And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.
Jesus charged the religious leaders with deliberately laying aside the commandment of God in order to preserve and keep their own tradition. He spoke it when scribes and Pharisees accused His disciples over unwashen hands and washings of cups and vessels, while they themselves set aside the fifth commandment by Corban, letting a man withhold help from father or mother under pretended devotion to the temple. Their traditions handed down from rabbi to rabbi were treated as more sacred and binding than the law itself, even than the Ten Commandments, and by elevating human rules to its level they made God's law void and of none effect. He made no defense but exposed their hypocrisy, tore away the error enveloping the law, restored its true meaning and exalted it in its great principles beyond their technicalities. The same rejection is repeated when Rome and modern religion forsake God's word for human tradition, especially in setting aside the sanctity of the fourth precept while exalting Sunday observance which has no authority in the precepts or example of Christ.
Historical Setting and Occasion
The saying was spoken when scribes and Pharisees came to watch Jesus and to accuse Him because His disciples ate with unwashen hands and did not keep the washings of cups, pots, vessels and tables. It charges them with deliberately laying aside the commandment of God in order to preserve their own tradition, giving as an example what they repeatedly did in setting aside the fifth commandment as of no consequence while being very exact in carrying out the traditions of the elders. Sayings handed down from rabbi to rabbi were treated as more sacred than the law itself, so that when tradition collided with the commandments given from Sinai preference was given to rabbinical precepts. Their worship was therefore empty, because they taught human commands as doctrine and regarded their own traditions as more important than keeping the commandments of God.
The immediate case was Corban, by which an undutiful child could withhold help from father or mother by pronouncing his means a gift devoted to the temple. He had only to pronounce Corban over his property to devote it to God, keeping it for his own use during life with it passing to temple service after death, and was then suffered to do nothing more for them. In this way the fifth commandment was treated as of no consequence while the traditions of the elders were strictly enforced, nullifying the plain requirements of God under cover of pretended devotion to God. The apparent zeal of priests and rabbis was pretense covering desire for self-aggrandizement, deceiving the people and laying heavy burdens God had not imposed, yet the rebuke does not lessen man's obligation to present gifts and offerings to God.
Their traditional precepts encumbered the law of God under professed design of guarding its observance, while numberless rules about purification made life one long struggle against defilement. They burdened His commands with needless requirements God had not given, distorted Scripture, obscured what He had made plain, and made plain Scripture indistinct by imposing ideas God had not given. This turned attention away from the great principles of God's law to trifling distinctions God had not required, weakening respect for God and the force and power of His word.
Especially the Sabbath was hedged in by senseless restrictions that made that holy day almost unendurable. A Jew was not allowed to kindle a fire or even to light a candle on that day, so that narrow views made the people slaves to their own useless regulations. Their meaningless exactions and requirements had become a by-word among other nations, and they became dependent on Gentiles to do services their rules forbade them to do for themselves. They did not reflect that if these necessary duties of life were sins they were as guilty in employing others to perform them as in doing them themselves.
About the time of John's birth faith was clouded by departure from God, and many of the leaders brought in their own traditions and enforced them upon the people as the commandments of God. Those traditions and needless ceremonies confused faith and filled minds with ignorance and bigotry, so that God could not manifest His glory and power through a corrupt priesthood. Pious Jews who were looking, believing, and earnestly praying for the Messiah trusted that God would not leave His people as a reproach to the heathen, and expected that when Messiah came He would give a clear revelation of the divine will and free their doctrines from tradition. The leaders maintained outward religious forms to appear devout and important, yet showed no mercy to the poor, burdened widows with heavy taxes, and took the people's offerings for themselves, for the traditions and ceremonies imposed came from human sources, not from God through Moses.
At His trial before Caiaphas His enemies had abundant evidence that He disregarded the traditions of the Jews and spoke irreverently of many of their ordinances, denouncing the priests and scribes as hypocrites and murderers. They could not use it to secure His condemnation because the Pharisees and Sadducees were sharply divided over tradition and at swords' points with each other. The Romans were disgusted with the pretensions of the Pharisees and would give such testimony no weight. For the same reason His enemies dared not accuse Him of Sabbath-breaking, lest an examination should reveal the merciful character of His healing work and defeat their own purpose.
Tradition Above God's Law
Full well means deliberately and knowingly: the leaders laid aside and set aside the commandment of God in order to preserve and keep their own tradition. The same rejection occurs whenever religious leaders harden their hearts against the Holy Spirit and refuse to recognize God's voice in order to hold to their own ways. When human tradition takes its place, the truth of God is set aside.
Through the rabbis customs handed down from generation to generation, from rabbi to rabbi, were made all-essential. They were regarded as more sacred than the law itself, of more value and of greater force than the law, even than the Ten Commandments given from Sinai. When tradition collided with those commandments, preference was given to rabbinical precepts. Thus the precepts and teachings of men were dwelt upon as of more value than the words of the living God and a Thus saith the Lord, displacing the reverence due to what God commanded. The immediate case was ceremonial washings before eating, treated as heinous sin if neglected, while numberless purification rules made life one long struggle against defilement and turned attention from the great principles of God's law to trifling distinctions God had not required.
Human rules and rites cannot take the place of God's law. To elevate them above it and place them on its level, so that they can take its place, is to make God's law void and of none effect through human inventions, rules and religious practices. Christ exposed how such traditions obscured the law and made its commandments ineffective, while restoring its true meaning without abolishing any precept. No human power has authority to change that law, which remains binding as long as heaven and earth remain, and keeping tradition does not excuse disobedience. Those who do this while shielding sinners disregard the commandments and promote apostasy, and their weak excuses bring confusion, darkness and destruction to themselves and others.
