Episode 116: Mark Part 55–The Scribes and the Widow’s Mite

Lest all the scribes get credit for the wisdom and honesty of the one (remember, the ones attached to the Sanhedrin have decided to get rid of him at this point), Yeshua takes the group of them to task for, among other things, oppressing the vulnerable and namely, widows. And what is the tragedy of the “Widow’s Mite” that is so often missed?

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12³⁸ And in his teaching, he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces ³⁹ and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, ⁴⁰ who devour widows’ houses and for a pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.” ⁴¹ And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box.  Many rich people put in large sums. ⁴² And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. ⁴³ And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. ⁴⁴ For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

And if you remember last week’s teaching, you’re going, “Oh my gosh, that scribe just honored him and all that and now Yeshua/Jesus is totally dissing on them.” And you would be right, but their conversational conventions were different than ours. Do you remember two years ago when we talked about polemic and stereotypes in ancient debate? We’re going to review that today. We’re also going to place the final nail into the coffin of the Second Temple, which Yeshua will condemn to destruction at the beginning of Chapter thirteen, and next week we’re actually going to talk about the actual destruction of the Second Temple according to the first century historian Josephus, who was a priest and was actually there, and later rabbinic writings. Unlike all previous weeks, I am not going to do a review of everything that has happened so far on the temple Mount because this one doesn’t need as much background material. Like last week, Yeshua is on the offensive now. Last week, we saw as one lone scribe stepped up and closed out the controversies by asking a genuine question and praising Yeshua’s answer—and I need to add something I didn’t mention last week, this is the only question asked on the Temple Mount that Yeshua straight up answers. He knows the difference between a seeker and an enemy and answers accordingly. As for the widow, Yeshua is praising her, but what she is doing and why will lead directly to next week’s proclamation of destruction against the Temple.

Hi, I am Tyler Dawn Rosenquist and welcome to Character in Context, where I teach the historical and ancient sociological context of Scripture with an eye to developing the character of the Messiah. If you prefer written material, I have five years’ worth of blog at theancientbridge.com as well as my six books available on amazon—including a four-volume curriculum series dedicated to teaching Scriptural context in a way that even kids can understand it, called Context for Kids—and I have two video channels on YouTube with free Bible teachings for both adults and kids. You can find the link for those on my website. Past broadcasts of this program can be found at characterincontext.podbean.com and transcripts can be had for most broadcasts at theancientbridge.com. If you have kids, I also have a weekly broadcast where I teach them Bible context in a way that shows them why they can trust God and how He wants to have a relationship with them through the Messiah.

All Scripture this week comes courtesy of the ESV, the English Standard Version but you can follow along with whatever Bible you want. A list of my resources can be found attached to the transcript for Part two of this series at theancientbridge.com.

So, let’s talk about polemic. Polemic was a very Greek way of speaking to and about one’s enemies but like all speech in honor/shame societies, had to be performed in front of an audience to be meaningful. The “woes” of Matthew 23 are all intra-Jewish polemic, meaning one group within Judaism laying into another group in an attempt to discredit them and win converts. That’s what polemic was about—they are dangerous and reckless and in error and let me tell you why. And Yeshua’s brand of polemic is so incredibly tame. You would blush to read some of the things that various Greek philosophical schools said about their opponents. Not really suitable for a Bible program, let’s just leave it at that. And the Essenes, they were ruthlessly brutal with their polemic against the Pharisees and the Sadducean High priesthood. The Romans employed polemic to battle the Christians during the first few centuries, and the Jews as well. Really, they applied it to anyone who wasn’t adopting a “Roman-enough” identity. Which would cause a lot of problems once the Romans stopped persecuting Christians and began to start equating their brand of doctrines and worship styles with the “one true way” and this caused serious rifts with Christians in Africa and the East. It’s something we still, as heirs of Roman identity politics and fueled by polemical rhetoric, still engage in—not realizing where it comes from and how it differs from what Yeshua was doing in battling those who were actively keeping the Jews from turning to Him for salvation. We just do it over stupid debatable stuff that no one’s salvation hinges on.

