Jesus fought the law, and the law appeared to be losing.
This was perhaps the conclusion prominent readers of Scripture were coming to as they observed the would-be Messiah tear down their traditions and rebuild something new in their stead. If there is one thread running through each of the last three posts on how Jesus read Scripture -- and I would contend that there are several -- it’s that his was a reading that generated conflict - conflict with the satan in the wilderness, conflict with his neighbours in Nazareth, and conflict with the scribes and Pharisees in Galilee. One might even say, with the benefit of hindsight, that Jesus’s reading of Scripture was what got him killed, but I’m jumping the gun.
Matthew 9 presents another conflict scene, and once again Jesus and Scripture are at the heart of things. This time he’s not eating with defiled hands, but rather eating with defiled people - tax collectors and sinners. Those pesky Pharisees want to know why this is happening. They appear to be caught between two minds. On the one side, they recognise some kind of authority in Jesus, both in his words and actions. But on the other, he’s just not playing by the rules! And of course if Jesus was truly god-ordained, he would look much like them…or so they thought, anyway. So they ask “Why?” in order to expose Jesus as the charlatan they thought he was.
Jesus is wise to their games, however. He points out that the kingdom agenda of the Pharisees takes care of the healthy; his own kingdom agenda -- the true kingdom of god -- takes care of the sick. Then he tells them to “Go and learn what this means”:
These words are taken from the prophet Hosea, with YHWH being the speaker. He is the “I” who desires mercy, and not sacrifice. So, what does this mean? How does this relate to Jesus’s table fellowship with the unclean? What were the Pharisees supposed to go and learn? What had Jesus learned from his own reading of this passage?
Whatever else we can say about this passage, Jesus’s reading of it produced the following outcome: He was communing with the sick/unclean, and calling them back to YHWH.
It seems that Jesus read this passage as authority to bypass the sacrificial system -- a system set up by YHWH under Moses no less. The cultic law was always a pointer towards a greater reality, and with Jesus being the very enfleshment of God, that reality was at hand. Therefore the barriers inherent in the system -- barriers between God and man, between the clean and the unclean -- were being done away with in Jesus’s ministry. Compassion was the order of the day; knowledge of God was trumping burnt offerings.
This is why Jesus could fraternise with those whom the law would call “unclean”; this is why he could touch the untouchable. The Pharisees knew the law all right, but they did not know the power of God nor the heart of God. Their interpretation was of the letter, not of the spirit. They read Scripture with a view to exclude; Jesus read it with a view to embrace.
So often we read Scripture in such a way that builds barriers. Here Jesus reads in it a call to tear them down. And at the heart of it all is the desire of YHWH, who longs to know his children and be known by them, from the least to the greatest.
This was perhaps the conclusion prominent readers of Scripture were coming to as they observed the would-be Messiah tear down their traditions and rebuild something new in their stead. If there is one thread running through each of the last three posts on how Jesus read Scripture -- and I would contend that there are several -- it’s that his was a reading that generated conflict - conflict with the satan in the wilderness, conflict with his neighbours in Nazareth, and conflict with the scribes and Pharisees in Galilee. One might even say, with the benefit of hindsight, that Jesus’s reading of Scripture was what got him killed, but I’m jumping the gun.
Matthew 9 presents another conflict scene, and once again Jesus and Scripture are at the heart of things. This time he’s not eating with defiled hands, but rather eating with defiled people - tax collectors and sinners. Those pesky Pharisees want to know why this is happening. They appear to be caught between two minds. On the one side, they recognise some kind of authority in Jesus, both in his words and actions. But on the other, he’s just not playing by the rules! And of course if Jesus was truly god-ordained, he would look much like them…or so they thought, anyway. So they ask “Why?” in order to expose Jesus as the charlatan they thought he was.
Jesus is wise to their games, however. He points out that the kingdom agenda of the Pharisees takes care of the healthy; his own kingdom agenda -- the true kingdom of god -- takes care of the sick. Then he tells them to “Go and learn what this means”:
I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.
These words are taken from the prophet Hosea, with YHWH being the speaker. He is the “I” who desires mercy, and not sacrifice. So, what does this mean? How does this relate to Jesus’s table fellowship with the unclean? What were the Pharisees supposed to go and learn? What had Jesus learned from his own reading of this passage?
Whatever else we can say about this passage, Jesus’s reading of it produced the following outcome: He was communing with the sick/unclean, and calling them back to YHWH.
It seems that Jesus read this passage as authority to bypass the sacrificial system -- a system set up by YHWH under Moses no less. The cultic law was always a pointer towards a greater reality, and with Jesus being the very enfleshment of God, that reality was at hand. Therefore the barriers inherent in the system -- barriers between God and man, between the clean and the unclean -- were being done away with in Jesus’s ministry. Compassion was the order of the day; knowledge of God was trumping burnt offerings.
This is why Jesus could fraternise with those whom the law would call “unclean”; this is why he could touch the untouchable. The Pharisees knew the law all right, but they did not know the power of God nor the heart of God. Their interpretation was of the letter, not of the spirit. They read Scripture with a view to exclude; Jesus read it with a view to embrace.
So often we read Scripture in such a way that builds barriers. Here Jesus reads in it a call to tear them down. And at the heart of it all is the desire of YHWH, who longs to know his children and be known by them, from the least to the greatest.
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