of the mind of God in the places of highest pretension? There have been seasons when the world was more hostile and the form of hatred more formidable as far as persecution goes, but never was there an hour when Christendom – ay, Protestant Christendom – had so many swamps of indifference to God’s authority, with here and there a standard of rebellion against the truth of Christ. This may seem strong, no doubt, but I have made the assertion according to God’s word, and, as far as that may go, with a closer study of Christendom in its various phases than many persons. I am not afraid, then, to reassert my conviction that there never has been a display of man’s evil heart of unbelief in the shape of indifference on one side, and, on the other, of enmity against the truth, equal to the present aspect of the age. Even when Christendom mumbled over their devotions, saturated with religious fable, and thoroughly subject to a crafty and ignorant priesthood, the word of God was less known and less slighted than now. The dungeon wall of superstition is partially fallen, the light of God’s testimony has been seen enough to provoke the malice of men. People are energetic enough in these days, but their energy is against the Gospel. It is not so with all, thank God! but the peculiar feature of the present age is that the active aggression is against Scripture, an organized rebellion proceeding from professors in the high seats of human learning. Not only daring individuals here and there attack Scripture, but the nominal teachers and heads of the clergy combine to do it with comparative impunity, as if they were determined to concentrate the whole weight of their personal and official influence. This has a voice for us; if we have understanding of the times, let us take care that we stand firmly, conscientiously, and uncompromisingly, though humbly, on the foundation of Divine truth, caring for nothing else. We shall be counted harsh: this is always the portion of faithfulness. But the name of the Lord is our tower of strength for the last days, as from the beginning. So Paul warns Timothy in his last Epistle, as he looked at the perils of these days (which are still more emphatically true now than they were then); and what is the resource for them? Not tradition, but the written word of God. “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable,” etc. (2Ti 3:16 ) It is not teachers, nor godly men raised up, however precious both may be – nothing but Scripture can be a permanent standard of truth.

As to things that defile, they come out of the man. This is true in all things, and all acts of evil. They invariably spring from within, from the corrupt will of man. Thus, for instance, it is plain that if the law execute the capital sentence on a criminal, it is not murder, but, contrariwise, the vindication of God’s authority in the earth. It is not a question of evil feeling against the culprit, and there is nothing defiling in it. But if you were so much as to injure a man in deed, word, or thought, there you have what defiles. The moment there is that which is a part of your self-will, without God, which comes out of you, and you yielding to it, there is the taint of defilement. “Murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: all these evil things go forth from within and defile the man.” In a word, we have the doctrine most plainly laid down here that man – i.e., man in his present state – is only the source of that which is evil. I require another absolutely perfect One, who is outside me, to be my life, and such a One I have in Christ. If I am a Christian at all Christ is my life, and the business for me thenceforth is to live on and according to that good which I have found in Christ. Therefore, the happy man is he who is always thinking of and delighting himself in Christ. The man, on the contrary, who is striving to find some good in himself is under the error of the disciples before they learnt to bow to the word of the Lord. His light was too bright, too searching, too severe, too unsparing, for the will of the disciples. They did not accept the truth with simplicity, and therefore they found it a hard saying.

Mar 7:24-30 .

Mat 15:21-28 .

We have seen that which cometh out of man, and how defiling it all is. We are now to learn what comes from God, and how full of mercy and goodness this is, delivering those oppressed by the devil. But there was, I am persuaded, a significant previous act in our Lord’s going from the scene where He had rebuked the traditions of earthly religion, and the universal sink of corruption in the heart and its issues, which they but conceal.tid=36#bkm72- The only real remedy is the deliverance of sovereign grace in Christ, who arose from thence and “went into the borders of Tyre and Sidon [those world-renowned monuments of God’s sure judgment], and entered into an house, and would have no man know it; and He could not be hid. But immediately a certain woman, whose little daughter had an unclean spirit, heard of Him, and came and fell at His feet.” What claim had she? Not the smallest. “The woman was a Greektid=36#bkm73- [or Gentile], a Syrophoenician by race.” She was from the fertile stock of Israel’s enemies, the corrupt and idolatrous despisers of the true God. But if Jesus desired an opportunity to show the grace of God above all question of right, desert, or any conceivable plea, save that of utter misery cast on Divine mercy in Him, never was there a more needy suitor. “And she besought Him that He would cast the demon out of her daughter.”

Yet if the faith of the woman was to triumph, none the less was it tried. And I consider that it is morally instructive to observe that the richest grace on the part of Christ does not make the trial of faith less, but more. The soul that is little exercised never cats the kernel of the blessing, never proves the depths that are in God and His grace.

Mark, precise as his Gospel usually is in details, does not give us the particulars of her first appeal to the Saviour as “Son of David,” the propriety of which in Matthew is evident. Neither does our Gospel bring out His unwonted silence, and the disciples’ entreaty, and the firm statement of His mission as minister of the circumcision, for which also we must turn to Matthew.

Nevertheless, even here our Lord does maintain the principle of “the Jew first,” as the simplicity of faith (what is so genuinely intelligent?) in her urges “and also the Gentile.” But there is more. Grace speaks out the whole truth, and strengthens its object to bear it, confess it, and delight in it. So here the Lord adds in verse 27: “It is not right to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs.”tid=36#bkm74- “And she answered and says to him, Yea, Lord: for even the dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs.” She is taught of the Lord to take her true place; but she cleaves with undoubting assurance to the certainty that He will not deny His. She was no better than a dog; but is not God full of bounty and goodness even to the dogs? “And He said unto her, Because of this saying, go thy way: the demon is gone out of thy daughter.” It was the blessed and holy ministry of grace to desperate need.

Mar 7:31-37 .

Mat 15:29-31 .

The scene that follows illustrates still farther the Saviour’s grace, only it is in the ordinary domain of His labours. “And again, departing from the borders of Tyre and Sidon, He came* to the Sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis. And they bring to Him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in speech; and they beseech Him to put His hand upon him.” What a picture of the impotence to which sin has reduced man – inability to hear the Lord’s voice, incapacity to tell Him his need! Such are those whom the Saviour heals among the despised Galileans or anywhere else. “And He took him aside from the crowd, and put His fingers to his ears, and He spat and touched his tongue; and, looking up to heaven, He groaned, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. And immediately his ears were opened, and the band of his tongue was loosed, and he spoke plainly. And He charged them that they should tell no man; but the more He charged them, so much the more abundantly they published it; and were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well: He makes both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak.” It is still the service of love, the heart and the hand of the only perfect Servant. “He has done all things well” was their astonished testimony. May we ever and for all confide in Him! His right hand has not forgotten; His heart is unchanged; He Himself is the “same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever.” (Heb 13:8 ) May we treasure up the look to heaven, the sigh over the earth, the gracious, interested handling of the sufferer, the word of delivering power, the manner and the measure of the cure! Truly “He has done all things well.”

*”Of Tyre and Sidon he came to”: so A with later uncials, almost all cursives (including 1, 69), Syrsin pesch hcl. Revised Version with Edd. have “of Tyre. He came through Sidon,” after BDL, 33, etc., Old Latin, the Syriac of Jerusalem, Memph. AEth. See, further, note tid=36#bkm75- .

NOTES ON Mar 7 .

66 Mar 7:1-23 . – Wernle here asks: “Why does this controversy about clean and unclean, detached from all other controversies, appear amidst stories about meals?” It is a signal instance of Mark’s method, not that of Matthew or Luke, with whom the arrangement is dispensational and moral respectively, of narrating incidents as they actually happened. How could it have anything to do with a device on the Evangelist’s part to connect it, for dramatic effect, as this critic suggests (p. 66), with the interview between Jesus and the heathen woman?

67 Mar 7:3 . – The usage explaining the word may be found in Edersheim, “The Temple, its Ministry,” etc., p. 239.

68 Mar 7:6 . – “Hypocrites.” The strong language of the Lord which enters into the narratives of both Mark and Matthew in other connections matches whatever can be alleged by Burkitt (p. 227 f.) and others of a more exasperating tone in any of the Johannine discourses.

69 Mar 7:13 . – “The word of God.” From the time of the Reformation much has been written as to the connection of this phrase with Scripture, some holding that the two terms are now co-extensive, whilst others maintain the ancient distinction between “the word” as oral and as written. Happily, in this country “the judicious Hooker” wrote, now three hundred years ago, that “we have no word of God but the Scripture.” He opposed the Puritans’ idea that mere reading of Scripture cannot be effectual (“Ecclesiastical Polity,” v. 21, 1, 2).

This standard Anglican writer has expressed himself as follows on the subject of interpretation: “I hold it for a most infallible rule in exposition of sacred Scripture that when a literal construction will stand, the farthest from the letter is commonly the worst” (cf. notes 88, 134). There is, of course, a logical connection between inspiration (note 13) and interpretation.

It is no doubt correct that, as A. B. Davidson has said for the Old Testament (Hastings, vol. iv., p. 127), “the word” stands for the spiritual meaning of the “words” (see Joh 8:43 , and cf. Joh 17:8 , Joh 17:14 ). It is, however, an exaggeration on the part of Farrar (“The Bible,” etc., p. 134 f.; cf. Beet, “Manual of Theology,” p. 65) to represent that “nowhere in the New Testament is the Old Testament called the word of God” – that this phrase is used of Christ alone. That “the word of God” is used in the New Testament chiefly of the contemporary oral word, as in Mar 2:2 (Cf. 2Ti 4:2 ) and Heb 13:7 , is unquestionable. But even if such a passage as Heb 4:12 could be shown not to refer to Scripture, it seems certain that Mar 7:13 distinguishes “the word of God” from aught oral. Cf. “it is written in your law” this last word, we know, applies in the New Testament, not only to the Pentateuch, but to the Psalms (Joh 10:34 ). As for the New Testament, when Timothy was enjoined to “preach the word” (2Ti 4:2 ), this precept was given in close connection with what the Apostle says of the Scriptures (end of chapter 3 – i.e., in the same context), so that the material of the written word can scarcely be excluded from the preaching. Professor Theodor Zahn, in a sermon on Jas 1:16 ff., has said: “When we talk of the word of God, we first think of the Bible, the word of God reduced to writing for His community (Church). But James is not speaking of the Bible. . . . It is possible to honour the Bible, and not to hear thus the voice of God. “

Moreover, God does of course speak to His creatures otherwise than by Scripture. We have, however, to be guided by intimations on the subject (as in the case of the raising up of Cyrus), not by the influence of great names, as Luther (Dorner, “History of Protestant Theology,” p. 244). Note here the extravagance of Zwingli: “He who is born of the Spirit requires a book no longer” (Dorner, i. 290 f.; cf. Barclay’s “Apology for the Quakers”). It is through the word that any are so born, so that it is the vital principle (which needs sustaining), if we listen to Apostles (1Pe 1:23 ); and those not of God are characterised by ears closed to the inspired writers (1Jn 4:6 ).

A further momentous question is the interrelation of the Bible and the Church. And, first, does the Church’s “sanction” impart to the Scriptures their authority? The Church has not formed the Bible, but it was through Christ’s word which we have in the Bible that the Church was “gathered” . . . . . “If the Bible,” writes Fairbairn, “is made to depend on the Church, is it not evident that it is not the Bible conceived as a revelation? What the canonizing process produced was not a revelation, but a book.” And again: “Hebrews was precisely as much inspired, and possessed exactly as much authority, before as after its incorporation in the Canon,” whilst “the continuance of the Spirit is the source of the authority of the word of the living God” (“Christ in Modern Thought,” p. 505 ff.). Dorner had already written that the Bible is itself a revelation, “not merely the record of a revelation previously given” (“History of Protestant Theology,” ii. 128).

Bishop Gore has written that, for his school, “it becomes more and more difficult to believe in the Bible without believing in the Church” (“Lux Mundi,” p. 248; cf. his sermon in 1900 at Westminster Abbey for the British and Foreign Bible Society), which means, doubtless, as Fairbairn puts it, that “as the supremacy of the Bible is weakened, the position of the Church is strengthened.” If men thus tell us that our faith must be rooted in the Church’s testimony, we need only reply by inquiring, How are we to know that “the Church” is to be trusted? Any rejoinder that the Church rests on the authority of the Bible would he manifest reasoning in a circle.

For the views of such as Dr. James Martineau on Scripture as authority, reference might be made to his “Seat of Authority,” book ii., chapter ii. The Deism which passed from this country to Germany, to beget there the Rationalism of the eighteenth century (see Cheyne, “Founders of Criticism”), returned hither in the nineteenth in the form of “Higher Criticism,” now running its course; with such a movement Unitarians naturally are in sympathy. They claim as virtual adherents the German leaders of this unholy cause, who, as their comrades in Great Britain, remain in outward conformity to officially orthodox Churches.

The “critics” at present in vogue find no proper place in their vocabulary for Paul’s “in part” (1Co 13:9 ). With such limitations as they themselves seek to impose, there can be no true progress, no fully scientific because no sufficient accuracy (cf. Sir Wm. Ramsay in the Expositor, December, 1906). Many of them, like souls of old, will not “enter in,” nor allow others to do so who lean upon them.

For Roman Catholic treatment of Tradition, see Schanz, “A Christian Apology,” ii., ch. xi.

70 Mar 7:15 . – The Lord here sets aside Mark 11: 43; so the critics wax bold with such an example! It is as with a Swiss hunter who scales an Alpine crag, his child looking on. Let the latter try the same experiment, and what will be the result? There is as little reasonableness in the one process as the other.

71 Mar 7:18-23 . – Use is made of this passage in Sanday’s “Lectures on Inspiration,” p. 410.

72 Mar 7:24-30 . Wernle (“Sources,” p. 60) speaks of fellow-investigators having “split their heads” over the cause of the Lord’s going into the region of Tyre and returning to the Sea of Galilee by, way of Sidon (see critical note for verse 31), but spares himself by the “simple” suggestion that the Evangelist, with the record of this interview before him, found it convenient to locate the Lord on heathen ground, and did so accordingly! Such is the “critical” intelligence which goes towards the making of a modern professor!

73 Mar 7:26 . – As to the respective use made of Hebrew, of Aramaic, and of Greek at that period, see Schrer, 22 f.

74 Mar 7:27 . – Some, as Pfleiderer, contrast the mainly Jewish outlook of Christ’s ministry with Paul’s “cosmopolitan” view. This can only be rightly understood by reference to Matthew’s Gospel, and such helps as the “Lectures” of W. Kelly upon it. Professor Julius Kaftan is one of the few German writers on the subject whose bearings are satisfactory. The Apostle, as he says in a recent pamphlet, did but follow his Master’s policy, for him, too, it was ever to the Jew first. Moreover, Kaftan points out how, according to the first, especially Jewish, Gospel, one finds the Lord incurring opposition from the hints He threw out of coming Gentile blessing; and Pfleiderer’s extreme form of this antithesis completely breaks down when we reach the light of the third Gospel. It is true that the Lord’s own “mission” was to Israel alone (Mat 15:24 ).

75 Mar 7:31 . – See critical note. W. M. Thomson (“The Land and the Book,” iii. 481) explains as follows: “He went northward, then eastward, and probably crossed the Jordan at Dan, and came through the region east of that river until He reached the shores of the Lake of Tiberias.” Cf. Burkitt, p. 92, and the route map there. The Cambridge professor resists the temptation to follow Wellhausen’s conjectural emendation of Sidon into Bethsaida from supposing that Mark had Saidan before him, which he took for Sidon.

Fuente: William Kelly Major Works (New Testament)

NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Mar 7:1-8

1The Pharisees and some of the scribes gathered around Him when they had come from Jerusalem, 2and had seen that some of His disciples were eating their bread with impure hands, that is, unwashed. 3(For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they carefully wash their hands, thus observing the traditions of the elders; 4and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they cleanse themselves; and there are many other things which they have received in order to observe, such as the washing of cups and pitchers and copper pots.) 5The Pharisees and the scribes asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with impure hands?” 6And He said to them, “Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:

‘This people honors Me with their lips,

But their heart is far away from Me.

7’But in vain do they worship Me,

Teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.’

8Neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men.”

Mar 7:1 “Pharisees” These were the most sincere religionists of their day. Culturally they were the best of the best. Jesus’ conversations with them are recorded often (cf. Mar 7:5-8; Mar 11:27-33; Mar 12:13-17). See fuller note at Mar 2:6.

“some of the scribes. . .had come from Jerusalem” The religious leaders were always following Him to find fault (cf. Mar 3:22; Joh 1:19). They apparently were an official fact-finding committee from the Sanhedrin (see Special Topic at Mar 12:13) of Jerusalem. The Sanhedrin was made up of 70 persons from

1. ruling priestly families (i.e., Sadducees, see Special Topic at Mar 12:18)

2. local religious leaders (i.e., Pharisees)

3. local wealthy land owners

Mar 7:2 “impure hands, that is, unwashed” This was not hygienic, but religious (cf. Mar 7:4). Ceremonial purity was a very serious matter to them (cf. Luk 11:38; Mat 15:2). It was spelled out in specific terms in the Talmud. The controversy was over the Oral Traditions, which interpreted OT texts.

“impure” This is the Greek term koinos, which means “common” or “available to all.” It is the name moderns give to the common Greek of Jesus’ day. The Latin term “vulgate” has the same connotation (i.e., available to all). In this context it refers to that which is ceremonially unclean because of its contact with other unclean things.

Mar 7:3

NASB”unless they carefully wash their hands”

NKJV”unless they wash their hands in a special way”

NRSV”unless they thoroughly wash their hands”

TEV”unless they wash their hands in the proper way”

NJB”without washing their arms as far as the elbow”

There is a Greek manuscript variation in this phrase. The most unusual reading is pugm, which means “fist,” found in the ancient uncial manuscripts A, B, and L, while pukna, meaning “frequently,” is found in , W, and the Vulgate and Peshitta. Some ancient texts just omit the parenthesis of Mar 7:3-4 (i.e., ninth century manuscript 037, known by the Greek capital letter delta, and some Coptic and Syriac translations and the Diatessaron). The UBS4 gives option #1 ans “A” rating (certain).

It is possible that this difficult Greek term reflects a Greek translation of an Aramaic phrase “unless they wash their hands in a (special) jug” (cf. Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, edited by Gerhard Friedrich and Geoffrey W. Broomiley, vol. 6, p. 916). The Pharisees took the OT requirement for priests on duty in the Temple and expanded them to all “true” Jews every day. They were adding to the Law of Moses.

Another option would be to take it as a rabbinical method of washing one’s hands and arms with a closed fist, but this is not substantiated by any written rabbinical tradition, unless it refers to the concept of catching the water poured over the elbows (with the hands down) with an open cupped hand so that it could be rubbed on the elbow again.

The term “wash” (nipt, cf. Mat 15:2) was usually used to refer to washing part of the body and not to a complete bath (i.e., lou, cf. Joh 13:10).

“observing the traditions of the elders” These traditions (cf. Gal 1:14) were codified in the Talmud (i.e., Mishna). There are two editions of these rabbinical traditions. The more complete one is from Babylon Talmud and the unfinished one is from Palestine. The modern study of this literature has been hampered because no one is sure when these discussions were originally spoken or recorded. Two later rabbinical schools of interpretation developed, one conservative (i.e., Shammai) and one liberal (i.e., Hillel). All issues are debated based on these rabbinical discussions. The rabbis would quote their predecessors as authoritative.

Mar 7:4 “unless they cleanse themselves” The Jews expanded the laws relating to the priest entering the tabernacle to include all Jews (cf. Exo 30:19). These regulations relate to ceremonial cleanliness. They had developed over a long period of time by inference and extrapolation from Levitical rules.

There is a Greek manuscript variant in this phrase. Some Greek texts have:

1. aorist middle subjunctive of baptiz (i.e., MSS A, D, W as well as the Vulgate and Syriac translations)

2. present passive indicative of baptiz (i.e., MSS F, L)

3. aorist middle subjunctive of rantiz “to sprinkle” (i.e., MSS , B and the Coptic translation). Most modern translations go with option #1. Early scribes may have inserted #3 because baptiz had become a technical term for Christian baptism.

The UBS4 gives #1 a “B” rating (almost certain).

NASB”and copper pots”

NKJV”copper vessels and couches”

NRSV”bronze kettles”

TEV”copper bowls and beds”

NJB”bronze dishes”

This term “pots” is a Latin term. Mark uses more Latin words than any other NT book. This may reflect its being written in Rome for Romans.

There is a Greek textual variant which adds klinn (i.e., beds or couches) in manuscripts A, D, and W, while P45, , B, and L omit it. Possibly scribes, knowing Leviticus 15, added the phrase, or later scribes, unfamiliar with the OT text, thought it out of place and deleted it. Speculation is interesting, but theologically insignificant.

Mar 7:5 “asked Him” This is an imperfect tense which implies that they asked Him over and over again or else began to ask Him.

“not walk according to the tradition of the elders” This was a serious religious matter for them. There is even a recorded incident in Jewish literature of a rabbi being excommunicated for failure to properly wash his hands. The Talmud, which recorded their rabbinical discussions on how to understand and implement OT texts, had become “the authority.”

Mar 7:6 “‘Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you'” Jesus believed that historically particular OT texts from Isaiah’s day related to this generation of Pharisees seven hundred years later. This shows the relevance of the Scripture to each new generation. God’s truths are affected by culture, but they also transcend time and culture! Jesus quotes Isa 29:13.

“hypocrites” This is a compound from two words “under” and “to judge.” It was a term used to describe actors playing a part behind a mask. Jesus accuses them of over zealousness on some issues, but total depreciation of others (cf. Isa 29:13; Col 2:16-23). It is not by accident that “hypocrites” and hand washing appear together in Psa 26:4; Psa 26:6!

SPECIAL TOPIC: HYPOCRITES

“as it is written” This is perfect tense meaning “it stands written.” This was a standard Jewish idiom for referring to inspired Scripture (cf. Mar 9:12-13; Mar 11:17; Mat 4:4; Mat 4:7; Mat 4:10). The quote is from the Septuagint of Isa 29:13, which describes human self-righteousness. Jesus gives an example of this in Mar 7:9-19 and in the parallel of Mat 15:4-6.

“‘heart'” For the Jews this was the center of mental activity, therefore, the basis of action. They used religious ritual as a means of gaining acceptance with God. Their traditions had become ultimate! This is always a danger with religious people. See Special Topic at Mar 2:6.

“‘is far away'” This means “to hold at a distance.” Religious practices are often used to circumvent total dedication to God. Often religion is a barrier, not a bridge, to God.

Mar 7:7 What a devastating condemnation of religious hypocrisy and formalism.

Mar 7:8 “neglecting” This means “to send away” (i.e., God’s commandment) and is in direct contrast to “hold,” which means “to grab,” “to grasp,” or “to cling to” the traditions.

“the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men” The issue is revelation (OT) versus tradition (Talmud). This is an issue for every person in every culture (or denomination). Religious authority is a crucial issue!

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

unto. Greek pros. App-104.

Pharisees. See App-120.

from = away from. Greek. apo App-104.

Jerusalem. Their head-quarters. Compare Mat 15:1.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

1-23.] DISCOURSE CONCERNING EATING WITH UNWASHED HANDS. Mat 15:1-20. The two reports differ rather more than usual in their additions to what is common, and are not so frequently in verbal agreement where the matter is the same.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

Chapter 7

Then came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem ( Mar 7:1 ).

They came on up from Jerusalem to the area of Galilee.

And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say, with unwashen hands, they found fault. For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders. And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brazen vessels, and of tables ( Mar 7:2-4 ).

I mean, all of the rules concerning ceremonial washing for cleanliness. Now, this is not hygienic; this is ceremonial. And according to the ceremonial washing, and, of course, sometime after this the Mishna was compiled in which all of these rules and regulations were put concerning the washing; it’s interesting that all of the rules that they had concerning the washing of hands, this particular type of washing, it wasn’t that you just go over and wash your hands off. You had to wash your hands a particular way in order to be ceremonial clean. Because you see, if your hands were ceremonial dirty by touching something that someone else had touched who wasn’t clean…say, if I was a Gentile and I had touched a coin and you touched that coin, I was a Gentile unclean, therefore, if you touched the coin that I touched, you would be unclean too, because I’m an unclean Gentile. So, you go to the marketplace and you get your change, and who knows who’s been touching those coins. And so, when you get home and you want to eat, you can’t just go wash your hands hygienically and eat. You’ve got to wash them ceremonially. And to do that, you had to, first of all, get someone to help you out because you had to have what they called a half a log of oil, which is about two eggshells full in the first washing. And what you’d do is, you’d, with your fingers extended upward, you would take your fist and rub it in the one hand as the water was poured over. Rub your fingers together, and then your fist within the hand, and then the other side. And you would hold your hands out this way, because anything that touches you would be unclean. So, the water that you’re washing with becomes unclean because it has touched you. And your hands were unclean, you see, ceremonially. So, you hold them out like this so that the water drips off the wrist, because you don’t want that water to drip on you. Because any part it would hit, that would be unclean too and you’d have to go through another bath. So, you hold it out like this and let the water drip on down. Then, because the water that was used is now unclean, and that which is dripping off is unclean, then you would have to hold your hands downward and out from you, and they would pour another half log of water over your hands as you’re holding them down and let it run off the fingers. And this is the way that if you didn’t wash that way, and you would eat without going through this, they would do it several times during a meal. You know, go through this whole ceremonial bit of washing their hands.

Now, they also had these pots that you don’t know what may have touched the pots. Some little fly may have landed on the pot that had landed on a Gentile’s shoulder or something. And so, they would also go through the process of washing the pot on the outside. However, if when the pot was open, a fly would happen to land on the inside, that was it. You had to break the thing in pieces and not leave a piece large enough to take oil to anoint your little toe. In other words, it had to really be shattered, because it was unclean. And there were a lot of rules like this. If it was brass or metal, then there was a ceremonial washing for that, and you could use that over. Or dishes, if they were just flat, then they would be all right. But if there were any rim on the dish and it became unclean, then you had to break it completely. You couldn’t use it again. And all of these rules were codified in the Mishna of these washings, the traditions of the elders.

Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands? [they’re eating bread without washing their hands] He answered and said unto them, Well hath Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men ( Mar 7:5-7 ).

It is interesting how easily the traditions of man can become the dogmas and the doctrines of the church. Things that are just traditions. I think that traditions are probably the hardest thing a person has to deal with as far as being free. We are bound by traditions. Traditions have a greater hold on a person than almost anything else. These traditions are deeply ingrained in us. But if you really go back to study the background of the traditions, you’ll find that many times they have no biblical base at all. But oftentimes, traditions are based in paganism. And yet, because they have been practiced so long in church, they become the dogma of the church, and finally the doctrines of the church.

