A story is told about a church in Denmark where the worshipers bowed regularly before a certain spot on the wall. They had been doing that for three centuries -- bowing at that one spot in the sanctuary. Nobody could remember why.
One day in renovating the church, they removed some of the whitewash on the walls. At the exact spot where the people bowed, they found the image of the Virgin Mary under the whitewash. People had become so accustomed to bowing before that image that even after it was covered up for three centuries, people still bowed.
Tradition is a powerful thing. It’s an important part of our faith, but it can be abused. We see that clearly in this Gospel today. The Pharisees had learned to substitute tradition, custom, habit for the presence of the living God. Traditionalism rears its head in many ways, in many times and in many places. It certainly has done that in the Church. Sadly, tradition is sometimes worshipped at the expense of God’s people encountering the true and loving presence of God.
The conflict we heard today revolves around an occasion when Jesus was teaching and healing in the region of Galilee. Some of the Pharisees from Jerusalem came to check him out, to see what he was up to, probably curious about how many people were following him. They notice that his disciples have begun to eat lunch without first performing the required ritual washing of their hands. So, they challenge Jesus about this, and he rebukes them for their hypocrisy.
The Pharisees believed that the moral law was important but that keeping strict observances was the best way to keep their faith vibrant. They are an easy target for criticism because of their tunnel vision and obstinate adherence to hundreds of laws with which they were obsessed.
They kept very high standards, and they wanted people to be proud of their Jewish identity. All of that would not have been so bad if it had helped bring people into communion with one another, but the reality was that their position excluded people and kept them out. And most of their concerns were around eating and food—a huge part of Middle Eastern culture.
Torah dictated what you could and could not eat, with whom you could or could not eat, what kind of dishes and pots you used and when and in what manner you had to perform ritual washing first.
For the Pharisees, the behavior of the disciples did not just demonstrate bad manners. It showed bad faith. And why didn’t Jesus, an educated Jew, insist that these rogue friends of his conform to Jewish Law in this regard?
I suspect it wasn’t just the twelve who neglected to wash their hands but hundreds of other followers who were in the crowd, ordinary people who could not afford to keep to all the dietary and ritual regulations and were hungry!
Jesus constantly violated religious laws in favor of ministering to those in need. He healed on the Sabbath, touched lepers and a dead child, is touched by a woman who suffered from hemorrhages for years, ate dinner with notorious sinners, allowed an unmarried woman to bathe his feet with her tears. All beyond taboo.
Jesus responds by quoting one of their most prominent Prophets: “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, 'This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.'
“Hypocrites” comes from the Greek ύποκρισις: to pretend, to display a mask. A good definition of a hypocrite is a person who is not, on the inside, what he or she shows on the outside. That’s the Pharisees’ pedigree.
Jesus can’t stand obstacles that keep people out, devalue them, cast them off to the margins of life. He was very clear: no law should exclude any person nor override compassion, forgiveness, and a welcoming inclusion into the community.
Jesus wants the Pharisees to get out of their head and get into their heart. “There is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.” God sees what is in our hearts not in our pedigrees or our wallets or even out piety.
Tradition is a powerful thing. We see that clearly in this Gospel today. Traditionalism rears its head in many ways, in many times and in many places. It certainly has done that in the Church. Yet tradition in its proper place is an important component of the Episcopal Church and one which we should cherish. Sadly, though, tradition is sometimes worshipped at the expense of God’s people encountering the true and loving presence of God.
What we see in the way Jesus lived and in what he taught is the warning that, when religion and its observance gets in the way of fulfilling the spirit, the heart of God’s law, which is love of one another, it’s no longer true religion—it’s counterfeit, and God is not amused by it.
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