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Friday, February 14, 2020

What's Wrong with the Pharisees Anyway? - 6th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Matthew 5:17-22; 27-28 (5:17-37)

Jesus said to his disciples:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.
I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.
Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away,
not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter
will pass from the law,
until all things have taken place.
Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments
and teaches others to do so
will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.
But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments
will be called greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses
that of the scribes and Pharisees,
you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

“You have heard that it was said to your ancestors,
You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgment.
But I say to you,
whoever is angry with his brother
will be liable to judgment;
and whoever says to his brother, ‘Raqa,’ [empty-head]
will be answerable to the Sanhedrin;
and whoever says, ‘You fool,’
will be liable to fiery Gehenna.
...
“You have heard that it was said,
You shall not commit adultery.
But I say to you,
everyone who looks at a woman with lust
has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
...

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Behind Judas and those who had Jesus arrested, the Pharisees are normally viewed as the great antagonists of the Gospels. We always find them arguing with Jesus, usually about how to interpret a particular Jewish law. We should not underestimate how heated these arguments became. It seems like, on every other page, we read about how “the Pharisees went and took counsel about how to destroy him” (Mt 12:14). 

The interesting thing about the Pharisees is that modern Christians often drastically misunderstand them. We need to remember that, in Jesus’ time, there were a number of schools of thought within Judaism. In the New Testament, we sometimes also hear about the “Sadducees.” But there were also the “Zealots” and the “Essenes,” as well as others. These were all movements or philosophical schools within Judaism with their own particular theological ideas and their own desires for what Judaism ought to look like.

Here’s the odd thing: compared to the others, the Pharisees were, without a doubt, the school of thought closest to that of Jesus. They agree on which books belong in the Bible; they agree on the nature of the afterlife; they agree on the need for a “kingdom of God” in this world. Indeed, as the celebrated Jewish scholar Lawrence Schiffman has pointed out, “it is striking that Jesus’ complaints throughout the Gospels are mostly directed at the Pharisees, yet his ethical preaching most resembles that of [the Pharisees]”! So what gives? What’s so wrong with the Pharisees anyway?

More often than not, we totally misunderstand why Jesus and the Pharisees fought with each other. We usually think the Pharisees were rigorists ― that they never allowed exceptions to the law ― and that Jesus was flexible. This is decidedly wrong. It is true that the Pharisees were very meticulous when it came to following Jewish laws, but Jesus’ dispute with the Pharisees was not about when or how often it’s acceptable to break the rules

This week’s reading reveals just the opposite. During the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus insists that “until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law. [Indeed,] whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.” Let’s be clear: this is what the Pharisees have been preaching. They’re loving the Sermon on the Mount so far!

But what happens next is more surprising yet: Jesus explicitly insists that he is even more rigorous than the Pharisees. Jesus starts by reminding his listeners of one of the Ten Commandments: “You have heard it said, ‘you shall not kill.’” This is ― for most of us anyway ― a pretty easy law to keep. Just don’t kill anybody. Yet Jesus keeps going: But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment.” Jesus deepens the meaning of the law so that it reaches to the heart of the matter. Killing begins with anger. The angry person is guilty too.

It is the same just a few moments later: “You have heard that it was said, ‘you shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Again, he deepens the meaning of the law: adultery begins with lust.

So the interesting thing ― the shocking thing even ― is that Jesus is way more strict than the Pharisees. It’s not just that you can’t murder or commit adultery, like the Pharisees insisted. Christians need to root out anger and lust from their lives too. What’s wrong with the Pharisees, then, is that, for all their meticulousness, they do not go far or deep enough. They do not go to the root of sin in order to “root it out.” Even the journey toward sin is sin. And so it’s not that the Pharisees were too rigorous. It’s that they weren’t rigorous enough. Jesus himself says as much: “unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.” 

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~Anthony Rosselli (PhD cand., theology, University of Dayton) writes out of St. Luke and Ascension Parishes in Franklin County, Vermont. These columns are archived here.

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