Take Halloween, the tradition of “trick and treat.” The children dressing up as witches and goblins and going around. Now, which one of you loving parents wants to deny your sweet little child the privilege of dressing up like a witch or a ghost or a goblin? That they might take their sack around to the neighbors and munch sweets off of them. Extort them, actually, because the idea is, if you don’t come through we’re going to soap your windows. It’s extortion! And yet, it’s tradition! Of course, when I was a kid, there were no treats. It was just tricks. Or if there were treats, I didn’t hear about it. But, really, as you look at the whole practice, it’s quite wrong. In fact, it’s extremely dangerous, because there are so many stupid people in this world, that there are those who get some kind of a kick out of lacing the goodies with razor blades or poison, or things of that nature. And every Halloween, children inadvertently are picking up harmful things, and many of them injured as the result of this. And yet, parents aid and abet them in their extortion plots, as they take them through the neighborhoods. You know, treat or else! But it’s tradition. We can see so many flaws and wrong aspects to it, and yet, which one of you have enough guts to say to your kid, “No, you’re not going to go out this year?” It’s interesting just how deeply ingrained traditions become.

Now within the church so many traditions have developed. And unfortunately, in the church the same things are being done which Jesus accused the Pharisees of doing. And that is, teaching for doctrines the traditions of man. There are many doctrines of the church that have not a scriptural base, but have only a traditional base. The doctrine of infant baptism for salvation: you will not find one scriptural base for that doctrine. It’s the traditions of men. And yet, it is held too tightly by many, many churches as solid church doctrine. But, it’s doctrine based upon tradition, not the foundation of the word. And, that’s just one of many. For He said,

For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. And he said unto them, Full well ye reject [you actually are rejecting] the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition ( Mar 7:8-9 ).

You’re putting your traditions above the commandments of God.

For Moses said, Honor thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth [his] father or mother, let him die the death: But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free. And ye suffer [allow] him no more to do ought for his father or his mother [or, he can do what he wants] ( Mar 7:10-12 );

Now, if you would curse your father and mother under the Jewish law, you’d be stoned. You’re to honor your father and mother. “And whosoever should curse his father and mother should be put to death.” But, they developed this tradition. You say, “Now, Dad, this is Corban. I’m going to give you a gift. You are a dirty rotten louse, and I hate you and I’ve always hated you. Now, this is for your good, Dad. This is a gift for you.” As long as you preface it, “This is a gift; this is corban, that you might be benefited by this,” then you can go ahead and say whatever you wanted. That was their tradition by which they circumvented the law of God. You were actually to provide for your parents. But you say, “Well, it’s Corban. I’ve given that to God; you can’t have that.” And you could actually wipe out any obligation you had to a person by saying, “Anything I owe you is Corban. That is, it’s dedicated to God, and therefore you can’t have it.” And by these traditions, they were actually negating the law of God.

Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye ( Mar 7:13 ).

You hypocrites, He said.

And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them, Hearken unto me ( Mar 7:14 )

And now He says probably one of the most radical things He has said up to this point. Now, Jesus said an awful lot of radical things in His life. But up to this point, this is probably the most radical thing that He said. And you have to understand the background in which it was said, that is, of the people. Under the Mosaic law, there were certain meats that they were forbidden to eat, one of those being swine, or pig. Under the law it was forbidden. It was considered unclean; it was forbidden. Now, during the time of Antiocus Zepiphanes, that Syrian king who had conquered Israel and sought to just profane and blaspheme these people, he ordered that they, all of them, eat pork. It was a commandment of Antiocus Zepiphanes, and if they would not eat pork, they would be put to death. And hundreds of Jews died rather than to eat pork, thousands of them, during the time of the Macabeans. Thousands of them died rather than to violate the law and eat pork. Now Jesus is going to say something extremely radical with this kind of a background.

Hearken unto me ( Mar 7:14 )

He’s talking to the crowd now. He’s been talking to the Pharisees, telling them about how they’ve disannulled the law of God by their traditions and now he’s calling the crowd to hearken to Him. And this radical statement,

There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear ( Mar 7:15-16 ).

It’s not what goes into a man’s mouth that defiles him; pork, whatever. Now, this was a radical departure from their traditions. In fact, when He came into the house away from the people, His disciples said, “Lord, explain that one to us.”

And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him; Because it entereth not into his heart, but [only] into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats? ( Mar 7:18-19 )

Now, the meats are all purged out of your body; they don’t defile you in a spiritual sense. And of course, we’re talking about ceremonial washing. The meat that you eat doesn’t defile you. Now, it can make you sick or it can do things, but spiritually it doesn’t defile you. There’s no spiritual defilement in it, because it passes through your body.

And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that [is what] defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man ( Mar 7:20-23 ).

So, it’s not what goes in, but what comes out. And that reveals what is in the man’s heart. And there’s where the true spiritual defilement or purity exists in the heart. “Blessed are the pure in heart; they shall see God.” That’s where real spiritual defilement is; not in what you are eating, but what you are, the inward part of your life, what’s in your heart. Not what’s in your belly that counts.

And from thence he arose ( Mar 7:24 ),

Now He’s at the area around Genesarret, there at the Sea of Galilee.

and went into the borders of Tyre and Sidon ( Mar 7:24 ),

Tyre and Sidon, of course, are over on the coast. You’ve been reading about them quite a bit of late. Tyre is about thirty-five miles from Capernaum in the northeasterly direction. And of course, about twenty-five miles further up the road is Sidon. And Jesus left the area of the Galilee now and is going over actually into the Gentile territory.

and [he] entered into a house, and would have no one know it [he wanted to do it secretly]: but he could not be hid. For [there was] a certain woman, whose young daughter had an unclean spirit, heard of him, and came and fell at his feet: the woman was a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician by nation; and she besought [begged] him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter. But Jesus said unto her, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet [right] to take the children’s bread, and cast it unto the dogs ( Mar 7:24-27 ).

Now, at this point, many people are offended with Jesus. Here is a woman, a mother, who is in real trouble. She’s got a daughter that’s got big problems; her daughter is possessed by an unclean spirit. And this mother, out of desperation, is coming to Jesus for help. But because she is a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician, Jesus makes reference to her as a dog. Now, there were there wild scavenger dogs that were hated by everybody. They would run in packs; they would attack sheep, they would attack children. And they were ferocious, vicious, hated animals. And it was very common for the Jews to call the Gentile Gentile dogs. And the word is equivalent to our English word bitch where it is a derogatory term. And so, they would use it, the word dog like a person would use the other word today, in a very derisive, derogatory way. And to think that Jesus would make reference to this woman like that is very unsettling, if He did. But He didn’t. There is another Greek word for dog, which is the word that Jesus used. It is that little household pet that’s always under the table, that little pet of the family. And most of the Jewish homes had their little pet dogs, which were domesticated and lovable little animals under the table. And when Jesus said, “It isn’t right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs,” He used this Greek word that could be translated, “It isn’t right to take the children’s bread and to throw it to the little puppies, these cute little dogs under that table.”

And she answered and said unto him, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs [those little puppies] under the table eat of the children’s crumbs ( Mar 7:28 ).

Now, in those days they did not have knives and forks and spoons. They did not have eating utensils. They didn’t even use chopsticks. They used the utensils that God first created for man to eat with. They used their hands. And the eating was an interesting process. Always bread. And usually you would break your bread, pull it off and then dip it in the soup or in the sauces or in whatever. And you’d use your bread oftentimes as sort of a spoon. And when we’re over there, we usually go out for what they call an oriental meal, but it’s more of an Arabic type of a meal, where they serve you the pita bread and all of these sauces. And you break the thing and you do your dipping and all, and you have all these exotic kind of salsas and everything else to eat with your pita bread. But they use their hands; they use their fingers. Now, of course, by the time you’re through eating, you’ve got the grease and everything else all over your hands. So, the final piece of bread, you would take it and use it to wipe off as a napkin. You’d use it to wipe off your hands. And then, you’d toss it under the table to the little dog down there waiting, standing up and “woof, woof.” You stand up and you drop him this final piece of bread that had all these delicious juices on it. And the dogs would eat these crumbs or these pieces of bread that would be used to wipe off the hands from the master’s table.

So, to understand it from its cultural background, it’s not nearly as severe as it would just appear on the surface to us. Here’s this woman, she’s a Greek, and she’s outside of the covenant. Jesus said, “I’m not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But here’s this woman from outside of the covenant race, and she’s coming to Jesus and she’s saying, “Lord, help me! My daughter is at home and she’s vexed with an unclean spirit.” Jesus said, “It’s not right to take the children’s bread and to cast it to the little puppies.” That is, the bread that they’re supposed to be eating. “No, that’s true, Lord. But those little puppies, they get the crumbs at the end, those that fall from the master’s table.” And Jesus said, “Ah, for this saying…” and another gospel said, “Oh, woman, great is thy faith.”

For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter. And when she was come to her house, she found the devil [was] gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed. And again, departing from the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, he came unto the sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis ( Mar 7:29-31 ).

So actually, He made a round about journey going north before coming south.

And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him. And he took him aside from the multitude, and he put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue; and looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain. And he charged them that they should tell no man: but the more he charged them, so much the more a great deal they published it; And [they] were beyond measure and astonished, saying, He hath done all [of these] things well: he maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak ( Mar 7:32-37 ).

Now, here we find again an interesting method that Jesus is using: spitting, putting His fingers in the guy’s ears because he’s deaf and then spitting and putting it on his tongue. The interesting thing about Jesus is that He did not follow a pattern.

We seem to be so organized; we want everything to work by patterns. We’re always looking for the secret formula. We’re always trying to find that method. And we’re seeking to develop within the church methodologies, “This is the method by which the work of God is wrought.” No, there is no method by which the work of God is wrought. God works in many different ways and refuses to be confined to any pattern, because God doesn’t want us to develop methodology. So, the Lord has chosen to work as He pleases to work, and often times in different ways. Now, we are told in Corinthians, “Now there are diversities of gifts that is of the Holy Spirit, and there are also diversities of operations.” So that God may give to ten people a gift of the word of knowledge, but it works in a different way in all ten. Because there are diversities of operations, even of the diversities of gifts. God refuses to be patterned or pigeonholed. God always allows Himself that freedom of working in a unique way, however He sees fit. And so, it is wrong for us to try to find some method, some secret formula whereby we might see the power of God working in a particular way.

There was a time in my own ministry when I was seeking the Lord, as He said, “Covet earnestly the best gifts.” And I was seeking the Lord for the gifts of healing. We were living in Tucson, and I was diligently seeking the Lord. I wanted all that God had for me. There were so many sick people in Tucson; it’s one of those places where people from the East who have asthma or arthritis or whatever, they go to Tucson because of the climate and the low humidity and so forth…a lot of sick people. And we had to minister to a lot of sick people. And so, I was just thinking, “Lord, it would just be so great if I just had the gift of healing.” And, so oftentimes, in our services we would pray for the sick. And one evening we had a lady who was…we had set up a tent and we were having a tent meeting out in the area of Twenty-second and Craycroft, under Davis Motham. And this one lady came to the tent, and she was blind in her left eye. And so her friends brought her that she might be prayed for to be healed. And so I laid hands on her to pray that God would heal the blindness in her left eye. And as I prayed, when I said, “In the name of Jesus,” I felt a sensation. And that’s the best I can say, just a sensation in my left hand. And when I took my hand off and the lady looked, to my surprise, she said, “I can see! I can see! Praise the Lord, I can see!” And, you know, it was exciting. She went around and told the whole neighborhood that she could see. And of course, they all knew she was blind and she proved it; she’d cover her right eye and read things with her left eye. And her eye was healed. I can’t explain it; I was surprised. And pleasantly so, but nonetheless, surprised. She started bringing a lot of people with different ailments to be prayed for. And I was trying to remember, “Now, just how did I do it? And what did I say?” I was looking for the magic formula. And I’d put my hand on and I’d say, “In the name of Jesus,” and wouldn’t feel anything. “IN THE NAME OF JESUS!” It’s got to be somewhere in there. But it’s interesting how we’re always trying to find that formula. God doesn’t work by formulas; He works by His sovereign grace. You can’t pattern God. And so, Jesus didn’t follow the same methods; He used different methods.

Now, one further thing: He would tell people, “Now, don’t tell anybody.” But they’d go out and blow it anyhow. Why was Jesus saying, “Don’t tell anyone”? Jesus was seeking to forestall any premature attempt by the people excited over the miracles seeking to acclaim Him and set Him up as the Messiah. There was a special day God had before ordained that the Messiah should be revealed to the people. When Jesus was in Cana of Galilee at the beginning of His ministry, and they were at this wedding feast and they had run out of wine, His mother came to Him and said, “Son, they’ve run out of wine.” He said, “What’s that to Me? It’s not My problem.” He said, “My hour has not yet come. Don’t rush things, Mom. My hour is not yet come.” Jesus was constantly looking forward to that hour in which He was to be presented as the Messiah. And over and over again we hear Him saying, “My hour is not yet come.” So, He would say, “Look, keep it quiet; don’t tell anybody.” Because there was an attempt, prematurely, to acclaim Him as the Messiah.

After the feeding of the multitudes, they said, “Wow! It’s got to be Him. Who else can feed them like that? The Messiah, the Kingdom Age is here. Look, He can take a few loaves of bread and feed everybody.” And they were going to, by force, push Him into the position of the Messiah. And He passed through their midst; He disappeared from them. God had promised a day. In the Psalms He declared, “This is the day that the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.” The day that the Messiah would be revealed. And so, Jesus was seeking to stop any movement by the people to prematurely go ahead of God’s plan, to seek to establish Him as the Messiah. So, that is why He would say, “Go thy way; don’t tell anybody.” But, you know, when God has done something like that, how can you be quiet about it? And so the more He seemed to try and stop them, the more they published it. And people were amazed because He was able to open up the ears of the deaf and to loosen the tongues of the dumb. The marvelous work of our Lord.

We’ll continue in chapter 8 of next week, as we get the feeding of the four thousand and a similar miracle to that of the feeding of the five. Dr. J. Vernon McGee has a little commentary entitled “Marching Through Mark.” I think we better write one, “Crawling Through Mark.” But, it’s all the word of God, and it’s all good for us.

May the Lord be with you and bless you through the week. May the word of Christ dwell in your heart richly through faith. And may God help you to take the time to pray, more time in prayer this week. Make it a covenant in your heart before the Lord just to spend more valuable time with Him. Even if it means turning off the TV, as horrible as that many sound. And may God just draw you close to Himself, fill you with His love, with His Spirit, strengthen you by His Spirit in your inner man. And out of your heart may there proceed praises, blessings unto the Lord our God. Oh, may God richly bless you this week as you walk with Him in close communion. In Jesus’ name. “

Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary

Mar 7:1-5. – – ( -) , …) The construction of the language is pendent: from not observing which, some inserted after . But the whole period, extended by the parenthesis, is sustained by the verb . For the verb is either repeated at the end of the parenthesis, Act 2:8; Act 2:11; 1Co 8:1-4; Jdg 9:16; Jdg 9:19; 2Sa 21:2-4; 1Ki 8:41-42; or it is then in fine [and not till then] set down, as in this passage, and Eph 3:1; Eph 3:14, and the connection is marked by the particles , , , and in this passage by .[49] Very similar is the section of Gregory Thaumaturgus, which we shall give in a more contracted form than the original: , ( , , …) , , . See Paneg. on Orig., p. 70, etc., ed. Stutgard.-[ , from Jerusalem) The Passover had been celebrated there.-V. g.]

[49] BDL Vulg. abc Syr. Memph. read in Mar 7:5, instead of . A supports the , with Rec. Text.-ED. and TRANSL.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

Mar 7:1-13

7. JESUS ATTACKED BY THE

PHARISEES AND SCRIBES

Mar 7:1-13

(Mat 15:1-9)

1 And there are gathered together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, who had come from Jerusalem,–Mark gives a glimpse of the organized opposition against Jesus. Between the events of this and the preceding chapter were Christ’s discourse at Capernaum (Joh 6:22-71), and the third Passover of his public ministry, which he did not attend (Joh 6:4; Joh 7:1). Disappointed in not seeing Jesus at the Passover (Joh 6:4; Joh 7:1), they probably came to Galilee to watch his movements and to conspire against him. These Pharisees and scribes were sent, doubtless by the authorities in Jerusalem, to counteract the widespread influence of Jesus in Galilee. No doubt the shrewdest and most able were sent. Sent from the seat of learning and authority, able and shrewd, and they were considered better prepared to meet Jesus than the ones who resided in Galilee.

2 and had seen that some of his disciples ate their bread with defiled, that is, unwashen, hands.–These Pharisees and scribes, watching for an opportunity to attack Jesus, found it in the fact “that some of his disciples ate their bread with defiled hands.” Mark explains that “defiled” hands are “unwashen” hands.

3 For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands diligently,–That is, frequently–often–carefully and up to the elbow.

eat not, holding the tradition–What had been handed down, not what was delivered by writing in the law of Moses, but what had been communicated from father to son, as being proper and binding.

of the elders;–The ancients, not the old men then living, but those who had lived formerly. This parenthetic clause is an explanation of the practices of “the Pharisees, and all the Jews,” in regard to the customs mentioned, in this and next verse. “All the Jews” is a comparative expression, meaning not literally every one of them, but the most of them; for a few were Sadducees, who rejected the tradition. The Jews claim there are two laws–the written law of Moses written in the Bible and the oral law, tradition handed down, they claim, from Moses through Aaron and his sons, the elders of that time, Joshua, and the prophets–from generation to generation successively. They claim that when God gave Moses the written law, he gave him also the tradition, or oral law, as an explanation of the written law. This explanation of the written law is “the tradition of the elders” handed down. They attached more importance to the tradition than to the law itself, or, human nature-like, to their interpretations of the scriptures than to the scriptures themselves. A digest of the tradition is called the “Mishua”;comments upon and explanations of the Mishua is the “Talmud.” Thus the Mishua explains the law and the Talmud explains the Mishua.

4 and when they come from the marketplace,–Where provisions are sold. A broad place or square in the city of public resort, with the market on one side and colonnades on the other. To this place people resorted for different purposes. Here children met to play (Mat 11:16-17); laborers to seek work (Mat 20:1-7);the sick, to be healed (Mar 6:56);and philosophers, to discuss grave and great questions. In the marketplace in Athens, Paul discussed the resurrection with the Epicureans and Stoic philosophers. (Act 17:17-18.) The Pharisees loved the “salutations in the marketplaces.” (Mar 12:38.) There at Philippi, Paul and Silas were dragged before the magistrates. (Act 16:19.)

except they bathe themselves, they eat not;–Except they immerse themselves. The word “bathe” is from the Greek “baptizo.” Hence the idea of dipping or immersing themselves, thus taking a bath before eating. While in the marketplace, the whole body was in danger of being defiled by coming in contact with all classes, hence the necessity of immersing the whole body in water.

and many other things there are, which they have received to hold,–Many other like usages which the Pharisees had “received” by tradition “to hold,” to adhere to and practice.

washings of cups,–In the original the baptisms of cups. Drinking vessels–those used at their meals.

and pots,–Vessels made of wood, used to hold liquids, etc., had to be washed–immersed.

and brasen vessels.–Vessels made of brass, used in cooking or otherwise, if much polluted, were commonly passed through the fire; if only slightly polluted, they were washed. The religious practices of the Jews in question are named. The law of uncleanness is plainly stated in the law of Moses, but these practices of the Jews were not parts of that law; they were traditions, extensions of the law by human wisdom and authority, “doctrines” and “the precepts of men.” (Mat 15:9.) Washing the hands, different vessels, and tables in order to cleanse them of dirt was not peculiar to the Jews. Others did that then and do it now. And this was not the practice Jesus condemned. He condemns all kinds of filthiness. However free from dirt their hands, vessels, tables, and they themselves ceremonially unclean, they performed these acts, nevertheless; they performed them as religious service, or ceremonies, or rites. This was the thing Jesus condemned. The law required the unclean to bathe themselves (Lev 14:9-15; Lev 16:24-28; Lev 17:15; Num 19:7-8; Num 19:19), but the Pharisees by their theories had added to the word of God and were punctilious in performing ceremonies which the law did not require. Let us beware “of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.” (Luk 12:1.) By our own theories, “logical deductions.” and traditions, it is possible for us to become pharisaical.

5 And the Pharisees and the scribes ask him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders,–They do not directly charge Jesus, but his disciples. They relied upon the authority of their tradition for the charge. Not to live according to it was to “transgress” it. (Mat 15:2.)

but eat their bread with defiled hands?–Without washing their hands before eating. The traditionary practices just mentioned, and the fact that the disciples were seen to eat with unwashed hands, gave rise to the discussion which now follows.

6 And he said unto them, Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites,–Jesus selects as a proof text Isa 29:13. He gave the sense, not the exact language. He applies the text to them. Their false doctrine and practice were foretold by the prophet, but they did not seem to realize it. This is the first time Jesus addressed them openly as hypocrites.

as it is written, This people honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.–In motive and purpose. The motive and purpose, as well as the words, must be pure. Their hearts were not right.

7 But in vain do they worship me,–Emptiness is all you give me in your worship. He gives the reason in the next clause.

teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men.–The precepts of men were the doctrine they taught. “Doctrines” refer to those things taught as binding upon the conscience, as obligatory. Jesus applies it to the Pharisees and scribes as religious teachers.

8 Ye leave the commandment of God,–Set the pure word of God on the sidetrack–neglecting and disregarding the commandment of God.

and hold fast the tradition of men.–They neglected the commandment of God and clung to the traditions of men. In this they preferred man to God. They set God aside –they dethroned him and gave man his seat. A severe charge indeed.

9 And he said unto them, Full well do ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your tradition.–They could not do both, so in order to keep their tradition they rejected the commandment of God. Note that Jesus did not deny the charge they brought against his disciples but virtually acknowledged its truth. He came down from heaven, not to do his own will, but the will of God who sent him (Joh 6:38), and not, therefore, “the tradition of the elders.” “The precepts of men” are no part of the will of God. Jesus did not keep them, because they were not commandments of God. In reply to this accusation, Jesus attacked tradition itself and charged his accusers with three things: (1) hypocrisy, because they pretended to honor God with their lips when their hearts were far from him; (2) worshiping God in vain, because they taught “as their doctrines the precepts of men”; (3) rejecting the commandments of God in order to keep their tradition. He applied the declaration of Isaiah (29:13) to them: “And their fear of me is a commandment of men which bath been taught them.”

10 For–Jesus introduces an example where the scribes and Pharisees set aside God’s law for their tradition to prove his charge against them.

Moses said,–In Exo 20:12. Jesus here gives his sanction of the decalogue as of divine origin and Moses as an inspired teacher and lawgiver. God gave the law through Moses.

Honor thy father and thy mother;–In every way–in word, deed and thought and by providing for them in old age or during distress.

and, He that speaketh evil of father or mother, let him die the death:–“Or, surely die.” Let him end with death. A severe penalty indeed and shows the importance of honoring father and mother.

11 but ye say,–By your tradition and your practice in opposition to what Moses says. He arrays Moses against themselves.

If a man shall say to his father or his mother, That wherewith thou mightest have been profited by me is Corban, that is to say, Given to God;–A gift–something brought near, or devoted to God, as a gift, offering or sacrifice. It was applied to all offerings whether with or without blood, and especially in fulfillment of a vow. (Lev 1:2; Lev 1:10; Lev 1:14; Lev 2:1; Lev 2:4; Lev 7:13 Num 31:50.) According to the Mosaic law, persons could devote certain things to God with certain limitations. (Lev 27:2-33; Num 30:2-15; Deu 23:21-22; Jdg 13:7.) To these regulations were added those of tradition by the scribes and Pharisees. And so far was it carried that even the pronouncing of the word “Corban” over one’s property absolved him from the obligation of caring for his parents. And even if this was done in the excitement of anger, it was held to be binding.

12 ye no longer suffer him to do aught for his father or his mother;–This was the result of setting aside the commandment of God and doing the tradition of men. God said to care for father and mother, but tradition would not allow it. You allow the children to do as they desire. Such an exposure as this should have made them ashamed of so wicked a practice.

13 making void the word of God by your tradition, which ye have delivered:–The tradition had been handed down and by their practice had annulled the word of God. Jesus returns in his argument to the charge made in verse 8, which he had sustained. Jesus shows the Pharisees and scribes by an example that they had rejected the commandment of God for their tradition. The example does not touch the uncleanness, but is against tradition, and is the stronger because it proves that tradition is not only without authority, but sets aside the command and authority of God. To honor father and mother is to give them the attention, care, and support necessary in their old age or affliction. God teaches that children who have widowed mothers and grandmothers should “learn first to show piety towards their own family, and to requite their parents”; that this service is acceptable in his sight; and that all who refuse to render it deny the faith and are worse than unbelievers. (1Ti 5:4-8.) One of the most general and popular evils of the day is neglect of the old, disregard for parents, and throwing off home duties and restraints. This is not taught at home, in school, or from the pulpit as it should be. Another popular evil of the day, and one that is growing more prevalent, is the neglect of the aged by both church and the business part of the world. The old preachers and the aged laborers who bore the heat and burden of the day in building up the churches and business enterprises are “laid on the shelf” without any means of support and their places given to the young. No nation can hope to prosper as long as it suffers such injustice to its aged. God emphasizes the duty of learning this kind of piety first. To honor father and mother is “the first commandment with promise,” and the promise is great–“that it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth.” (Eph 6:1-3.) Nothing can take the place of this, and it cannot be set aside for anything else. To pretend to be Christians while neglecting these home duties is to be pharisaical and worse than infidels. There is such a thing as being worse than an infidel, and this is it. There is too much self-denial, hard work, and homekeeping in Christianity to suit the Pharisees of the present or any other age.

and many such like things ye do.–After giving the above example, Jesus here made the application. Not only this one, but “many others” on the same order are practiced by you.

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

In strong and clear language the Master denounced tradition as contrary to the commandment of God.

1. Things from without do not defile, and therefore are not sin. Temptation is not sin.

2. Only that is sin which comes from within, which is the deliberate outcome of the determining will of man.

3. Such determinings are the sources of defilement.

4. The list of evil things which the Master gives includes every possible form of evil, and these defile a man when they proceed from him in acts.

5. Such acts are committed only by the will of man.

The story of this woman is full of beauty. Hers was the faith that recognized the importance of Jesus’ dictum that the children should first be fed, and consented to abide in His household as only a dog if she might have the crumbs of His table. His was the giving which recognized that her submission to divine arrangement and faith in the love of God raised her at once into the true sphere of blessing. She was spiritually, and therefore most truly, a daughter of the covenant.

The story of the healing of the deaf man is an instance of our Lord’s freedom from any stereotyped method. Could we but understand all the facts of the man’s condition, and all that the Master wished to do for him, we would see the necessity for every step in the process.

Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible

DISPUTE WITH THE PHARISEES ABOUT EATING WITH UNWASHED HANDS

7:1-23. Certain Scribes and Pharisees from Jerusalem, seeing the disciples eating with unwashed hands, complain of the violation of tradition. Jesus denies the force of tradition, and the possibility of material defilement of the spirit.

