Matthew 15 & Mark 7

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Reformed_Rob

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Jesus is not “Down with Tradition!!” He’s against it!

That little sentence is only meant to be an attention grabber, like for when you pass your mouse over the thread link. Did it work?

So here’s my contention. It’s more a request for discussion, I’m not coming off anti-Catholic here, I just want answers.

Matthew 15:1-3
Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying, “Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread.” But He answered and said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?

Likewise, in Mark 7, it’s very similar. Mark might give some more helpful context though:

Mark 7:4,5
And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brazen vessels, and of tables. Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, “Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands?”

Already you know what I’m probably getting at, and I have 2 replies to the initial question:
  1. This shows, at the most, that the Talmud and other Rabbinical written/oral sources of tradition are not the “Commandment of God?”
  2. The Apostle Paul (and the Holy Spirit) would seemingly contradict Christ here, since in II Thessalonians 2:15, he tells them to hold fast to the traditions… you know.
I’m mostly pleased with those replies, but not everybody is.
Fr. Mitchell Pacwa has a good appendix on this topic on p. 555 of Sungenis’ “NBSA” book. But it doesn’t do much to address the specific charge brought forth. Or if it does, I missed it.

Ok, set your sights on the typical anti-Catholic (clearly, not me) charge, that** the Catholic church is just like those hypocritical Pharisee Jews**, and fire off some rounds at that.

BTW, sometimes I’m playing devil’s advocate or whatever, but not now, I’m serious. Like some other issues, I want to know. Because this is quintessential to the 5th power. But to press on to better answers, I might argue the Protestant side to get there on this thread.
 
In 33 A.D. Jesus established His visible Church, His body on earth. During His life He commanded ALL followers to be loyal to His Apostles and the leaders of His Church. Jesus gave St. Peter/Kephas His keys and thus His authority for leadership on earth.

The Church taught based on oral "T"radition for hundreds of years. Capital “T” Tradition. Some people wrote Scriptures perhaps thousands of them? Many have survived to this day. Many of them were destroyed over the years.

In the 4th century, hundreds of years after Jesus rose from the dead, Emporer Constatine wanted to consolodate Scripture ‘books’ (i.e. scrolls) into one ‘book’ (i.e. Bible). The Church, with its authority from Jesus, chose all 73 books that are inspired, canonized the Bible, and declared it inspired. All this came from Tradition. All people who use the Bible use Catholic Tradition and believe in it. Without Tradition we would not have a Bible today.

Luther started his faith alone heresy based upon "t"radition. Small “t”. Luthers tradition was not based on God or His authority. Luther invented his faith alone tradition. Faith alone is a tradition of man. Catholics have Tradition from God.

Not everything in the Catholic Church is Tradition. Some is tradition and some is teaching and some is dogma and some is Faith and Morals. Tradition like one God does not change. Teachings may change. There is a differance here.

The Bible proves what I have said as parts were included that deal with Jesus founding His Church, commanding loyalty/unity, giving His authority to the leader of His Church.

Catholics are immersed in Tradition. Protestants exist in tradition.

Short but to the point.
 
Reformed Rob:
Jesus is not “Down with Tradition!!” He’s against it!

That little sentence is only meant to be an attention grabber, like for when you pass your mouse over the thread link. Did it work?

So here’s my contention. It’s more a request for discussion, I’m not coming off anti-Catholic here, I just want answers.

Matthew 15:1-3
Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying, “Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread.” But He answered and said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?

Likewise, in Mark 7, it’s very similar. Mark might give some more helpful context though:

Mark 7:4,5
And when they come from the market, except they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, which they have received to hold, as the washing of cups, and pots, brazen vessels, and of tables. Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, “Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands?”

