Why do thy disciples transgress what has been delivered by the ancients? for they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.
The complaint that opens Matthew 15 comes from religious experts who travelled from Jerusalem. They watched the disciples eat a meal. Their charge is not that the disciples broke God's law. It is that they broke a rule handed down by respected teachers. The Lord's answer turns the charge back on the accusers.
The men who raise the question carry every credential Israel could offer.
The scribes were men learned in the law. The Pharisees belonged to the sect most respected in religion. As Paul says, "according to the strictest party of our religion I have lived as a Pharisee" (Acts 26:5). And they were "of Jerusalem," the very centre of the system God had set up. So everything that could give weight and authority to "religion" was there.
They also chose a strange moment. Jesus was healing crowds.
Scribes and Pharisees from Jerusalem broke into this lovely scene with their complaint and question: the disciples were not keeping the tradition of the elders about washing hands. Just imagine it. The Son of God was giving out healing everywhere in the fullness of divine grace, and these men, blind to all that was happening, broke in with their point of order.
The hand-washing here is not part of the law of Moses. It comes from an oral system that grew up beside Scripture. Men enforced it more harshly than Scripture itself.
The Old Testament says nothing at all about such washing of hands. But the oral law piles up rule after rule about this ceremony. Neglect it, and people counted that a great sin, worthy of being cut off from the community. A person was even allowed to eat unclean meat and drink unclean drinks, which the law forbade, as long as he kept the traditions of the elders and washed his hands before he broke the law.
William Kelly asks what such a custom is worth, and where it came from.
There was nothing moral in this. Nothing in it could touch the soul or affect a man's relationship with God. But it went against their traditions, and so they found fault. It is easy to imagine that this tradition began from a devout motive. These leaders may have meant to keep the importance of personal purity before the people. Washing the hands would be a very natural sign that God looks for and insists on holiness in the works of His people. The great principle of the word is this: God is infinitely wise and holy, and where He gives no command of His own, woe to the man who takes away liberty. Man takes advantage of the opening. Where God has not laid down a law, he makes one of his own.
They ask about the disciples, but a teacher answers for his followers. In the minds of the accusers, this breach ranked above breaking the law of God.
They come to Him with the question, which of course is an accusation. As a charge against His disciples, it is by implication a charge against Him, their teacher. Here they had what in their minds convicted the disciples as very obvious sinners. For these men, breaking such a tradition was a greater sin than breaking the law itself.
Jesus does not debate whether the elders had the right to make the rule. He shifts the question to whom the tradition belongs.
But Jesus at once puts both scribes and Pharisees, and their tradition, in direct contact with God. He says to them, "Why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition?" He does not go around in circles arguing the question of this tradition. It might be right enough in some sense, and man respected it. But He says, "You are flying in the face of God by your tradition!" To the Pharisees, this tradition was the tradition of the elders. To Christ, it was "you" and "your tradition."
Unwashed hands look trivial. Darby answers that the size of the rule does not matter, because adding one rule unseats the authority behind all the rest.
They did not merely set aside one commandment so that they might keep their tradition. By setting up another authority, they made void the whole word of God, which claims all authority. If another can direct, then I am not sole master, and the man is not my servant. Not only is the servant misled; the master is set aside. Anyone who adds one small stroke sets aside God's authority and His revealed will as authority. If it is only about washing my hands, another can step in and claim obedience — the word of God is not the sole authoritative rule.
- Tradition arrives dressed up. The complaint came from Jerusalem, from scribes and Pharisees. Learning and piety together put every human weight of authority behind it.
- Tradition adds. Hand-washing before meals appears nowhere in the Old Testament. It grew as oral rule, and these men counted neglect of it a sin worthy of expulsion.
- Tradition inverts. These men ranked a breach of their custom above a breach of the law of God itself.
- Tradition displaces. Set up a second authority, even over hand-washing, and the word of God is no longer the only rule. That misleads the servant and pushes aside the Master.