The leaders distorted Scripture, obscured what God had made plain, and made plain Scripture indistinct. They burdened His commands with needless requirements God had not given, imposed ideas He had not given, and weakened respect for God and the force and power of His word. They mixed human sayings and inventions with heaven's precepts and presented inventions handed down by the rabbis as divine truth. They wove human traditions and maxims of men into the laws of God, so that men were confused about the laws of His government. Their worship was vain because they taught for doctrines the commandments of men, honoring Him with lips while heart was far from Him, treating human rules and outward observances with superstitious reverence while setting aside the prophets' teachings and the principles that produce a holy life and reaching the opposite of what God's plain precepts required. They even put a forced, mystical construction on the oracles of God to condemn their own course.
Those traditions and ceremonies came from human sources, not from God through Moses. They had no command from God, no authority in Scripture, and no divine credentials, yet were treated as binding and exalted above God's word and His precepts. Jesus therefore refused to treat the rabbis' inventions and traditions as sacred. The sects that shaped Jewish belief placed such human rules and ceremonies above the commandments, including handwashing ceremonies and other oral traditions God had not commanded. Attachment to such forms over differences about religious practices and ceremonial details and differences of opinion helped lead them to oppose and kill the Redeemer, while they maintained outward forms to appear devout and important yet showed no mercy to the poor, burdened widows with heavy taxes, and took the people's offerings for themselves.
God requires complete obedience to His commandments, not selective obedience based on human judgment. Those who teach that any part of His law is no longer binding stand condemned as transgressors. No human power has authority to change that law, which remains binding as long as heaven and earth remain, and such traditions that make it void cannot justify disobedience. Keeping tradition does not excuse disobedience, but leads into confusion and darkness.
The people's own ideas, customs, practices and misinterpretations became their idols. They taught the people their own misinterpretations as sacred doctrines and would never give them up, forming a confederacy to stand by the old traditions and setting their human interpretations in defiance of Christ's lessons and the pure truths of practical godliness. Christ sought to give back precious jewels of truth originated by Himself and given to patriarchs, prophets and apostles, replaced in the framework of the gospel in their own divine brightness, but they were obstinate and refused them. The Pharisees gave attention to inherited traditions instead of the precious truths of God's Word, focusing on matters of no importance while matters concerning salvation were left unheeded.
Christ's Rebuke and Restoration
Jesus offered no defense of himself or his disciples against the charge concerning human rites, but turned the charge back by exposing the spirit behind it. He denounced every abomination and hypocrisy, unmasking a sanctity that was only a cloak for iniquity and for self-aggrandizement. He charged the teachers with ignorance both of the Scriptures and of the power of God, for weaving human traditions and maxims of men into the laws of God until men were confused about his government and his word was made of none effect. Their worship was vain because they honored him with the lips while the heart was far from him, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.
He condemned teachers who used tradition to twist the commandments until they reached the opposite of God's plain requirement. They treated human rules and outward observances with superstitious reverence while setting aside the prophets' teachings and the principles that produce a holy life. Leaders who claimed to believe and teach the Word interpreted it to suit preconceived opinions so it would seem to harmonize with the traditions and commandments of men.
He came not to lessen the dignity of the law but to exalt it, for the Jews had perverted it by traditions and misconceptions and made it a yoke of bondage. He restored its true meaning without abolishing any precept, tearing away the error enveloping the commandments and showing the true character of the law of Jehovah. He expounded the law and made its true meaning plain after priests and rulers had misunderstood and misinterpreted it, piling tradition and the imaginations and sayings of men upon it until it was buried beneath rubbish and the common was mingled with the sacred. In the sermon on the mount he showed its far-reaching claims as never heard before, going beyond the technicalities on which the scribes dwelt and presenting its great principles as the first four and the last six commandments.
He met the rejection of God's commandment by preaching the word pure and unadulterated, when religious teachers were instructing children in customs, traditions and fables mingled with their own sayings and opinions with so little of heaven's light that souls were not elevated, ennobled or strengthened. He rescued truth from the rubbish of error, freed it from human exactions and traditions to stand fast forever, and made it shine in its original luster. Crowds followed him giving praise and honor and glory.
He refused the theology of the rabbinical schools, took no notice of their forms and ceremonies, and would not treat inventions without authority in Scripture as sacred. He followed what the Bible taught rather than obeying traditions against it, even though the rabbis were angry at his refusal although they knew their rules were contrary to Scripture. He would not follow requirements that led away from God's will nor give influence to teachings grounded in human authority rather than God, and he would not practice customs that conflicted with Scripture. By encouraging sinners to go directly to God as a merciful Father he set aside the priesthood, and by revealing the true spirit of the rabbis he sought to free all who truly desire to serve God from bondage to tradition. His example shows the importance of guarding the mind against corrupting error instead of letting it take hold and trying to correct it later.
By placing their own requirements above the divine precepts the rabbis set themselves above God. Their apparent zeal was pretense covering desire for self-aggrandizement, deceiving the people and laying heavy burdens God had not imposed. They drowned God's voice by men's commandments, yet the rebuke does not lessen man's obligation to present gifts and offerings to God.
His setting aside of Jewish Sabbath customs did not abolish the Sabbath commandment. Keeping human traditions that displaced God's commandments meant rejecting God's commandment, not honoring it. Works of mercy and necessity were lawful and consistent with Sabbath keeping, and accusations that he broke the Sabbath were false.
That teaching irreparably hurt the leaders' influence and lessened their authority, for by it he exposed their evil practices and declared that though they strictly enforced the ritual law their maxims and traditions made void the law of God. When Satan brought it to their minds at the council after the raising of Lazarus it became a grievance that moved them to resolve to put Jesus to death in order to maintain their power. At the same time they regarded themselves as patriots seeking the nation's salvation.
Papal Apostasy and Prophecy
Keeping human tradition so as to reject God's commandment is what Rome did in forsaking the word of God and the Biblical paths for human tradition. The commandment of God is found in Scripture, which reveals the plan of salvation and sets forth Christ as the only advocate for man, and Rome's elevation of papal authority and religious traditions displaced trust in Him and obedience to God's law and helped produce corruption. Restoring Scripture to the people and reestablishing its authority in the church answers that forsaking.
