There was a surprising level of anger in our Bible study group the other night. We were studying Mark 2:13-3:6, and looking at four controversies between Jesus and religious leaders (particularly the Pharisees). We discussed the Pharisees’ religious background: they were very serious about keeping God’s law—so serious, they built up a whole bunch of other laws to protect themselves from going anywhere near breaking God’s law. For example, to protect themselves from breaking commandment #4 (don’t work on Saturday), they had a rule that one mustn’t even look into a mirror on the Sabbath because one might see a grey hair and be tempted to pluck it out, which might be construed as ‘work’. Our group sympathized with them a little: in much the same way that a modern Christian might make a blanket rule not to drink alcohol or visit a pub to protect himself from the possibility of causing offence or temptation to an alcoholic Christian brother, the Pharisees made rules to help them to honour God in all areas of life. (more…)