This dispute is occasioned by the disregard of the disciples for the ceremonial law about eating with unwashed hands. But the Pharisees, who make the attack, signalize it by complaining of this unconventional act as a violation of the tradition of the fathers. And Jesus answer is at first directed towards this feature of their complaint. It is a case, he says, of the commandments of men versus the commandments of God, of tradition against law. They even set aside the law of God, in order to keep their tradition. But then, taking up the more immediate question of unwashed hands, Jesus strikes at the root not only of traditionalism, but of ceremonialism, saying that it was not what a man took into his stomach, but what came out of his heart, that defiled him. And this, Mk. says, had the effect of cleansing all foods. And of course, as the distinction between clean and unclean belonged not to tradition, but to the written law, this made a breach in the law itself. It released men from the obligation of a part of the law said to have been given by God to Moses. And it affirmed the distinction between outward and inward in religion. It was no wonder that Jesus fate hastened to its end, and that the next record of him marks practically the end of his Galilean ministry.

1. -there gather together to him the Pharisees.1 The distinction made between the Pharisees and certain of the Scribes would seem to mean that the Scribes were not so well represented.

This renewed activity of the Scribes and Pharisees against Jesus is another indication that there was a Passover at some time just before this, at which either the presence of Jesus himself, or the reports brought from Galilee, drew fresh attention to him. It would not be enough of itself, but it adds to the strength of other indications of the same thing. See on 6:39.

2. , , -omit -with this omission it reads, they gather to him, having come from Jerusalem, and having seen that certain of his disciples are eating with common hands, that is, unwashed.

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. RV. BL 33 (Memph. Pesh.). Omit , found fault, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. ABEGHLVX one ms. Lat. Vet. Memph.

-literally, common. In the Greek, it denotes simply what is common to several people, as common property. It is only in later Greek, that it comes to denote what is ordinary, or vulgar, or profane, as distinguished from select or sacred things. Under this general head, it comes to mean ceremonially unclean. The Pharisees did not seek by these washings to remove dirt, but the defilement produced by contact with profane things.

3. -The Pharisees and all the Jews. This custom had become general among the Jews, though it originated with the Pharisees. -this means with the fist. But the awkwardness of the process has led to doubt from the very first, whether this is the meaning intended. But the doubt has not led to the substitution of any justifiable alternative rendering. The meanings, up to the wrist, or elbow, RV.marg. are both linguistically and grammatically disallowed. With a fist full of water needs too much read between the lines, and, besides, the word denotes the closed fist. Finally, frequently, or diligently, RV., was probably taken in the first instance, in the Lat. Vet. and Syrr., from the reading . The supposition that had come to have this figurative meaning, seems forced, and besides, there is no warrant for it in actual usage. Edersheim quotes from the Jewish ordinance the provision that the hands should be held up in order that the water might run down to the wrist, and says that the provision that washing should be performed with the fist is not found in the Jewish law. This is, of course, a serious consideration, but does not seem to compare in importance with the other fact, that the Greek word does not mean this, nor the Greek case. The custom was not necessarily a part of the law, and may have been merely a usage arising from a desire for scrupulous observance. The very fact that the reading occasions this difficulty, makes the strong external evidence for that reading still more convincing, and with this reading the only translation possible seems to be with the fist.

, Tisch. mss. Lat. Vet. Vulg. Syrr.

-the tradition. It is the Greek etymological equivalent of tradition, and denotes what is passed along from one to another, and among the Jews, the body of Rabbinical interpretation of the written law, preserved by oral transmission from one generation to another. The word occurs in the Gospels only in this account and in the parallel passage in Mt. In attacking this, Jesus was assailing the very citadel of the Judaism of his time.1

-the elders. The word is used here in the sense of fathers, or ancestors.

4. -unless they bathe, Amer. Rev. The contrast between this and the preceding case is indicated by the , from the market place. These words are put first, in order to indicate that this is a special case, inasmuch as in the market place they would contract special defilement, owing to its being a place of public resort, where they would meet all sorts and conditions of men. This case would require special treatment, denoted by the difference between . , and , they wash their hands, and they wash themselves all over. This case required the washing of the whole body. For instances of such washings, see Lev 14:8, Lev 14:9, Lev 14:15:5, Lev 14:6, Lev 14:8, Lev 14:10, Lev 14:11, Lev 14:13, Lev 14:16, Lev 14:21, Lev 14:22, Lev 14:27, Lev 14:16:4, Lev 14:24, Lev 14:26, Lev 14:22:6. Moreover, Edersheim says that immersion of the things washed was the Jewish ritual provided in such cases. Dr. Morison contends that sprinkling was the ritual method provided in such cases, and attempts to overthrow the plain meaning of the word by the supposed custom. But he does not prove the custom, only the supposed impossibility of wholesale bathing. Moreover, the contrast would be a very lame one in that case, since the custom required careful washing of the hands, and so an actual removal of defilement, but in the case of extreme defilement, only a sprinkling of the body for forms sake is supposed. And his argument, that words constantly undergo such changes, amounts to nothing, as it is unaccompanied by proof that this word has gone through the process of change.

WH. non marg. RV.marg. , sprinkle, instead of , with B 40, 53, 71, 86, 237, 240, 244, 259. A manifest emendation.

-the counterpart of , denoting the process of receiving a thing by transmission, as the latter does its giving. . . -cups, and wooden vessels, and brazen vessels. . ,-and of beds, is omitted.1 Edersheim shows that the Jewish ordinance required immersions, , of these vessels.

Omit , Tisch. WH. RV. BL 102, Memph.

5. -and they question. -walk; the figurative use of this word to denote manner of life, conduct, is Hebraistic.

, instead of , then, before , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BDL 1, 33, 209, Latt. Pesh. Memph.

-with unclean hands.

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. B 1, 28, 33, 118, 209, mss. Lat. Vet. Memph.

6. -well; i.e., in this case, truly. -the hypocrites. This is the only passage in Mk. in which this word occurs. It means properly a play-actor, and hence a person who is playing a part in life, whose real character is not represented by what men see. This secondary meaning belongs to Biblical Greek.

Omit , answering, at the beginning of this verse, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BL 33, 102, Memph. Pesh. Omit before , Tisch. (Treg.) WH. BL 33, 102, most mss. Lat. Vet. Vulg. Pesh. , instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. B* DL 1, 13, 33, 124, 346.

-literally, as it has been written, that this people.

Insert before , Tisch. WH. BL Pesh.

This quotation is from Isa 29:13, and conforms for the most part to the LXX., which reads , , ; . -This people draws near to me with its mouth, and with their lips they honor me, but their heart is far from me. But in vain they honor me, teaching commandments and teachings of men. The Heb. is translated in the RV., Forasmuch as this people draw nigh to me, and with their mouth and with their lips do honor me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment of men which hath been taught them. The principal difference is in this last clause, which in the original charges them with fearing God only in obedience to a human commandment; while in our passage and in the LXX., it states the vanity of their worship, owing to their substitution of human commands for the Divine law. It is this misquoted part which makes the point of the quotation, and it is the misquotation which makes it available.

7. -the part. gives the reason for the vanity or uselessness of their worship, and may be translated, while teaching. -is in apposition with , and may be translated for teachings. 1-commandments of men. These two words contain the gist of the charge, and it is this inculcation of human teachings for the Divine law that is developed in what follows.

8. -Leaving the commandment of God.

Omit after , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BL * 124, Memph.

This statement, that the Scribes and Pharisees leave Divine commands for human, is a singular comment on their attempt to build a hedge about the Law. The oral tradition was intended by them to be an exposition of the Law, and especially of the application of its precepts to life. They devised it so that men should not by ignorance and misunderstanding come short of the righteousness prescribed in the Law. But, in the first place, their method of interpretation was fitted to bring out anything except the real meaning of the Scripture, being to the last degree fanciful and arbitrary; and then in the second place, they proceeded to make this interpretation authoritative, so that really a human word got to be substituted for the Divine in most cases. Their mistake does not stand by itself; it has been repeated in every age. Everywhere, the same fatality attends authoritative exposition, nay, is involved in its very nature. The human exposition gets substituted for the Divine word, and so the worship of man becomes vain.

Omit last part of this verse, beginning , washings, Tisch. (Treg.) WH. RV. BL 1, 209, 251, Memph.

9. 1-well do you set aside. is used here ironically, like our word bravely.

10. For quotations, see Exo 20:12 and 21:17. -let him surely die (RV.marg.), a rendering of the Heb. inf. abs. which simply intensifies the meaning of the verb. This last command, affixing the capital penalty to the sin of reviling parents, is adduced by our Lord to show how seriously the Law takes this fifth commandment.

11. With the omission of , and, at the beginning of v. 12, the two verses belong together, and read, But you say, If a man say to his father or his mother, Anything in which you may be profited by me is Corban (that is, an offering), you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or his mother.2

Omit , and, at beginning of v. 12, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BD 1, 13, 28, 69, 102, 346, mss. Lat. Vet. Memph.

is the Hebrew word for an offering. It is the predicate, having the antecedent of the relative for its subj. The meaning is, that a man had only to pronounce this word over anything, setting it aside to a Divine use, in order to escape the obligation of giving it for the relief or comfort of his parents. Even when said in good faith, this contravenes the Divine Law, since the duty to the parent takes precedence of the obligation to make offerings. The choice in such cases is not between God and man, but between two ways of serving God, the one formal and the other real. Offerings belong to the formal side of worship, whereas God is really served and worshipped in our human duties and affections. But it was not necessary that the banning should be carried out on its positive side. The word having once been uttered, the man was freed from the human obligation, but needed not to make the offering. Nay, he was positively forbidden to use the article any longer for the human purpose with reference to which the Korban had been uttered. The regulation was not invented for this purpose, but was intended to emphasize the sacredness of a thing once set apart, even by a thoughtless word, to Divine uses. But it failed, as the uninspired mind generally does, to define Divine uses, and left out what was of real importance, while emphasizing and retaining the unimportant.

Omit after , Tisch. Treg. WH. BDL 28, 69, 240, 244, 245, 346, mss. Lat. Vet. Omit after BDL 1, 13, 28, 56, 69, 240, 244, 346, Latt.

13. -invalidating is an exact translation of the Greek word, which means to deprive a thing of its strength. -the tradition which you handed down. It is impossible to render into English the paronomasia here. The verb describes the handing along from one generation to another which constitutes tradition. -nearly like.1

14. -Having called up the crowd again. It seems that the previous conference has been held with the Scribes and, Pharisees alone. But Jesus wishes what he says now about the matter to be heard by the people. It is a matter, not of private conference or debate, but of the utmost importance for the popular understanding of true religion.

, again, instead of , all, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BDL mss. Lat. Vet. Vulg. Memph. Harcl. marg.

. -This is no formal introduction, but calls on his hearers to lend him not only their ears, but their understandings, in view of the special importance of what follows. He may well do so, since what he says abrogates the distinction between clean and unclean, which forms so essential a part not only of tradition, but also of the Levitical part of the Law itself.

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. BDHL. ,2 instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. BHL 238.

, -There is nothing outside the man entering into him, which can defile him. The reason that Jesus gives for this statement shows that he meant to make the distinction between outward and inward in the sense of material and spiritual. The things from outside cannot defile, because they enter the belly, and not the heart, while those from within are evil thoughts of all kinds. This has nothing to do, therefore, with the question, whether, among spiritual things, it is only those from within the man himself that can hurt him. Inwardness in this sense belongs to things within the man himself and within others, and externality is to be taken in the same sense. -but the things coming out of the man are the things which defile the man. The repetition of the noun man, instead of using the pronoun, which here amounts to inelegance, is quite in Mk.s manner.

, coming out from the man, instead of , coming out of him, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BDL 33, Latt. Memph. Omit , those, Tisch. (Treg.) WH. BL 102, Memph.

Verse 16 is omitted by Tisch. WH. RV. (bracketed by Treg.) BL 28, 102, Memph.

17. -the parable (riddle).From the use of this word to represent the Heb. word , it loses sometimes its proper sense of similitude, and comes to be used of any sententious saying, or apothegm, in which the meaning is partly veiled by the brevity, but especially by the material and outward form of the saying. Here, entering from the outside, and coming out, are used to express the contrasted ideas of material and spiritual, and what the saying gains in pungency and suggestiveness it loses in exactness. Hence it is called a .

, the parable, instead of , concerning the parable, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BDL 33, Latt.

18. -You too, as well as the multitude. Jesus saying was a riddle to them, not only because of the concrete form of statement, but also because of its intrinsic spirituality. They had been trained in Judaism, in which the distinction between clean and unclean is ingrained, and could not understand a statement abrogating this. It was all a riddle to them.

. -nothing outside can defile.1

19. This verse gives the reason why outward things cannot defile. They do not enter the inner man, the , but the , belly, belonging to the outward man, and are passed out into the , the privy.2

-RV. This he said, making all things clean. The part. agrees with the subj. of , he says (v. 18). That is, the result of this statement of Jesus was to abrogate the distinction between clean and unclean in articles of food. The use of quotation marks would show this connection as follows: He says to them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive that nothing which enters into the man from without can defile him; because it does not enter into the heart, but into the belly, and goes out into the privy, so making all foods clean.

With the reading , the part. agrees with the preceding statement; that is, the going out into the privy purifies the food, as that receives the refuse parts which have been eliminated in the process of digestion. With the masc., it is possible to connect it with , but the anacoluthon involved is rather large-sized and improbable, as only a single word separates the noun from its unruly adjunct. The only probable connection is with the subject of (v. 18).

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. ABEFGHLSX 1, 13, 28, 69, 124.

20. . , -what cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. Coming out is used here to denote the spiritual, as entering in is to denote the material. Spiritual things can defile the man, and these only, not such material articles as food. And of course, this means that the real man is the spiritual part, and that defilement of the physical part does not extend to the spiritual part, which constitutes the real man. That can be reached only by spiritual things akin to itself. This principle, that spiritual and spiritual go together, and that the material cannot penetrate the spiritual, which is impervious to it, is needed in the interpretation of Christianity, as well as in the reform of Judaism.

21. -The article denotes the class of things collectively, whereas the anarthrous noun denotes them individually. This is the general term, under which the things that follow are specifications. The noun denotes the kind of thought which weighs, calculates, and deliberates. It is used here of designs or purposes. It is in accordance with our Lords whole course of thought here, that he designates the evil as residing rather in the thought than in the outward act. The order of the first four specifications is as follows: , , , , fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries. The arrangement of the TR. is an attempt at a more studied order, bringing together things that are alike. The only principle of arrangement in Mk.s enumeration is the distinction between these grosser, more outward forms of sin, and the more subtle, inward manifestations which follow in v. 22.1

, , , , instead of , , , , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BL Memph.

22. -In general, this is a generic term for evil. Where it is used specifically, as here, it probably denotes malice as a distinct form of evil. -deceit does not convey the flavor of this word, which, starting from the idea of bait, comes to denote any trick, and abstractly, trickery, cunning, craft. -Here also, the EV. lasciviousness, fails to convey the meaning. The word denotes in a general way the absence of self-restraint, unbridled passion, or cruelty, and the like. License, or wantonness, may be used to translate it. -an evil eye-a Hebrew expression for envy. -a general word for evil or injurious speech, either of God or man. Toward the former it is blasphemy, toward the latter, slander. In this connection it is probably slander. -a common Greek word, but found only here in the N.T. It includes pride of self and contempt of others, arrogance. -folly translates this better than foolishness, as it denotes the morally foolish.

23. -from within. These things are morally unclean, while only the physically unclean comes from without.

What Jesus says here is directed specially against the traditional law, but the thing condemned, the distinction between clean and unclean, belongs also to the written law. Plainly, then, the distinction between the word of God and the word of man has to be carried within the Scripture, and used in the analysis of its contents. The thing that Jesus calls a word of man here is found also in the O.T. itself, and is fundamental in the Levitical law.

HEALING OF THE SYROPHNICIAN WOMANS DAUGHTER IN THE VICINITY OF TYRE AND SIDON

24-30. Jesus leaves Galilee and comes into Syrophnicia. A woman of the place asks him to heal her daughter, and overcomes Jesus apparent reluctance by her shrewd wit and faith.

The account reads simply that Jesus departed from that place into the borders of Tyre, where he wished to remain unknown, but could not hide his presence. For a Gentile woman, a Syrophnician, found him out, and begged him to cast the evil spirit out of her daughter. Jesus was not there for the purposes of his work, and in general confined himself to the Jews in his ministrations. But he feels the irony of the situation that makes the Jew plume himself on his superiority to the Gentile, and reflects it in his answer, that it is not a good thing to cast the childrens bread to the dogs. The quick wit of the woman catches at these words, and her faith feels the sympathy veiled in them, so that she answers, yes, and the dogs eat the crumbs. That word is enough; Jesus assures her of her daughters cure, and she goes home to find the evil spirit gone. So far the account. But when we find in the succeeding chapters that Jesus excursion into the Gentile territory is not confined to this case, but that he continues there in one place and another, rather than in Galilee, that his teaching is restricted mostly to his disciples, and that he begins to warn them of his approaching fate, it is evident that this journey marks practically the close of our Lords ministry in Galilee, and that this dispute with the Pharisees about clean and unclean marks a crisis in his life. These are not missionary journeys, but are undertaken to enable Jesus to be alone with his disciples.

24. 1 -And from thence he arose and went into the coasts of Tyre.

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. marg. WH. RV. BL Harcl. marg. , instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. BDL 1, 13, 28, 61 marg. 69, 209, 346. Omit , Tisch. (Treg. marg. WH.) RV.marg. DL 28 mss. Lat. Vet. It is a case in which a copyist, used to the conjunction of the two places, might easily insert the words, but the omission is improbable for the same reason. And Mk. evidently meant to discriminate, since he says afterwards that Jesus left the region of Tyre, and came through Sidon, v. 31 (Tisch. Treg. WH. RV.).

-The word denotes primarily the boundaries of a territory, and then the country itself included within those limits. It has been contended that the original meaning of the word is to be retained here, and that Jesus did not penetrate Gentile territory, but only its borders, that part of Galilee which bordered on Syrophnicia. But this would be the single case of this restricted meaning in the N.T., and the universally accepted reading, (v. 31), shows that he did penetrate the Gentile territory. Mt., however, in accordance with the plan of his Gospel, seems to represent this event as taking place on Jewish soil (15:22). Tyre and Sidon belonged to Syrophnicia, a strip of territory on the Mediterranean, noted for its antiquity, wealth, and civilization, which had remained practically independent of Jewish, Greek, and Assyrian rule, though subject to the Romans since the time of Augustus.

, , -And having entered a house, he wished no one to know it, and he could not be hidden.

Omit before , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. ABLNX Pesh. ,1 for , Tisch. WH. B.

-he wished no one to know it. This was in accordance with his purpose in resorting to this unaccustomed place. Morison makes a foolish distinction here between the wish of Jesus and his purpose, evidently with the idea that a purpose of Jesus could not be defeated. But aside from the fact, that N.T. usage does not bear out such a distinction, it would be difficult to draw the line between a wish that one is at pains to carry out, and a purpose. No, this is one of the cases in which the human uncertainty belonging to action based on probabilities, not certainties, appears in the life of Jesus. -he could not be hid. The inability is put over against the wish. This statement, which prepares the way for what follows in regard to Jesus unreadiness to perform the miracle, is peculiar to Mk.

25. -but immediately having heard. Jesus had no sooner arrived than this took place.

This reading, instead of , for having heard, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BL 33, one ms. Lat. Vet. Memph. edd. Harcl. marg.

-whose daughter had.2

Tisch. reads , having entered, instead of , having come, with L most mss. Lat. Vet. Vulg. Memph. A very probable reading.

26. , -a Greek, a Syrophnician by race. That is, she was in general a Gentile, and more particularly a Syrophnician.

is literally, a Greek, but used by the Jews to designate any Gentile, owing to the wide diffusion of the Greek race and language. Syrophnician is a more particular designation of the race to which she belonged. The prefix denotes that part of Phnicia which belonged to Syria, in distinction from Libophnicia, or the Carthaginian district in the north of Africa.

, instead of , Tisch. WH. txt. AKLS marg. V marg. 1.

-and she asked him to cast out.1

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. ABDE, etc.

27. -and he said.

This reading, instead of , and Jesus said, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BL 33, Memph.

-let the children be fed first. In this word, first, Jesus hints that the time of the Gentiles is coming, as he frequently does in the course of his teaching, while he restricts his own work to the Jews. Mt. omits this, and makes Jesus refusal to be much more definite and positive. . . -By these terms, Jesus distinguishes between the Jews, who are the children of the household, and the Gentiles. Dogs is a term expressing the contempt of your true Jew for the heathen, and sounds strange in the mouth of our Lord. Weiss denies the contemptuous use of the term dog, and makes it merely a parable, in which an arrangement of the kingdom of God is expressed in the terms of household economy, in which the contempt for dogs plays no part. But this is to ignore the fact that dog is always a term of contempt, especially in the East; that as such, it was applied by Jews to Gentiles; and that, if Jesus did not mean to express contempt, his language was singularly ill-chosen, as the woman would be sure to understand him so. See Bib. Dic. But I am inclined to believe that Jesus did not use the term seriously, but with a kind of ironical conformity to this common sneer, having felt in his own experience how small occasion the Jews of his time had to treat any other people with contempt. He had good reasons for confining his work to the Jews, but they did not arise from any acceptance of their estimate of themselves or of others. It is as if he had put in a you know, to indicate a common opinion.

28. , -Yes, lord; and the dogs eat.

Omit before , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BH 13, 28, 33, 69, Memph. Pesh. , instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. BDL .

This use of Jesus own words to neutralize the force of his seeming rebuff has been regarded rightly always as a unique combination of faith and wit. But it is not simply a trick of words; the beauty of it is, that it finds the truth that escapes superficial notice in both the analogy and the spiritual fact represented by it. It means, there is a place for dogs in the household, and there is a place for Gentiles in Gods world. And further, her faith was quickened by what she saw of Jesus. She knew intuitively that he was a being to take a large and sympathetic view of things, not the hard and narrow one, and that he had really prepared the way for her statement. This is of the essence of faith, to hold fast to what your heart and the highest things in you tell of God, in spite of all appearances to the contrary.

30. . -the child thrown upon the bed. Probably the cure had been attended by violent convulsions, as in other cases of the same kind in the Gospels.1

, , instead of , , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BDL most mss. Lat. Vet. Vulg. Memph. Pesh.

CURE OF A DEAF AND DUMB MAN IN THE REGION OF DECAPOLIS

31-37. From the region of Tyre, Jesus went still further north, through Sidon, and then south again to Decapolis, on the SE. shore of the lake. Here they bring him a deaf man, whose speech has been impaired by his deafness, to be cured. Jesus is not here for the purposes of his mission, and in order to call as little attention to the cure as possible, he takes the man aside from the multitude. And as the man is deaf, and Jesus needs to establish communication with him in some way in order to draw out his faith, he employs signs, thrusting his fingers into his ears, and putting spittle on his tongue, and casting his eyes to heaven. The man is cured, and then Jesus enjoins silence in regard to the cure. But in vain, as they are more eager to tell the story of his beneficent power, the more he tries to prevent it.

31. -he came through Sidon to the sea.

, instead of , , and of Sidon, he came to the sea, Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BDL 33, Latt. Memph.

This reading establishes the fact that Jesus entered Gentile territory in this visit, and also that Mk. does not mean by (v. 24), the Galilean territory adjoining Syrophnicia. The two statements taken together show that he means to distinguish between two districts of Syrophnicia, the one about Tyre, and the other about Sidon.

-into the midst of the region of Decapolis1 (through the midst, EV.). But plainly Jesus came to, not through, Decapolis, as he went by boat to the west shore of the lake after the feeding of the multitude (8:1-10). Jesus had been in this district before, at the time when he healed the Gadarene demoniac, and had been driven away. He meets with a different reception now.

, deaf and having an impediment in his speech. is a Biblical word, found in the Sept., but only here in the NT. Literally, it means speaking with difficulty; but in the LXX., it is used to translate the Hebrew word meaning dumb. In this case the cure is said to have resulted in the mans speaking rightly, implying that before he had spoken, but defectively.

Insert before , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BD Latt.

33. -and having taken him aside from the crowd by himself. The AV. gives the meaning of better than the RV., which translates it privately. It means apart, by himself. -he thrust. Put, EV. does not give the force of the word. Our Lords symbolic action here is intended to convey by signs to the deaf mans mind what Jesus means to do for him, and so to give him something for his faith, as well as his intelligence, to act upon.

In explaining Jesus action in taking the man apart from the multitude, we have to consider two things: first, the condition of the man, and the necessity of concentrating his attention on what Jesus was doing. It goes along with the other signs employed by our Lord to convey his purpose to the man, cut off from other means of communication. And secondly, Jesus unusual reasons for desiring secrecy. He was engaged with his disciples on this journey, not with the multitude, and he did not want the one miracle to grow into his ordinary engrossing work. The peculiar methods of this miracle have to be cordinated with those of 8:22-26, and it is evident that, in both cases, this motive of secrecy is strong. Jesus avoided publicity in all his miracles, but especially in this period of retirement.

, -and having spit, he touched his tongue (with the spittle), and having looked up to heaven, he groaned. This is a part of the language of signs employed by our Lord, and is intended to convey to the mans mind, first the help that he is to receive, the loosening of his tongue, and secondly, the heavenly source from which his help was to come. The groan was an expression of his own feelings, stirred to sympathy by the sight of human suffering, of which there was so much that he could not relieve. 1-Be opened. This is addressed to the man, who was himself to be opened to sound and speech through the opening of his organs.

35. 2 -And his ears were opened.

Omit , Tisch. Treg. (Treg. marg.) WH. RV. BDL 33, mss. Lat. Vet. Memph. , instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. BD 1, etc.

-literally, hearings, but applied by metonymy to the organs of hearing. -bond of his tongue. Probably, as this was a case in which deafness and dumbness went together, the dumbness was occasioned by the deafness, and denotes figuratively whatever stood in the way of his speech, and not necessarily a defect in the organ of speech itself. The bond in this case would be the deafness which tied his tongue. -rightly. This confirms the view, that the defect has been primarily in his hearing, and that this had resulted in partial, but incomplete loss of speech. See on , v. 32.

36. , -and he commanded them to tell no one. But the more he commanded them, the more exceedingly they heralded it.3

, instead of , Tisch. Treg. WH. BL 28, 33. Omit after , Tisch. Treg. WH. ABLX 1, mss. Lat. Vet. Vulg. Memph. Insert before , Tisch. Treg. WH. B(D) LN 33, 61, one ms. Lat. Vet. Memph. Pesh.

Jesus accompanies this miracle with the ordinary injunction of secrecy, but it only inflamed their zeal to publish it.4 The conduct of the multitude is a good example of the way in which men treat Jesus, yielding him all homage, except obedience.5

37. -a word not found elsewhere, and expressing, like the double comparative , the excessive feeling and demonstration of the people. -another strong word, meaning literally were struck out of their senses.6

-and dumb to speak.

