Now you Pharisees make the outside of the cup and dish clean, but your inward part is full of greed and wickedness

 

 And as He spoke, a certain Pharisee asked Him to dine with him.  So He went in and sat down to eat.  When the Pharisee saw it, he marveled that He had not first washed before dinner.  Then the Lord said to him, "Now you Pharisees make the outside of the cup and dish clean, but your inward part is full of greed and wickedness.  Foolish ones!  Did not He who made the outside make the inside also?  But rather give alms of such things as you have; then indeed all things are clean to you.  

 

"But woe to you Pharisees!  For you tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass by justice and the love of God.  These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.  Woe to you Pharisees!  For you love the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like graves which are not seen, and the men who walk over them are not aware of them."  

Then one of the lawyers answered and said to Him, "Teacher, by saying these things You reproach us also."  And He said, "Woe to you also, lawyers!  For you load men with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers.  Woe to you!  For you build the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers killed them.  In fact, you bear witness that you approve the deeds of your fathers; for they indeed killed them, and you build their tombs.  Therefore the wisdom of God also said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and persecute,' that the blood of all the prophets which was shed from the foundation of the world may be required of this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah who perished between the altar and the temple.  Yes, I say to you, it shall be required of this generation.  Woe to you lawyers!  For you have taken away the key of knowledge.  You did not enter in yourselves, and those who were entering in you hindered."

 

- Luke 11:37-52 

 

 Yesterday we read that as Jesus preached, a certain woman from the crowd raised her voice and said to Him, "Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breasts which nursed You!"  But He said, "More than that, blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!"  And while the crowds were thickly gathered together, He began to say, "This is an evil generation.  It seeks a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet.  For as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so also the Son of Man will be to this generation.  The queen of the South will rise up with the men of this generation and condemn them, for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and indeed a greater than Solomon is here.  The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and indeed a greater than Jonah is here.  No one, when he has lit a lamp, puts it under a basket, but on a lampstand, that those who come in may see the light.  The lamp of the body is the eye.  Therefore, when your eye is good, your whole body also is full of light.  But when your eye is bad, your body also is full of darkness.  Therefore take heed that the light which is in you is not darkness.  If then your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, the whole body will be full of light, as when the bright shining of a lamp gives you light."

 

 And as He spoke, a certain Pharisee asked Him to dine with him.  So He went in and sat down to eat.  When the Pharisee saw it, he marveled that He had not first washed before dinner.  Then the Lord said to him, "Now you Pharisees make the outside of the cup and dish clean, but your inward part is full of greed and wickedness.  Foolish ones!  Did not He who made the outside make the inside also?  But rather give alms of such things as you have; then indeed all things are clean to you."   Jesus speaks of the importance of the inner life.  "Cleansing" is therefore related to an inner spiritual reality, and not simply an external focus.  We can see the relationship between His preaching to followers in yesterday's reading (above) and what He is saying to the Pharisees regarding alms and the inner life, which reflects His teachings on treasure of the heart and almsgiving in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6:19-21).  St. Paul writes that to those who are clean, nothing is unclean (Romans 14:14). 

"But woe to you Pharisees!  For you tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass by justice and the love of God.  These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.  Woe to you Pharisees!  For you love the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces.  Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!  For you are like graves which are not seen, and the men who walk over them are not aware of them."   Woe is a term which indicates complete and devastating destruction, my study bible explains (6:24-26; see Isaiah 5:18-24, Amos 5:18-19, Revelation 12:12).  It  comments that because the example of a leader can be so influential, leaders who do not love God can hinder others from finding God as well, and so leaders are held to a higher standard (James 3:1).  Therefore to be hypocrites is to fail as religious leaders.  Moreover, my study bible adds, these warnings are especially important to those Christians who come from traditions which have maintained ancient practices such as tithing ("These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone"), sacred vessels, holy rites, and following patristic tradition.  These practices, it says, can be expressions of deep faith, lead a person to deeper commitment to God, and safeguard our life in Christ -- or they can be observed without ever taking them to heart, and lead to condemnation.