With the accession of the Roman Church to power in the Dark Ages, faith was transferred from Christ the true foundation to the pope of Rome. People were taught to look to the pope and to the priests and prelates to whom he delegated authority for forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation instead of trusting in the Son of God. They were taught that the pope was their earthly mediator whom none could approach God without, that he stood in the place of God and must be implicitly obeyed, so that deviation from his requirements brought severest punishment on body and soul. Minds were thus turned away from God to fallible, erring, and cruel men, and to the prince of darkness exercising his power through them.
Setting aside the law of God to elevate human laws and traditions always produces corruption. When the Scriptures are suppressed and man regards himself as supreme, sin is disguised in a garb of sanctity, and fraud, deception, and debasing iniquity follow. The exchange means setting down God and His most holy Word and setting up traditions, human councils, and a pope in its place. It replaces Bibles with beads, the light of the gospel with wax tapers burned even at noonday, Christ's cross with purgatory for money, and clothing the naked, the poor, and the helpless with decking images and garnishing stones and stocks, and it is the devil's diligent work, never idle and never out of his diocese, to bring about that exchange.
The monastic system repeats the Pharisees' evil against the fifth commandment, which requires children to love, honor, obey, and not abandon father and mother. By that tradition youths are persuaded to enter a cloister and devote themselves to a monastic life without the knowledge or consent of their parents and contrary to their commands. They are even taught that though father should lie weeping before the door and mother show the body that bore them they must trample them underfoot to go onward. Like the Pharisees of old, papal leaders by this steel the hearts of children against their parents, make homes desolate, and deprive parents of the society of their sons and daughters.
Treating customs and ceremonies not commanded in Scripture as acceptable additions to worship gives human authority a place alongside God's word. This pattern marks the beginning of apostasy, which can progress from enjoining what God has not forbidden to forbidding what He has commanded. The same spirit of venerating human traditions above the commands of God and conforming to worldly customs is permeating the Protestant churches and leading them to follow in the steps of papists by seeking the support of the State for the institutions and usages of the church. In the time of the end thrones and churches unite to oppose God's purposes by putting human laws in the place of the law of God, setting aside God's law and exchanging the Scriptures for the traditions of men, and this is the reign of Antichrist with Satan as ruler of the world. The same conflict appears whenever men make human laws that oppose God's commands and exalt human authority above the divine law. This rejection of God's commandment in order to keep human traditions was in the papists who opposed Luther and is in those in the present day who accept human theories and traditions in place of God's word.
Sabbath Versus Sunday Tradition
A just God has given no commandment which cannot be consistently kept by all, and His laws sanction no meaningless usages nor clumsy restrictions. The Jews had perverted the law by traditions and misconceptions and made it a yoke of bondage, with meaningless exactions and requirements that became a by-word among other nations, and Jesus came to exalt the law, not to lessen its dignity. Especially the Sabbath was hedged in by senseless restrictions that made that holy day almost unendurable, such as not allowing a Jew to kindle a fire or even to light a candle, so that narrow views made the people slaves to their own useless regulations and dependent on Gentiles to do services their rules forbade. They did not reflect that if these necessary duties of life were sins they were as guilty in employing others to perform them as in doing them themselves, while thinking salvation was restricted to the Jews and the condition of all others hopeless. As the Jews set aside the fifth commandment, modern religion sets aside the sanctity of the fourth precept of the Decalogue while eagerly grasping traditions and enforcing them on the people. God did not give the Jews their multitudinous traditions and ceremonies nor require them to spend sacred time on profitless acts while disregarding His commands, and He has not commanded men to observe the first day of the week. The religious world largely follows the Jews by teaching for doctrine the commandments of men and making God's Word void through tradition, by upholding Sunday, a day without divine credentials, clothing the false sabbath with sanctity and compelling its observance by imprisonment and fines, until under the enemy's training their zeal grows till like the Jews they think they do God service by heaping reproach on those who keep His commandments.
Replacing God's seventh-day Sabbath with a common working day and its ceremonies exalts human tradition above God's command and treats what is sacred as common. The observance of the first day of the week by most professed Christians, which has no authority in the precepts or in the example of Christ or His followers, is an instance of setting aside the commandment of God to keep human tradition, and this turning from God's commandments to the veneration and obedience of the traditions of the world is Satan's constant work. Rejecting the light in regard to the Sabbath and trampling upon God's holy day, while exalting a spurious sabbath that has no other foundation than the authority of the Roman church, brings accountability when men have the plain teachings of His Word but disregard them to accept the sayings and customs of men. With the Bible open before them ministers and people show contempt for God's holy precepts, and Protestant churches having received doctrines which the Word of God condemns will bring them to the front and force them upon the consciences of men, just as papal authorities urged their dogmas upon the advocates of truth in Luther's time. The claims of the spurious sabbath enforced upon the world are the same battle fought again where every soul must decide which side of the controversy to stand on. Papal and Protestant churches follow worldly customs and human authority instead of Scripture by the elevation of Sunday above the biblical Sabbath, honoring Sunday tradition while opposing the Sabbath and demanding that the Sabbath be profaned, which puts human rules against God's commandment. Those who defend the Sabbath therefore face opposition and coercion.
Sunday observance is a custom which originated with Rome and which she claims as the sign of her authority, set against the Sabbath and its defenders. That spirit of veneration for human traditions above the commands of God and conformity to worldly customs is permeating the Protestant churches and leading them to follow in the steps of papists by seeking the support of the State for the institutions and usages of the church, with the enforcement of Sunday observance as its principal object. Protestants urging it are doing the same work of Sunday exaltation which the papacy has done before them, opening the door for popery to regain in Protestant America the supremacy she has lost in the Old World. The soon-coming contest over it will show how papists and Protestants united deal with those who reject their dogmas. Setting aside the commandments of God for the precepts of men can never be justified, even when a human requirement is joined to a work that is good in itself and to needed reforms and principles in harmony with the Bible, for the good does not change the nature of the error. Mixing just enough truth with falsehood to give it plausibility only makes the error more dangerous, like poison disguised in wholesome food, and is one of Satan's devices. Therefore God's servants cannot unite with the movement to enforce Sunday observance, because while it claims to improve morals and joins itself to temperance and reform, it requires what is contrary to God's law.