- Christ reassigns it. He does not debate the elders' rule. He calls it "your tradition" and sets the accusers face to face with the commandment of God.
But he answering said to them, Why do *ye* also transgress the commandment of God on account of your traditional teaching?
Scribes and Pharisees came from Jerusalem with all the weight of learning and reputation behind them. Their complaint was that the disciples ate without washing their hands. The Lord does not defend His disciples. He answers their question with a question, and turns the accusers into the accused.
Jesus never argues about whether the elders had the right to make rules. He moves the whole conversation onto one plain fact.
The Lord goes straight to the conscience. He does not open a theoretical discussion about tradition. He does not argue with them about the authority of the elders. He takes hold at once of the plain fact: in their zeal for the tradition of the elders, they were setting themselves squarely against the clear, definite commandment of God.
The Pharisees had spoken of "the tradition of the elders." That name carried age and reputation. The Lord changes the wording, and the change is the sting of the verse.
But Jesus at once brings both scribes and Pharisees, and their tradition, into direct contact with God... This tradition might be right enough in some sense. At the very least it was respected by men, backed by the learning of the scribes and by the religiousness of the Pharisees, and it looked proper in Jerusalem. But He says, "You are flying in the face of God by your tradition!" He closes the point at once, and drops the elders and everything else. A man may plead tradition, the authority of age and the like, but in fact he does so only to clothe himself with it. To the Pharisees, this tradition was the tradition of the elders; but to Christ, it was "you" and "your tradition."
These rules were not invented to fight God's law. They started out as explanations of it. That is what made them so dangerous.
These traditions of the elders were explanations of the law, additions to it, and conclusions drawn from it by respected teachers of long ago. They took over the minds of the Pharisees and clouded the law of God from view. It went so far that they broke the law in order to keep their tradition.
The word "tradition" itself is neutral. It can point in either direction:
Tradition can be described as teaching handed down by word of mouth. It may be from God, as in 2 Thessalonians 2:15... instruction handed down before the word of God was complete. Or it may be from man, like the tradition of the elders of Israel. The Lord condemned that tradition and said it overturned the commandments of God... What man sets up, man holds on to most tightly.
Jesus does not answer the hand-washing charge with a hand-washing defence. He picks a different tradition — one where the damage is impossible to deny.
He does not deal with the washing of hands, though; that was an empty rule, hardly worth mentioning. But He does rebuke a tradition of theirs that openly cancelled the commandment of God. To honour father and mother was one of the original ten commandments. Yet the Jews had invented a tradition that let a son or daughter point to something he owned that could have met his parents' need and call it "Corban," that is, a gift given to God. By this trick he avoided helping his parents.
The loss is bigger than the one rule broken. Once another voice can give orders, God's word stops being the final word at all.
They did not only set aside one commandment in order to keep their tradition. By doing this they rejected and cancelled the authority of the whole word of God... When I set up another authority, I push aside and cancel the whole word of God, which claims all authority. If someone else can give orders, I am not the only master, and the man is not my servant... Even if it is only about washing my hands, another person can interfere and claim obedience — and the word of God is no longer the only rule that has authority.
Putting Matthew and Mark side by side, writers set out the Lord's charge in four rising steps:
(1) laid aside the commandment of God (Mark 7:8); (2) rejected the commandment of God (Mark 7:9); (3) transgressed the commandment of God (Matt. 15:3); (4) made void the word of God (Matt. 15:6; Mark 7:13).
- Transgress — the accusers charged the disciples with breaking a human rule. The Lord charged them with breaking God's. Only the second charge stands.
- Transferred — He drops "the elders" and says "your tradition." The blame now rests on them, not on the men they were hiding behind.
- Tested — He proves it by the command to honour father and mother. A gift labelled "Corban" became an excuse for leaving parents in need.
- Total — the loss is not one commandment but all of them. Add any other authority, and God's word is no longer the only rule.
- Today — the same pattern appears wherever explanations of Scripture grow heavier than Scripture itself. Man guards his own rules most closely.