Mark 7:1–23

Jesus Challenges the Pharisees’ Traditions—Matthew 15:1–20

¹The Pharisees and some experts in Moses’ Teachings who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus. ²They saw that some of his disciples were unclean^abecause they ate without washing their hands. 

³(The Pharisees, like all other Jewish people, don’t eat unless they have properly washed their hands. They follow the traditions of their ancestors. ⁴When they come from the marketplace, they don’t eat unless they have washed first. They have been taught to follow many other rules. For example, they must also wash their cups, jars, brass pots, and dinner tables.^b) 

⁵The Pharisees and the experts in Moses’ Teachings asked Jesus, “Why don’t your disciples follow the traditions taught by our ancestors? They are unclean because they don’t wash their hands before they eat!” 

⁶Jesus told them, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites in Scripture: 

‘These people honor me with their lips, 

but their hearts are far from me. 

⁷Their worship of me is pointless, 

because their teachings are rules made by humans.’ 

⁸“You abandon the commandments of God to follow human traditions.” ⁹He added, “You have no trouble rejecting the commandments of God in order to keep your own traditions! ¹⁰For example, Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’ and ‘Whoever curses father or mother must be put to death.’ ¹¹But you say, ‘If a person tells his father or mother that whatever he might have used to help them is corban (that is, an offering to God), ¹²he no longer has to do anything for his father or mother.’ ¹³Because of your traditions you have destroyed the authority of God’s word. And you do many other things like that.” 

¹⁴Then he called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and try to understand! ¹⁵Nothing that goes into a person from the outside can make him unclean. It’s what comes out of a person that makes him unclean. ¹⁶Let the person who has ears listen!”^c

¹⁷When he had left the people and gone home, his disciples asked him about this illustration. 

¹⁸Jesus said to them, “Don’t you understand? Don’t you know that whatever goes into a person from the outside can’t make him unclean? ¹⁹It doesn’t go into his thoughts but into his stomach and then into a toilet.” (By saying this, Jesus declared all foods acceptable.) ²⁰He continued, “It’s what comes out of a person that makes him unclean. ²¹Evil thoughts, sexual sins, stealing, murder, ²²adultery, greed, wickedness, cheating, shameless lust, envy, cursing, arrogance, and foolishness come from within a person. ²³All these evils come from within and make a person unclean.”