If you would like to read an excellent scholarly article on ancient polemic, try this one The New Testament’s Anti-Jewish Slander and the Conventions of Ancient Polemic by Luke T Johnson— it is available through JSTOR.org. We just toss around insults because we aren’t creative or knowledgeable enough to do anything else—with these guys, it was very calculated with goals in mind because, in an honor/shame society, it was sometimes even a matter of life and death to do it correctly. Families could rise and fall based on polemic. Because we don’t live this way anymore, thank you God, we mistake what is happening here.

³⁸ And in his teaching he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces ³⁹ and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, ⁴⁰ who devour widows’ houses and for a pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”

We’ll go through this verse by verse but it is important to know what has happened here. Yeshua just praised a scribe but He can’t allow this to turn into praise for all scribes. And it could be that this scribe was trying to speak for all his compatriots because, after all, he would undoubtedly be wearing his scribe costume. Everyone knew the man who approached Yeshua was a scribe—but the scribes have been all opposing Him in this Gospel, save one. Yeshua cannot allow any honor conferred on this scribe to spread to the group as a whole and it would have if He hadn’t taken corrective action through polemic. “Okay guys, this one scribe got it right but do not listen to the group of them. They are getting it wrong and are far from the Kingdom and if they do not repent, they will be condemned.” Man, you can just see that wise scribe slinking away at this point.

³⁸ And in his teaching he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces 

This is a very direct beginning. Nothing veiled here. “Beware!” But how dangerous can a retainer-class (aka working class) civil servant be? If you are asking that then you have obviously never had to go to the Department of Motor Vehicles in California. And no, I am not kidding either. Okay, maybe just a little bit. But what about these “long robes”? Scribes wore long white linen robes to set themselves apart as educated professionals available for hire and also for the sake of honor. Colored garments were for the common people. You can just imagine how long white robes, with long tassels/tzitzit, would stand out in a sea of all sorts of colors—most of which would have been muted. We aren’t talking about bright turquoise and red like you see in Sunday School programs. But, just imagine a crowd at Passover, and what would happen if someone who looked as pure as the driven snow came through the crowd. People would instinctively move out of his way and would even greet him out of respect. In honor/shame societies, everything was about respect and although scribes weren’t rich—the fortunate ones were educated retainers of the rich, but most would probably just be big fish in small ponds—the educated guys in town who could write out contracts and would be most likely to be reading in the synagogue. Just think of how intoxicating this would be—this sort of recognition and admiration. Yeshua is telling the crowd the exact same thing He has been hammering into the disciples—beware of ambition. Get rid of it, it’s poison and it will lead you to all sorts of evil.

In Luke’s version of the beatitudes, Yeshua says, “Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets” (Luke 6:26). Not only do fame and good reputation lead us to seek more of it, but they are fickle. The people who love you today will hate you tomorrow, which anyone who teaches can tell you. So your goal has to be to teach the text and not to be famous or respected. False prophets were well paid and well thought of because they told people in high places what they wanted to hear. And even when it didn’t bear any fruit, still, it made them feel better. Nowadays, we also have false prophets in that there are a lot of people who don’t know the Word but teach all sorts of nonsense because they haven’t studied, and often haven’t even read the whole Bible! They will set dates, and twist around apocalypses until they would be unrecognizable to the original audiences or tear down fellow believers just because it draws a certain element who love to watch a slaughter—don’t tell me we are any different than the pagans who gathered to watch Christians torn apart in the arena. We just do it with words and reputations now. But because these people do not know the Scriptures but love to be identified by these sorts of teachings and revel in the adoration it gains, they would probably get the same kind of warning pinned on them by Yeshua as the first-century scribal authorities. It’s amazing how little changes—and how artificially distant we feel from these rebukes when we are really very much the same.

In any event, as we have seen previously and as it detailed in Matthew 23, the scribes know the Bible but they do not do it and they disregard the poor. They came up with nitpicky rulings that sometimes help expand on the Law and sometimes subverted it altogether. That means that people had to be careful and weigh everything they said and not just accept them as unquestioned authorities.