Omit before , Tisch. Treg. WH. RV. BL 33.

1 Are gathered, RV., would require the perf. pass. This is the historical present.

Tisch. Tischendorf.

Treg. Tregelles.

RV. Revised Version.

Codex Sinaiticus.

B Codex Vaticanus.

L Codex Regius.

Codex Sangallensis

33 Codex Regius.

Memph. Memphitic.

Pesh. Peshito.

WH. Westcott and Hort.

A Codex Alexandrinus.

E Codex Basiliensis.

G Codex Wolfi A.

H Codex Wolfi B.

V Codex Mosquensis.

Codex Tischendorfianus

Lat. Vet. Vetus Latina.

RV. Revided Version marg.

Syrr. Syriac Versions.

Vulg. Vulgate.

1 See Schrer, N. Zg. II. I. 25, on Scribism.

1 AV. tables!

102 Codex Bibliothecae Mediceae.

D Codex Ephraemi.

1 .Codex Basiliensis

209 An unnamed, valuable manuscript.

Latt. Latin Versions.

28 Codex Regius.

13 Codex Regius.

346 Codex Ambrosianus.

1 belongs to Biblical Greek. is the Greek word.

1 is a later Greek word.

2 This is an anacoluthon, as the condition belongs to the saying of the Jews, and the conclusion to the statement of Jesus.

69 Codex Leicestrensis.

1 This word, which is common in classical Greek, is found only here in the N.T.

Harcl. Harclean.

2 This form, sec. aor. imp., occurs only here in N.T. The aor. imperatives here are appropriate to the beginning of discourse.

1 , everything cannot, is the inexact, Hebrew form of the universal negative; the logical, Greek form being , nothing can. Win. 3 c, 1.

2 is the heart, in the broad, Scriptural sense of the inner man. is a barbarous word, probably of Macedonian origin, the proper Greek equivalent being .

F Codex Borelli.

S Codex Vaticanus.

1 On the use of the plural of the abstract noun to denote the forms or manifestations of a quality, see Win. 27, 3.

1 This use of corresponds to the Heb. , and belongs to Oriental fulness, if not redundancy, of speech. Win. 64, 4, Note at end, contends that it is not redundant in all cases, but admits its redundancy here. Thay.-Grm. Lex. denies its redundancy altogether. And it is not redundant in one sense, since it is included in the action. But so is the straightening out of the limbs. It is so far redundant that the Greek, with its finer sense of the needful in speech, would omit it.

N Codex Purpureus.

Codex Petropolitianus

1 On the form, see Thay.-Grm. Lex.

2 This is a literal translation of the Heb. idiom, which inserts the personal pronoun after the relative.

K Codex Cyprius.

1 There is a double irregularity here: first, in the use of to denote a request, instead of a question; and secondly, in the use of with the subj., instead of the inf., to denote the matter of the petition. Burton, 200, 201.

Bib. Dic. Smiths Dictionary of the Bible (1st or 2d edition).

1 See 1:26, 9:26.

1 On Decapolis, see on 5:1-20.

AV. Authorised Version.

1 represents the Aramaic , the ethpael imper. of the verb , Heb. .

2 Both the augment on the prep., and the sec. aor. in belong to later Greek.

3 The regular form of stating this proportion is , with a comparative in each member. strengthens a comparative with which it is joined.

4 See on 1:44. Cf. 5:19, 43, Note; 6:45, Note.

5 See 1Sa 15:22, 1Sa 15:27.

6 See on 1:22.

Fuente: International Critical Commentary New Testament

Breaking the Bonds of Tradition

Mar 7:1-23

The Pharisees laid great stress on ritual. They followed endless rules, both intricate and troublesome, as to ablutions and outward ceremonials. So long as their devotees were careful in the minor observances, they were permitted a wide license so far as the weightier matters of the Law were concerned. This is a natural tendency of the human heart. It is glad to be able to reduce its religious life to an outward and literal obedience, if only its thoughts may be unhampered. In the life of true holiness everything depends on the control of the thoughts. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. With infinite wisdom the wise man said, Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life, and Jesus put evil-thoughts first in the black category of the contents of the evil heart. A gang of thieves sometimes put a very small boy through a tiny window that he may unlock the front door. So one evil thought will often admit an entire crew of evil. Heart of mine, hast thou learned this lesson? Art thou careful enough of thy cleanliness? That the hands should be often washed, that vessels of household use should be kept cleansed, that there should be decorum and neatness in the outward life, all these customs are good. But it becomes thee to inquire whether thou art not more eager for the outward than the inward cleanliness. Create in me a clean heart, should be thy constant prayer.

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

Jesus Condemns the Traditions of the Pharisees (Mar 7:1-13)

To the spiritual mind it is a question of unceasing wonder that men should be so ready to follow and even fearlessly contend for the authority of human traditions, while they are just as ready to ignore the plain teachings of the Word of God. On many occasions we find our blessed Lord coming into conflict with the prejudices of those in Israel who exalted tradition to a level with revelation, and in some instances, to a higher level.

In Mark 7 we find our Lord dealing directly with the Pharisees exaltation of human tradition. Mar 7:1-8 has to do with the question of eating with unwashed, or literally, unbaptized hands. Certain of the Pharisees and scribes who were ever on the watch for something with which they might find fault in the words or behavior of Jesus and His disciples, noticed that some of the disciples ate bread with what they considered defiled hands. This was an unlawful practice according to a tradition that had been handed down from early days. The more rigid Pharisees went through a long process, not only of cleansing the hands from any uncleanness but also of ceremonial washing, before they would eat. We are told in the fourth verse that when they come from the market, except they wash [or baptize], they eat not. This is one of the many baptisms referred to in Heb 9:10. The word translated washings there is really baptisms. Many other similar rites were observed in the cleansing of drinking vessels, dishes, and tables.

The observant legalists came directly to Jesus, and inquired why His disciples did not wash according to the tradition of the elders, but ate bread with unbaptized hands. Observe, it was not a question of behavior contrary to the Word of God but behavior contrary to mere human tradition.

In reply our Lord referred to the words of the prophet Isaiah: Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites. This was strong language! A hypocrite is a man with a second face-really an actor, for the Greek actors appeared on the stage wearing masks in order to represent various parts and personalities. The Lord knew that while these hypocritical questioners were punctilious about such matters as ceremonial cleansing, they were careless in regard to laws definitely commanded by God and therefore carrying far greater weight. Jesus reminded the Pharisees that Isaiah had written of them, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men (Mar 7:6-7). There is something very important here that we do well to take to heart. It is always a great mistake for those who profess to be servants of God to observe forms and ceremonial rites and traditions that have no Scriptural basis. Such traditions may seem innocent enough to begin with, but little by little they will usurp the place of the Word of God over the consciences of those who follow them, and this is most dangerous.

We are told in 2Ti 3:16-17 that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly [or thoroughly] furnished unto all good works. If Scripture carefully studied and obeyed will equip a man of God to do all good works, then it should be clear that nothing is worthy to be counted a good work in the sight of God if the action is not authorized by Scripture. The recognition of this principle would save us from a great deal of folly and worthless labor in connection with the things of God. The Lord applied the words of Isa 29:13 to the critics of His disciples by telling them that they themselves laid aside the commandment of God and substituted human traditions such as those dealing with ceremonial cleansing. He added, Many other such like things ye do.

Many Romanists and Protestants alike exalt tradition, directly or indirectly, to the level of Holy Scripture or even above it. How we need to get back to the place of teaching the Word of God! We need to inquire, What saith the scripture? when questions as to methods and teachings arise. For anything that is contrary to Gods revelation can never be looked on with favor by Him, however much good it seems to accomplish.

In so writing I would not for one moment ignore the fact that Scripture itself gives considerable latitude in regard to methods of reaching the lost and seeking to help believers. The apostle Paul declared, I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some (1Co 9:22). What I would stress is the serious mistake of substituting human authority for divine authority. We need to be sure that not only our doctrines, but also our practical ways are in accordance with the Scriptures. This alone is the path of safety.

Continuing His discourse the Lord pointed out how these Pharisees ignored the plain teaching of the Word while giving full authority to tradition. Observe how strongly He speaks in Mar 7:9: Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. The natural heart revolts against that which is divine but readily accepts what is merely human.

Jesus then cited a very definite instance of conflict between tradition and the Scriptures. God had spoken through Moses, commanding that His people honor father and mother. The penalty of death was attached to the violation of this commandment. He that curseth [that is, in any way harms or wrongs] father or mother, let him die the death (Mat 15:4). This would surely involve caring for aged parents who were unable to provide for themselves. The least that sons and daughters could do would be to share with their parents that which God had given to them, but the rabbis had declared that a man might dedicate all his possessions to God, declaring it to be Corban-that is, a gift for the maintenance of the work of the temple. If his parents were in need, he would insist that he had nothing with which he could help them because all he possessed had already been devoted to God. This was the very essence of selfishness under pretended piety; and thereby the Word of God was made of none effect through tradition. This was only one instance of the violation of Gods truth by the substitution of human regulations. Jesus again added, Many such like things do ye.

Jesus Defines the True Source of Defilement (Mar 7:14-23)

We are told that after condemning the traditions of the Pharisees, Jesus took occasion to instruct all the people in regard to the true nature of defilement. Hitherto the more conscientious an Israelite was, the more anxious and concerned he was about what he ate or drank, lest he even inadvertently take in something that was ceremonially unclean. If he did eat something considered unclean, he would be defiled and unfit to join with the congregation of the Lord when gathered together for worship in the temple. In Mar 7:14-16 our Lord laid down a great principle and emphasized a tremendous fact. Jesus declared that moral and spiritual defilement comes not from outward things such as food or drink but from within the man himself. Defilement comes from ones own heart, that heart which the prophet Jeremiah declared to be deceitful above all things and desperately wicked (Jer 17:9).

It is evident that these words of the Lord astonished even His own disciples, so accustomed had they been to looking at things from the ritualistic standpoint. So when they had left the multitude and were in the house alone with Jesus, they asked Him to explain what He meant by speaking as He had done. Always ready to open up truth to sincere inquirers, He explained that outward things such as food and drink were only material: they could not affect the spirit of the man. Of course our Lord was not denying that there are hurtful and even poisonous foods that might seriously injure one physically. What He had in view here was defilement of spirit, which makes one unfit for fellowship with God. Food of any kind does not enter into the heart but passes through the digestive tract. Food makes no impression whatsoever on the soul or spirit of the one who has eaten or drunk.

That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man-that is, those things which come from his heart defile him, for the heart itself is like a nest of unclean birds. Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. What a list! Who can say that these things have never had any place whatever in his heart? Of course there are some to whom several of these things are thoroughly repugnant, and yet every man is capable of falling into every sin here mentioned if he but allows his mind to dwell on evil thoughts. There are men who deny the depravity of the natural man, but they might well consider the list set forth here and honestly answer the question, Have none of these things a place in my heart?

When we speak of the total depravity of the natural man, we do not mean necessarily that all men are guilty of all the sins enumerated here. We do mean that all men are by nature out of touch with God and that the capacity for all these sins is found in all their hearts.

Once when Dr. Joseph Cook was challenged as to the scripturalness of the doctrine of human depravity, he used the following illustration. He said that he was in possession of a very fine clock. It was a beautiful piece of furniture and an adornment to the room in which it was placed. The works were very expensive; the face of the clock was beautiful to look upon; the hands were of excellent workmanship; and altogether it was an admirable clock. There was only one thing wrong with it: it would not keep time. As a timepiece it was totally depraved. So it is with the natural man. He is out of touch with God. His heart is at enmity with God and from within that heart come forth many different sins. Thank God there is a remedy for this condition! David prayed, Create in me a clean heart, O God (Psa 51:10), and this is what God delights to do through the new birth.

All the evil things enumerated by Jesus come from within. These defile a man. How important it is that we recognize the fact that these things naturally find lodging in the human heart, and that we judge all in the light of the cross of Christ.

Jesus Rewards the Faith of a Gentile Woman (Mar 7:24-30)

In these verses we see the grace of God going out beyond the nation of Israel. The Lord Jesus had gone into the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon-that is, in the course of His travels He had journeyed with His disciples to the northwest district of Galilee. Just beyond were the Gentile cities of Tyre and Sidon. The Lord Himself, so far as we have any record, never stepped over the border that separated Palestine from the Gentile lands, except of course when as a baby He was taken down into Egypt by His mother and Joseph, His foster father, to escape the wrath of Herod. Jesus came into the world, as Paul told us in Rom 15:8, as a minister [or servant] of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers. While it is true that He looked forward to the time when the Gentiles might glorify God for His mercy (Rom 15:9), during His life on earth He confined His ministry to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

But now we find Him in contact with a certain woman who was a Greek, a pure Gentile, a native of Syrophenicia. This woman had an afflicted daughter who was possessed with a demon. She had suffered terribly because of this condition. Though a stranger to the covenants of promise, the Syrophenician woman had heard of Jesus and she felt sure that He could deliver her daughter if He were willing to do so. She came, therefore, pleading that He would cast the demon out of the young girl. Elsewhere we are told that she based her plea on the fact that He was the Son of David. She had evidently learned through some of her Jewish neighbors of the Messiah who was to come in Davids line, and she rightly believed Jesus to be the Messiah. So she came pleading, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David (Mat 15:22). But He held His peace. As a Gentile sinner she had no claim whatever on Him as the promised Son of David. But finally, as she cried after Him, He said, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the childrens bread, and to cast it unto the dogs. This may seem to us to be a hard saying. But even as Joseph charged his brothers with being spies in order to probe their consciences (Gen 42:8-14), so the Lord thus answered the woman in order to bring her to the place where she would recognize that her only claim to blessing was on the ground of pure grace.

She responded in a wonderful way. There was no ill-feeling on her part, as though He had insulted her or spoken to her in a discourteous manner. Humbly she answered Him, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs [and she used a diminutive here, the little dogs] under the table eat of the childrens crumbs. It was as much as to say, Lord, I recognize the fact that I am just a poor, outcast Gentile, but give me some of the crumbs that the children of the kingdom are refusing; allow me to take the place even of a puppy under the table and so obtain mercy at Thy hand. Nothing appealed to our blessed Lord more than faith coupled with humility. He replied by saying, Go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter. She hastened to her home, doubtless with a glad heart and eager expectation. Entering the house, she found her daughter lying quietly upon the bed, the demon having left her.

Jesus Opens the Ears of the Deaf (Mar 7:31-37)

Leaving the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, Jesus crossed over the northern part of Galilee and entered into a boat, passing over the sea once more to visit Decapolis, the ten cities. It was in this region that the man from the tombs, the demoniac of Gadara, lived. After Jesus delivered him, He told him to go home and tell his friends what great things the Lord had done for him. So he spread the good news, we are told, throughout all Decapolis. Thus when Jesus returned, the people were ready to meet Him. Possibly the very ones who on the former occasion had besought Him to depart out of their coasts were among the eager crowd who came to hear His words and see His miracles.

We are told that they brought to Him one who was deaf and had a speech impediment. They begged Jesus to put His hands on him-those tender hands that had so often been lifted in blessing. At the touch of those hands disease and uncleanness had flown away. But the Lord dealt with this man in a somewhat peculiar manner. Recognizing the fact that opposition was developing, Jesus took him aside from the multitude instead of healing him openly before all the people. Jesus put His finger into his ears, and then spat and touched his tongue. We may wonder at this, but we need to remember that the humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ was absolutely holy and pure, untouched by sin or corruption of any kind. He was evidently indicating that the healing came from within His own being. Looking up to Heaven He sighed as He recognized the ravages that sin had made; and then speaking in Aramaic He said, Ephphatha, which means, Be opened. Immediately the man was able to hear and also to speak.

Jesus charged those that were around Him not to spread this abroad. As we have noticed before, He had no desire to gain notoriety as a wonderworker. While always ready to minister to the needs of men, His great mission was to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom as He went from place to place. But the people were so enthusiastic about what they saw of His mighty power that the more He commanded them to say nothing about it, the more they published it abroad. Surely everyone who knows Christ in any measure will gladly join with these people of Decapolis in ascribing all honor and glory to Him who has done all things well.

Fuente: Commentaries on the New Testament and Prophets

Mar 7:24

I. The Lord Jesus is not hid. The Old Testament contained one promise which like a thread of gold ran through the whole; a promise that was oft repeated, which was embraced by all believers, the blessings of which were grandly unfolded as time rolled on; and which, in the fulness of time was accomplished. It was the Messiah. The Dayspring from on high has visited us. The Sun of Righteousness has arisen with healing in His wings, and therefore the Lord Jesus is not hid. He is plainly seen by those who have eyes to see, and plainly heard by those who have ears to hear, although He is in the highest heavens.

II. The Lord Jesus ought not to be hid. Who shall declare how wicked is the attempt to hide the Lord Jesus, who said, “I am the light of the world.” Do any attempt it? Yes, many have done so. The Scribes and Pharisees saw clearly enough that He was the Christ; yet they tried to hide Him by saying that He wrought miracles by the power of Beelzebub. This our Lord declared, but nothing else, is the unpardonable sin. The Jews wished Christ to be hid, when they quenched His costly life on Calvary; they wished His words to be hid when they beat the Apostles, and commanded them not to speak in His Name. The Church of Rome has endeavoured to hide Christ under a mass of superstition, and to prevent the people from seeing Christ in the Gospel by ministering to them in an unknown tongue, and by forbidding the people to read the Scriptures. Christ ought not to be hid.

III. Christ cannot be hid. All things prepare for the coronation of Christ. All things, consciously or unconsciously, are being attuned for the glory of Christ. This is God’s mighty purpose which all events are unfolding. All things are for Christ and Christ in all things. He cannot be hid. For Christ the vast machinery of providence is kept in beneficent action; all persons, all things, all events, are under His beneficent rule. Over all men’s conscience His purpose must prevail, His cause roll on. “He must reign.”

J. Fleming, Penny Pulpit, No. 577, new series.

Reference: Mar 7:24.-G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines, p. 330.

Mar 7:24-30

The Syrophenician’s Daughter.

Notice:-

I. The Girl Herself. She was “grievously vexed with a devil.” Her case was very sad and strange. All the gods, helpers and physicians, in Tyre and Sidon could not set this girl free. For anything man’s skill could do she was beyond all hope and remedy. The sun shines on no sadder sight than a young soul that is the willing slave of Satan. Well may the Church of Christ weep over that soul, as the Syrophenician mother wept over her darling child, whom Satan was claiming as his slave.

II. The Girl’s Mother. She was probably a widow, as no mention is made of the girl’s father. The girl would thus be all the world to her mother. On earth there is no stronger love than a mother’s for her suffering child. This mother was drawn by a secret influence to Jesus Christ. No wonder that she was allured to Him, for He was the Maker of home, the Lover of children, the Exalter of woman, and the Friend of all mankind.

III. The Girl’s Saviour. We are surprised at first that Jesus did not hear her on the spot, for He was very ready to be moved by such cases. For once the disciples seemed kinder than the Master; they wished Him to grant the mother’s request there and then. But he was wiser and more merciful than they, and therefore He delayed. God’s delays are always full of meaning. He brought out this woman’s faith and humility, and taught all men that the feast of His love is for Gentile and Jew alike.

IV. The Cure. Look on the girl before she was healed-a perfect picture of wretchedness; such is the soul in sin. Look on the girl after Christ had done His work in her. She lies upon the bed in peace, and her gratitude overflows. Such is the soul in a state of grace. This girl’s cure was perfect; she was made whole. To be whole, and to be holy, mean the same thing; the two words come from the same root. Christ’s salvation brings true health to the soul. Then Christ cured her, though she was at a distance from Him. Christ has healed many who could not give day and date. Dr. Livingstone tells that he once asked a chief how old he was. All the people around him burst into loud laughter. “The idea,” they said, “of a man remembering when he was born!” But they knew that they had been born, though they knew not when. If you have the true signs of the new birth, never trouble yourself about anything else.

J. Wells, Bible Children, p. 213.

Reference: Mar 7:24-30.-H. M. Luckock, Footprints of the Son of Man, p. 156.

Mar 7:28-29

Lowly-minded Perseverance in Prayer.

I. Consider the example of faith we have set us here. Though Apostles were rejected entreating in her behalf, yet this woman “cries unto” our Lord, because He alone could save her. And though she had heard them say He was not sent to those of her race, yet she repeats her entreaty, as confident He could help whom He would; she did not say “Pray for me,” or “Entreat for me,” but “Help me,” as believing the help was in Himself to bestow. But our Lord was pleased to try her yet further and more sharply. He answered, and said, “It is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it unto dogs.” Thus, when He did answer her, His words to her were at first more discouraging than silence. He calls the Jews now not sheep only but children, and her nation dogs. He no longer refers to the will of another, “I am not sent,” but withholds what she asks, as though it were not in His own judgment meet that it should be granted. But the woman, so far from being disheartened, makes for herself a fresh plea from those very words of His “Yes, Lord, yet the dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs.” She acknowledges herself a dog, and the Jews children, nay masters; but on this very ground she claims to partake a little of the blessed privileges of His presence and healing, so fully enjoyed, though so little valued by those whom she is not reluctant to call children, nay, even masters.

II. And now we may see, partly, why it was our Lord continued so long to refuse her. He knew she would say this; and it was His gracious will to give her occasion to exercise and show forth this faith and humility. Else, if it had been His purpose from the first to deny her, He would have refused her still, for He was not a mere man that He should repent and change His mind, so that it was not in sternness He kept silence, but in order to unfold the concealed treasure of her humility and faith; and also that we might draw from her history a full assurance that, however severe and repeated the discouragements we may meet with in prayer, and in our endeavours after holiness, we have but to persevere in faith with humility, and we shall obtain in the end an abundance of blessings, the more ample the longer our faith is tried.

Plain Sermons by Contributors to “Tracts for the Times,” vol. vii., p. 28.

References: Mar 7:24-30.-Christian World Pulpit, vol. iv., p. 65. Mar 7:27, Mar 7:28.-Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxii., No. 1309. Mar 7:28.-Preacher’s Monthly, vol. vi., p. 50. Mar 7:28, Mar 7:29.-J. Keble, Sermons from Lent to Passiontide, p. 140. Mar 7:31-37.-Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 83; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 347.; H. M. Luckock, Footprints of the Son of Man, p. 161; W. Hanna, Our Lord’s Life on Earth, p. 237.

Mar 7:32-35

I. The friends brought their suffering friend to ask for him the Lord’s healing hand. He did not refuse their prayer. He gave them what they asked. But He sighed as He gave it-sighed, no doubt, with a sense of heaviness and pain, even while He cheered their spirits by granting the boon they asked for. They felt no doubt in asking. They thought they knew quite well that it would be a great blessing to their friend to be restored. The Lord knew more than they did, and He sighed while He granted their prayer. Can we not apply this thought to ourselves? We often wish for things and pray for things for ourselves and our friends, nothing doubting that this or that which we ask will be a great boon and blessing to us or to them. Sometimes the request is denied, and we are apt to be disappointed and perhaps repining. Sometimes the prayer is granted. May we not think that sometimes the merciful Lord sighs as He grants it, knowing what we little know, that perhaps it will turn out not for our good but for our hurt that we should have what we have asked? foreseeing that it will bring us perhaps into temptations and dangers, which otherwise we might escape.

II. But the particular prayer offered in the case before us seems to suggest still more particular reflections. The sufferer in this case was deaf and well-nigh speechless. The Lord gave him back both his hearing and his voice, and sighed to give them. Was a man sure to be better and please God better and die more happily because his restored power of hearing brought all this multitude of new things to his thoughts and knowledge? And, again, his loosened tongue, was it so sure that the gift of voice so long withheld would bring him nothing but good? Was it certain that the loosened tongue would always be employed in uttering good and wholesome words, and that a sacred watch would be set over the door of his lips, now at last made vocal with articulate sounds? No doubt it was in the anticipation of a future which man could not foresee that the Lord sighed even in the midst of His act of mercy, and gave the boon desired, but with fear and heaviness and distress of mind. The narrative may well set us on thinking how it may be with ourselves-whether, thinking of our own way of living and acting, our possession of all these precious senses and powers has really been and is a blessing to us, so that the Lord may be thought to have given them to us in love and mercy, or whether we should rather think that He sighed in giving them.

G. Moberly, Plain Sermons at Brightstone, p. 134.

Mar 7:32-37

The Deaf and Dumb.

I. Our Lord healed the deaf and dumb man miraculously, by means at which we cannot guess, which we cannot even conceive. But the healing signified at least two things-that the man could be healed, and that the man ought to be healed; that his bodily defect-the retribution of no sin of his own-was contrary to the will of that Father in heaven who willeth not that one little one should perish. But Jesus sighed likewise. There was in Him a sorrow, a compassion, most human and most Divine. It may have been that there was something too of a Divine weariness-I dare not say impatience, seeing how patient He was then, and how patient He has been since for more than eighteen hundred years-of the folly and ignorance of man, who brings on himself and on his descendants these and a hundred other preventable miseries, simply because he will not study and obey the physical laws of the universe; simply because he will not see that those laws which concern the welfare of his body are as surely the will of God as those which concern the welfare of his soul; and that therefore it is not merely his interest but his solemn duty to study and to obey them, lest he bear the punishment of his own neglect and disobedience.

II. Christ had indeed some good seed in his field. He had taught men by His miracles, as He had taught them by His parables, to whom nature belonged, and whose laws nature obeyed. And the cessation of miracles after the time of Christ and His Apostles had taught, or ought to have taught, mankind a further lesson-the lesson that henceforth they were to carry on for themselves, by the faculties which God had given them, that work of healing and deliverance which He had begun. Miracles like prophecies, were to vanish away; but charity-charity which devotes itself to the welfare of the human race-was to abide for ever. Christ, as I said, had some good seed; but an enemy-we know not whence or when, certainly within the three first centuries of the Church-came and sowed tares among that wheat. Then began men to believe that man’s body was the property of Satan, and his soul only the property of God. No wonder if in such a temper of mind the physical amelioration of the human race stood still. How could it be otherwise, while men refused to see in facts the acted will of God, and sought, not in God’s universe, but in the dreams of their own brain, for glimpses of that Divine and wonderful order by which the Eternal Father and the Eternal Son are working together for ever through the Eternal Spirit for the welfare of the universe?

C. Kingsley, Westminster Sermons, p. 48.

Mar 7:33

I. Our Lord seems to have taken this man apart. He may have intended the multitude to follow with their eyes that which He was about, that the might that there was in the action, the might that underlay the deed, should be dwelt upon, and so should sink more surely into their spirits. As we too follow the Redeemer, may we not feel that in our lives He has taken us apart from the multitude? We have had moments-awful precious moments they were-when something of God’s mercy has made us feel that God and we exist alone, in this mighty universe, something that has shut out the crowd, drowned the noise, stopped the wheels of the world, taken us into a kind of sacred solitude, and made us feel in deepest earnestness, “I live, God lives; my God and my Lord.” While God can have compassion upon numbers, while we can understand the Lord Jesus lifting up His eyes and seeing the multitudes being moved with compassion, yet that same Blessed One is also the Good Shepherd who leaveth the heavenly Jerusalem, leaves the ninety-and-nine perfect of God’s hundred beings, and going to seek and to save the one that is lost.