Choosing to obey the word of God in preference to the traditions of men requires keeping the fourth commandment by resting on Saturday, teaching and working only five days in the week, even when called obstinate, seized and imprisoned with no crime charged except obedience itself. Rejecting God's command in order to preserve human tradition was the practice of religious leaders in Christ's time, and the same disregard for God's law — ignoring, despising, and declaring it no longer binding — is present in the religious world near the close of earth's history. Christ reproved the priests, rulers and teachers for making void the law of God by their traditions and teaching for doctrines the commandments of men, putting a forced, mystical construction upon the oracles of God because those truths condemned their own course, putting the Word of God to the torture to advance apostasy to His law. Teachers turn the people from the law of God to observe and exalt tradition, and drown the voice of God by the commandments of men, and the same work done then was done in 1898.
Faithful Obedience Today
Even when Christ was on earth with only few followers, His own disciples were constantly held back from advancing, supplying their lack of knowledge, and becoming efficient workers by the customs and maxims of the scribes and Pharisees. Those customs and traditions handed down from generation to generation through the rabbis had been made all-essential and were regarded as of greater force and more value than even the Ten Commandments, so that the precepts and teachings of men were taught and dwelt upon as of more value than a Thus saith the Lord and the words of the living God. Putting human tradition above the commandment of God in this way hinders spiritual education through misconception of what is most essential to be done. Schools must therefore not pattern after any already established school but study the Word of God critically as the great Lessonbook and receive and do it, staying watchful and guarded lest the same hindrance enter spiritual education.
Rejecting the commandment of God to keep human tradition is repeated when those who profess to believe and receive the living oracles give the word of God an inferior place to human inventions. It is drifting into worldly plans, methods, and customs with no thought of the time lived in or the great work to be done, as in Noah's day, and following the Jews in conforming to customs, practices, and traditions God has not given, which is breaking His commandment. It is clinging with tenacity to old habits and love of studies and books that are not essential, as if salvation depended on them, turning away from God's special work and the special light He has given in His Word, and giving a deficient and wrong education. Such institutions travel over the same ground as the Jews and suppose better facilities, skill, and newer methods will set things right, yet their education cannot cure the disorder of society or transform it. It is turning minds from a plain Thus saith the Lord involving eternal interests to human theories and teachings, and explaining infinite, eternal truth, the revelation of God, by human interpretation, when only the power of the Holy Spirit can unfold spiritual things, for human wisdom that does this is foolishness because it misses God's providences which look into eternity.
The same comparison applies to medical theories and maxims likened to the traditions of the scribes and Pharisees, for keeping human tradition does not excuse rejecting God's command. Much of such learning is worthless, unnecessary or harmful and can injure the mind, and valuing it as authoritative resembles Pharisaism rather than Scripture truth. To mingle human spirit and ideas with truth and to cover up the precepts of God by traditions, suppositions, and personal devisings is to reject the commandment of God to keep human tradition. Those who teach must not mix self into their presentation but must give the people the truth as it is in Jesus, pure and unmixed, for if truth is mixed with self it will taste so strongly of self that it will disgust the hearers. Those waiting for Christ must give up errors and traditions received from men and turn wholly to God and His word, because Jesus cannot yet come to earth, and they must endure greater trials for His sake and be purified, made white, and tried, and those who endure that bitter trial will obtain an eternal victory.
The people of Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum, and Jerusalem trusted what the priests, Pharisees, and rulers taught instead of searching the Scriptures for themselves, comparing scripture with scripture, and using the reason and judgment God gave them to understand its true meaning. By placing priests and rulers where God should be they rejected the truth and commandment of God and rejected the Lord of life and glory, for leaders who claimed to believe and teach the Word interpreted it to suit their own preconceived opinions so it would seem to harmonize with the traditions and commandments of men. This gives warning not to commit the same error of interpreting the Word to suit preconceived opinions. Christ denounced the teachers in His day for making void the law of God and stamped them as deceivers, and unity can be expected only on the ground of obedience to the commandments of God, which reveals the character of His church as obedient and requires voicing no other message than that which combines the first, second, and third angels' messages, which require obedience to God's law.
Strict observance of religious forms without openness to God's Spirit gives no spiritual vitality or devotion when human traditions and commandments are followed instead. Religious sects that shaped Jewish belief placed human rules and ceremonies above God's commandments even though those traditions had no command from God, treating handwashing ceremonies and other oral traditions as binding and exalting human inventions above God's precepts. Their attachment to such forms led them to oppose and kill the Redeemer over ceremonial details and differences of opinion about religious practices. In Christ's day this rejection helped lead them to reject the Son of God, and the same danger arises when human command is given sacred honor while God's Sabbath, the memorial of creation given in Eden, is dishonored to turn others from obedience and loyalty to God. Choosing human traditions over God's commandments makes His law void, and those who do this while shielding sinners disregard His commandments and promote apostasy, with weak excuses bringing destruction to themselves and others, for rejection of God's law leads to oppression and suffering while eternal realities are treated as worthless.
In the days of Christ religious teachers instructed children in customs, traditions, and fables mingled with their own sayings and opinions, giving so little of heaven's light that their teaching did not elevate, ennoble, and strengthen the soul. Christ met this rejection of God's commandment by preaching the word pure and unadulterated, rescuing truth from the rubbish of error, freeing it from human exactions and traditions to stand fast forever, and making it shine in its original luster, so that crowds followed Him giving praise and honor and glory. He rejected traditions and customs when they conflicted with God's commandments and word, would not follow requirements that led away from God's will or give influence to teachings grounded in human authority rather than God. His example shows the importance of guarding the mind against corrupting error instead of letting it take hold and trying to correct it later.