I want to look at the greetings in the marketplace really quick here because a lot is written about that in extra-biblical literature. Kiddushin 33a expands on Leviticus 19:32, which commands people to stand in the presence of an elder, and, might I add that even though I am now over fifty I have never seen anyone who claims to be “Torah Observant” follow this commandment even though it is easy enough to do unless you are disabled. And I am not saying you have to but I am saying that if you want to make that claim, you need to do it. Anyway, here’s the argument, “Just as reverence does not include neglect of work, so too, standing does not include neglect of work; therefore, one who is engaged in work is not obligated to stand before an elder. And the verse also juxtaposes reverence to standing: Just as standing includes no monetary loss, as standing applies only when it does not entail neglect of work, as explained previously, so too, reverence is referring to an action that includes no monetary loss. From here the Sages stated: Craftsmen are not permitted to stand before Torah scholars when they are engaged in their work.”

So, unless someone was actually doing work that would cause them loss if they stood up, they were required to stand in the presence of one of the Torah scholars, Torah lawyers, or scribes, which are the various names they go by in the Gospels. The proper addresses were Rabbi, father, or master as we see in Makkot 24a: “And he honors those who fear the Lord”; this is referring to one who conducts himself like Jehoshaphat, king of Judea, who when he would see a Torah scholar would arise from his throne and hug him and kiss him, and call him: My father, my father, my teacher, my teacher, my master, my master.” Of course, Yeshua forbids this type of exaltation among His followers. We don’t see any of the NT authors calling themselves anything except slaves, servants and brothers. There are jobs but not titles. So, although this dates to legendary material published over five hundred years after Yeshua, this expresses the expectations of how the scholars expected and demanded to be treated at that time, and we know from Yeshua in Matthew 23–

“⁸ But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. ⁹ And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. ¹⁰ Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. ¹¹ The greatest among you shall be your servant. ¹² Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”

I mean, if I went around calling myself “Teacher Tyler” I wouldn’t be able to do it with a straight face. Yeah, I teach. God has given me a gift for it and has called me to do it. So what? Does it mean I need a title or does it mean I need to get to work? And for the record, no one is allowed to stand when I go by until I am in at least my 80’s because I don’t want to be reminded of how old I am getting. Seriously.

³⁹ and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, ⁴⁰ who devour widows’ houses and for a pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”

Scribes would have the best seats in the synagogues because they were literate and could read and write in Hebrew, which most Jews were unable to do at this point. On the Sabbath, the Torah would be read in Hebrew and then someone would read or recite the Aramaic Targum aka paraphrase, which everyone could understand, or maybe from the Septuagint Greek manuscripts, which were also common in those days. But, they would have the seats closest to the alcove where the Torah scroll was stored. They would be facing the rest of the synagogue attendees. And everyone was to stand when the Torah scroll was being read—so really, these guys are demanding to be treated almost on par with the scroll itself.  Places of honor at feasts is easy enough to understand except that it goes further than you probably suspect. Torah teachers/scribes were to be given precedence in feast seating above elders and even one’s own parents—which puts the desire to be called and considered “father” and “master” in more context.

They make long prayers—for a pretense. Nothing is said here against long prayers but the heart and intention behind them is called seriously into question. What I really want to talk about will tie into the story of the widow’s mite—and that is elderly abuse. “Devouring houses” is actually a Greek idiom for conning someone out of money or land. But how would scribes do this, exactly? Ben Witherington III has some interesting theories in his excellent book, The Gospel of Mark: Socio-Rhetorical Commentary (of course, I love all his books, really). First, he highlights Malachi 3:5, where Yahweh declares judgment against those who oppress widows, which should come as no surprise to anyone. These guys weren’t paid for their work in teaching the Torah, okay, and so they had to make their money in other ways. Some very legitimate, like doing contract work. But they would serve as guardians over the estates of both widows and orphans and really, anyone who was not considered competent or who contracted their services. Remember that these guys went around in long white linen robes making long public prayers? Frankly, it drummed up business. You knew exactly who to go to. They were like walking billboards. Anyway, I don’t care who you are, Jew or Gentile, when you have these sorts of situations you end up with dishonest managers bilking their vulnerable clients.

