CHAPTER 16 - Conflicts with Other Teachers
CHAPTER 16
Conflicts with Other Teachers
“It will be bad for you Pharisees, for strict though you are in tithing even products like mint and rue and every sort of herb, you overlook justice and the love of God. You should have done the latter without neglecting the former.”
LUKE 11:42 (PARALLELED IN MATTHEW 23:23)
Although Jesus’ teachings fit their Palestinian Jewish environment, that Jewish environment included a range of perspectives. The diversity of perspectives regularly led to disagreements, often produced harsh rhetoric between competing groups, and reportedly occasionally even led to violence. If Jesus taught some ideas that differed from those of some other teachers of the law, we would expect some disagreements. This is, in fact, what we find in the tradition. Although valuing and calling his people back to the message of Scripture, Jesus failed to lay the emphasis where some of his contemporaries expected. If Jesus’ other activities (such as healings) augmented his popularity beyond that of most other teachers, others may have viewed him as undermining the sound teachings they were laboring to cultivate among the people.1