Already you know what I’m probably getting at, and I have 2 replies to the initial question:
  1. This shows, at the most, that the Talmud and other Rabbinical written/oral sources of tradition are not the “Commandment of God?”
  2. The Apostle Paul (and the Holy Spirit) would seemingly contradict Christ here, since in II Thessalonians 2:15, he tells them to hold fast to the traditions… you know.
I’m mostly pleased with those replies, but not everybody is.
Fr. Mitchell Pacwa has a good appendix on this topic on p. 555 of Sungenis’ “NBSA” book. But it doesn’t do much to address the specific charge brought forth. Or if it does, I missed it.

Ok, set your sights on the typical anti-Catholic (clearly, not me) charge, that** the Catholic church is just like those hypocritical Pharisee Jews**, and fire off some rounds at that.

BTW, sometimes I’m playing devil’s advocate or whatever, but not now, I’m serious. Like some other issues, I want to know. Because this is quintessential to the 5th power. But to press on to better answers, I might argue the Protestant side to get there on this thread.
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I might be off base here but I think you are confusing tradition and customs. I beleive what the Tradition here means teachings.
 
Reformed Rob:
Jesus is not “Down with Tradition!!” He’s against it!

That little sentence is only meant to be an attention grabber, like for when you pass your mouse over the thread link. Did it work?
Click to expand...
Indeed it did work!

The whole key to those passages is the fact that they are traditions which “nullify the Word of God.” Anything that nullifies the Word of God should be condemned, whether it is traditions or anything else.

Obviously tradition in and of itself is not bad, and, when it is apostolic Tradition, it is not only good, but commands our full religious assent.

Tradition in the Catholic sense, is not some extra-Scriptural revelation as some protestants believe. It is merely an amplification of the teaching of the Bible. It would be as if the apostles gave a sermon today regarding a topic in the Bible. It would be in perfect accordance and harmony with the teaching in Scripture…but just more of it, with increased clarity.

An example would be infant baptism. Do we, or do we not baptize infants? It never addresses this topic in Scripture, yet, we must have a particular stance on the topic. The only way to ignore this dilemna is to avoid the necessity of baptism altogether. How can we know which is the right teaching? Well, what did the apostles do? We find quite clearly that infants were baptized.

Is John 6 referring to a symbol, or the Real Presence? What did the apostles teach about this?

The Bible is part of a Tradition that is larger than itself.
 
From Matthew 15:6 in the NIV: "Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. "

It seems to me pretty clear that the tradition that Jesus is condemning is the Corban tradition. He then goes on to claim that the Pharisees were hypocrites by judging Jesus’ followers for not washing their hands (a tradition) when another of their traditions goes against the very teaching of God. However he never condemns the tradition of washing hands ceremonially before eating. Indeed, he then goes on to explain in Mark 7: "14Again Jesus called the crowd to him and said, "Listen to me, everyone, and understand this. 15Nothing outside a man can make him ‘unclean’ by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him ‘unclean.’ "

Yet he still has not condemned that tradition (of washing hands…). Rather he has said that the tradition is not needed. Useless perhaps, but not inherently evil as such. In Matthew 15:9 (and also in Mark…) Jesus quotes Isaiah by saying “their teachings are but rules of men”. So is Jesus condemning all traditions, or simply the Pharisees false teachings? To me there is a massive jump in logic to say that Jesus is condemning all traditions in this passage. Indeed if you put this passage together with the passage you cited - II Thessalonians 2:15 - “So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the teachings[c] we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter.” one would have to conclude that there are some traditions which one would necessarily need to adhere to.

To conclude, the Roman Catholics are not like the Pharisees in these passages, as our traditions and teachings are not teachings of men but the teachings of the Apostles. Indeed (on a side not, indeed is my favourite word so sorry for using it too much, as I indeed do…) the traditions of the Catholic Church never contradict Scripture, and so we are dealing with a different case to the case of Jesus dealing with the Pharisees and their traditions which certainly did contradict Scripture.
 
All so-called “Bible ONLY believing” Christians by the very fact they accept the
Bible believe in SOME oral tradition.

I’ll name one. The Canon (the books that belong in Scripture).