Yahweh is very serious about widows being taken advantage of—as we see in Isaiah 10:1-3 “Woe to those who decree iniquitous decrees, and the writers who keep writing oppression, to turn aside the needy from justice and to rob the poor of my people of their right, that widows may be their spoil, and that they may make the fatherless their prey! What will you do on the day of punishment, in the ruin that will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help, and where will you leave your wealth?” And we see clearly here that these are educated people doing harm through writing—making decrees or defrauding but it gets labelled as oppression either way. History has proven that religious people don’t tend to be inherently trustworthy in financial matters and it is very tempting to take more than you are owed when doing such work—and easy as well because people won’t watch you as closely. I mean, in my own life and within my own sphere I have seen pastors and apostles and whatever, getting away with murder financially and their supporters just demand no accountability. No one wants to admit to following someone who takes advantage of widows, of the elderly, whatever, even if they have to pretend like nothing happened. We just can’t give anyone except Yahweh that kind of devotion.

So, yeah, they get greater condemnation because they posed as Bible experts and painted themselves as being super righteous and took advantage of it for financial gains. Their condemnation will be greater as will, I believe, those who turned a blind eye and refused to hear the cries of the widows. I mean, seriously, how many times does this have to happen? Interestingly, the whole concept of elder abuse and widow abuse lead right into this next bit.

⁴¹ And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box.  Many rich people put in large sums. 

This is worded strangely. The treasury, the Beit Otzrot, was a very large building on the Southwestern corner of the original Temple Mount platform, which had been greatly expanded during Hasmonaean and Herodian times. My Temple teacher, Joseph Good, has identified this as the same location as Solomon’s House of the Forest of Lebanon. As he is greatly respected by the Temple Institute in Jerusalem, I am not just floating wild theories from people who aren’t experts. When I do that, they are my theories and I freely admit they are neither expert opinions nor am I an expert, I just play one on the radio. To be opposite the treasury would not put the boxes in the same place as the Mishnah places them—unless, of course, they were also different boxes in different locations—and perhaps there was a box outside to allow gentiles to donate. I admit that I do not know. Anyway, Tractate Shekalim 6.5 says there were thirteen trumpet-shaped boxes within the Courtyard of the Women. And these boxes allowed anyone to donate to the various functions of the Temple, from the “Temple tax” which every male had to pay yearly and which paid for the sacrifices, to buying gold plating for the walls of the sanctuary. You could donate to supply frankincense or animals or whatever. Your choice. Hence, the wealthy people putting in large sums.

⁴² And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. 

I have told you previously about how the Temple had come to be seen as a national shrine and a matter of pride. And there was very much a feeling of ownership about it. Now, this widow was not paying the Temple tax—which would have been two drachmas. This was far less. Two drachmas was like two days wages and the two lepta (another Latin loan word) that make up the “penny” or quadran, was worth less than ten minutes wage. If that doesn’t tell you how miniscule this was then I don’t know what would. And yet, she was making a voluntary donation to the running/beautification of the Temple. So, don’t make the mistake of thinking that she is donating to the poor or that any of them were—this was about the Temple itself. And people felt so passionately about it and identified both personally and religiously with it so much that this widow would give up all the had to live on just to be a part of it. And this is part of the problem. This, combined with the fact that Herod the Great and his posterity had and were building and improving it with tax money from these Jews, the majority of which were barely staying afloat and had already sold their land to absentee landlords, many of whom were among the chief priests—you begin to see how corrupt and oppressive the Temple system had become and how it hid behind the aura of glorifying God. But you can’t glorify God by oppressing and taking advantage of the poor—even the willing poor. Compare this to how the Tabernacle was originally constructed—out of materials and monies looted from Egypt—out of absolutely everyone’s surplus.  But there was nothing glorious about what was happening here.

⁴³ And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. 

And yet, Yeshua still praises her. Just like He praised that scribe before ripping into the institution in general. He does this time and again to turn their perceptions of the world and the Kingdom upside down. Less is sometimes more. The least will be the greatest. The greatest will serve everyone. The woman who chooses to be a student, upending first-century gender expectations, has chosen the better thing. Those who battle the Empires of the world with the testimony of Yeshua in Revelation are great while those who live by the sword will perish by it, as Yeshua said after Peter got violent. Blessed are the meek, the hungry, the merciful, the persecuted. Love and pray for those who are your enemies. Whenever He was asked to make a ruling about sin, He pretty much refused to do anything except remind people of God’s intentions in the beginning, not the allowances Moses made because of our hardened hearts. How many times did He prepare them to see that the people who seem to have the least to offer sometimes do more than anyone else? And it isn’t just a lesson for them but for us. How often are we dazzled by the rich, the powerful, the beautiful, and the “anointed” and totally miss those who are truly doing greater things for the Kingdom? Probably 99% of the time. And that’s why these sorts of people get away with so much for so long—we are distracted by worldly standards of greatness and excellence. We want to “ooh” and “aah” at the people with the long white robes and the long tassels with the fancy titles—when frankly, if they were just doing their jobs they wouldn’t need a title because it would be obvious what they were—and we ignore the true workhorses out there laboring away as foster parents and feeding the poor? That’s us, “oh look, something shiny.” But Yeshua gives them a reality check of how God sees these things from the vantage point of the Kingdom:

