{"id":10281,"date":"2023-03-22T00:00:20","date_gmt":"2023-03-21T14:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/?p=10281"},"modified":"2023-03-22T09:31:47","modified_gmt":"2023-03-21T23:31:47","slug":"sabbath-controversy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/2023\/03\/22\/sabbath-controversy\/","title":{"rendered":"Sabbath Controversy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mark 2:23-28\u00a023<\/sup>And it happened that on the Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and on the road, his disciples began plucking heads of grain. 24<\/sup>And the Pharisees were saying to him, \u201cLook, why are they doing what is not permitted on the Sabbath?\u201d 25<\/sup>And he said to them, \u201cHave you never read what David did, when he had need and he was hungry and those with him,\u00a026<\/sup>how he entered the house of God under Abiathar the high priest, and they ate the consecrated bread, which it is not permitted to eat but only the priests, and also he gave it to those with him?\u201d 27<\/sup>And he said to them, \u201cThe Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath. 28<\/sup>So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

The controversy with the Pharisees continues to intensify with the next story. The key time indicator in this story is the Sabbath day, the seventh day of the week that was sacred to Jews. The Pharisees had become legalistic in their effort to keep this day holy by extending the idea of what included work. The problem in this story seems quite trivial. The disciples were walking along with Jesus on one of their many journeys in Galilee. They innocently pick the heads of some grain growing in a field by the roadside.<\/p>\n

They made two mistakes. One is implied in that they were walking at some distance. The Pharisees had determined that a person could only walk a short distance on the Sabbath. The other is that they picked the grain, which the Pharisees interpreted as harvesting, thus it was work. The Jewish Mishanaic tractate called\u00a0Shabbat\u00a0<\/em>7:2\u00a0made reaping and threshing along with 37 other classes of work unlawful on the Sabbath.<\/p>\n

This very narrow definition of Sabbath law created another controversy for Jesus. Curiously, the Pharisees saw this, so they must have been following Jesus, which means that they saw and heard all that he was doing. They should have seen the hand of God at work but were already hardened in their hearts. They interpret what the disciples were doing as\u00a0not permitted\u00a0<\/em>(existin<\/em>), a word that is related to proper or authorized. The problem is, who was the authority behind this permission? Of course, they and the traditions they cited were.<\/p>\n

Jesus responds to their complaint in two ways. First, he cites Scripture from 1 Samuel 21:1-6 in the form of a rhetorical question. Of course, the Pharisees knew the Bible and knew this story and how David and his mighty men were hungry and got special consecrated bread from the tabernacle. There are some oddities about this account as told by Mark. First, there is no reference in 1 Samuel of David actually entering the tabernacle, though that could be possible. Second, the priest in the story is Ahimelech, whose father was Abiathar. Luke leaves out the name, which suggests that somewhere in the retelling of this story in the early church, names got mixed up.<\/p>\n

Second, Jesus gives a proverb in verses 27-28 that also serves as the climax of the passage. Jesus appeals to the human need of his disciples. God created the seventh day for the good of humanity. The Sabbath was created as a day of rest and reflection, a time to slow down, regroup, and consider God and God’s wonderful creation. Working seven days none stop will eventually wear us out.\u00a0For the Pharisees, people were made for rules. David broke the law because of his mission and purpose. There was a higher law at for him to follow. Jesus\u2019 disciples also broke the law as interpreted by the Pharisees because of their urgent mission of proclaiming the kingdom.<\/p>\n

Jesus had authority as the\u00a0Son of Man<\/em> to determine what activities were allowed on the Sabbath. His authority was unique. But what he allowed did not break the law or distort its meaning but fulfilled its purpose. The Sabbath is not meant to be a burden but a blessing. Legalism saps energy and enthusiasm; liberty brings renewal and refreshing.<\/p>\n

For older posts, click\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mark 2:23-28\u00a023And it happened that on the Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and on the road, his disciples began plucking heads of grain. 24And the Pharisees were saying to him, \u201cLook, why are they doing what is not permitted on the Sabbath?\u201d 25And he said to them, \u201cHave you never read what David […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotions","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10281"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10281\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10303,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10281\/revisions\/10303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}