Legalism

John 5:8-12 (ESV)  Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” ⁹ And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked.

Now that day was the Sabbath. ¹⁰ So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.” ¹¹ But he answered them, “The man who healed me, that man said to me, ‘Take up your bed, and walk.’ ” ¹² They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk’?”

Sometimes it is so hard to spot legalism, isn’t it?  We have rules within our faith, but can these rules be broken or bent?  In secular life, there is a hierarchy of laws.  If we hear a child next door drowning and screaming for help, it is perfectly legal for us to trespass on our neighbor’s land to save that child.  So, even our civil laws recognize leniency according to situations and so should the rules of our faith.

In this passage above, Jesus healed a man who had been an invalid for 38 years.  The problem for the Jewish leaders was He did it on the Sabbath.  Did he break the actual Sabbath law, though? Here is the simple instruction from God on observing the Sabbath: 

Exodus 20:6-10 (ESV)  “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. ⁹ Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, ¹⁰ but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates.”

After the Maccabean Revolt, a bit over 200 years before this scene, the Pharisees became the legal arm of the Jewish religious culture.  They spent much of that time creating specific and restrictive rules that were to apply to the Mosaic Law. It was considered work.  Among these restrictions were 39 sets or “classes” of regulations to define what qualified as work on the Sabbath.  In these man-made rules was a rule against carrying a bed on the Sabbath.  Strangely, you could carry a bed if someone was in it but not if it was empty. 

This wasn’t the silliest rule.  There was a rule against throwing something into the air and catching it was the same hand.  The jury is still out on if it could be caught legally with the other hand.  Jesus saw how silly these regulations were and pointed it out a few times to the “Jews” (John’s term for Pharisees, scribes, and Priests):

Matt. 12:11-12 (ESV)  He said to them, “Which one of you who has a sheep, if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will not take hold of it and lift it out? ¹² Of how much more value is a man than a sheep! So it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.

Luke 13:15 (ESV)  ¹⁵ Then the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water it?

Mark 2:27 (ESV)  And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath

As with modern civil law, mitigating circumstances should be taken into account.  The heavily restrictive and foolish laws the Pharisees forced on the people were uncalled for and caused great hardship.

Why is this important?

The Jewish leaders who confronted the man who had been healed questioned him about the man-made law he was breaking not God’s Law.  When he explained he had been healed and the man who healed him told him to carry his bed, the Pharisees didn’t rejoice in his healing but then looked for someone else whom they might hold responsible or even arrest for breaking their rules.

This is the great danger in legalism.  We ignore the kindness that might be done, rejoicing in the favor God has shown to another. Instead, we might favor asserting our own authority whether actual or imagined.  It boils down to a problem of pride, of arrogance, and of self-righteousness.  I pray we never fall into this pit which replaces compassion with self-righteousness and tarnishes the reputation of our Lord.