⁴⁴ For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”

“Who cares what they did! Ain’t none of them going hungry tonight!” But she will. She’ll go hungry unless she has something at home to prepare and maybe she doesn’t. And because that’s all she has to live on? Guess what! No sons either or she wouldn’t have to worry about her own living. This woman is destitute in more ways than one. In a way, she is a picture of Yeshua as well. He will give more than anyone else can give—His life. That she did it out of a misplaced devotion doesn’t negate the lesson. It makes it all the more tragic. The disciples are still dazzled and enamored with their Temple, their national treasure, and next week when we move into chapter thirteen, they’re going to go gaga over all the gorgeous buildings and stones and Yeshua is going to tell them that it will all be destroyed and very soon at that. The Temple is the place where Heaven and Earth overlap, and it has been replaced by Yeshua. Still, it might have been allowed to continue standing had it not been for the corruption and the failure of the Jerusalem elites to recognize the living Temple in their midst—instead of snubbing Him and plotting against His life. Temples in the ancient world existed for the purpose of (1) caring for a god but Yahweh doesn’t need to be cared for like the false gods who needed to be fed, bathed, anointed with perfumed oils, clothed and put to bed at night; (2) the house for the idol that was imbued with the essence of the god in question so that all of the things I mentioned in the first purpose could be fulfilled; and (3) allowing two-way mediation between god and man. The priests did that in all cultures—they presented offerings and served as the go-between between heaven and earth. They made sure that there was order in the cosmos and that the gods were happy and everything operated smoothly. If there was a revelation from the god they made sure to deliver it. But Yeshua became that Temple—in effect, Yeshua was that idol with Yahweh’s essence in it, come down to earth. So are we, once we have been filled with the Spirit, because we become houses containing the living God through His Spirit. Certainly not pure receptacles like Yeshua where no sin gets in the way and He heard perfectly and He discerns everything from the Father because He is the Word and you can’t separate the Word from the Father. And not in an idolatrous way but this is how the first-century believers would have understood it. It’s about functionality. We are living stones of Yahweh’s Temple, which is Yeshua, because wherever there is a believer, there is a small overlap of heaven and earth where Yahweh can act through us to bring love, stability, and mercy to the earth. That is, when we aren’t acting like total gooberheads.

I will tell you—I studied the Temple for quite a few years and at one point I wanted it rebuilt but not anymore. Yeshua is my Temple, that place where Heaven and earth meet. I am a stone in that Temple. He provides me with all of the mediation and forgiveness I need. He is not lacking in any way that He needs to be supplemented with anything built with human hands. And Yahweh commanded the building of the Tabernacle. David was provided with the tavnit, the blueprint, of the first Temple in writing from the Spirit. Haggai was commanded to rebuild after the return from exile and they were cursed with famine until they complied. In the absence of Yeshua, the Temple provided a picture of the greater Temple to come. Do you remember Yeshua saying, “Something greater than the Temple is here” in Matthew 12:6? Why would we build something inferior that there has been no commandment to rebuild? Nowhere, not once.

