Patristic Wisdom: Looking to the Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Then the Pharisees and some of the scribes came together to Him, having come from Jerusalem. Now when they saw some of His disciples eat bread with defiled, that is, with unwashed hands, they found fault. For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands in a special way, holding the tradition of the elders. When they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other things which they have received and hold, like the washing of cups, pitchers, copper vessels, and couches. Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands?” He answered and said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:

This people honors Me with their lips,
But their heart is far from Me.
And in vain they worship Me,
Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.

For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men—the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.” He said to them, “All too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition. For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’ But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is Corban”—’ (that is, a gift to God), then you no longer let him do anything for his father or his mother, making the word of God of no effect through your tradition which you have handed down. And many such things you do.” (Mark 7:1–13)

For the tradition of those elders, which they pretended to observe according to the Law, was contrary to the Law given by Moses. Wherefore also Isaiah says, Your vintners mingle wine with water: signifying that the Elders mingled with the strict commandment of God a diluted tradition: contriving, that is, a law spurious, and contrary to The Law: as also the Lord made manifest, saying unto them, Why do you transgress the commandment of God, because of your own tradition? Yes, not only did they by perversion make void the Law of God, mingling water with wine; but they even set up in opposition their own law, which even to this day is called Pharisaical. Wherein they take away some things, some they add, others they expound at their own will: and of these their teachers make special use. And being minded to maintain these traditions, they have no mind to submit themselves to God’s Law, training them up for the coming of Christ: but they called the Lord Himself to account for healing on the Sabbath, which however, as we said before, was not forbidden by the Law. (For themselves too in a manner used to do a work of healing, in that they would circumcise a man on the sabbath.) But with themselves they found no fault, when by their tradition and Pharisaical Law (of which I spoke before) they were transgressing the Commandment of God, and not having that which the Law commands, i.e., Love towards God.

But that this is the first and greatest commandment, and the next that towards our neighbor, the Lord taught, when He said that the whole Law and Prophets hang on these commandments. Nor did even He bring down any other commandment greater than this: but this same one He renewed to His Disciples, bidding them love God with all their heart, and all others as themselves. But had He come down from another Father, never would He have adopted His first and chief commandment from the Law: rather surely he would have tried at any rate to bring it down as somewhat greater from the perfect Father, instead of using that which had been given by the God of the Law.

And Paul too says, Love is the fulfilling of the Law: and that when all other things are done away, there abides faith, hope, charity, and that the greatest of these is charity: and that neither knowledge without love towards God avails anything: nor understanding of mysteries, nor faith, nor prophecy, but that all things are void and in vain without love: and that it is love which completes the perfect man, and that he who loves God is perfect, both in this world and in the future. For we never come to an end in our loving of God, but the more we shall have looked upon Him, so much the more we love Him.

Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies 4.12.1–2