II. And yet, mark the sadness of the Divine Healer. He looked to heaven and He sighed. That sigh must be part of the perfect revelation of the Father. In that sigh, as in all else, there is a portion, a fragment, of God’s love to us. May it not be that He was bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows at the very moment that He was healing them and having compassion upon them? And in this we learn the truth, that there is no self-sacrifice, there is no errand of mercy, there is no ministry of love, there is no work of goodness, there is no great deed of kindness, which does not involve painstaking and the giving up of self. Any alleviation of human woe must be at a cost. Imagine what lay upon His heart; imagine to the purest, holiest manhood what it was to come in contact with the man with the unclean spirit. And in all the ministries of our sorrowing and enfeebled humanity you may be sure that there are none that are Christlike that are not touched with the shadows of the Cross.

T. J. Rowsell, Penny Pulpit, new series, No. 343.

Mar 7:33-34

The Pattern of Service.

I. We have here set forth the foundation and condition of all true work for God in our Lord’s heavenward look. We are fully warranted in supposing that that wistful gaze to heaven means, and may be taken to symbolise, our Lord’s conscious direction of thought and spirit to God as He wrought His work of mercy. The heavenward look is (1) the renewal of our own vision of the calm verities in which we trust, the recourse for ourselves to the realities which we desire that others should see; (2) the heavenward look draws new strength from the source of all our might; (3) it will guard us from the temptations which surround all our service, and the distractions which lay waste our lives.

II. We have here pity for the evils we would remove set forth by the Lord’s sigh. Mark how in us, as in our Lord, the sigh of compassion is connected with the look to heaven. It follows upon that gaze. The evils are more real, more terrible, by their startling contrast with the unshadowed light which lives above cloud-racks and mists. Habitual communion with God is the root of the truest and purest compassion. It at once supplies a standard by which to measure the greatness of man’s godlessness, and therefore of his gloom, and a motive for laying the pain of these upon our hearts, as if they were our own.

III. We have here loving contact with those whom we would help set forth in the Lord’s touch. Wherever men would help their fellows, this is a prime requisite-that the would-be helper should come down to the level of those whom he desires to aid. Such contact with men will win their hearts, as well as soften ours. It will make them willing to hear, as well as us wise to speak. Let us preach the Lord’s touch as the source of all cleansing. Let us imitate it in our lives, that “if any will not hear the word, they may without the word be won.”

IV. We have here the true healing power, and the consciousness of wielding it set forth in the Lord’s authoritative word. The reflection of Christ’s triumphant consciousness of power should irradiate our spirits as we do His work, like the gleam from gazing on God’s glory which shone on the lawgiver’s stern face while He talked with men. We have everything to assure us that we cannot fail. The tearful sowing in the stormy winter’s day has been done by the Son of man. For us there remains the joy of harvest-hot and hard work indeed, but gladsome too.

A. Maclaren, The Secret of Power, p. 26.

Peculiarities in the Miracle of Decapolis.

I. It cannot have been without meaning, though it may have been without any efficaciousness to the healing of disease, that Christ employed the outward signs used in this miracle. Some purpose must have been subserved, forasmuch as we may be sure that there was never anything useless or superfluous in the actions of our Lord. And the reason why Christ thus touched the defective organs, before uttering the word which was to speak them into health, may be found, as is generally allowed, in the circumstances of the man on whom the miracle was about to be wrought. This man, you will observe, does not seem to have come to Christ of his own accord; it is expressly stated, “And they bring unto Him one that was deaf,” etc. The whole was done by the relatives or friends of the afflicted individual; for anything that appears to the contrary, he himself may have had no knowledge of Jesus. Our Lord took him aside from the multitude, because His attention was likely to be distracted by the crowd, and Christ wished to fix it on Himself as the Author of his cure. The man was deaf, so that no question could be put to him, and he had an impediment in his speech which would have prevented his replying. But he could see and he could feel what Christ did; and therefore our Lord supplied the place of speech, by touching the tongue and putting His finger into the ears,-for this was virtually saying that He was about to act on those organs,-and by looking up to heaven, for this was informing the deaf man that the healing power must come from above.

II. Consider next whether the possession of miraculous power did not operate upon Christ in a manner unlike that in which it would, most probably, operate on ourselves. When He did good, He manifested no feeling of pleasure. On the contrary, you might have thought it a pain to Him to relieve misery; for the narrative tells us that, at the instant of giving utterance to the omnipotent word, He showed signs as of a burdened and disquieted spirit; “He sighed”-not, He smiled-not, He rejoiced; but “He sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened.” It is no undue inference from the circumstance of Christ’s sighing at the instant of working the miracle before us, when we take it as evidence of a depression of spirit which would not give way before even that most happy-making thing, the making others happy. Of all the incidental proofs of our Lord’s having been “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief,” there is, perhaps, none of a more touching or plaintive character than is thus furnished by our text.

H. Melvill, Sermons on Less Prominent Facts, vol. i., p. 208.

Mar 7:34

I. The general study of this story would furnish several very excellent and edifying lessons suggested by our Lord’s action in working this miracle upon the shore of Decapolis. (1) We might note the wide reach of the Master’s zeal. Jesus had just come from Tyre and Sidon, clear across in a heathen land; He was now in the midst of some Greek settlements, on the eastern shore of the Sea of Tiberius. We see how He appears thus going upon a foreign mission. (2) We might dwell upon the need of friendly offices in apparently hopeless cases. (3) We might also mention the manipulations of our Saviour as illustrating the ingenuity of real sympathy. (4) We observe our Lord’s respect for everyone’s private reserves of experience. “And He took him aside from the multitude privately.” (5) We notice the naturalness of all great services of good. At the supremely majestic moments of His life our Lord became simpler in utterance and behaviour than at any other time. He fell back on the sweet and pathetic speech of His mother-tongue.

II. The singular peculiarity of this story, however, is what might be made the subject of more extended remark. Three things meet us in their turn. (1) Why did our Lord sigh when He was looking up to heaven. Everyone is aware of the pleasure it gives to bring cure to a chronic weakness, or give a hope in the place of humiliation. Somehow our Saviour seems depressed, and we look for a reason. But in the narrative there is furnished not even so much as a hint for our help. (2) We are left in this case to conjecture. And in a general way, perhaps, it would be enough to say, that there was something like an ejaculatory prayer in this sigh of Jesus’ soul; but more likely there was in it the outbreaking of sad and weary sympathy with the suffering of a fallen race like ours. It may be He sighed (a) because there was so much trouble in the world everywhere; (b) because there were many who made such poor work in dealing with their trouble; (c) because He could not altogether alleviate the trouble He found; (d) because the trouble He met always had its origin and aggravation in sin; (e) because so few persons were willing to forsake their sins which made the trouble. (3) Christians need more sighs. They are a royal priesthood, and they have an office of intercession to exercise. There was a day when Jehovah sent an angel with an inkhorn by his side through Jerusalem, to set a mark upon the foreheads of those who, in their sad hearts, kept up a great masterful, pitiful yearning for sinners’ conversion, and a cry against the abominations of sin.

C. S. Robinson, Sermons on Neglected Texts, p. 281.

I. This is not the only record of the sighs and tears and troubled heart of Jesus. We are told in the Epistle to the Hebrews that in the days of His flesh He offered up supplications with strong crying and tears. By the grave of Lazarus, when He saw Mary weeping, and the Jews also weeping, He groaned in the spirit, “and the silent tears streamed down His face.” He wept aloud over the hypocrisy and crime of Jerusalem. Truly, He was a “man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.”

II. But on two of the occasions on which we are told that Jesus sighed and wept, He was immediately about to dispel the cause of the misery. He sighed because He was not thinking only of the individual case. That He had power to remedy; but how many myriads were there of the bereaved whom He could not thus console? of the deaf and dumb who in this world could never hear and never speak? Even in the individual cases there was, to His quick sympathy, cause enough to sigh for the wreck caused by the sin of man and the malice of Satan, in deforming the beauty of God’s fair creation. His sigh for these was not the sigh of powerlessness-it was the sigh of sympathy. But more than this, He was thinking of all the world, looking down to the very depths of its drear abyss of sorrow. His act of healing could be but a drop in the ocean.

III. In that poor afflicted man our Lord saw but one more sign of that vast crack and flaw which sin causes in everything which God has made. (1) Jesus had seen, laid stark upon the bier, the widow’s only son. He had seen the little maid of Jairus lying pale and cold. He had seen Mary weeping for Lazarus dead. And as He looked out upon a world of death, can you wonder if, looking up to heaven, He sighed? (2) This, alas! was not all, and was not the worst. Sickness may be cured and pain assuaged; and Time lays his healing hand on the wounds of death. But the ravages of sin! there is mischief and unmingled mischief there. Can you wonder if, as Jesus looked on the world of sin, He looked up to heaven and sighed? (3) Our Lord saw all the sorrow; He did not ignore it; He sighed for it; He wept for it; He prayed for it; but not for one moment did He despair for it; nay, He worked to lighten it, leaving us thereby, as in all things, an example that we should follow His steps.

F. W. Farrar, Ephphatha: Sermons, p. 1.

Sorrow in Healing.

Our Lord sighed, we cannot doubt,-

I. At the thought of that destructive agency of which He had before Him one example. Here was one whom Satan had bound. Here was an illustration of that reign of sin unto death to which the whole world bears witness. This deaf-and-dumb man reminded Christ of the corruption that had passed over God’s pure creation; and therefore, looking up to heaven, He sighed.

II. But there was more than this, as we all feel at once, in that sigh. That outward bondage was but the token of an inward thraldom. Whether healed or not in this life, no bodily infirmity can have more than a temporary duration. Death must end it. But not so that spiritual corruption of which the other was but a sign. That inward ear which is stopped against God’s summons, that voice of the heart which refuses to utter His praise-these things are of eternal consequence. And while bodily infirmities and disorders are occasional and partial in their occurrences, spiritual disease is universal. It overspreads every heart. Christ’s thoughts at that moment were directed to the sins of the whole world, feeling them as a sore burden laid upon His soul, and made by man’s obstinacy too heavy even for Him to bear.

III. He sighed therefore, we may say, further, from a sense of the disproportion in actual extent between the ruin and the redemption. The ruin universal. All the world guilty before God. Every soul of man corrupted by estrangement from God. And yet the great multitude refusing to be redeemed. And again, through the simple negligence and cold-heartedness of the professed Church of Christ, to how few, comparatively speaking, does the message of life come at all! Generation after generation, since the word was first spoken which bade the Church go forth into all the world, and evangelise the whole creation, has fallen asleep utterly ignorant of that holy name, for lack sometimes of a sender and sometimes of a messenger. And this even until now; and even without remorse, without shame, without any vigorous or at least adequate efforts to repair the wrong. Might not He who foresaw these things sigh within Himself as He plucked one brand from the burning? Might He not sorrowfully contrast the price paid with the possession purchased-the multitude of the redeemed with the fewness of the saved?

C. J. Vaughan, Harrow Sermons, p. 279.

I. Our Lord may have sighed (1) As He contemplated the afflicted one before Him. (2) As He viewed the desolation and disaster which moral evil had been the means of spreading in the world. (3) The sigh may have been the result of that feeling of sadness which comes over our hearts even in moments when all things suggest joy. These feelings are more reasonable than we suppose. The tears that steal forth unbidden at the wedding feast, the sigh which love heaves over the cradled treasure of the nursery, are not empty exhibitions of a feeble hysteria. They have their roots in sober truth. It is the shadow of the future which calls forth that sadness. Life’s experiences tell us that, notwithstanding all that hope has prophesied, there have been failures and mishaps-that many a golden morning has been followed by a stormy afternoon and a dark and disastrous eventide. It is the thought, though only half realised, of the shipwrecks of life which prompts the sigh and compels the unbidden tear. Thus it was, I think, with Christ. He knew, as we and all men know, that the boon He was about to bestow might prove no real blessing.

II. Yet Christ did not withhold the boon. If there crossed His mind all the evil, the rancour, derision, and scandal which the unfettered tongue might occasion, He did not on that account stay the hand of His benevolence. Freely, ungrudgingly, were His miracles of love performed, though it is too much to suppose that the recipients of His mercy always made good use of their restored senses or newly won faculties. Though the boon may be used for evil, Christ does not withold it.

III. There is a remedy for the evils that accompany our freedom. Christ, while He teaches us that the remedy is not to be sought in depriving man of the gift, points by His conduct where the real remedy is to be sought. It is by conferring an additional and guiding gift; not by withholding one boon, but by bestowing another, does He suggest to us the true course of conduct. There is another “Ephphatha.” He speaks “Be opened,” and the tongue is loosed; but the ear is unstopped also. The tongue is set free to speak, and it may be the instrument of untold harm; but the ear is open, and there is a voice which speaks truths in tones of unearthly sweetness, and that voice the sufferer can now hear. While therefore He bestows the faculty of speech, He bestows the opportunity of hearing those glad and soul-elevating principles of righteousness and forgiveness and love which will fill the loosened tongue with joy, and put a new song of praise in that silent mouth. The Ephphatha of gift and the Ephphatha of new opportunities for good go hand in hand.

Bishop Boyd-Carpenter, Sermon Preached May 28th, 1876.

From the text we learn-

I. The duty of compassion. The world has, in all ages, deeply needed, and in this age still deeply needs, the lesson of pity. We profess and call ourselves Christians; have we yet learnt the simplest and earliest element in the sigh of the Saviour, the divineness of mercy, of compassion, and of love?

II. Yet we must learn the lesson not of compassion only, but of energy therewith. Compassion which ends in compassion may be nothing more than the luxury of egotism; but the sigh of Jesus was but an instant’s episode in a life of toil. If His sigh binds us to pity all sin and sorrow, it binds us no less to bend every effort of our lives towards the end that sin may cease and be forgiven, and sorrow flee away. (1) The world is full of sorrow. The sigh of Christ pledges us, as our first duty, not to add to that sorrow, either actively or passively, either directly or indirectly, by our pride or self-indulgence, by cruelty or malice, for our gain or our gratification, by taking unfair advantages, or by speaking false, bitter, and unwholesome words. (2) The world is full of disease. The sigh of Christ pledges us not only to be gentle and sympathetic and helpful to all who are afflicted, but also to strive by pureness and kindness, by high example and sound knowledge, to improve the conditions which shall make life sweet and healthy, cheerful and genial, vigorous and pure. (3) The world is full of sin. The sigh of Jesus pledges us ourselves to keep innocency, and do the thing that is right; not to set examples which lead to sin; to lead men, both by our life and doctrine, to that Saviour who died for sin, and who can alone forgive it, and cleanse us from its guilt and power.

III. A lesson of hope (1) For ourselves; the perfect confidence with which each one of us may throw ourselves upon Christ’s love; the infinite conviction with which we may each of us say, “Christ died for me.” (2) For all the world. Who was it that sighed and said, “Ephphatha, Be opened”? Ah, it takes the fourfold Gospel to answer that question! It was He whom St. Matthew set forth as the Divine Messiah who fulfilled the past; and St. Mark as the Son of God, filling with power and awfulness the present; and St. Luke as the Seeker and Saviour, to all ages, of the lost; and St. John in the spiritual Gospel as the Incarnate Word. God is everywhere; and the footsteps of Him who sighed for the miseries of man have illuminated even that unknown land which every man must enter.

F. W. Farrar, Ephphatha: Sermons, p. 229.

There is one trait, and only one, in which, though it may be our necessity, and perhaps our privilege, yet it can scarcely be called our duty, to be like our great Master. And yet that trait is almost the largest in our Saviour’s character-sadness of spirit; and the reason why we are not to copy our Saviour’s sadness is evident: it is twofold. One, because He Himself is happy now, and the duty of being like Him as He is, is greater than the duty of being like Him as He was; so that we are most copying Christ when we are exceedingly happy. And the other reason is, that those sorrows of Jesus were the very materials out of which He was making the Church’s joy. Therefore to imitate them would be as if a man should think to copy a rainbow by painting a shower. For when we are sad, we are so far frustrating the sadnesses of Jesus. In all our Saviour’s sorrows-I do not enter now into the mysteries of Gethsemane and Calvary-but in all the sorrows of our Saviour’s life among men, there are two features characteristic, beautiful, and instructive. (1) Our Saviour’s recorded sadnesses were all for others. (2) His sorrow was never an idle sentiment. The sigh of Jesus when He healed the deaf-and-dumb man at Decapolis was-

I. The Sigh of Earnestness. Because it says that, “looking up to heaven, He sighed.” Some connect the two words, and account that the sigh is a part of the prayer, an expression of the intensity of the working of our Lord’s heart when He was supplicating to the Father.

II. The Sigh of Beneficence. He who never gave us anything but what was bought by His own suffering-so that every pleasure is a spoil, purchased by His blood-did now by the sigh, and under the feeling that He sighed, indicate that He purchased the privilege to restore to that poor man the senses he had lost.

III. The Sigh of Brotherhood. The scene before Him would be to His mind but a representation of thousands of thousands. His comprehensive thought, starting from that point, would travel on, till it embraced, in one dark union, all the miseries with which this earth is filled.

IV. The Sigh of Holiness. Do you suppose our Saviour’s mind could think of all the physical evil, and not go on to the deeper moral causes from which it sprang? Doubtless, in those closed ears and that chained tongue, He read, too plainly written, the fall-the distance-the degradation-the corruption-the universal defilement of our world. He sighed. That is the way in which perfect holiness looked on the sins of the universe.

J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 1874, p. 198.

References: Mar 7:34.-H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, Sunday Sermonettes for a Year, p. 109; W. F. Hook, Sermons on the Miracles, vol. ii., p. 49; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. viii., p. 152; C. Kingsley, Town and Country Sermons, p. 358. Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 394. Mar 7:36.-Homiletic Quarterly, vol. v., p. 314. Mar 7:36, Mar 7:37.-Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. i., p. 76.

Mar 7:37

Low Estimate of the Church’s Work.

Let us compare the danger, to which we are open, of taking a low estimate of the Church with the popular view once taken of the ministry of our Blessed Lord.

I. There were few, when He was alive on earth, who came to Him in the spirit of Nicodemus, seeking truth. The greater number followed, like the multitude at Capernaum, not because they saw His miracle, but because they ate of the loaves and were filled. Two of the disciples owned how they were mortified at the loss of their political expectations from Jesus. Can we suppose that there was a more spiritual mind in those who cheered Him on this road with such applause as this, “He hath done all things well: He maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak”?

II. Then, as to our own danger, what the miracles of Christ and His beneficence were to the witnesses of His ministry, the indirect but manifest effects of Christianity in the world are to us. Let us take the case of public charities in this and other Christian countries. Who would not point to them as evidence of the power of the Gospel? And yet, are these public charities a gauge of religion? Men give largely, or admire those who do so, under a vague impression that benevolence is equivalent to God. (2) Again, education is one of the most obvious benefits arising from the influence of Christianity in this age. But, great and precious as are the benefits conferred by education, let no one imagine that the best of schools atones for an ill-appointed Church.

III. There is a high and admirable sense in which the description of Christ in the text may be read. “He hath done all things well”-so the redeemed in heaven will say of Him. “He hath done all things well,” and not according to the right and wrong of this world, but well according to the judgment of eternity-well, insomuch as the work answered perfectly to the design, the end to the beginning. When did He say that His work was finished? Was it when crowds followed Him whom He had fed in their hunger or healed in their sicknesses or raised from the dead? No; but at the moment when His admirers forsook Him, and left Him in the hands of His enemies. When the world stood only near Him that they might gaze on His misery, when He disappointed all popular expectations and was despised and rejected of men, then, in the hearing of God, when His voice alone of all His bodily powers survived His agony, He said of His work, “It is finished.”

C. W. Furse, Sermons at Richmond, p. 121.

The Gift of Hearing.

I. It is Christ who enables any one of us to hear any of the common sounds that enter into our ears as we walk out on an August day. If you have heard the singing of the birds or the running of the stream or the voices of children, recollect it was Christ who caused you to hear them. He fills the earth and air with all melodies, and He gives to men the power of taking them in. By giving back hearing to this man who had lost it, He declared this: He said, I am the Giver of hearing, the power comes from Me. Think how wonderful that is.

II. There is another kind of deafness besides that which cannot take in sounds. We may hear sounds, and yet the words that are within the sounds may never reach us. They may float about us, and seem as if they were coming unto us. And then we may feel just the same as if they had never been uttered. As far as we are concerned, we might as well have been a hundred miles away. But if they are words of health and life-words that come from the good God-words that are to make us right and true men-words that are to make all that is past fresh and new to us, and what is going on around us good and not evil, and what is to be hereafter through all ages blessed,-it is a very sad thing, is it not, that they should be all lost upon us? But must it be so? Shall it be so with any of us? What, when it is written, “He maketh the deaf to hear”! When we can say, Lord, Thou hast sent us these words; they are Thine! Once more say, Ephphatha; Be opened! to, me and to all who have not received the good news of Thy New Testament into their hearts.

F. D. Maurice, Sermons in Country Churches, p. 10.

I. Our Lord, it is remarked, took this man aside, as in the eighth chapter He is represented as taking the blind man by the hand, and leading him out of the village, before He restored his sight, probably for this reason in both cases-that both patients might be moved out of the noise and bustle of the wondering crowd, and thus the lesson of the heavenly power and goodness of Him who healed them might sink more quietly and deeply into their hearts. Unlike the pictures of those workers of mere wonders which men’s fancies have devised, the Lord is ever represented as anxious in His great works for this, almost above all things-that the healing of their bodies might be, for the cured, the outward and visible sign of His power to heal their souls. And He knew that for this purpose each character required its own peculiar treatment; sometimes the patient’s temptation was to lose the sobering and hallowing impression in the midst of much talk, while he professed to be showing forth the mercy he had received among his friends and acquaintances; sometimes (as in the case of the demoniac in the country of the Gadarenes, whose dwelling had before been in the tombs) the best help to the patient’s holiness was to be found in the society of his friends, and in no solitary brooding over his state, but in telling to all how great things the Lord had done for him.

II. In the instance before us, the Lord’s solicitude for the sufferer and regard for the peculiarities of his case seems, it has been remarked, to be shown even in the form in which He sets about the miracle. The man could not hear, and therefore the Lord spoke to him by signs; He put His fingers into his ears, and touched his tongue, and looked up to heaven, to let him more readily understand the blessing which was intended, and the source from which it was to come. He sighed, too, as He wept afterwards at the grave of Lazarus, thinking in both cases how vast was the amount of spiritual evil that remained to be vanquished, and how easy it was, comparatively, to cure men’s bodily diseases, or even to raise them bodily after death to life again; how difficult to regenerate their souls. This mixture of anxiety to effect a spiritual along with a bodily cure is one great source of deep interest in our Lord’s miracles. He is not, as we have said, the mere wonder-worker, manifesting His Divine commission by a supernatnral power that awes us into conviction. His power is not more remarkable than His love-a love which begins with the body, but is not at rest till it has laboured for the soul. And hence that curiosity is very natural which has led men to ask whether they cannot learn something as to the ultimate spiritual fate of those who were blessed to be thus the objects of His solicitude. But God has not thought fit to gratify this curiosity, and we may be content to leave the subjects of it in the hands of Him who so evidently cared for them, and who does all things well, both for our bodies and our souls.

A. C. Tait, Lessons for School Life, p. 183.

References: Mar 7:37.-H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, The Life of Duty, vol. ii., p. 104; C. Girdlestone, A Course of Sermons, vol. ii., p. 273; J. C. Hare, Sermons in Herstmonceux Church, p. 245; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. v., p. 32; J. Vaughan, Sermons, 14th series, p. 5. Mar 7:37.-Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iv., p. 114. Mar 8:1, Mar 8:2.-J. Keble, Sermons for Sundays after Trinity, Part I., p. 254. Mar 8:1-8.-Outline Sermons to Children, p. 146. Mar 8:1-9.-Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 13; J. C. Harrison, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii., p. 321; H. M. Luckock, Footprints of the Son of Man, p. 165. Mar 8:1-26.-W. Hanna, Our Lord’s Life on Earth, p. 237. Mar 8:2.-J. Keble, Sermons on Various Occasions, p. 189. Mar 8:2, Mar 8:3.-G. Huntington, Sermons for Holy Seasons, p. 47; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iv., p. 225; G. Matheson, Moments on the Mount, p. 41.

Fuente: The Sermon Bible

Chapter 7

1. The Opposition of the Pharisees. (Mar 7:1-23. Mat 15:1-20)

2. Grace shown to the Syrophenician Woman. (Mar 7:24-30. Mat 15:21-28)

3. The healing of the deaf man. (Mar 7:31-37. Mat 15:29-31.)

1. The Opposition of the Pharisees. Mar 7:1-23

This paragraph is of much importance. The scope of the analysis forbids a full annotation, but we refer the reader to the exposition of Mat 15:1-20, the parallel passage. The Servant in His divine wisdom uncovers the hypocrisy which lies underneath the traditions of the elders. He shows that the Pharisees had rejected the commandment of God for the sake of men-made inventions and traditions. Their ritualistic service founded upon tradition was dishonoring to God and His Word. Such ritualism springing from tradition must always be. He condemns religiousness, which knows nothing of heart obedience and holiness of life. And this outward, human, man-made religion, which boasts of being something and doing something, He condemns. Then He shows that mans defilement does not consist in what enters into him, but the things which come out of him. He shows what man is within (Mar 7:21-23). No, mere religiousness cannot take away this defilement. Thus He uncovers the hypocrisy of an outward religion and the true state of the heart of man. The product of the natural heart of man, though it may delight in religious observances, is nothing but vileness.

2. Grace shown to the Syrophenician Woman. Mar 7:24-30

While the omniscient Lord in the form of the Servant showed what the heart of man is, He now also uncovers His own heart in showing Grace to one, who belonged to the Gentiles. In the borders of Tyre and Sidon the blessed Servant sought quietness and entered a house; but He could not be hid. Note again that Mark mentions this exclusively, because it brings out His character as Servant. He also informs us that she was a Gentile, a Syrophenician, belonging to the enemies of Gods people, Israel. But Mark leaves out Matthews statement, that she appealed to Him as Son of David. Matthews Gospel is the proper place for that. What evidences all along we find of the inspiration of these records. She had no claim on His Mercy and Power, for she was under the curse. Her daughter had a demon. And though she had no claim on His power and no promise, she believed in His love. She takes the place He gave to her and the daughter was restored. What a manifestation of Grace! And how it must have cheered the Servants heart! In that moment His omniscient eye must have beheld the multitudes of Gentiles, who, after His death on the Cross, as lost sinners with no promise, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, would believe in His love.