Then one of the lawyers answered and said to Him, "Teacher, by saying these things You reproach us also."  And He said, "Woe to you also, lawyers!  For you load men with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers.  Woe to you!  For you build the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers killed them.  In fact, you bear witness that you approve the deeds of your fathers; for they indeed killed them, and you build their tombs.  Therefore the wisdom of God also said, 'I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and persecute,' that the blood of all the prophets which was shed from the foundation of the world may be required of this generation, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah who perished between the altar and the temple.  Yes, I say to you, it shall be required of this generation.  Woe to you lawyers!  For you have taken away the key of knowledge.  You did not enter in yourselves, and those who were entering in you hindered."  On the prophet Zechariah, there are some patristic teachings that this was the prophet at the time of Joash the king (2 Chronicles 24:20-22), while others say that this refers to the father of St. John the Baptist.  According to tradition, he was also murdered in the temple.

Let us note that Jesus' teachings here of woe to the Pharisees and lawyers are similar to His warnings to those who asked for a sign in yesterday's reading, above.  But there is a difference, in that His words in today's readings are addressed to the religious leaders, and not simply those who ask for a sign or who reject His preaching.  Here, Jesus links the religious leaders' hypocrisy -- and by implication, their eventual conspiracy to kill Him -- to the leaders before themselves who killed and persecuted apostles and prophets sent by God to call people back to God.  But this time, unlike in yesterday's reading, the warning is not about the judgment that is to come at the end of all things.  Here the warning is given to "this generation" and what shall be required of it, especially those who are supposed to lead the people (like the experts in the Mosaic Law), but whose heart is in the externals, and not on drawing closer to God and therefore lack real depth of knowledge of God in that communion of the heart.  Therefore they take away the key of knowledge to their flocks -- they did not enter in themselves, and those who were entering in they hindered.  All of this is to point to the power of God which is at work in the world (which Jesus recently referred to as the "finger of God," the Holy Spirit, in Monday's reading).  We have seen ample demonstrations of the power of God through Jesus' ministry, and that this power is also shared with His followers as it has worked through the apostles (as, for example, when the Seventy returned with joy to report healings and exorcisms in this reading).  Here, Jesus gives a negative warning about the power of God, in the sense that He warns of rejecting that true power within oneself, by neglecting the matters of the heart and real faith which is an internal work.   These religious leaders are not only the heirs of those who killed the prophets and apostles in the generations before them, but they are themselves rejecting, and will work to conspire to murder, a "greater than" Jonah or Solomon who is Christ Himself.  In this sense, the warnings about the rejection and abuse of the Holy Spirit, and the working of God in the world, also teach us what the negative power of rejection can do.  That would specifically include rejection by those who should know better, and do not act out of ignorance.  Let us consider for today our own assumptions about the power of God at work in the world.  Is God extraneous to our lives?  Does God exist (or God's power in the world) in some compartmentalized place we rationalize away, or we don't think about?  Are our services mere reminders, or acts designed to prompt pious thoughts or sentimental understanding of Christ?  Or does this power live in our lives somehow, with our awareness of how we participate in Christ's life or not, how we cooperate with grace at work or not?  Jesus' teachings certainly do not have the flavor of a powerless musing or image we're supposed to take as merely metaphorical for nice sentiments and pious thoughts.  His speech is full of power and made with absolute conviction.  The thing is, do we realize how this power is at work in our lives?  Do we make time for prayer and communion so that we strengthen our lives in Christ?  Are we aware of the subtle and not-so-subtle ways we can experience this and truly find help and wisdom in ways that help us transcend and go through our own problems?  Are we aware of what we're missing when our souls are not refreshed through spiritual communion?  Do we neglect it so that we have no idea what we are missing?  These are choices that still remain up to us, just the way that Jesus indicates through His own strong speech.  We might not have Jesus with us in the flesh, exhorting us to pay attention.  But Christ is at work through us and in us, and we are assured of that, even as He has exhorted us to follow in His light and bear that light into the world -- and even as we read of the woes for those who choose to knowingly reject it.