Jesus charged the religious leaders with deliberately laying aside the commandment of God in order to preserve and keep their own tradition. He spoke it when scribes and Pharisees accused His disciples over unwashen hands and washings of cups and vessels, while they themselves set aside the fifth commandment by Corban, letting a man withhold help from father or mother under pretended devotion to the temple. Their traditions handed down from rabbi to rabbi were treated as more sacred and binding than the law itself, even than the Ten Commandments, and by elevating human rules to its level they made God's law void and of none effect. He made no defense but exposed their hypocrisy, tore away the error enveloping the law, restored its true meaning and exalted it in its great principles beyond their technicalities. The same rejection is repeated when Rome and modern religion forsake God's word for human tradition, especially in setting aside the sanctity of the fourth precept while exalting Sunday observance which has no authority in the precepts or example of Christ.
Historical Setting and Occasion
The saying was spoken when scribes and Pharisees came to watch Jesus and to accuse Him because His disciples ate with unwashen hands and did not keep the washings of cups, pots, vessels and tables. It charges them with deliberately laying aside the commandment of God in order to preserve their own tradition, giving as an example what they repeatedly did in setting aside the fifth commandment as of no consequence while being very exact in carrying out the traditions of the elders. Sayings handed down from rabbi to rabbi were treated as more sacred than the law itself, so that when tradition collided with the commandments given from Sinai preference was given to rabbinical precepts. Their worship was therefore empty, because they taught human commands as doctrine and regarded their own traditions as more important than keeping the commandments of God.
The immediate case was Corban, by which an undutiful child could withhold help from father or mother by pronouncing his means a gift devoted to the temple. He had only to pronounce Corban over his property to devote it to God, keeping it for his own use during life with it passing to temple service after death, and was then suffered to do nothing more for them. In this way the fifth commandment was treated as of no consequence while the traditions of the elders were strictly enforced, nullifying the plain requirements of God under cover of pretended devotion to God. The apparent zeal of priests and rabbis was pretense covering desire for self-aggrandizement, deceiving the people and laying heavy burdens God had not imposed, yet the rebuke does not lessen man's obligation to present gifts and offerings to God.
Their traditional precepts encumbered the law of God under professed design of guarding its observance, while numberless rules about purification made life one long struggle against defilement. They burdened His commands with needless requirements God had not given, distorted Scripture, obscured what He had made plain, and made plain Scripture indistinct by imposing ideas God had not given. This turned attention away from the great principles of God's law to trifling distinctions God had not required, weakening respect for God and the force and power of His word.
Especially the Sabbath was hedged in by senseless restrictions that made that holy day almost unendurable. A Jew was not allowed to kindle a fire or even to light a candle on that day, so that narrow views made the people slaves to their own useless regulations. Their meaningless exactions and requirements had become a by-word among other nations, and they became dependent on Gentiles to do services their rules forbade them to do for themselves. They did not reflect that if these necessary duties of life were sins they were as guilty in employing others to perform them as in doing them themselves.
About the time of John's birth faith was clouded by departure from God, and many of the leaders brought in their own traditions and enforced them upon the people as the commandments of God. Those traditions and needless ceremonies confused faith and filled minds with ignorance and bigotry, so that God could not manifest His glory and power through a corrupt priesthood. Pious Jews who were looking, believing, and earnestly praying for the Messiah trusted that God would not leave His people as a reproach to the heathen, and expected that when Messiah came He would give a clear revelation of the divine will and free their doctrines from tradition. The leaders maintained outward religious forms to appear devout and important, yet showed no mercy to the poor, burdened widows with heavy taxes, and took the people's offerings for themselves, for the traditions and ceremonies imposed came from human sources, not from God through Moses.
At His trial before Caiaphas His enemies had abundant evidence that He disregarded the traditions of the Jews and spoke irreverently of many of their ordinances, denouncing the priests and scribes as hypocrites and murderers. They could not use it to secure His condemnation because the Pharisees and Sadducees were sharply divided over tradition and at swords' points with each other. The Romans were disgusted with the pretensions of the Pharisees and would give such testimony no weight. For the same reason His enemies dared not accuse Him of Sabbath-breaking, lest an examination should reveal the merciful character of His healing work and defeat their own purpose.
Tradition Above God's Law
Full well means deliberately and knowingly: the leaders laid aside and set aside the commandment of God in order to preserve and keep their own tradition. The same rejection occurs whenever religious leaders harden their hearts against the Holy Spirit and refuse to recognize God's voice in order to hold to their own ways. When human tradition takes its place, the truth of God is set aside.
Through the rabbis customs handed down from generation to generation, from rabbi to rabbi, were made all-essential. They were regarded as more sacred than the law itself, of more value and of greater force than the law, even than the Ten Commandments given from Sinai. When tradition collided with those commandments, preference was given to rabbinical precepts. Thus the precepts and teachings of men were dwelt upon as of more value than the words of the living God and a Thus saith the Lord, displacing the reverence due to what God commanded. The immediate case was ceremonial washings before eating, treated as heinous sin if neglected, while numberless purification rules made life one long struggle against defilement and turned attention from the great principles of God's law to trifling distinctions God had not required.
Human rules and rites cannot take the place of God's law. To elevate them above it and place them on its level, so that they can take its place, is to make God's law void and of none effect through human inventions, rules and religious practices. Christ exposed how such traditions obscured the law and made its commandments ineffective, while restoring its true meaning without abolishing any precept. No human power has authority to change that law, which remains binding as long as heaven and earth remain, and keeping tradition does not excuse disobedience. Those who do this while shielding sinners disregard the commandments and promote apostasy, and their weak excuses bring confusion, darkness and destruction to themselves and others.