3. The healing of the deaf man. Mar 7:31-37

A comparison with Matthew shows that the account here is peculiar to Marks Gospel. In Mat 15:29-31 we find the dumb man mentioned among others whom He healed. He represents Israel. Altogether deaf, unable to hear Gods voice, which spoke through the One who had come and an impediment in speech. They attempted to speak of God and praise God. And such is mans natural state. And such He came to heal. Israel might have had the ear opened by Him, the Servant, whose ear was always open, and Israel might have the tongue loosed, to praise His Name. He heals the afflicted one. And how the Servant looked to heaven and groaned. What must He have felt!

Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)

CHAPTER 28

The Religion of the Pharisees

Then came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem. And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say, with unwashen, hands, they found fault. For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders. And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brasen vessels, and of tables. Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands? He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition. For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free. And ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father or his mother; Making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.

Mar 7:1-13

As our Lord Jesus warns us elsewhere to beware of false prophets, he warns us here to beware of false religion. Nothing is more dangerous to the souls of men, and nothing more deadly than false prophets and false religion.

The Apostle Paul warns us that those who eat and drink the bread and wine of the Lords Table without faith in Christ eat and drink damnation to themselves. What he says about the Lords Table is true of and applicable to all other religious practices without faith in Christ. To profess faith without faith, to claim an interest in Christ without an interest in Christ, to be baptized without being born of God, to pretend to be a child of God while you are yet a child of the devil, all these things are eating and drinking damnation to yourself.

Our Lord Jesus warns us again and again to, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. The warning is repeated often because it is needed often. Here he explains exactly what he meant by the leaven of the Pharisees. When our Lord warns us to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, he is talking about the doctrine, or the religion of the Pharisees.

What a humbling picture we have before us of apostate, human religion. Here we see, to some extent, what man is capable of doing in the perversion of truth, while clinging to the name of God. These well read, highly educated, greatly respected religious men really thought God was impressed by watching them meticulously wash their hands and their dishes in religious ceremony! There are multitudes exactly like them today. In fact, the religion of the Pharisees is the natural religion of the carnal heart. All men, by nature gravitate to it. Yet, the religion of the Pharisees, though it is naturally appealing to and universally approved of by all men, is deadly to a mans soul and an utter abomination in the sight of God. The religion of the Pharisees is both the most ancient and the newest of all religions. In this study I will call your attention to seven things that characterize the religion of the Pharisees. As we look at these seven characteristics of it, let us ask ourselves this question: Is my religion the religion of Christ or the religion of the Pharisees?

1.The religion of the Pharisees makes people self-righteous, critical, and judgmental.

Then came together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jerusalem. And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is to say, with unwashen, hands, they found fault (Mar 7:1-2).

The Pharisees were always watching other people, inspecting the behavior of other people, finding fault with other people. They had a keen eye for what others did, or failed to do. Such critics and fault-finders are a penny a dozen. If you do something, anything, before you sit down, someone who never does anything will come along and find something wrong with what you have done. In natural things this is annoying; but in spiritual things it reveals a proud, unregenerate, self-righteousness, which is always the result of legalistic, works religion.

These Pharisees really thought they could tell, by observing the outward conduct of men in their daily routine of life, who was spiritual and who was carnal. We have many like them in our day. Self-righteous religionists in our day, like the Pharisees of our Lords day, ever justify themselves in their own minds, before others, and before God, proudly asserting, I am not as other men (Luk 18:11). They always justify themselves by comparing themselves with people they consider more sinful than they are. I am not as this publican. Their claim to holiness is based upon what they do and what they do not do, not upon the work of Christs gift of Gods grace in him. Though they talk much above love, they despise others. That is manifest by their treatment of others. They are professional critics of men, who love to point out the weaknesses of others.

Here, the Pharisees and Scribes seized the opportunity to point out what they thought was a terrible evil in our Lord and his disciples. They saw them eating in public without ceremonially washing their hands beforehand. That was a breach of their religious traditions that was simply unpardonable! John Trapp tells us that, the Pharisees deemed it as great a sin to eat with unwashen hands, as to commit fornication.

The complaint of the Scribes and Pharisees against the disciples was not that they were evil, corrupt, covetous men, but that they did not, in keeping with Jewish traditions, wash their hands before they ate! Obviously, it is always good to wash your hands, the more often the better, as a matter of personal hygiene. But the practice of always washing ones hands before eating, as a show of religious devotion, had become a religious tradition with them, a tradition they would never dare to break, at least not in public. They washed their hands, whether they needed washing or not, because they vainly imagined that in doing so they showed spirituality and devotion to God. Our Lords disciples, following his example and instruction, felt no compulsion to obey religious tradition. They washed not their hands when they ate bread! Why should they wash them if they were clean? Tradition had no power over their consciences.

You may think, What does that have to do with me? How does this apply to anyone today There are multitudes who do much of what they do purely out of religious tradition, only to be seen of men, so that they will appear to others to be true Christians, spiritually minded, and devoted to Christ. How often have you heard people say, or said yourself, I do that to show people that I am a Christian. I want people to know that I love the Lord? The one thing our Lord Jesus tells us plainly that we are never to do is to try, by our dress, our public appearance, or our public behavior, to show that we are Christians. Read Mat 6:3-18. You may say, But I want people to see Jesus in me. Lost, unbelieving people did not see Jesus in Jesus. They certainly are not going to see him in you and me.

Let us take care that we live as men and women who trust and worship the Lord Jesus Christ in honesty, in labor, in conversation, in modesty, in love, and in patience. Adorn the doctrine of God our Savior (Tit 2:10). But do nothing to be seen of men. Several years ago, I was in the company of several pastors in a restaurant. When his meal was served, the senior pastor among us began eating his meal without bowing to give thanks first (without publicly washing his hands). One of the younger men objected to his conduct, saying, I could never do that. I always give thanks before I eat, especially in a public place. When my older friend asked, Why, he said, I want people to know that Im a Christian. The older, wiser pastor smiled and said, If you want people to know youre a Christian, leave the waitress a good tip.

No man has any more right to institute a new religious duty in the kingdom of God than to neglect an old one. The issuing of commands is for the King alone. Yet these religionists wanted to know why the Lords disciples broke a law, which was never established by God as a law. Lost religionists in all ages love to invent traditions and then rest their souls upon them. Going about to establish their own righteousness, they refuse to submit themselves to the righteousness of God in Christ. They refuse to trust Christ alone for righteousness before God. They have a form of godliness, which they cherish, but deny the power of true godliness, which is the gospel of Gods free, saving grace in Christ (Rom 1:16-17). That which our Savior said to the Pharisees of his day is yet true. Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God (Luk 16:15).

The washing of hands, like all other religious tradition, is nothing. Faith which worketh by love is everything. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin. All those things that men do to make themselves righteous in will worship is abomination in the sight of God.

2.The religion of the Pharisees is a religion which has apostatized and departed from the Word of God.

For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders. And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brasen vessels, and of tables. Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands? He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition (vv. Mar 7:3-9).

Never was there a nation of men raised so high and fallen so low as the nation of Israel. Never was there a people given such great privileges and opportunities, only to cast them aside, as the Jews. Israel was the nation to whom God gave his law, his ordinances, his priests, his tabernacle, his temple, his altar, his mercy-seat, and his prophets. These are the people to whom Moses, Samuel, and Isaiah prophesied. This is the people who sprung from Abrahams lions, who descended from Davids kingdom, and wore Israels name. These are the people who once trembled before the ark of the covenant. How they have fallen! Here are Abrahams sons. Here are men who claim Moses name, though they had long ago rejected his doctrine, who consider the ceremonial washing of hands, cups, saucers, and pots and pans an evidence of spirituality! In their opinion, the person who paid the most rigid attention to the external observance of man-made religious customs was the most holy among them.

Let us be warned. Once a church, a denomination, or an individual leaves the Kings highway of truth, we must not be surprised to see them washing pots and calling it godliness! Multitudes today are just like the Pharisees. They wear the names of Gods prophets and claim identification with them; but have long since forsaken the truth of Gods Word in utter apostasy. Todays religion places great emphasis on getting people into church, but none on getting them into Christ. Multitudes who pass by the doctrine of the cross proudly wear a cross around their necks. In churches everywhere, people sing Amazing Grace, though they despise the doctrine of grace. People everywhere make a big show of outward religion, but ignore righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. They have a form of godliness, but despise the gospel of Christ, which is the power of God. Pharisees in all generations are great washers of the outside. But formal, ritualistic, ceremonial, outward religion, without heart faith, is empty, useless religion.

3.The Pharisees religion is outward, lip-service religion.

He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me (Mar 7:6).

The passage our Lord referred to is Isa 29:13. I wonder if we will ever learn that God Almighty is not impressed with the way we comb our hair, the clothes we wear, the food we eat, or the show we make in our pretense of piety and godliness. The Lord looketh on the heart! God says, My son, give me thine heart. Keep thy heart with all diligence. Let us remember the heart is the principle thing in faith, in private worship, in public worship, at the Lords Table, in prayer, and in all things spiritual.

The heart is the principle thing in the relationship of a husband and wife, parents and children, friend and friend. And in our relationship with, service to, and worship of our God the matter of chief concern is our hearts (Isa 29:13; Eze 33:31; Rom 10:13; Rom 14:17).

What must we have to be saved? A New Heart! What sacrifice does God require from us? A Broken and Contrite Heart! What is true circumcision? Heart Circumcision! What does God call for from his sons? My son, give me thine heart! Where does Christ dwell? In Our Hearts! J. C. Ryle wrote, The bended knee, the bowed head, the loud Amen, the daily chapter, the regular attendance at the Lords Table, are all useless and unprofitable, so long as our affections are nailed to sin, or pleasure, or money or the world.

4.The religion of the Pharisee is a religion which uses the pretense of piety as a covering and excuse for irresponsibility.

For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother; and, Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death: But ye say, If a man shall say to his father or mother, It is Corban, that is to say, a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; he shall be free. And ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father or his mother (Mar 7:10-12).

While true religion, true spirituality is a very practical thing. False, empty religion will allow a man or woman to neglect and despise the most common duties of life. True religion, true Christianity causes people to cherish and faithfully perform the most common duties of everyday life for the glory of God.

The Lord Jesus declares (Mat 15:5-8) that if a person refuses to take care of his parents, trying to excuse his selfishness, by saying that the only money he has has been devoted as a gift to God, he nullifies the Word of God, and proves himself a religious hypocrite. The worship of God causes a believer to honor his parents, causes a father and husband to provide for his family, causes a believer to be a diligent employee, causes a Christian to be a faithful employer, and causes a woman to be a good wife and mother. Rowland Hill once said, When a man comes to know the Lord, even his dog and cat and farm animals will be the better for it. It was William Jay who wrote, A person, when he comes to Christ, will be better in every relationship. He is a better husband, father, master, worker, and friend than before or else his religion is not genuine.

5.The religion of the Pharisee is a religion which rejects and makes of non-effect the Word of God, supplanting it with the customs, creeds, and confessions of men.

Three times our Lord lays this charge at the feet of these pompous, self-content, self righteous religionists. You lay aside the Word of God, holding the traditions of men (Mar 7:8). Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition (Mar 7:9). You make the Word of God of none effect through your tradition (Mar 7:13). First, they added their traditions to the Scriptures. Next, they made their traditions equal with the Word of God. In the end, they rejected the Word of God altogether and held to their traditions!

The religion of the Pharisees is religion that supplants the Word of God with the doctrines and traditions of men. Instead of teaching the doctrine of Holy Scripture, the gospel of Christ, salvation by his blood, righteousness, and grace alone, it teaches religious morality. Instead of teaching people to observe our Saviors ordinances of worship (Believers Immersion and the Lords Supper), it teaches duties and ceremonies of purely human invention (The Sprinkling of Infants, The Observance of Lent, and Religious Pageantry). Such religion, though practiced with great devotion and ceremonial gaudiness, is an utterly vain thing, an empty show, void of life, power, and spirituality. It is unacceptable to God and of no benefit to man. The practice of it is eating and drinking damnation to ones own soul!

6.The religion of the Pharisee is a religion of legalism, works, and asceticism.

The Pharisees thought they would defile themselves by touching or using things and people they considered unclean. Multitudes today follow their example. Entire systems of works based religion have been established and gained popular acceptance by inventing extra-biblical taboos for Christians. Adventism is a classic example. All men by nature are legalists and love legal religion, any religion that gives them something to do or not to do, by which they can distinguish themselves from others and make themselves holier than others. That religion which says, touch not, taste not, handle not, no matter what denominational name it wears, is nothing but a show of wisdom in will-worship (Col 2:21-23). I personally know people who question the spirituality of anyone who enjoys boxing, horse races, baseball, basketball, or football, of anyone who eats pork, red meat, or catfish, and of anyone who drinks coffee, tea, or Coca-Cola! I am not exaggerating. I really do know such people.

Every servant of God, each child of God stands or falls before his own Master. We have absolutely no business in trying to govern the lives of Gods children. That is the work of God the Holy Spirit. Perhaps you are thinking If we do not, by some means, try to regulate peoples lives, what is there to prevent them from drunkenness, lasciviousness, fornication, and adultery? That is the thinking of every legalist. Because he must be governed by rules, he presumes that everyone else must be. The believer is governed and constrained by the love of Christ, seeks to honor God in all things, and endeavors to mold his life to the Word of God.

Our energies and efforts would be far better spent if we would seek to love and serve one another, rather than rule and judge one another. I ask the reader to weigh these thoughts by only one criteria: Are they or are they not in total compliance with both the spirit and the letter of the New Testament?

7.In its essence, at its core, the religion of the Pharisee is a religion that denies the need of grace and redemption, because it denies the utter, total depravity of man (Mar 7:14-23).

And when he had called all the people unto him, he said unto them, Hearken unto me every one of you, and understand: There is nothing from without a man, that entering into him can defile him: but the things which come out of him, those are they that defile the man. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear. And when he was entered into the house from the people, his disciples asked him concerning the parable. And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him; Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats? And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man (Mar 7:14-23).

All human religion, like the religion of the Pharisees, operates on the assumption that the defilement and corruption of a persons soul comes from without, from the things we come into contact with in this world. But the Lord Jesus shows us that the defilement and corruption of our souls arises from within us. He shows us that our hearts are polluted, defiled, corrupt, and depraved. We are all by nature corrupt at heart, in need of Gods free, saving grace, and Christs precious blood atonement.

The Pharisees of old, like the religionists of our day, taught that holiness, righteousness, and godliness depended upon abstaining from certain meats and drinks and carefully observing religious ceremonies of washing and purification. Our Savior overthrows this doctrine by declaring three things.

It is not what you put in your body that defiles you, but what comes out of your heart (Rom 14:17).

Material things cannot defile your soul by using them. And material ceremonies cannot cleanse your soul by enduring them. Carnal things can neither corrupt nor cleanse the soul. If we would worship and serve God, we must have something more than a separated life and a form of godliness. We must have a heart that is clean and upright before God, a clean heart and a right spirit. Such a heart is the gift of Gods grace, the work of his Spirit in the new birth.

All sin and defilement originates in and springs from the heart. It is not our environment that corrupts us, or our company, or our education, but our hearts.

From within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. What a list! What must that heart be out of which so many evils pour forth! If these are the bees, what must the hive be? Evil thoughts, evil devisings such as the Pharisees displayed, come from the heart. Murders begin not with the dagger, but with malice in the soul. Adulteries and fornications are committed in the heart,before they are performed by the body. The heart is the cage from which every unclean bird flies forth into the world. Thefts are born in the covetousness of the heart. No man steals what he does not first covet. False witness, lying and slander, is venom in the heart that is spewed out of the mouth. Blasphemies are the enmity of the heart expressed by the vile speech of the tongue. All these, and all other evils, ooze from the vile cesspool inside fallen man called, the heart.

All these evil things come from within, and defile the man. It is the corruption of the heart that makes fallen man unfit for communion with God, not failure to pour water on your hands before you eat, or failure to observe religious duties. The heart of man is abominable before God. The evils gushing from the heart make fallen man loathsome and revolting before God and expose all to shame and ruin. It is only the blood of Christ that can cleanse us from the pollution and guilt of our corrupt hearts and save us from the wrath of God, which we so fully deserve. Yet, those who know nothing of the corruption of their hearts, know nothing of Gods saving grace, know nothing of repentance and faith in Christ, are horrified when they see one who worships God in Spirit and in truth neglecting the religious traditions by which their blind leaders lead them into hell.

God looks on the heart; but we prefer outward things, because we are able to perform them and they call attention to us.

Few are able to grasp such elementary, but vital truths, because they are turned away from the simplicity that is in Christ by self-righteous, works religion. There is a vast difference between physical and spiritual defilement. What we eat and drink does not touch the soul. It passes through the body; but it does not reach our hearts. Material things cannot defile a person. That which is eaten is material substance, and cannot make anyone spiritually, or morally unclean. That fact is so obvious that no one would ever imagine otherwise, were it not for the man made dogmas of false religion.

The only hope for your soul and mine is that God might be pleased to save us from ourselves. I have no hope but Christ. He alone is all my Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification, and Redemption. May God make him yours.

Fuente: Discovering Christ In Selected Books of the Bible

The Pharisees: Mar 3:22, Mat 15:1, Luk 5:17, Luk 11:53, Luk 11:54

Reciprocal: Deu 4:2 – General Ezr 7:11 – a scribe Mar 8:11 – Pharisees

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

AS WE COMMENCE this chapter the opposition of the religious leaders again comes to light. The disciples, filled with labour-as verse Mar 7:31 of the previous chapter has told us-were not observing certain traditional washings, and this roused the Pharisees, who were the great sticklers for the tradition of the elders. The Lord accepted the challenge on behalf of the disciples, and answered by a searching exposure of the whole Pharisaic position. They were hypocrites, and He told them so.

The essence of their hypocrisy lay in the profession of worship, consisting in outward ceremonials, when inwardly their hearts were utterly estranged. Nothing counts with God if the heart be not right.

Then, in carrying out their ceremonials they brushed aside the commandment of God in favour of their own tradition. The Lord not merely asserted this, but proved it by giving an instance of the way in which they set aside the fifth commandment by their rules concerning Corban; that is, things devoted to the service of God. Under cover of Corban many a Jew divested himself of all his rightful duties towards his poor old parents. And he did the thing with an air of sanctity, for did it not appear more pious to devote things to God rather than to ones parents?

The things that came under Corban were not things that God demanded; had it been so His demand must have prevailed. There were things that might be dedicated, if so desired; whereas the obligation to support parents was a distinct command. Pharisaic tradition permitted a man to use a permissive enactment in order to avoid complying with a distinct command. They might try to support their tradition with sophistry which appeared pious, but the Lord charged them with nullifying the Word of God. The written words of Exo 20:12 were to Jesus the Word of God. There is no support here for that religious fastidiousness which declines to attach the designation Word of God to the written Scriptures.

We believe we should be right in saying that all human tradition in the things of God ultimately sets the Word of God at naught. The originators of the tradition probably have no such thought, but the master spirit of evil, lying behind the business, has just that intention.

Having unmasked the Pharisees as men whose hearts were far from God, and who dared to make of no effect the Word of God, the Lord called the people and publicly proclaimed the truth which cuts at the root of all religious pretension. Man is not defiled by physical contact with external things, but is himself the seat of what defiles. A hard saying this, and only they who have ears to hear will receive it.

The disciples had to ask Him privately concerning it, and in verses Mar 7:18-23 we have the explanation. Man is corrupt in his nature. What comes from his very heart defiles him. Out of his heart proceed evil thoughts which develop into every kind of evil action. This is the most tremendous indictment of human nature ever uttered. No wonder the Pharisaic heart was far from God; but what a terrible thing that men with hearts like this should profess to draw near and worship Him.

These searching words of our Lord cut at the root of all human pride, and show the worthlessness of all human movements, whether religious or political, which deal merely with externals and leave the heart of man untouched.

His disciples as yet hardly understood these things, and experience will show us that professing Christians are very slow to accept and understand them today; but we shall not get very far except we do understand them. However, it is one thing to expose the heart of man: something more is needed-the heart of God must be expressed. This the Lord proceeded to do, as the rest of the chapter shows.

To the very borders of the land which harboured so much of hypocrisy He went, and there came in contact with a poor Gentile woman in desperate need. His fame had reached her ears and she would not be denied. Yet the Lord tested her by His little parable about the childrens bread and the dogs. Her answer, Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the childrens crumbs, was happily free of hypocrisy. She said in effect, Yes, Lord: it is true that I am no child of the kingdom but a poor Gentile dog without any claim; but I am confident that there is enough power with God and enough goodness in His heart, to feed a poor dog like me.

Now this was faith. Matthew indeed tells us that the Lord called it great faith, and it delighted Him. It also brought her all that her heart desired. Her daughter was delivered. How great the contrast between the heart of God and the heart of man! The one full of benevolence and grace: the other full of every kind of evil. How happy for us when instead of harbouring hypocrisy we are marked by honesty and faith.

In verse Mar 7:31 He again returns to the neighbourhood of the lake, there to meet a man who was deaf and dumb-a condition that was strikingly symbolic of the state in which the mass of the Jews were found. The poor Gentile woman had had ears to hear, and consequently found her tongue to utter words of faith, but they were deaf and had nothing to say.

In healing this man the Lord performed certain actions, which doubtless have symbolic meanings. He took him aside from the crowds, that He might deal with him in privacy. His fingers, symbolic of Divine action, touch his ears. That which came from His mouth touched the mouth of the dumb man. Thus the work was done, and the deaf and dumb both heard and spoke. If any ears are opened to hear the voice of the Lord, it is the fruit of Divine action which takes place in secret. And if any tongue can utter the praise of God or the Word of God, it is because that which comes from His mouth has been brought into contact with ours.

Nothing is said as to the faith of the man. What he felt he was unable to express, and others brought him to Jesus. He was met, however, in full and unstinted grace. Once more it was a case of the goodness of the heart of God being manifested by Jesus.

Evidently the people in some measure were conscious of this, and in their amazement they confessed, He hath done all things well! Coming where it does, this word is all the more striking. The early part of the chapter reveals man in his true character, and we find his heart to be a fountain whence proceeds nothing but evil-he has done all things ill! The perfect Servant reveals the goodness of the heart of God. He has done all things well.

With this verdict we too have abundant cause to agree.

Fuente: F. B. Hole’s Old and New Testaments Commentary

1

The Pharisees were a religious sect of the Jews, and the scribes were those whose business it was to copy the law of Moses and expound it unto the people. Both of these groups were constant foes of Jesus because he rebuked their hypocrisies.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

THIS passage contains a humbling picture of what human nature is capable of doing in religion. It is one of those Scriptures which ought to be frequently and diligently studied by all who desire the prosperity of the Church of Christ.

The first thing which demands our attention in these verses, is the low and degraded condition of Jewish religion, when our Lord was upon earth. What can be more deplorable than the statement now before us? We find the principal teachers of the Jewish nation finding fault, “because our Lord’s disciples ate bread with unwashen hands”! We are told that they attached great importance to the washing of cups, and pots, and brazen vessels, and tables”! In short, the man who paid most rigid attention to mere external observances of human invention was reckoned the holiest man!

The nation, be it remembered, in which this state of things existed, was the most highly favored in the world. To it was given the law on Mount Sinai, the service of God, the priesthood, the covenants, and the promises. Moses, and Samuel, and David, and the prophets, lived and died among its people. No nation upon earth ever had so many spiritual privileges. No nation ever misused its privileges so fearfully, and so thoroughly forsook its own mercies. Never did fine gold become so dim! From the religion of the books of Deuteronomy and Psalms, to the religion of washing hands, and pots, and cups, how great was the fall! No wonder that in the time of our Lord’s earthly ministry, He found the people like sheep without a shepherd. External observances alone feed no consciences and sanctify no hearts.

Let the history of the Jewish church be a warning to us never to trifle with false doctrine. If we once tolerate it we never know how far it may go, or into what degraded state of religion we may at last fall. Once leave the King’s highway of truth, and we may end with washing pots and cups, like Pharisees and Scribes. There is nothing too mean, trifling, or irrational for a man, if he once turns his back on God’s word. There are branches of the Church of Christ at this day in which the Scriptures are never read, and the Gospel never preached-branches in which the only religion now remaining consists in using a few unmeaning forms and keeping certain man-made fasts and feasts-branches which began well, like the Jewish church, and, like the Jewish church, have now fallen into utter barrenness and decay. We can never be too jealous about false doctrine. A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. Let us earnestly contend for the whole faith once delivered to the saints. [Footnote: Absurd and ridiculous as the customs and traditions of the Pharisees appear at first sight, it is a humbling fact that the Pharisees have never wanted imitators and successors. Zeal about washing pots, and cups, and tables, may seem almost ludicrous, and worthy of none but children; but we need not look far to find an exact parallel near home. What can we say to the gravity and seriousness with which men argue on behalf of chasubles, albs, tunicles, piscinas, sedilia, credence-tables, rood-screens, and the like, in the present day? What can we say to the exaggerated attention paid by many to ceremonies, ornaments, gestures, and postures, in the worship of God, about which it is enough to say that Scripture is totally silent? What is it all but Pharisaism over again? What is it but a melancholy repetition of disproportioned zeal about men’s traditional usages? What single argument can be used in defence of these things that the Pharisees might not have used with equal force? Eighteen hundred years have passed away, and yet the generation that made so much ado about washing pots, cups, and tables, is still amongst us. The succession of the Pharisees has never ceased.]

The second thing, that demands our attention, is the uselessness of mere lip-service in the worship of God. Our Lord enforces this lesson by a quotation from the Old Testament: “Well hath Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites, This people honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.”

The heart is the part of man which God chiefly notices in religion. The bowed head, and the bended knee-the grave face and the rigid posture-the regular response, and the formal amen-all these together do not make up a spiritual worshiper. The eyes of God look further and deeper. He requires the worship of the heart. “My son,” he says to every one of us, “Give me thy heart.”

Let us remember this in the public congregation. It must not content us to take our bodies to church, if we leave our hearts at home. The eye of man may detect no flaw in our service. Our minister may look at us with approbation. Our neighbors may think us patterns of what a Christian ought to be. Our voice may be heard foremost in the praise and prayer. But it is all worse than nothing in God’s sight, if our hearts are far away. It is only wood, hay, and stubble before Him who discerns thoughts, and reads the secrets of the inward man.

Let us remember this in our private devotions. It must not satisfy us to say good words, if our heart and our lips do not go together. What does it profit us to be fluent and lengthy, if our imaginations are roving far away, while we are upon our knees? It profits us nothing at all. God sees what we are about, and rejects our offering. Heart-prayers are the prayers He loves to hear. Heart-prayers are the only prayers that He will answer. Our petitions may be weak, and stammering, and mean in our eyes. They may be presented with no fine words, or well-chosen language, and might seem almost unintelligible, if they were written down. But if they come from a right heart, God understands them. Such prayers are His delight.