And frankly, if Yahweh wanted it rebuilt, a red heifer would make it three years without disqualification—and it never has—not in close to two thousand years. I think we need to take a hint. If the Temple were rebuilt, it would be a step backward and away from Yeshua. And I say this as a Torah teacher and someone who enjoys studying about the Temple—but Yeshua is greater than both. He is God’s final Word, God’s decisive salvific action on behalf of humanity. Just as the Yom Kippur sacrifice was not accepted for the final forty years the Temple stood, according to the Talmud, it still won’t be if it is rebuilt and I will tell you something about Americans and American Revelation beliefs and how they skew our beliefs in this area. People have it in their heads that the Temple must be rebuilt to usher in the Great Tribulation and the return of Yeshua but that is a very modern belief. One that really has damaged our Middle Eastern foreign policies and hurt real people, including Christians, in the Middle East. The whole idea behind pushing for the rebuilding of the Temple, artificially moving up God’s sovereign timeline of when Yeshua returns, is incredibly arrogant and disruptive. Not here, but there.

I tell you, if we would only put as much prayers and money and time into Missions as we do into trying to see another Temple built, Yeshua would already be here and reigning over all the earth. But we think we can find shortcuts instead of making sure He is being worshiped by people from every nation, tribe and tongue. We can’t shortcut Yahweh’s sovereign timing. All we can do is to either do or neglect what we are commanded to do.

And so, next week, Yeshua is going to climax this whole two chapter arc, where He has been condemning the Temple and the elites who run it and put their trust in it, by formally condemning the Temple itself and pronouncing its destruction. And, you know, He does this in our lives too—if we are committed to Him and the changes brought on through the New Creation. When people ask me the difference between a true and false convert, I tell them to look for radical changes in a person’s life, inside and out. Yahweh is jealous of us but often not in the ways we assume. Not in the nitpicky sort of pronouncing the name properly and understanding the difference between justification and sanctification but in being incredibly jealous of the ways that we are committed to being unlike Him—divided from Him by whatever idols are in our lives.

The temple and people’s trust in it was a big problem, a problem that blinded them to the abuses and oppression that was tied to it—not just because the high priestly family was collaborating with Rome, getting wealthy and snatching up the land of poor farmers as they went under but because it was built on the backs of the horrifyingly poor populace. I mean, it wasn’t Herod paying for that out of his own pocket—he got his money from demanding tribute from the Jews. It was a monument, not to Yahweh but to Herod’s attempt to buy the approval of the Jewish people—who always considered him to be an outsider and, frankly, a half-breed. He was only marginally Jewish anyway. He murdered multiple family members, including his favorite wife and two of his sons that I can think of off-hand. He was one of the most brilliant architects who has ever lived and the Temple in Jerusalem was reported to be the most stunning building on earth and it was the nation’s pride and joy because they had lost sight of the fact that you cannot honor Yahweh by oppressing the vulnerable. Look at Jeremiah 7:

7 The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: ² “Stand in the gate of the Lord‘s house, and proclaim there this word, and say, Hear the word of the Lord, all you men of Judah who enter these gates to worship the Lord. ³ Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Amend your ways and your deeds, and I will let you dwell in this place. ⁴ Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord.’ ⁵ “For if you truly amend your ways and your deeds, if you truly execute justice one with another, ⁶ if you do not oppress the sojourner, the fatherless, or the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own harm, ⁷ then I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your fathers forever.

It seems that Israel, really—all of us, cycle through the same thing again and again but we tend to choose new ways to commit the old sins. Yahweh desires mercy and not sacrifice and they had completely lost sight of why the sacrificial system existed. That’s why Yeshua kept bringing people back to their creational purpose—to worship Yahweh and love one another. Sacrifices emerged from a breakdown of that creational purpose. They would break faith in some way with Yahweh and would need to offer up blood. And I know that there were also sacrifices that were not sin related but right now I am talking about the Den of Robbers—committing crimes and sins and then running back to the Temple to make a sacrifice and considering yourself right with Yahweh. But that’s not mercy, that’s presumption—that’s putting faith in a ritual. It’s like my remembering Matthew’s birthday but forgetting Andrew’s, even though they are twins, and my trying to make it up to Andrew sometime during the next week with a present. The relationship has been violated. I can’t just shrug and give him a present and expect him to be okay with my blatant favoritism. In the same way, those coming to the Temple needed to see it as a place to approach God—not to ritually sacrifice their way into God’s favor because He is clear all through the Bible that it doesn’t work that way.

So, next week, we will talk about the Jewish Revolt against Rome that took place between 66 and 70 CE and the ensuing destruction of both the Temple and the inner city of Jerusalem.