The leaders distorted Scripture, obscured what God had made plain, and made plain Scripture indistinct. They burdened His commands with needless requirements God had not given, imposed ideas He had not given, and weakened respect for God and the force and power of His word. They mixed human sayings and inventions with heaven's precepts and presented inventions handed down by the rabbis as divine truth. They wove human traditions and maxims of men into the laws of God, so that men were confused about the laws of His government. Their worship was vain because they taught for doctrines the commandments of men, honoring Him with lips while heart was far from Him, treating human rules and outward observances with superstitious reverence while setting aside the prophets' teachings and the principles that produce a holy life and reaching the opposite of what God's plain precepts required. They even put a forced, mystical construction on the oracles of God to condemn their own course.
Those traditions and ceremonies came from human sources, not from God through Moses. They had no command from God, no authority in Scripture, and no divine credentials, yet were treated as binding and exalted above God's word and His precepts. Jesus therefore refused to treat the rabbis' inventions and traditions as sacred. The sects that shaped Jewish belief placed such human rules and ceremonies above the commandments, including handwashing ceremonies and other oral traditions God had not commanded. Attachment to such forms over differences about religious practices and ceremonial details and differences of opinion helped lead them to oppose and kill the Redeemer, while they maintained outward forms to appear devout and important yet showed no mercy to the poor, burdened widows with heavy taxes, and took the people's offerings for themselves.
God requires complete obedience to His commandments, not selective obedience based on human judgment. Those who teach that any part of His law is no longer binding stand condemned as transgressors. No human power has authority to change that law, which remains binding as long as heaven and earth remain, and such traditions that make it void cannot justify disobedience. Keeping tradition does not excuse disobedience, but leads into confusion and darkness.
The people's own ideas, customs, practices and misinterpretations became their idols. They taught the people their own misinterpretations as sacred doctrines and would never give them up, forming a confederacy to stand by the old traditions and setting their human interpretations in defiance of Christ's lessons and the pure truths of practical godliness. Christ sought to give back precious jewels of truth originated by Himself and given to patriarchs, prophets and apostles, replaced in the framework of the gospel in their own divine brightness, but they were obstinate and refused them. The Pharisees gave attention to inherited traditions instead of the precious truths of God's Word, focusing on matters of no importance while matters concerning salvation were left unheeded.
Christ's Rebuke and Restoration
Jesus offered no defense of himself or his disciples against the charge concerning human rites, but turned the charge back by exposing the spirit behind it. He denounced every abomination and hypocrisy, unmasking a sanctity that was only a cloak for iniquity and for self-aggrandizement. He charged the teachers with ignorance both of the Scriptures and of the power of God, for weaving human traditions and maxims of men into the laws of God until men were confused about his government and his word was made of none effect. Their worship was vain because they honored him with the lips while the heart was far from him, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.
He condemned teachers who used tradition to twist the commandments until they reached the opposite of God's plain requirement. They treated human rules and outward observances with superstitious reverence while setting aside the prophets' teachings and the principles that produce a holy life. Leaders who claimed to believe and teach the Word interpreted it to suit preconceived opinions so it would seem to harmonize with the traditions and commandments of men.
He came not to lessen the dignity of the law but to exalt it, for the Jews had perverted it by traditions and misconceptions and made it a yoke of bondage. He restored its true meaning without abolishing any precept, tearing away the error enveloping the commandments and showing the true character of the law of Jehovah. He expounded the law and made its true meaning plain after priests and rulers had misunderstood and misinterpreted it, piling tradition and the imaginations and sayings of men upon it until it was buried beneath rubbish and the common was mingled with the sacred. In the sermon on the mount he showed its far-reaching claims as never heard before, going beyond the technicalities on which the scribes dwelt and presenting its great principles as the first four and the last six commandments.
He met the rejection of God's commandment by preaching the word pure and unadulterated, when religious teachers were instructing children in customs, traditions and fables mingled with their own sayings and opinions with so little of heaven's light that souls were not elevated, ennobled or strengthened. He rescued truth from the rubbish of error, freed it from human exactions and traditions to stand fast forever, and made it shine in its original luster. Crowds followed him giving praise and honor and glory.
He refused the theology of the rabbinical schools, took no notice of their forms and ceremonies, and would not treat inventions without authority in Scripture as sacred. He followed what the Bible taught rather than obeying traditions against it, even though the rabbis were angry at his refusal although they knew their rules were contrary to Scripture. He would not follow requirements that led away from God's will nor give influence to teachings grounded in human authority rather than God, and he would not practice customs that conflicted with Scripture. By encouraging sinners to go directly to God as a merciful Father he set aside the priesthood, and by revealing the true spirit of the rabbis he sought to free all who truly desire to serve God from bondage to tradition. His example shows the importance of guarding the mind against corrupting error instead of letting it take hold and trying to correct it later.
By placing their own requirements above the divine precepts the rabbis set themselves above God. Their apparent zeal was pretense covering desire for self-aggrandizement, deceiving the people and laying heavy burdens God had not imposed. They drowned God's voice by men's commandments, yet the rebuke does not lessen man's obligation to present gifts and offerings to God.
His setting aside of Jewish Sabbath customs did not abolish the Sabbath commandment. Keeping human traditions that displaced God's commandments meant rejecting God's commandment, not honoring it. Works of mercy and necessity were lawful and consistent with Sabbath keeping, and accusations that he broke the Sabbath were false.
That teaching irreparably hurt the leaders' influence and lessened their authority, for by it he exposed their evil practices and declared that though they strictly enforced the ritual law their maxims and traditions made void the law of God. When Satan brought it to their minds at the council after the raising of Lazarus it became a grievance that moved them to resolve to put Jesus to death in order to maintain their power. At the same time they regarded themselves as patriots seeking the nation's salvation.
Papal Apostasy and Prophecy
Keeping human tradition so as to reject God's commandment is what Rome did in forsaking the word of God and the Biblical paths for human tradition. The commandment of God is found in Scripture, which reveals the plan of salvation and sets forth Christ as the only advocate for man, and Rome's elevation of papal authority and religious traditions displaced trust in Him and obedience to God's law and helped produce corruption. Restoring Scripture to the people and reestablishing its authority in the church answers that forsaking.
