THE THIEF COMES TO STEAL, KILL & DESTROY (PART XI)

“You Have Heard That It Was Said…But I Say to You”

By Akin Ojumu

Until they devolved into showy religiosity and performative theatrics that they came to be characterized by, the party of the Pharisees was originally a group of serious-minded worshipers of YAHWEH. Their piety was pure, and their zeal, authentic. They genuinely loved the LORD with all their heart, with all their soul, and with all their might.

But as it tends to happen to even the best of us when we taste wealth, power and prestige, their love for God was soon choked to death by the allure of the lust of the eyes, lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. Their spiritual innocence quickly got corrupted, and their sincerity turned rancid. 

With malevolent skillfulness, the Pharisees crafted a moral narrative to legitimize power and perpetuate spiritual authority. They became adept at using noble words to mask their many complex ungodly interests. The Pharisees were the first to weaponize faith for leverage, even as they muddied the water of godliness to hide the intersection of their moral symbolism and material interests.

Under the guise of democratizing the worship of YAHWEH, the Pharisees rejected acceptable worship as prescribed in the Written Torah where the Temple is the center of worship with the Levitical priesthood as the overseer. Instead, they invented their own system of religion, called the Rabbinic Judaism, comprised of local synagogues run by self-appointed Rabbis or sages and the sacred Scripture becoming the Oral Torah, an invention of their own making which was not inspired but contained the Tradition of the Elders.

Eventually, the Rabbinic Judaism rose to prominence in Israel. Like a little leaven that spoils the whole lump, this man-made religion metastasized to take over the religion landscape. The various local synagogues soon became the central place in Jewish religious life. 

It was this apostate religious system that was in operation at the time of the Lord Jesus, and it was, in many ways, antithetic to the Judaism prescribed in the Written Law that God gave to Moses. This perversion of biblical Judaism would come to underscore the chasm and acrimonious relationship between Christ and the Pharisees. 

On several occasions, the Lord Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for overemphasizing external show of piety and preferring performative theater. 

Matthew 23:5-7

“They do all their deeds to be seen by others. For they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.”

There are many instances when the Lord Jesus pronounced woes on the Pharisees for their hypocrisy, denouncing them as polished graves full of putrid corpses.

Matthew 23:27

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.”

Because the Oral Torah of the Pharisees had softened the demands of the Written Torah of Moses by focusing on external show of obedience rather than emphasizing an internal conformity with God’s precept, the Lord Jesus called His disciples to a much higher righteousness than that of the Pharisees.

Matthew 5:20

“For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

In a series of “You have heard that it was said…But I say to you” in Matthew chapter 5, Christ, in His Sermon on the Mount, exposed the vacuousness of the Pharisees. Pointing to several key areas of the Law, the Lord Jesus contrasted God’s standard for righteousness with the false standards of the Pharisees. 

On Anger and Murder

Matthew 5:21-26

“You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment…”

On Lust and Adultery

Matthew 5:27-30

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart…”

On Divorce

Matthew 5:31-32

“It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery…”

On Oath

Matthew 5:33-37

“Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ But I say to you, Do not take an oath at all…”

On Retribution and Retaliation

Matthew 5:38-42

“You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also…”

On Enemies

Matthew 5:43-48

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you…”

Nowhere is the misplaced emphasis of the Pharisees on outward show of piety better demonstrated than in the ritual of washing of hands. This ritual, which is not found in the Written Torah given by God to Moses, is an important rite encoded in the Tradition of the Elders. In Mark 7:1-8, the Pharisees rebuked Christ and His disciples for violating the ceremonial handwashing custom.

As stipulated in the Tradition of the Elders, all Jews are required to wash their hands before every meal and upon return from the market or from being out and about where they could have come in contact with gentiles and sinners. This is to cleansed themselves from spiritual contamination. 

There’s actually a specific procedure prescribed in the Tradition of the Elders for the hand washing ceremony and it goes as follows:

First, you get a water pitcher and a bowl for catching water. To start, you put out your left hand face down over the water bowl. Then you take the water pitcher and pour a drop or two of water on the back of your left hand, then you shake your hand. Next, you switch hands by putting out your right hand face down over the bowl, pour water on the back of your right hand, and then you shake the water off. Again, you switch by putting out your left hand with the palm up this time. Pour a drop or two of water onto your left palm and shake it to get the water off. Switch hands again, hold out your right hand with the palm up, sprinkle a couple of drops of water on your right palm, and shake it off. 

Once you are done with sprinkling water on the back and palm of both hands, you put the water pitcher down. Then you are required to say the following prayer. “I thank you Lord God, Maker of heaven and Earth, that you have given me the command to wash my hands.”

As if that’s not bad enough, there’s yet another dreadful tradition that exemplified the cold orthodoxy, hypocrisy, and spiritual deadness of the Pharisees. This time, it has to do with their violation of the Fifth Commandment (Exodus 20:12 and Exodus 21:17); the commandment that stipulates the duty of children to their parents.

Mark 7:10-13

“For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God) – then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And many such things you do.”

Driven by an insatiable appetite for filthy lucre, the Pharisees distorted the Fifth Commandment. In their greed, they fostered an environment whereby the people were given the permission structure to deny financial assistance to their own parents simply by declaring the money and resources that they would have used to support their parents as belonging to God. This practice, which is also encoded in the Tradition of the Elders, was a means of fleecing the people, since any money that was declared Corban would eventually be brought to the Pharisees.

This is no different from what we find happening today in the various houses of horror called churches. Modern-day descendants of the Pharisees are extorting their flock by using all sorts of gimmicks and spiritual manipulation. By twisting the Word of God, the scoundrels of the Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements build empires for themselves and their children on the blood, sweat, and tears of their hapless followers. 

A quintessential modern-day offspring of the Pharisees would be Pastor John Doe. Only a few years prior, John Doe was barely able to feed or clothe himself. Today, he has become stupendously wealthy overnight. Such is the wealth at his disposal that he can afford to live in his own secluded gated estate of multiple magnificent mansions that give Mar-a-Lago a run for its money in their gold-plated adornments. And when it comes to his numerous travels, Pastor John Doe is a highflyer who jets around in the latest high-end Gulfstream private jets. 

As it was with the Pharisees and their man-made religion of self-glory and personal empires, so it is with the general overseers, bishops, apostles and pastors of the modern-day Church.

Until next time, stay tuned.