In today’s Gospel Jesus continues his denunciation of the scribes and the Pharisees. These along with the Sadducees were the religious leaders at the time of Jesus. At the time of the writing of Matthew’s Gospel (around 85 A.D.) the Pharisees were the main religious leaders hence the denunciation of the Pharisees is stronger in Matthew’s Gospel than Jesus’ actual criticism of them. The historical Jesus and the historical Pharisees agreed on many things such as zeal for the will of God and belief in the resurrection. They also disagreed on purity rules and what was required to keep holy the Sabbath. Jesus’ denunciation in today’s Gospel is not a denunciation of all Jews since all the early disciples were Jewish. It is also not a denunciation of all Pharisees since St. Paul among other disciples was a Pharisees. There were also many good and righteous Pharisees such as the great rabbi Gamaliel. His sage advice to the Sanhedrin was not to oppose the Christian movement: “For if this endeavor or this activity is of human origin, it will destroy itself. But if it comes from God, you will not be able to destroy them; you may even find yourselves fighting against God.” (Acts 5:38-39).
Jesus’ denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees applies to all religious leaders especially to Christian leaders. In today’s Gospel Jesus condemns the hypocrisy of religious leaders who “preach but they do not practice…who tie up heavy burdens hard to carry and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them” (23:3-4). The Greek word “hypocrite” originally meant “actor” what we might even call a poor actor. They speak their lines, they preach to others and they don’t hear what they are saying, they don’t preach to themselves. Jesus also condemns religious leaders who put heavy burdens on people through their interpretation of the Scripture and the will of God. They make religion a heavy burden, full of guilt and joyless.
Jesus denounces those who “tie up heavy burdens hard to carry and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them.” Jesus’ teaching was different:
“Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for yourselves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.” (Matthew 11:28-30).
Image: “47 Matthew 23 v27 Jesus upbraids the Scribes and Pharisees (Woes)” by fz1844 is marked with Public Domain Mark 1.0.