With the accession of the Roman Church to power in the Dark Ages, faith was transferred from Christ the true foundation to the pope of Rome. People were taught to look to the pope and to the priests and prelates to whom he delegated authority for forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation instead of trusting in the Son of God. They were taught that the pope was their earthly mediator whom none could approach God without, that he stood in the place of God and must be implicitly obeyed, so that deviation from his requirements brought severest punishment on body and soul. Minds were thus turned away from God to fallible, erring, and cruel men, and to the prince of darkness exercising his power through them.
Setting aside the law of God to elevate human laws and traditions always produces corruption. When the Scriptures are suppressed and man regards himself as supreme, sin is disguised in a garb of sanctity, and fraud, deception, and debasing iniquity follow. The exchange means setting down God and His most holy Word and setting up traditions, human councils, and a pope in its place. It replaces Bibles with beads, the light of the gospel with wax tapers burned even at noonday, Christ's cross with purgatory for money, and clothing the naked, the poor, and the helpless with decking images and garnishing stones and stocks, and it is the devil's diligent work, never idle and never out of his diocese, to bring about that exchange.
The monastic system repeats the Pharisees' evil against the fifth commandment, which requires children to love, honor, obey, and not abandon father and mother. By that tradition youths are persuaded to enter a cloister and devote themselves to a monastic life without the knowledge or consent of their parents and contrary to their commands. They are even taught that though father should lie weeping before the door and mother show the body that bore them they must trample them underfoot to go onward. Like the Pharisees of old, papal leaders by this steel the hearts of children against their parents, make homes desolate, and deprive parents of the society of their sons and daughters.
Treating customs and ceremonies not commanded in Scripture as acceptable additions to worship gives human authority a place alongside God's word. This pattern marks the beginning of apostasy, which can progress from enjoining what God has not forbidden to forbidding what He has commanded. The same spirit of venerating human traditions above the commands of God and conforming to worldly customs is permeating the Protestant churches and leading them to follow in the steps of papists by seeking the support of the State for the institutions and usages of the church. In the time of the end thrones and churches unite to oppose God's purposes by putting human laws in the place of the law of God, setting aside God's law and exchanging the Scriptures for the traditions of men, and this is the reign of Antichrist with Satan as ruler of the world. The same conflict appears whenever men make human laws that oppose God's commands and exalt human authority above the divine law. This rejection of God's commandment in order to keep human traditions was in the papists who opposed Luther and is in those in the present day who accept human theories and traditions in place of God's word.
Sabbath Versus Sunday Tradition
A just God has given no commandment which cannot be consistently kept by all, and His laws sanction no meaningless usages nor clumsy restrictions. The Jews had perverted the law by traditions and misconceptions and made it a yoke of bondage, with meaningless exactions and requirements that became a by-word among other nations, and Jesus came to exalt the law, not to lessen its dignity. Especially the Sabbath was hedged in by senseless restrictions that made that holy day almost unendurable, such as not allowing a Jew to kindle a fire or even to light a candle, so that narrow views made the people slaves to their own useless regulations and dependent on Gentiles to do services their rules forbade. They did not reflect that if these necessary duties of life were sins they were as guilty in employing others to perform them as in doing them themselves, while thinking salvation was restricted to the Jews and the condition of all others hopeless. As the Jews set aside the fifth commandment, modern religion sets aside the sanctity of the fourth precept of the Decalogue while eagerly grasping traditions and enforcing them on the people. God did not give the Jews their multitudinous traditions and ceremonies nor require them to spend sacred time on profitless acts while disregarding His commands, and He has not commanded men to observe the first day of the week. The religious world largely follows the Jews by teaching for doctrine the commandments of men and making God's Word void through tradition, by upholding Sunday, a day without divine credentials, clothing the false sabbath with sanctity and compelling its observance by imprisonment and fines, until under the enemy's training their zeal grows till like the Jews they think they do God service by heaping reproach on those who keep His commandments.
Replacing God's seventh-day Sabbath with a common working day and its ceremonies exalts human tradition above God's command and treats what is sacred as common. The observance of the first day of the week by most professed Christians, which has no authority in the precepts or in the example of Christ or His followers, is an instance of setting aside the commandment of God to keep human tradition, and this turning from God's commandments to the veneration and obedience of the traditions of the world is Satan's constant work. Rejecting the light in regard to the Sabbath and trampling upon God's holy day, while exalting a spurious sabbath that has no other foundation than the authority of the Roman church, brings accountability when men have the plain teachings of His Word but disregard them to accept the sayings and customs of men. With the Bible open before them ministers and people show contempt for God's holy precepts, and Protestant churches having received doctrines which the Word of God condemns will bring them to the front and force them upon the consciences of men, just as papal authorities urged their dogmas upon the advocates of truth in Luther's time. The claims of the spurious sabbath enforced upon the world are the same battle fought again where every soul must decide which side of the controversy to stand on. Papal and Protestant churches follow worldly customs and human authority instead of Scripture by the elevation of Sunday above the biblical Sabbath, honoring Sunday tradition while opposing the Sabbath and demanding that the Sabbath be profaned, which puts human rules against God's commandment. Those who defend the Sabbath therefore face opposition and coercion.
Sunday observance is a custom which originated with Rome and which she claims as the sign of her authority, set against the Sabbath and its defenders. That spirit of veneration for human traditions above the commands of God and conformity to worldly customs is permeating the Protestant churches and leading them to follow in the steps of papists by seeking the support of the State for the institutions and usages of the church, with the enforcement of Sunday observance as its principal object. Protestants urging it are doing the same work of Sunday exaltation which the papacy has done before them, opening the door for popery to regain in Protestant America the supremacy she has lost in the Old World. The soon-coming contest over it will show how papists and Protestants united deal with those who reject their dogmas. Setting aside the commandments of God for the precepts of men can never be justified, even when a human requirement is joined to a work that is good in itself and to needed reforms and principles in harmony with the Bible, for the good does not change the nature of the error. Mixing just enough truth with falsehood to give it plausibility only makes the error more dangerous, like poison disguised in wholesome food, and is one of Satan's devices. Therefore God's servants cannot unite with the movement to enforce Sunday observance, because while it claims to improve morals and joins itself to temperance and reform, it requires what is contrary to God's law.
