Riverside(i)
1 ONCE the Pharisees gathered about him with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem,
2 and they saw that some of his disciples were eating bread with "common," that is, unwashed, hands.
3 For the Pharisees and all the Jews never eat without first washing their hands up to the wrist, holding faithfully to the tradition of their forefathers,
4 and when they return from market they do not eat until they have washed. There are also many other traditions which they have been taught to hold tenaciously, such as washing cups and pitchers and copper vessels.
5 The Pharisees and scribes asked him, "Why do not your disciples live according to the tradition of our fore-fathers? Why do they eat their bread with common hands?"
6 He replied, "Well did Isaiah prophesy about you hypocrites when he wrote: 'This people honor me with their lips, but their heart is far from me;
7 in vain they worship me, while they teach what are merely commandments of men.'
8 Neglecting the commands of God, you hold firmly to the traditions of men."
9 He said further to them, "How thoroughly you set aside the command of God so that you may keep your tradition!
10 For Moses said, 'Honor thy father and thy mother,' and, 'He who speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.'
11 But you say, 'If a man says to his father or his mother, Whatever benefit you enjoy from me is now Korban, that is, a gift to God,' —
12 you no longer let him do anything for his father or his mother,
13 thus nullifying the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down; and many similar things you do."
14 Then, calling the crowd to him again, he said to them, "Hear me, all of you, and understand.
15 There is nothing from outside a man that can go into him and defile him, but the things that come out of the man are the things that defile the man."
16 TEXT OMITTED
17 After he had gone into the house, his disciples asked about his figurative language.
18 He said, "Are you too so lacking in insight? Do you not know that everything from outside that goes into a man is unable to defile him,
19 for it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach and passes out into the sewer?" Thus he pronounced all foods clean.
20 "But," he said, "what comes out of a man is what defiles him;
21 for from within, out of the hearts of men, come evil thoughts, unchastities, thefts, murders,
22 adulteries, lusts, wickednesses, deceit, sensuality, an evil eye, slander, arrogance, recklessness —
23 all these had things come out from within, and they defile the man."