The last thing that demands our attention in these verses, is the tendency of man’s inventions in religion to supplant God’s word. Three times we find this charge brought forward by our Lord against the Pharisees. “Laying aside the commandments of God, ye hold the traditions of men.” “Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own traditions.” “Making the Word of God of none effect through your traditions.” The first step of the Pharisees, was to add their traditions to the Scriptures, as useful supplements. The second was to place them on a level with the Word of God, and give them equal authority. The last was to honor them above the Scripture, and to degrade Scripture from its lawful position. This was the state of things which our Lord found when he was upon earth. Practically, the traditions of man were everything, and the Word of God was nothing at all. Obedience to the traditions constituted true religion. Obedience to the Scriptures was lost sight of altogether.

It is a mournful fact, that Christians have far too often walked in the steps of Pharisees in this matter. The very same process has taken place over and over again. The very same consequences have resulted. Religious observances of man’s invention, have been pressed on the acceptance of Christians-observances to all appearance useful, and at all events well-meant, but observances nowhere commanded in the word of God. These very observances have by and by been enjoined with more vigor than God’s own commandments, and defended with more zeal than the authority of God’s own Word. We need not look far for examples. The history of our own church will supply them. [Footnote: The persecution of the Puritans in the time of the Stuarts, on account of canons and rubrics was, in too many cases, neither more nor less than zeal for traditions. An enormous amount of zeal was expended in enforcing conformity to the Church of England, while drunkenness, swearing, and open sin were comparatively let alone. Obedience to man-made ecclesiastical rules was required, on pain of fine or imprisonment, while open disobedience to God’s ten commandments was overlooked. Experience supplies painful proof, that traditions once called into being are first called useful. Then they become necessary. At last they are too often made idols, and all must bow down to them, or be punished.]

Let us beware of attempting to add anything to the word of God, as necessary to salvation. It provokes God to give us over to judicial blindness. It is as good as saying that His Bible is not perfect, and that we know better than He does what is necessary for man’s salvation. It is just as easy to destroy the authority of God’s word by addition as by subtraction, by burying it under man’s inventions as by denying its truth. The whole Bible, and nothing but the Bible, must be our rule of faith-nothing added and nothing taken away.

Finally, let us draw a broad line of distinction between those things in religion which have been devised by man, and those which are plainly commanded in God’s word. What God commands is necessary to salvation. What man commands is not. What man devises may be useful and expedient for the times; but salvation does not hinge on obedience to it. What God requires is essential to life eternal. He that wilfully disobeys it ruins his own soul. [Footnote: The subtle way in which the Pharisees evaded the requirements of the fifth commandment, to which our Lord refers in this passage, calls for a few words of explanation.

We must remember that the Pharisees did not openly deny the obligation of the fifth commandment. In all probability they professed to attach as much importance to it as any men. And yet they contrived to make it void! How did they effect this?

They taught that a man might dedicate to God’s service, as sacred, any part of his property which might be applied to the relief of his parents, and so discharge himself from any further expense about them. He had only to say that all his money was “corban”-that is, given over to holy purposes-and no further claim could be made upon him for his father’s or mother’s support. Under pretence of giving God a prior claim, he set himself free from the burden of maintaining them for ever. He did not flatly deny his duty to minister of his worldly substance to his parents’ necessities. But he evaded it by setting up a human tradition, and asserting a higher call of duty, even duty to God.

The likeness between the traditions and sophistries of the Pharisees, making void God’s word under a pretended zeal for God’s glory, and those of the Jesuits, and other advocates of the Roman Catholic Church, is painfully striking. The following passage from an old commentator is worth reading:

“The Scriptures teach that there is no difference to be put between meats, in regard of holiness, but that every creature of God is good. This the Papists make void by teaching that it is matter of religion and conscience to abstain from flesh meats at certain seasons. The Scripture teacheth that we should pray to God alone. This they make void by their manifold prayers to saints departed. The Scripture teacheth Christ alone to be our mediator, both of redemption and intercession. This they make void by making saints intercessors. The Scripture teacheth Christ to be the only head of the church. This they abrogate by their doctrine of the Pope’s supremacy. The Scripture teacheth that every soul should be subject to the higher power. This they abrogate by exempting the Pope and popish clergy from subjection to the civil power of princes and magistrates. Lastly, to instance in the same kind as our Saviour here against the Pharisees, whereas the word of God commands children to honor their parents, the Papists teach that if the child have vowed a monastical life, he is exempted from duty to parents.”-Petter on Mark.]

Fuente: Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on the Gospels

Mar 7:1. And there are gathered together unto him. Against Him, as we see.

From Jerusalem. They had recently come.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

Subdivision 2. (Mar 7:1-37; Mar 8:1-9.)

The Opposition of Traditionalism and the Service of Love.

The next subdivision runs still, for the most part, side by side with Matthew. Luke omits it all. We have here in the first place the opposition of traditionalism to the ways of God, and therefore to the true service of man; whereas faith directly connects us with God, discerns and owns His way and is confirmed by Him, as with the Syro-phoenician woman. The healing of the deaf man following this is peculiar to Mark; and in this man’s condition spiritually seems more fully imaged to us, with no ear to hear, and therefore speech failing. Here the Lord is specially oppressed by the condition, and His “Ephphatha” is uttered with a sigh. Then in another wilderness scene the divine mercy satisfies once more the poor with bread, which as a figure has been plainly interpreted for us; and with this the present subject ends.

1. The growth of traditionalism is not hard to trace. Truth itself from the source of truth, where ministered by man; necessarily accredits the one who brings it. So far this is well, or it would not be necessary; but how often it follows, and at no long interval, that the teacher comes to accredit the truth which first accredited him. We have gained confidence in the man, and begin to accept with less careful examination whatever comes to us from such a source. The interpreter begins to displace the Word that he interprets. For the next generation this is an easier process, and the rule of the rabbi is soon begun. There is soon (formally or informally) a body of doctrine growing up, which although confessedly human and theoretically fallible, is accepted for truth and attaches to itself the masses. Henceforth he who will learn from God has to break through a steadily increasing barrier to the end he would attain.

Traditional teaching is ever tending downwards. If it has a creed this will be a conservative element, no doubt, but a dead support at best, not a living principle. Being human, it will have gaps through which error will come in; if not error of its own; which will readily unite with further error. Immediate recourse to God is shut off by it, and the profit of His word “for correction, for reproof” is, at least, limited.

In Israel the scribes arose as a reaction from that departure from the law which had been the nation’s ruin. They came forward as its defenders and vindicators, and in order to this its investigators and interpreters. Their zeal for its observance urged them to “make a hedge about it” of their own rules, which, while making it ever a heavier yoke, came naturally by degrees to displace what they were intended to enforce. The human came inevitably into conflict with the divine. As additions to it, they broke the law necessarily from the beginning; and the end could not but be still worse than the beginning.

But worse even than their conflicting ordinances was their total mistake as to the nature of the law itself, and of the disease for which it was the appointed remedy. With all their laborious enquiries as to it, they interpreted it superficially, and had no knowledge of its true working. They had not learned the lesson of experience as the apostle declares it, that “that which was ordained to life” he “found to be unto death.” They tried therefore to remedy the failure under it by additional ordinances, instead of turning to that Saviour of whom the prophets with one voice testified. Their remedy was law, not grace; letter and not spirit. They would heal man’s deep-seated disease from the outside, and if they suppressed the external signs, only aggravated to a fatal issue the internal disorder.

(1) Mark emphasizes beyond Matthew the religious scrupulosity which dealt with the outside, the ceremonial washings (or “baptisms”) of hands, cups, vessels, couches; tedious in proportion to its vain unprofitableness. God, by Isaiah, had characterized it long since as mere externalism without heart, human commandments claiming divine authority: so essentially hollow that the Lord denounces it as hypocrisy.

(2) In fact, what God had commanded was set aside by it; and the breach of the “first commandment with promise” was only an example of many like things which they did.

(3) With such it was even vain to argue. The Lord turns, therefore, to the multitude to show them the simple underlying principle which justified to the conscience what He said. Nature had provided for the cleansing of impurities as to the body. Moral, spiritual defilement is, alas, from what comes out of the man; from the heart, and is native there. But how then shall the heart be cleansed?

2. For this they are not ready. He turns from them towards the Gentiles as hiding Himself from their unbelief, to find in one herself a Gentile, a conscious need of Him from which He could not hide Himself, and a discernment of faith which Israel’s doctors lacked. This Syro-phoenician, content to take her true place as a dog before Him, could find her title in His grace to divine bounty, discerning what was impenetrable to the men of law. This faith on His part He recognizes and rejoices in. The power of Satan is quelled, and the soul satisfied.

3. But Israel had no ear to hear the Voice that spake to them: and this is indeed man’s condition naturally, a condition symbolized in this deaf man brought to Christ, and who has a corresponding impediment in his speech: for the speech can only be right where the ear is open. The Lord is oppressed in spirit with this condition. He puts the finger which had touched the leper into his ears: for does not spiritual leprosy underlie such deafness spiritually? and in the cleansing of the leper the ear is the first part anointed. In this type the meaning is quite clear. The soul under the power of sin is deaf to the voice of God – has lost even the power of hearing aright. That which cleanses the leper alone gives the ear to hear.

The Lord touches the tongue also; and then; lifting up His eyes to heaven, sighs and says, Ephphatha! “be opened.” Immediately, his ears are opened, and the bond of his tongue loosed. He is here in Decapolis, a part of the land mainly Gentile and heathen, but the fame of this miracle goes far and wide.

4. The crowds follow Him; and the miracle of the loaves is repeated on their behalf. Here again we are in the track of Matthew’s Gospel, and the difference between the two accounts is very slight. The healing of the multitudes, however, which Matthew records, is omitted here, and their glorifying the God of Israel. Instead of five loaves among five thousand men; as on the former occasion, with twelve baskets of fragments taken up (see p. 157, notes), we have now seven loaves with seven baskets, and four thousand men: the numbers of perfection and of the world at large. They remind us of the perfect sufficiency of divine blessing for all human need, and of all men without restriction being in God’s desire participants in it. This fittingly closes what we have had before us.

Fuente: Grant’s Numerical Bible Notes and Commentary

The former part of this chapter acquaints us with the conference or disputation which our Saviour had with the Pharisees about their superstitious observation of the Jewish traditions. These traditions were such rites and customs as were delivered to them by the elders and rulers of the Jewish church in former times: which traditions they valued and regarded more than the express commandments of God.

Learn thence, That superstitious men are always more fond of and zealous for the traditions of men in divine worship, than for the express and positive commands of God.

Secondly, That it is the manner of such persons to tie others to their own practice and example in matters of religious worship, and to censure and condemn all those who do not conform to them in the smallest matters. The Pharisees here censure the disciples for eating with unwashen hands, because it was their custom to wash when they did eat; yet did not Christ or his disciples refuse to wash before meat, as it was a civil and decent custom, but because the Pharisees made it a religious worship, and to censure and condemn all those who do not conform to them in the smallest matters.

The Pharisees here censure the disciples for eating with unwashen hands, because it was their custom to wash when they did eat; yet did not Christ or his disciples refuse to wash before meat, as it was a civil and decent custom, but because the Pharisees made it a religious rite: teaching us, That what is in itself indifferent, and may without offence be done as a civil custom, ought to be discountenanced and opposed when required of us as an act of religion. The Jews, fearing lest they should touch any person or thing that was unclean, and so be defiled unawares, did use frequent washings, as of cups, pots, vessels, tables, beds, or couches, which they lay upon when they eat.

This Pharisaical hypocrisy puts God off with outward cleansing, instead of inward purity; regarding more the outward cleanness of the hand, than the inward purity of the heart. This was the accusation of the Pharisees, to which our Saviour replies by way of recrimination, that if his disciples did not observe the tradition of the elders, they (the Pharisees) did reject and make void the commandments of God, and did worship him in vain, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

Learn hence, That all service and worship which is offered to God, according to man’s will and ordinances, and not according to the rule of God’s own word, is vain and unprofitable: divine institution is the only pure rule of religious worship, as to the substance of it; here, what God doth not command, he forbids.

Observe next, The instance which our Saviour produces of the Pharisees’ violating an express command of God, and preferring their own traditions before it: he instances in the fifth comandment, which requires children to relieve their parents in their necessities. Now though the Pharisees did not deny this in plain terms, yet they made an exception from it, which, if children pleased, might render it vain, void, and useless.

For the Pharisees taught, That in case the child of a poor parent, that wanted relief, would give a gift to the temple, which gift they called Corban, that is, a gift consecrated to God and religious uses, that then the children of such poor persons were discharged from making any further provision for their aged and impotent parents; but might reply after this manner, “That which thou askest for thy supply is given to God, and therefore I cannot relieve thee.” So that covetous and graceless children looked upon it as the most frugal way, once for all, to fine to the temple, rather than pay the constant rent of daily relief to their poor parents.

Learn hence, that the practice of moral duties is required before, and is more acceptable to Almighty God than the most solemn acts and exercises of instituted worship whatsoever. I will have mercy, says God, rather than sacrifice; and to do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than burnt-offering.

Secondly, That no duty, gift, or offering to God, is accepted where the duty of charity is neglected: it is much more acceptable to God, to refresh the bowels of his saints, who are the living temples of the Holy Ghost, than to adorn material temples with gold and silver.

Corban is a Syriac word, signifying a gift given unto God. The Pharisees applied these gifts to the use and service of the temple; possibly to repair, beautify, and adorn it; which had not been amiss, if they had not taught that such gifts to the temple did discharge children from the duty of charity to their natural parents: These things they ought to have done, in the first place, and not to leave the other undone.

Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament

Mar 7:1-2. Then came the Pharisees and scribes from Jerusalem They probably came on purpose to find occasion against him. For some of them followed him from place to place, looking on every thing he did, even on his most innocent, yea, and most benevolent and holy actions, with an evil and censuring eye. Accordingly, here they ventured to attack him for allowing his disciples to eat with unwashed hands, thereby transgressing, they said, the tradition of the elders, which they thought to be a very heinous offence. When they saw his disciples eat bread with defiled, that is, with unwashen, hands The Greek word here rendered defiled, literally signifies common. It was quite in the Jewish idiom to oppose common and holy; the most usual signification of the latter word, in the Old Testament, being, separated from common and devoted to sacred use. As we learn from antiquity that this evangelist wrote his gospel in a pagan country, and for the use of Gentile converts, it was proper to add the explanation, that is, unwashen, to the epithet common, or defiled, which might have otherwise been misunderstood. They found fault The law of Moses, it must be observed, required external cleanness as a part of religion; not, however, for its own sake, but to signify with what carefulness Gods servants should purify their minds from moral pollutions. Accordingly, these duties were prescribed by Moses in such moderation as was fitted to promote the end of them. But in process of time they came to be multiplied prodigiously: for the ancient doctors, to secure the observation of those precepts which were really of divine institution, added many commandments of their own as fences unto the former. And the people, to show their zeal, obeyed them. For example: Because the law, Lev 15:11, saith, Whomsoever he toucheth, that hath the issue, he shall wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, &c., the people were ordered to wash their hands immediately on their return from places of public concourse, and before they sat down to meat, lest, by touching some unclean person in the crowd, they might have defiled themselves. The Pharisees, therefore, being very zealous in these trifles, would not eat at any time unless they washed their hands with the greatest care. From this source came that endless variety of purifications not prescribed in the law, but ordained by the elders. These ordinances, though they were of human invention, came at length to be looked upon as essential in religion; they were exalted to such a pitch, that, in comparison of them, the law of God was suffered to lie neglected and forgotten, as is here signified.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

P A R T S I X T H.

FROM THE THIRD PASSOVER UNTIL OUR

LORD’S ARRIVAL AT BETHANY.

(Time: One Year Less One Week.)

LXV.

JESUS FAILS TO ATTEND THE THIRD PASSOVER.

SCRIBES REPROACH HIM FOR DISREGARDING TRADITION.

(Galilee, probably Capernaum, Spring A. D. 29.)

aMATT. XV. 1-20; bMARK VII. 1-23; dJOHN VII. 1.

d1 And after these things Jesus walked in Galilee: for he would not walk in Juda, because the Jews sought to kill him. [John told us in his last chapter that the passover was near at hand. He here makes a general statement which shows that Jesus did not attend this passover. The reason for his absence is given at Joh 5:18.] a1 Then there come to Jesus from Jerusalem b1 And there are gathered together unto him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, who had come from Jerusalem, 2 and had seen that some of his disciples ate their bread with defiled, that is, with unwashen, hands. [Evidently several days intervened between the address of Joh 6:22-40. and the events recorded here, for the Pharisees and scribes would not be likely to leave Jerusalem until after the passover. Isa 29:13], asaying, bas it is written, This people [394] honoreth me with their lips, But their heart is far from me. 7 But in vain do they worship me, Teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men. 8 Ye leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men. 9 And he said unto them, Full well do ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your tradition. [These Pharisees coming from Jerusalem could find nothing wherein Jesus or his disciples transgressed the law, so they eagerly grasped this transgression of the tradition as affording ground for an accusation. Jesus does not deny their charge, but justifies his disciples by attacking the whole traditional system, basing his attack upon a pointed prophecy which condemns it. It is hard for us to learn and apply the distinction between serving God as God wishes to be served, and serving him according to our own wishes and notions.] a4 For God {bMoses} said [that is, God said it through Moses], Honor thy father and thy mother; and, He that speaketh evil of father or mother, let him die the death [see Exo 20:12, Deu 5:16, Exo 21:17, Lev 20:9]: 11 but ye say, If a man {aWhosoever} shall say to his father or his mother, That wherewith thou mightest have been profited by me bis Corban, that is to say, Given to God; a6 he shall not honor his father. b12 ye no longer suffer him to do ought for his father or his mother; aAnd ye have made {b13 making} void the word of God by {abecause of} your tradition. bwhich ye have delivered: and many such like things ye do. [Leaving for a moment the main question concerning uncleanness and washing, Jesus makes good his indictment against their tradition by giving an example of the mischievous way in which it set aside God’s commandments. The law required the honoring of parents, and for any one to cast off his parents in their old age, thus subjecting them to beggary or starvation, was to do more than to speak evil of them. Such conduct was practically to curse them, and to incur the death penalty for so doing. But at this point the Pharisees interfered with their tradition, which taught that [395] a son could say of that part of his estate by which his parents might be profited, It is a gift; that is, a gift to God, and by thus dedicating that part to God, he would free himself from his obligation to his parents. Thus tradition undid the law. God’s law leads to pure and acceptable worship, while human additions and amendments make worship vain, if not abominable. There is probably not one such addition or amendment which does not to a greater or less degree make some commandment void.] 14 And he called to him the multitude again, and said unto them [Having been accused by the scribes and Pharisees of a breach of their tradition, Jesus points out to them generally the iniquity of tradition, for it lay within their power as leaders to remedy the whole system of things. Having done this, he turns to the multitude and answers before them as to the offense with which he is specifically charged. Thus he gives to the leaders general principles, and to the common people the single instance], Hear me all of you, and understand: a11 Not that which entereth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which proceedeth out of the mouth, this defileth a man. b15 there is nothing from without a man, that going into him can defile him: but the things which proceed out of the man are those that defile the man. 17 And when he was entered into the house from the multitude, a12 Then came the disciples, and said unto him, Knowest thou that the Pharisees were offended, when they heard this saying? [The entire speech offended them. He charged them with hypocrisy. He showed that their tradition, which they reverenced as a revelation from God, led them into sin, and he disturbed their self-complacency by showing that the ceremonial cleanness, which was founded on tradition, and in which they prided themselves, was worthless in comparison with the moral cleanness required by God’s law, which they had ignored. It grieved the disciples to see Jesus offend these reverend gentlemen from Jerusalem. Like many modern disciples their respect for men counteracted their zeal for truth.] 13 But he answered and said, Every [396] plant which my heavenly Father hath planted not, shall be up rooted up. [God had planted the law with its doctrine: he had planted the Hebrew religion as given by Moses. He had not planted the tradition of the elders; so it, and the religion founded upon it, was doomed to be rooted up.] 14 Let them alone: they are blind guides. And if the blind guide the blind, both shall fall into a pit. [This proverbial expression is found in the Sermon on the Mount. See Psa 37:1, Psa 37:2). The words of Jesus are full of encouragement to those who adhere to the simple teachings of God; for they show that God guarantees that every error shall be uprooted, and that every teacher of error or false religion shall participate in the judgment which uproots, and shall fall into the pit of ruin; and his disciples, no matter how numerous, shall share his fate. In this particular instance, the destruction of Jerusalem was the pit. The Jewish leaders led their disciples into it, and God uprooted their system of tradition, that the pure gospel might be sowed in the room which they occupied.] 15 And Peter answered and said unto him, Declare unto us the parable. [The word “parable” is used here in its looser sense to indicate an obscure saying.] bhis disciples asked of him the parable. [They asked what he meant by the words contained in the Mat 15:11. 18 And he saith {asaid,} bunto them, aAre ye even yet bso without understanding also? [It was to be expected that the multitude, swayed by the teaching of the Pharisees, would be slow to grasp what Jesus said about uncleanness; but the disciples, having been so long taught of him, and having felt free to eat with unwashed hands, should have been more quick of understanding.] Perceive ye not, that whatsoever from without goeth into the man, it cannot defile him; 19 because it goeth not into his heart, but apasseth into the {bhis} belly, and goeth out into {aand is cast out into} the [397] draught? bThis he said, making all meats clean. 20 And he said, a18 But the things which proceed out of the mouth come forth out of the heart; and they defile the man. bThat which proceedeth out of the man, that defileth the man. 21 For from within, out of the heart of men, acome forth {bproceed,} aevil thoughts, bfornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, 22; covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye [an envious eye] afalse witness, railings: {brailing,} pride, foolishness: 23 all these evil things proceed from within, and a20 these are the things which defile the man; but to eat with unwashen hands, defileth not the man. [Thus Jesus sets forth the simple doctrine that a man’s moral and spiritual state is not dependent upon the symbolic cleanness of his physical diet, much less is it dependent on ceremonial observances in regard to things eaten, or the dishes from which they are eaten. Of course, Jesus did not mean at this time to abrogate the Mosaic law of legal uncleanness. These uncleannesses worked no spiritual defilement, but were merely typical of such; for the food in no way touched or affected the mind or soul, the fountains of spiritual life, but only the corporeal organs, which have no moral susceptibility. The Pharisees had erred in confusing legal and spiritual defilement, and had added error to error by multiplying the causes of defilement in their tradition. By thus showing that legal defilement was merely symbolic, Jesus classed it with all the other symbolism which was to be done away with when the gospel reality was fully ushered in ( Col 2:16, Col 2:17). In saying, therefore, that Jesus made all meats clean, Mark does not mean that Jesus then and there repealed the law. The declaration of such repeal came later ( Act 10:14, Act 10:15). He means that he there drew those distinctions and laid down those principles which supplanted the Mosaic law when the kingdom of God was ushered in on the day of Pentecost. Here was the fountain whence Paul drew all his teaching concerning things clean and unclean.] [398]

* It was a whole year.–J. W. McG.

[FFG 393-398]

Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)

Mark Chapter 7

The ruling power in exercise among the Jews had shewn itself hostile to the testimony of God, and had put to death the one whom He had sent in the way of righteousness. The scribes, and those who pretended to follow righteousness, had corrupted the people by their teaching, and had broken the law of God.

They washed cups and pots, but not their hearts; and, provided that the priests-religion-gained by it, set aside the duties of children to their parents. But God looked at the heart, and from the heart of man proceeded every kind of impurity, iniquity, and violence. It was that which defiled the man, not having his hands unwashed. Such is the judgment on religiousness without conscience and without fear of God, and the true discernment of what the heart of man is in the sight of God, who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity.

But God must also shew His own heart; and if Jesus judged that of man with the eye of God-if He manifested His ways and His faithfulness to Israel; He displayed nevertheless through it all, what God was to those who felt their need of Him and came to Him in faith, owning and resting upon His pure goodness. From the land of Tyre and Sidon comes a woman of the condemned race, a Gentile and a Syrophenician. The Lord replies to her, on her request that He would heal her daughter, that the children (the Jews) must first be filled; that it was not right to take the childrens bread and cast it to the dogs: an overwhelming answer, if the sense she had of her need and of the goodness of God had not gone beyond, and set aside, every other thought. These two things made her humble of heart, and ready to own the sovereign favour of God towards the people of His choice in this world. Had He not a right to choose a people? And she was not one of them. But that did not destroy His goodness and His love. She was but a Gentile dog, yet such was the goodness of God that He had bread even for dogs. Christ, the perfect expression of God, the manifestation of God Himself in the flesh, could not deny His goodness and His grace, could not say that faith had higher thoughts of God than were true, for He was Himself that love. The sovereignty of God was acknowledged-no pretension made to any right whatsoever. The poor woman rested only upon grace. Her faith, with an intelligence given of God, laid hold of the grace which went beyond the promises made to Israel. She penetrates into the heart of the God of love, as He is revealed in Jesus, even as He penetrates into ours, and she enjoys the fruit of it. For this was brought in now: God Himself directly in presence of and connection with man, and man as he was before God-not a rule or system for man to prepare himself for God.

In the next miracle, we see the Lord, by the same grace, bestowing hearing and speech upon a man who was deaf and unable even to express his thoughts. He could have received no fruit from the word, from God, and could give no praise to Him. The Lord is returned into the place where He arose as light on Israel; and here He deals with the remnant alone. He takes the man apart from the multitude. It is the same grace that takes the place of all pretensions to righteousness in man, and that manifests itself to the destitute. Its form, though exercised now in favour of the remnant of Israel, is suited to the condition of Jew or Gentile-it is grace. But as to these too it is the same: He takes the man apart from the crowd, that the work of God may be wrought: the crowd of this world had no real part therein. We see Jesus here, His heart moved at the condition of man, and more especially at the state of His ever-loved Israel, of which this poor sufferer was a striking picture. He causes the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak. So was it individually, and so will it be with the whole remnant of Israel in the latter days. He acts Himself, and He does all things well. The power of the enemy is destroyed, the mans deafness, his inability to use his tongue as God gave it him, are taken away by His love who acts with the power of God.

The miracle of the loaves bore witness to the presence of the God of Israel, according to His promises; this, to the grace that went beyond the limits of these promises, on the part of God, who judged the condition of those who asserted a claim to them according to righteousness, and that of man, evil in himself; and who delivered man and blessed him in love, withdra wing him from the power of Satan, and enabling him to hear the voice of God, and to praise Him.

There are yet some remarkable features in this part of the history of Christ, which I desire to point out. They manifest the spirit in which Jesus laboured at this moment. He departs from the Jews, having shewn the emptiness and hypocrisy of their worship, and the iniquity of every human heart as a source of corruption and sin.