Choosing to obey the word of God in preference to the traditions of men requires keeping the fourth commandment by resting on Saturday, teaching and working only five days in the week, even when called obstinate, seized and imprisoned with no crime charged except obedience itself. Rejecting God's command in order to preserve human tradition was the practice of religious leaders in Christ's time, and the same disregard for God's law — ignoring, despising, and declaring it no longer binding — is present in the religious world near the close of earth's history. Christ reproved the priests, rulers and teachers for making void the law of God by their traditions and teaching for doctrines the commandments of men, putting a forced, mystical construction upon the oracles of God because those truths condemned their own course, putting the Word of God to the torture to advance apostasy to His law. Teachers turn the people from the law of God to observe and exalt tradition, and drown the voice of God by the commandments of men, and the same work done then was done in 1898.
Faithful Obedience Today
Even when Christ was on earth with only few followers, His own disciples were constantly held back from advancing, supplying their lack of knowledge, and becoming efficient workers by the customs and maxims of the scribes and Pharisees. Those customs and traditions handed down from generation to generation through the rabbis had been made all-essential and were regarded as of greater force and more value than even the Ten Commandments, so that the precepts and teachings of men were taught and dwelt upon as of more value than a Thus saith the Lord and the words of the living God. Putting human tradition above the commandment of God in this way hinders spiritual education through misconception of what is most essential to be done. Schools must therefore not pattern after any already established school but study the Word of God critically as the great Lessonbook and receive and do it, staying watchful and guarded lest the same hindrance enter spiritual education.
Rejecting the commandment of God to keep human tradition is repeated when those who profess to believe and receive the living oracles give the word of God an inferior place to human inventions. It is drifting into worldly plans, methods, and customs with no thought of the time lived in or the great work to be done, as in Noah's day, and following the Jews in conforming to customs, practices, and traditions God has not given, which is breaking His commandment. It is clinging with tenacity to old habits and love of studies and books that are not essential, as if salvation depended on them, turning away from God's special work and the special light He has given in His Word, and giving a deficient and wrong education. Such institutions travel over the same ground as the Jews and suppose better facilities, skill, and newer methods will set things right, yet their education cannot cure the disorder of society or transform it. It is turning minds from a plain Thus saith the Lord involving eternal interests to human theories and teachings, and explaining infinite, eternal truth, the revelation of God, by human interpretation, when only the power of the Holy Spirit can unfold spiritual things, for human wisdom that does this is foolishness because it misses God's providences which look into eternity.
The same comparison applies to medical theories and maxims likened to the traditions of the scribes and Pharisees, for keeping human tradition does not excuse rejecting God's command. Much of such learning is worthless, unnecessary or harmful and can injure the mind, and valuing it as authoritative resembles Pharisaism rather than Scripture truth. To mingle human spirit and ideas with truth and to cover up the precepts of God by traditions, suppositions, and personal devisings is to reject the commandment of God to keep human tradition. Those who teach must not mix self into their presentation but must give the people the truth as it is in Jesus, pure and unmixed, for if truth is mixed with self it will taste so strongly of self that it will disgust the hearers. Those waiting for Christ must give up errors and traditions received from men and turn wholly to God and His word, because Jesus cannot yet come to earth, and they must endure greater trials for His sake and be purified, made white, and tried, and those who endure that bitter trial will obtain an eternal victory.
The people of Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum, and Jerusalem trusted what the priests, Pharisees, and rulers taught instead of searching the Scriptures for themselves, comparing scripture with scripture, and using the reason and judgment God gave them to understand its true meaning. By placing priests and rulers where God should be they rejected the truth and commandment of God and rejected the Lord of life and glory, for leaders who claimed to believe and teach the Word interpreted it to suit their own preconceived opinions so it would seem to harmonize with the traditions and commandments of men. This gives warning not to commit the same error of interpreting the Word to suit preconceived opinions. Christ denounced the teachers in His day for making void the law of God and stamped them as deceivers, and unity can be expected only on the ground of obedience to the commandments of God, which reveals the character of His church as obedient and requires voicing no other message than that which combines the first, second, and third angels' messages, which require obedience to God's law.
Strict observance of religious forms without openness to God's Spirit gives no spiritual vitality or devotion when human traditions and commandments are followed instead. Religious sects that shaped Jewish belief placed human rules and ceremonies above God's commandments even though those traditions had no command from God, treating handwashing ceremonies and other oral traditions as binding and exalting human inventions above God's precepts. Their attachment to such forms led them to oppose and kill the Redeemer over ceremonial details and differences of opinion about religious practices. In Christ's day this rejection helped lead them to reject the Son of God, and the same danger arises when human command is given sacred honor while God's Sabbath, the memorial of creation given in Eden, is dishonored to turn others from obedience and loyalty to God. Choosing human traditions over God's commandments makes His law void, and those who do this while shielding sinners disregard His commandments and promote apostasy, with weak excuses bringing destruction to themselves and others, for rejection of God's law leads to oppression and suffering while eternal realities are treated as worthless.
In the days of Christ religious teachers instructed children in customs, traditions, and fables mingled with their own sayings and opinions, giving so little of heaven's light that their teaching did not elevate, ennoble, and strengthen the soul. Christ met this rejection of God's commandment by preaching the word pure and unadulterated, rescuing truth from the rubbish of error, freeing it from human exactions and traditions to stand fast forever, and making it shine in its original luster, so that crowds followed Him giving praise and honor and glory. He rejected traditions and customs when they conflicted with God's commandments and word, would not follow requirements that led away from God's will or give influence to teachings grounded in human authority rather than God. His example shows the importance of guarding the mind against corrupting error instead of letting it take hold and trying to correct it later.