Sunday 30th August 2009

The gospel reading needs to be set against a particular backdrop - the struggle of the Early Church with the observance of the Jewish law.  Read on in the NT and try to get to grips with the discussions between Peter and Paul, and you will have some sense of what I am talking about.  Mark presents Jesus as upholding the basic principles of the law, but challenging the traditions that had grown up around it.

It is interesting that early on in the reading, Mark notes of the Jewish leadership that, ‘they observe many other traditions / customs’ as well.  We are not dealing simply with washing at meal-times.  Tradition in Scripture is not necessarily a positive word - it is a neutral word; reflection and scrutiny are necessary… not simply unblinking acceptance.  I guess that we would concur with this: there is saying that in Britain, if you do something for two years consecutively, then it becomes a tradition… which means that we have to grapple with a great many traditions.  Jesus, of course, shared faithfully in the Passover; the AV records that he did not come to alter a ‘jot or tittle’ of the law - an archaic if evocative translation - yet this same Jesus did not, could not advocate inflexible observation of the Sabbath rules.  Legal frameworks should be a service, a means of enablement, not a prison.

It needs hardly be noted that we can often see in the Church the same tendency that Jesus criticized - holding on to human tradition as though they were required by God.  Basic principles become overlaid, obscured with practices and particular ways of thinking.  What may have been proper contextual responses in their time have become absolute.  As in this passage, such traditions and practices can be fiercely protected because they become the marks of identity and orthodoxy.  Jesus wanted to transform living and believing, not just to adapt religious practices.  So… a possible contemporary example:  some people bemoan a service in which the Lord’s Prayer may be omitted… but they are strangely reluctant to get to grips with the teaching of this prayer on forgiveness and the like.

Jesus, in dealing with his critics in this passage, makes a clear plea for consistency:  do what you say… otherwise you are guilty of hypocrisy.  Neil J and his family bought me a novel for my birthday… a book which Neil was horrified to learn that I had not read when we were talking about it a few weeks previously.  The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell… essentially, a Socialist take on the situation of the working man in the early years of the twentieth century.  Churches and clergy feature reasonably prominently; the Church of the Whitened Sepulchre (read C of E) and the Shining Light Chapel (read independent evangelical).  Neither emerge with a great deal of credit, because Tressell believed that both condoned the pious exploitation of the workers, contrary to Christ’s explicit teachings.  Tresssel had few problems with the teachings of Christ and every problem with organized religion, since he felt that time and again, its proponents failed to live up to the teachings which they espoused.  Hypocrisy.

Jesus’ comments on washing are slightly cryptic.  The external does not become unclean by going in; it is those things which leave us which render us unclean – and he unpacks this a few verses later with his talk of heart-born evils.  Unwashed hands matter little when set alongside arrogance; there is no value in following washing rules meticulously, if the so-called golden rule is neglected.

In a sense, this paves the way for one of the great debates at the heart of all faiths.  Where does evil come from?  This question, central to this reading from Mark, is at the heart of dialogues between different world views.  If there are no spiritual absolutes of good and evil (materialism), if evil is only a figment of a misguided imagination (Christian Science), if evil is unavoidable (fatalism), if evil is predetermined (hyper-Calvinism)… well, then there is no purpose or need or discussion regarding what is represented by the life of Jesus and the death of Jesus.  Since this is not our ‘take’ on evil, then we are faith-bound to get to grips with the circumstances surrounding the last week of Jesus’ life and beyond.  Some argue convincingly that the uniqueness of Christianity as a path of faith is that both the glory of humanity’s potential and the depths of humanity’s sin are held in true contrast and tension.  In Christ, a diverse world of extraordinary possibilities are held before us… redemption, in its most accessible and positive and long-lasting sense is not simply a possibility, but reality.

Now, I know that this last paragraph has been on the heavy side in terms of ideas, but, as I say, fundamentally this is a reading about the nature of evil… and, conversely, the nature of good.  As people of faith, it is not enough simply to reiterate the nature v. nurture debate, nor is it enough to recite certain bits of Genesis without reflection on what they are actually saying.  We continue in reflection as a part of our continuing journey of faith.