The Lord-at this solemn moment, which displayed the rejection of Israel-goes far away from the people to a place where there was no opportunity for service among them, to the borders of the stranger and Canaanite cities of Tyre and Sidon (chap. 7:24), and (His heart oppressed) would have no one know where He was. But God had been too plainly manifested in His goodness and His power, to allow Him to be hidden whenever there was need. The report of what He was had gone abroad, and the quick eye of faith discovered that which alone could meet its need. It is this that finds Jesus (when all, that had outwardly a right to the promises, are deceived by this pretension itself and by their privileges). Faith it is that knows its need, and knows that only, and that Jesus alone can meet it. That which God is to faith is manifested to the one that needs it, according to the grace and power that are in Jesus. Hidden from the Jews, He is grace to the sinner. Thus, also (chap. 7:33), when He heals the deaf man of his deafness and of the impediment in his speech, He takes him aside from the multitude, and looks up to heaven and sighs. Oppressed in His heart by the unbelief of the people, He takes the object of the exercise of His power aside, looks up to the sovereign Source of all goodness, of all help for man, and grieves at the thought of the condition in which man is found. This case then exemplifies more particularly, the remnant according to the election of grace from among the Jews, who are separated by divine grace from the mass of the nation, faith, in these few, being in exercise. The heart of Christ is far from repulsing His (earthly) people. His soul is overwhelmed by the sense of the unbelief that separates them from Him and from deliverance; nevertheless He takes away from some the deaf heart, and looses their tongue, in order that the God of Israel may be glorified.

Thus also on the death of Lazarus, Christ grieves at the sorrow which death brings upon the heart of man. There, however, it was a public testimony.

Fuente: John Darby’s Synopsis of the New Testament

CHAPTER 34

BAPTIZE NOT ALWAYS A TOTAL SUBMERSION

Mat 15:1-2; Mar 7:1-6. And the Pharisees and certain ones, the scribes, having come from Jerusalem, are assembled before Him. And seeing certain ones of His disciples eating bread with defiled, that is, unwashed hands; for the Pharisees and all the Jews, unless they may wash their hands diligently, do not eat; holding the tradition of the elders; and from the forum, if they may not be baptized, they do not eat; there are many other things which they receive to hold, such as the baptism of pots and cups and brazen vessels and couches. Here we have the regular Greek word baptizo, constantly used in the Christian ordinance in this case, setting forth the washing of their hands when they came from the forum before they ate. How do you know but they totally immersed their hands? Perhaps they did, and for aught we know they did not but that hypothesis is utterly irrelevant to the question at issue, as it says they are baptized i.e., the whole person whereas it is a well-known fact that those Pharisaic traditions only required the washing of hands, and that was all they did. But in that case it is said that they were baptized. In a similar manner and from the same reason i.e., the Pharisaic traditions they baptize pots, cups, brazen vessels, and couches. Of course, they did not immerse the beds on which they slept and the couches on which they ate; as they would have to do it every time they came from the forum, where they were likely to transact business with Gentiles, come in contact with unclean animals, and in various ways contract ceremonial defilement. We have no controversy on water baptism or anything else. We only want the truth, which will stand the white light of the Judgment. We advise all to satisfy your consciences on this subject and every other. These Scriptures certainly reveal the fact that baptizo, the constant Greek word for baptize, does not always mean a total submersion.

PHARISAICAL HYPOCRISY

Then the Pharisees and scribes interrogated Him, Wherefore do not Thy disciples walk according to the traditions of the elders? But they eat bread with unwashed bands. The Word of the Lord is alone authoritative. The Churches of the present day are burdened to death with human institutions, unheard of in the Bible, wearing out the people, bankrupting them financially and spiritually, consuming their time, which ought to be spent in saving souls, in which case the Lord would turn on them showers of blessings, making life a heaven instead of a tread-mill drudgery. And responding, He said to them, Well did Isaiah prophesy concerning you hypocrites, as has been written, This people honoreth Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. In vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men. For leaving the mandate of God, you hold the traditions of men, the baptisms of cups and pots, and you do many other such things. Here we see that our Savior denounces all of these empty Church rites and ceremonies, with which the clergy have burdened the people. God wants His people to be free as angels, unincumbered, to labor in His vineyard with the greatest possible efficiency, and fight the devil, not like soldiers, but heroes. Hypocrite means an actor on the theatrical stage, playing an assumed part. This was the awful trouble of the Jewish Church: they had run into hollow hypocrisy and dead formality, clinging to their Church institutions with the pertinacity of a drowning man, and at the same time spiritually dead, blinded by Satan, and led captive at his will. The Oriental Churches seemed to have lost sight of everything but their own traditional institutions, while the Americans are on their track at locomotive speed. We need all the holiness people in the world i.e., those who take the Holy Bible as their only guide to go on eagles wings to the ends of the earth, and preach the everlasting gospel, before the people are all caught fast in the meshes of ecclesiastical tradition, tied up in human institutions, and totally blinded to the simple, sweet Word of God; thus led away into playing religion, instead of getting it deep down in their hearts, till it goes through them like a cyclone of fire, revealing all the contents of their interior spirit, committing to the flames all the chaff of dead formality, which constitutes the essence of practical hypocrisy, so abominable in the sight of God, and so utterly withered by the preaching of Jesus.

Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament

Mar 7:3. The pharisees, and all the jews, except they wash their hands oft, eat not. Their traditionary laws, which enjoined all possible corporeal purity, were built on the notion that a person might unconsciously have touched something unclean. They washed their hands as far as the wrist, literally the fist. It is some credit to revelation that those were laws of tradition, imposed as maxims of the wise. Yet we cannot deny, that they obtained in various forms through the whole of Shems race; and corporeal purity was associated with purity of heart. Those rites became so extensive, and were enforced with so much rigour, that St. Paul denominates the whole ritual law, a yoke which neither they nor their fathers could bear. During the dark ages of the church, christians were nearly as much burdened with papal injunctions as the jews with the cabala of their rabbins.

Mar 7:7. Teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. See on Mat 15:9. The pharisees came to Christ with unclean hands, violating the first duty of the second table by exempting for corban, a paltry gift, a young man from supporting his aged parents. Men who reprove others should themselves be pure. The rigorous observance of traditions was an affliction. How could a man in the field wash before meat when he had no water. The evangelist adds a word more than Matthew, that meat, like sin, does not enter the heart: Mar 7:15. Bruce found a people in Abyssinia called the Remmont, once the Falasha, who have a great abhorrence of fish, because they boast of a descent from the prophet Jonah. They carry wood and water to Gondar, a people of whom the Abyssinians speak with contempt. Having as christians been once baptized, and having once received the holy sacrament, they seem to pay no further attention to religion. On coming from market or any public place, they wash themselves from head to foot, lest they should have touched any one of a different sect to their own, esteeming all unclean. Travels, vol. 4. p. 275. This enterprising Caledonian had evidently received this account of those poor christians in Abyssinia from their mahommedan enemies.

Mar 7:10. Whoso curseth father or mother, let him die the death. Moth jumath, as in Beza, without any hope of commutation of punishment. This quotation is a full stroke at the commutation of corban, which excused a man from maintaining his aged parents.

Mar 7:21. Out of the heart of men proceed evil thoughts. Here is the fountain of sin. The issues of life have their source in the heart, the seat of all depravity. The most powerful of exterior causes of excitement is, an evil eye. Achan saw in Jericho an ingot of gold, and a Babylonian garment. Here the motions of evil commence, followed by ruin in all its forms.

But what is the remedy? The answer of philosophy is here vague and weak, that of the gospel pure and perfect. Come unto me, says the Saviour, and I will give you rest. Look unto me, and be ye saved, all ye ends of the earth. Behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord, and be changed into the same image, which you see in the gospel as clearly as you see your own face in a mirror; yea, be changed from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. There is a moral connection between the heart and the objects with which it converses; and these acts of faith, connected with the ever-burning altar of piety, will produce a new creation in the soul, and make a man as heavenly as he has been earthly, as holy as he has been sinful. Sin can be conquered only by the mighty and effectual working of the Spirit of God. Rom 8:13. Eph 3:7.

Mar 7:25-26. A certain woman a Greek, a Hellenist. Mark adds this to Mat 15:21. How illustrious is the character of this woman, whose case is worthily recorded by three evangelists. Severe afflictions excited her cries, and faith emboldened her pleadings. Her cries were not silenced by the silence of the Saviour. She ceased not to cry, though he had apparently disregarded the intercessions of the apostles, by saying, I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Nay, the severe proverb of the jews, who called the gentiles dogs, only heightened her claims. She ascended above discouragement, and all these mountains, still keeping her eye on the charity that never faileth. See on Mat 15:21; Mat 15:28.

Mar 7:31. Decapolis, beyond Jordan, contained Pella, Macherus, and eight other towns.

Mar 7:34. Ephphatha, that is, be opened. St. Mark gives untranslated the Chaldaic imperative, which our Saviour used; for opening the drum of the ear, and loosing the ligament of the tongue, as well as giving sight to one born blind, were miracles in kind and character equivalent to the creation of the world. Therefore the people said,

Mar 7:37. He hath done all things well; yea, doubly well, for he had just made the pharisees deaf, and the scribes dumb; and now he made this man to hear and speak.

REFLECTIONS.

The Saviour appears here in his proper character. He purifies the law from all the soils it had received in the hands of men. He repudiates the gaited portrait of pharisaical superstition. They washed their hands, their pots, vessels, and beds. They washed whatever they bought in the market, and dipped their whole body in water for every species of ceremonial uncleanness, a custom which would kill the world in colder climates. Christianity nowhere imposes dipping, either in baptism or in ceremonial impurities.

These hypocrites, being now sent as spies on our Saviours person, he treated them with all the becoming dignity of a prophet. He exposed their errors in magnifying exterior services, while they neglected the grand precepts of the law, purity and love; judgment, mercy and faith. In particular he corrected that error of ceremonial impurity, that man was not defiled by what entered his mouth, but by what proceeded from his heart. And where is there a foul and wicked deed that was not first conceived and nourished in the heart. We must trace the source of this evil to our birth- fault, or rather to original sin, whereby the nature of man is of itself inclined to evil. Hence it must be the work of regeneration to strike at the heart, and to crucify the flesh with its affections and lusts. This would indeed be a hopeless struggle, had not God so strongly promised a new heart and a right spirit. But the flesh being always weak, no man can enjoy that glorious liberty and spiritual perfection, without the atoning merits of Christ every moment applied to the soul; nor can we in regard to the infirmities of nature enjoy it in this world. Yet, the believer having constant access to the merits of Christ may be so cleansed from unbelief and self- love, and so sanctified, that the emanations of pure love may flow from his heart to God and man.

We cannot but remark the confusion with which this deputation must have returned to Jerusalem. They did not find in the Lord an artful impostor, affecting sanctity, with a countenance looking twenty ways. They found, I know not what of heaven in his looks, so as to forbid them meeting his eyes. They were awed and embarrassed in his presence; they looked ashamed one at another, and dropped their countenance to the earth. They found a searcher of hearts, and a prophet tutored in the university of heaven. And when their foolish customs were exposed, they did not dare to open their mouth, but retired confounded before the crowd. His character is equally illustrious in the extension of grace and mercy to a poor woman of Tyre and Sidon. He refused the trammels of men in doing the work of the Father. What an example for ministers to be unawed by the bigotry and opposition of unbelieving men.

Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Mar 7:1-23. The Washing of Hands and the Traditions of the Elders.This discussion with the Pharisees serves to bring out the antagonism of Jesus to the restrictions which separated Jews from Gentiles. Perhaps for this reason it is associated with the story of the Syro-Phnician woman. In substance it is connected with the disputes recorded in chs. 2f. The Jerusalem scribes of Mar 3:22 reappear in Mar 7:1. Into the original story some explanations are inserted, e.g. the reference to Jewish washings in Mar 7:3 f. and the interpretation of common by unwashed (Mar 7:2) and of Corban by gift (Mar 7:11). These insertions are probably due to Mk. himself. There is a characteristic touch of exaggeration in ascribing these customs to all the Jews (cf. Mar 1:5). The washings are ceremonialto avoid religious defilement due to contact with Gentiles or with legally unclean objects in the market-place. The reply of Jesus to the challenge of the Pharisees consists of three main utterances, Mar 7:6-8, Mar 7:9-13, Mar 7:14 f. The quotation from Isa 29:13 may be due to the evangelist, since it is close to LXX and the point urged is not apparent from the Heb. The direct answer of Jesus begins with Mar 7:9 and consists of two parts: (1) To follow the traditions of the elders may annul the law of God instead of safeguarding it; (2) Religious impurity cannot be contracted from without. Inward defilement, the defilement of the heart by the sins of the heart, is the only possible religious defilement (Montefiore, i. 168, 170). The first involves the discussion of Corban. The term was used as a formula in vows. This form of speech, a gift, by whatsoever thou mayest be profited by me does neither argue that he who thus spake devoted his goods to sacred uses nor obliged him . . . to devote them; but only restrained him . . . from helping him by his goods to whom he thus spake. So J. Lightfoot (Works, xi. 218) rightly explains the use of the phrase, which does not imply that the goods are actually made over for the use of the Temple, as Loisy and Menzies suggest. Herford (Pharisaism, pp. 156162) and Montefiore point out two difficulties: (a) the binding character of vows is laid down in the Law, e.g. Num 30:2, and is not a matter of mens traditions; (b) it appears that Rabbinic teaching as recorded in the Mishnah did permit the annulling of vows which conflicted with duty to parents. With regard to (a), either Jesus was not conscious that His argument directly infringed Mosaic Law, just as in Mar 7:14 f. He criticises Lev. and not simply Pharisaic tradition, or else He regards the whole Pharisaic attitude towards the Law as a human tradition. The reverence which sets legislation about vows on an equality with the fifth commandment is a teaching of men which conflicts with Gods will. The violence done to conscience in attempting to believe in the equal inspiration of all Scripture is a vain worship. As to (b), while we cannot, in view of later evidence, charge Pharisaism as a whole with this rigid maintenance of vows, there must have been some scribes in the time of Jesus who held the strict view, that a hasty vow, probably uttered in anger (this seems suggested by the cursing of father and mother in Mar 7:10) was binding, even if it involved neglect of parents. (See Mat 15:1-20*, Montefiore, i. 166, and Menzies, Hibbert Journal, iv. 791f.).

[Mar 7:3. diligently: lit. with the fist (mg.) but the meaning of this is quite uncertain. The rendering up to the wrist is grammatically questionable, and this applies to that in the Westminster Version, do not eat save only after washing their fingers, the Gr. being supposed to mean to the juncture of the fingers. Possibly the clenched list was rubbed against the palm of the other hand. Allen says, It suggests some particular method of ceremonially cleansing the hands, the precise nature of which we do not know.A. S. P.]

Mar 7:17-23. forms the development and interpretation of the principle laid down in Mar 7:15. The catalogue of things that defile may be compared with the list of sins in Gal 5:19 f., Rom 1:29 f.

Mar 7:19. Follow RV in regarding the phrase making all meats clean as referring to Jesus. A late addition, emphasizing the far-reaching significance of the position taken up by Jesus. (Cf. Moulton and Milligan, Vocabulary, p. 118, brma.)

Mar 7:22. an evil eye: not the malignant power familiar in folk-lore, but the spirit of envy (cf. Mat 20:15).

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

(Mark 7) MAN EXPOSED AND GOD REVEALED

We have seen in chapter 6, the exposure and condemnation of the social and political world. In this chapter we have the condemnation of the formal religion of the flesh (1-13); the exposure of the heart of man (14-23); and the revelation of the heart of God (24-37).

(Vv. 1-5). The chapter opens with the religious leaders of the nation coming to Jesus, not with any sense of their need or of His grace, but, alas! to oppose Christ by finding fault with His disciples because they ate bread with unwashen hands. The religion of these men consisted in honouring the tradition of their ancestors, by the performance of certain outward forms and ceremonies which any one can do, and which make a reputation before men, but leave the heart far from God.

(Vv. 6-13). In His reply to these men, the Lord exposes the emptiness of their religion that consists in mere outward forms. First, it leaves men mere hypocrites, as proved by Scripture, for Isaiah said of such, “This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.” Hypocrisy is pretending to be what we are not. By their religious acts they professed great piety before men, and by their words they professed to reverence God; actually their hearts were far from God. (Isa 29:13 : Eze 33:31).

Secondly, the Lord shows that such religion is “in vain”. It may gain for its devotees a reputation for piety before men, but it is worthless in the sight of God.

Thirdly, it sets aside the plain word of God in favour of the traditions of men. The Lord gives an example of this great evil. The word of God gives plain directions for the children to honour the parents; but they had a tradition by which they could profess to set aside their property for the use of God by saying “It is Corban,” meaning a gift devoted to God, and therefore could not be used to help a needy parent. Thus, by their tradition, they set aside the word of God, evaded their responsibility to their needy relatives, and ministered to their own covetousness.

It adds solemnity to this passage, if we remember that these Pharisees and Scribes from Jerusalem were the religious leaders of the remnant that had been delivered from Babylon. There was indeed, in the Lord’s day, a little feeble remnant within this remnant, who feared the Lord, thought upon His Name, and looked for redemption in Israel, but alas! the mass had sunk into the terrible condition set forth by these leaders. They were no longer idolaters. Outwardly they were very pious before men, and with their lips they made a fair profession before God, but we learn that all this is possible and yet the heart be far from God, and the word of God be set aside by the traditions of men.

(Vv. 14-16). Having exposed the hypocrisy of the outward religion of the flesh, the Lord, in the hearing of “all the people,” shows that the source of defilement is not from without, but from within. The washing of hands and cups and pots, simply deals with defilement from without, but the source of moral defilement springs from the inward evil of the heart. This cuts at the root of all worldly religion of the flesh which simply deals with externals and leaves the heart untouched. God works from within and deals with the conscience and heart. The real source of defilement is not a man’s environment but himself. It is true that man being such as he is – a fallen creature – if he goes into scenes of evil and temptation, his surroundings will stir up his lusts within. But even so the source of the evil is from within. An Angel can pass through Sodom and not be defiled, but not so Lot. There was no evil heart in the Angel to answer to sin; there was in Lot.

(Vv. 17-23). Alone with His disciples the Lord enlarges upon this theme, and interprets His illustration. Moral evil has its root in the heart whatever form the evil may take, whether it be evil thinking, evil acts, such as adulteries, murder, thefts or deceit, evil looking, or evil speaking in blasphemy, pride and foolishness. “All these evils come from within, and defile the man.”

(Vv. 24-30). The evil of the heart of man being exposed, we nave in the story of the Syrophenician woman a blessed unfolding of the heart of God – a heart that, full of love, maintains the truth while dispensing grace to needy sinners. The Lord as He passed through this world that had rejected Him would fain be hid, thus revealing the lowly mind of Christ that led him to make Himself of no reputation. But such was His perfection – so great the contrast to all around – that He could not be hid. As one has said, “Goodness joined with power are too rare in the world to remain unnoticed” (J.N.D.)

The woman was a Greek, that is a Gentile, but her deep need brought her to the Lord. She had faith in the power of Jesus, and in His grace to use the power on behalf of a Gentile dog. The Lord draws out her faith by saying, “Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it unto the dogs”. This was a great test for faith. She might have argued, “Then I am only a dog and have no claim upon the Lord; the blessing only belongs to the children.” Her faith triumphs over this difficulty by admitting the truth as to herself and falling back upon the grace that is in His heart. She can say, as it were, “Yes, as far as I am concerned, it is true I cannot claim the place of a child. I am but a dog, but my whole trust is in what You are and not what I am. I see there is such grace in your heart that you would not deny a crumb to a dog.” This is ever the way of faith to own the wretchedness, the vileness, and unworthiness of our hearts, and rest in the perfect grace of His heart. Faith lays hold of Christ and rests upon Who He is and what He has done.

This was a faith that the Lord would not, and could not, deny. He could not say, “I am not so good as you suppose,” or “My grace is not so great as you imagine.” Blessed be His Name, His grace exceeds all our faith, and He delights to respond to the smallest faith. Thus faith in Christ secures the blessing, and He can say to the woman, “For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter.”

(Vv. 31-37). In the closing scene the Lord is found again in Galilee, amongst the people of Israel. They bring to Him one that is deaf and with an impediment in his speech. The man fitly represents the condition to which sin had reduced the nation. Christ is in their midst with grace and power to meet their need, but sin has so blinded them that the nation, as a whole, cannot avail themselves of the healing virtue that is in Christ.

Nevertheless their sin cannot change His heart of love. Hence He will not turn away a case of need. If He will not send away a Gentile woman, neither will He refuse an appeal on behalf of a needy Jew. But in dispensing grace, He will, in both cases, maintain truth. So we read, “He took him aside from the multitude.” He is not indifferent to their rejection of Himself. If He works in their midst it is because of their need, and not because they are Jews. Sin has put Jew and Gentile on one common level, and grace can bless either on the ground of their need.

In showing grace the Lord looked up to heaven and sighed. He ever acted in dependence upon the Father and in accord with the mind of heaven. His heart was sustained by heaven if it was broken by the sorrows of earth. We, too, as the sorrows of earth press upon our spirits may well sigh; but, too often, we sigh without looking up to heaven, and so become vast down and depressed. Looking around we sigh; but looking up we are sustained. Having healed the man He charges them that they should tell no man. He was here as the perfect Servant, so would not use His mighty power and grace to exalt Himself. His mind was to make Himself of no reputation. But He could not be hid. The people were beyond measure astonished and said, “He hath done all things well: He maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak.”

Fuente: Smith’s Writings on 24 Books of the Bible

CHAPTER 7

1 The Pharisees find fault at the disciples for eating with unwashen hands. 8 They break the commandment of God by the traditions of men. 14 Meat defileth not the man. 24 He healeth the Syrophenician woman’s daughter of an unclean spirit, 31 and one that was deaf, and stammered in his speech.

Ver. 2. To eat with common, that is, with unwashen hands. Hands unwashed were called common, because unclean and profane things were common to both Jews and Gentiles, to clean and unclean persons alike.

Observe, the Apostles were not so boorish as not to wash their hands before dining or supping, which even husbandmen and artisans do before meals; but they abstained from the ceremonial, or rather the superstitious washing of the Pharisees, which they scrupulously observed from the tradition of their ancestors.

Ver. 3. Often washing: Syr. betilarth, i.e., diligently or carefully; Gr. , zealously; Heb. caph el cabh, i.e., hand to hand, namely, by constant rubbing, as they do who wish to cleanse defiled hands.

Ver. 4. From the market. Because in the market are all kinds, both of persons and things, clean and unclean, by coming in contact with which they feared they had incurred pollution, and so they thought they could not cleanse themselves from such contamination except by washing, not their hands only, but their whole body. Whence it follows:

Unless they be baptized, i.e., unless they immerse and wash their whole body, as the Jews do frequently, even at the present time. For to be baptized is more than to wash the hands. Because, therefore, by conversing with and touching Gentiles in the market they were compelled to handle some things that were unclean, they washed themselves all over when they came home.

Of pots: Gr. , i.e., of wine-drinking vessels. The Syriac has nophororun, vessels in which wine is carried. Vatablus understands wooden vessels, which were turned and polished, or ornamented with carving.

And beds: on which they reclined at table.

Ver. 15. Make a man common (Vulg.), i.e., defile him, as some MSS. read.

Ver. 19. Because it entereth not into his heart, i.e., into his soul, and cannot therefore defile it. But goeth into the belly, where the purer portion of the food, being separated, proceeds to the liver and heart; but that which is impure and feculent into the draught, by its going forth, purging, i.e., leaving pure all meats. For in that it, the impure, goeth away, it cleanses and purifies the remainder of the food.

Ver. 26. A Gentile: Gr. , i.e., a Grecian woman, for where the Greeks bore sway, all Gentiles were called Greeks. Hence the expression in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, “The Jew first, and also the Greek” i.e., the Gentile.

A Syrophonician, i.e., belonging to that part of Phnicia which looks towards Syria.

Ver. 32. And dumb: Gr. , i.e., speaking with difficulty or an impediment, stammering. For when he was healed by Christ he spake right, i.e., freely, as it is in the 35th verse. He was not, therefore, entirely dumb, as they are who are born deaf. These are called in Greek .

Ver. 33. And spitting, He touched his tongue. Christ wrought harmoniously, as though by His healing saliva He would moisten and loosen the dumb mouth, which was bound through drought.

Now He spat not upon the mouth of the mute, but upon His own finger, and by means of His finger applied the saliva to the mouth of the mute, as may be gathered from the Greek. This was required by propriety and decorum. Moreover, when Christ opened the ears and unloosed the tongue of the body, He opened also the ears and tongue of the soul, that they might listen to His inspiration, and believe that He was the Messiah, and that they might ask and obtain of Him pardon of their sins.

Tropologically: Every one ought to seek the same thing, and say with the Psalmist, “0 Lord, open Thou my lips, and my mouth shall show forth Thy praise” (Psa 51:17). We ought to do the same as regards our ears, that we may be able to sing aloud with Isaiah (Isa 1:4), “The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary: He wakeneth morning by morning, He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned.” Now this is done when He Himself with His own Finger, that is, the Holy Ghost (for He is “the Finger of God,” Exod. viii. 19), and the spittle of Heavenly Wisdom, which is He Himself proceeding forth from the mouth of the Most High, touches the tongue of the soul.

Ver. 34. And looking up to heaven (because from thence come words to the dumb, hearing to the deaf, healing for all infirmities, says Bede), He groaned; both because He sympathised with the misery of the deaf and dumb man, as because in groaning He prayed and obtained healing for him from God.

Ephpheta, which is, Be thou opened, ie., which so signifies. “Where,” says Bede, “the two natures of the one and the same Mediator between God and man are plainly set forth. For, looking up to heaven as man, He groaned, being about to pray to God; presently by a single word, as having the power of Divine Majesty, He healed.” For we all have eyes, but the blind have theirs shut and closed, which in the Syriac idiom are elegantly said to be opened when their shutters are unclosed, as Angelus Caninius says (in Nom. Heb. c. 10). Moreover, the Heb. patach signifies to open. From whence is the imperative passive, or Niphal, hippateach, by crasis hippatach, for which the Syrians use Ephpheta, be open.

Ver. 36. He charged them that they should tell no man. This was not properly a command, involving a fault if disobeyed, but merely a token of urbanity and modesty, that, indeed, He might signify He would not make a parade of His miracles, or by their means obtain the vain glory of men. Wherefore they did not commit sin who nevertheless divulged them. Wherefore it follows, the more He charged them, so much the more a great deal did they publish it. “We are taught by this,” says Theophylact, “that when we confer benefits we should not seek for applause therefrom; but when we have received benefits we should praise our benefactors, even though they are unwilling to be praised.” And S. Augustine says, “By His prohibition the Lord wished to teach us how very fervently they ought to preach to whom He has given a command to preach, when they who were commanded to be silent could not hold their peace”

Ver. 37. He hath done all things well: Gr. , i.e., beautifully, becomingly, harmoniously. Christ did nothing which the Pharisees or such like fault-finders could justly blame. Again, the Heb. for well is heteb, i.e., beneficently, because He gave hearing to the deaf, speech to the dumb. Indeed, Christ’s whole life was one continuous beneficence. (Top )

Fuente: Cornelius Lapide Commentary