Nobody is going to be able to show you a verse that says . . . “In the Bible there is a collection of books. These books are Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, . . . etc. . . .Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, . . . . .Etc. . . . Jude and Revelation.”

The Canon IS authoritative Tradition (sorted out by the Church at the Councils of Hippo and Carthage in 393 A.D. and 397 A.D.).

They will come up with a “list of reasons” of HOW to decipher which books belong in Scripture and which books don’t. Ask them to show you where their “list of reasons” are in a verse of Scripture (they won’t be there - more tradition. Just that this one is wrong tradition).

This may seem obvious that the Canon is oral Tradition, but it escapes many people that I discuss this issue with. You NEED an authority. That’s REALLY the bottom line. That’s the issue.

The Apostles and their successors had God-given authority. That’s why St. Luke can say: “He who HEARS you hears me, and he who rejects you rejects me, and he who rejects me rejects him who sent me” (Luke 10:16, all cap. emphasis mine).

The way to continue to teach faith and morals with Divine protection would be to give ONE of these commissioned, a primacy in authority to settle any disputes that may arise. That doesn’t disqualify interaction and discussion with the other Bishops, or negate the Bishops special charisms in general, but ultimately a decision must be reached to settle disputes. That’s what the “Keys” in Matthew 16 symbolize (See Isaiah 22 and focus on the “Key of the house of David”) - Authority. Nobody else even claims to hold the Keys in Matthew 16 (other than the Catholic Church and a few “anti-Popes”). Yes Jesus is the Keyholder behind the earthly keyholder (the Pope). That’s our protection. Rejecting Apostolic authority is ironically enough . . . a tradition of men that nullifies the commandments of God!

There are Apostolic Traditions that have full authority, there are other good traditions, and there are bad traditions (traditions of men that nullify the commandments of God).
HOW to decide these good, bad etc. traditions is a topic for a different thread.

Incidentally, the Hebrew word for “tradition” I believe is “Talmud”.
 
Hi,

Thanks for the responses. I’m not neglecting this thread, just have been busy with a couple others. Give me a day or two, I will respond.

In the meantime :ehh: I’ll be thinking about what youall’ve said.

“meantime” does anybody still use that??

-Rob
 
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Atreyu:
To conclude, the Roman Catholics are not like the Pharisees in these passages, as our traditions and teachings are not teachings of men but the teachings of the Apostles. Indeed (on a side not, indeed is my favourite word so sorry for using it too much, as I indeed do…) the traditions of the Catholic Church never contradict Scripture, and so we are dealing with a different case to the case of Jesus dealing with the Pharisees and their traditions which certainly did contradict Scripture.
Click to expand...
Thank you Atreyu,

I was trying to think of a way to bolster my case without getting into a long discussion about any particular doctrines. You know, me claiming they contradict Scripture, you claiming they dont, and long discussions on that.

Hmmmm. I’m working on it. My thoughts are in my head and I’ve just got to get them out. I might call in reinforcements, like William Webster.

Gotta run, run, run to sleep

-Rob
 
Reformed Rob:
Yup, I’m still around.
:yup:
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Well, not around this thread much, sorry 😦

Maybe in the future, sorry to whet your apologetical appetites and let you down after just serving the appetizer.

-Rob
 
Hey,

Honestly, I haven’t given up on all this, in fact…

Anyways, in the midst of the business and living of life, and reading some Ratzinger I’ve been taken into his way of addressing these types of issues.

That tradition, even the Bible, requires people to “carry it on” and in the midst of that, even in the Christian Church which is Christ’s mystical body, there are often ‘pharasaical’ elements that can make their way in over time, and need to be purged out, so that the word of God is not nullified, so to speak.

That’s from Principles of Catholic theology. So, I guess I can say that maybe I’m not settled in a simple answer other than those given here, much more than that requires much honesty with the development of doctrine, and human nature in general.

This isn’t easy!!! I mean, it’s simple, but not easy…???
 
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