Mercy, not Sacrifice

Forgiveness connects the call of the tax collector to the healing of the paralytic – Christ’s authority to forgive sins – Mark 2:13-17.

When Jesus pronounced the paralytic man’s sins forgiven, he offended the Scribes and Pharisees. But he went on to alienate them even further by showing mercy “to sinners,” individuals considered unacceptable by religiously observant Jews. Seeing him eating with “tax collectors,” the Scribes and Pharisees insinuated that Jesus was also a notorious sinner – (Mark 2:1-17).

In his daily actions and teachings, Jesus stressed mercy. The very idea of mercy lies at the heart of the gospel and Christ’s self-sacrificial death to save and redeem us. Mercy characterizes the Kingdom of God and the mission and reign of the Son of God.

[Mercy - Photo by NADER AYMAN (Egypt) on Unsplash]

Jesus summons every man and woman who would be his disciple to emulate his example and words by pursuing mercy to friend and foe alike, rather than hatred and vengeance. Performing acts of mercy especially for our enemies is how we “become complete, as our Father in Heaven is complete,” a teaching found also in the writings of the Apostles – (Matthew 5:43-48).

• “Avenge not yourselves, beloved, but give place to the wrath of God. For it is written, Vengeance belongs to me. I will recompense, says the Lord. But if your enemy is hungry, feed him! If he thirsts, give him something to drink! For in doing so, you will heap coals of fire upon his head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good” – (Romans 12:19-21, citing Deuteronomy 32:35 and Proverbs 25:21).

Jesus demonstrated mercy in real-time by reaching out to tax collectors, members of Jewish society who were despised by everyone else. Their occupation required them to handle coins from pagan and Jewish sources, and they interacted with men from all walks of life. Physical contact with pagan symbols and Gentiles meant they were ritually unclean. Moreover, patriotic Jews viewed tax collectors as collaborators with the hated Roman authorities.

• (Mark 2:13-17) - “And he went forth again by the sea, and all the multitude was coming to him, and he began teaching them. And passing by, he saw Levi, the son of Alphaeus, sitting over by the tax office, and he said to him: Follow me! And arising, he followed him. And it came to pass that he was reclining in his house, and many tax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many, and they began following him. And the Scribes and Pharisees, seeing that he was eating with the sinners and the tax collectors, began saying to his disciples: He is eating with the tax collectors and sinners! And hearing it, Jesus said to them: The strong have no need of a physician, but they who are sick. I came not to call the righteous but sinners” – (Parallel passages: Matthew 9:9-13, Luke 5:27-32).

Levi, the tax collector, was in the service of Herod Antipas. The Roman government collected land taxes directly. Taxes on transported goods were contracted to local tax collectors who collected predetermined amounts of revenue. Whatever sums they collected over and above the contracted amount became their profit.

Religiously scrupulous Jews avoided employment of this kind since it required them to engage in transactions with Gentiles, compromising their ritual purity. The actions of Jesus were doubly scandalous because he associated with men who were politically objectionable to Jewish patriots and partisans. He compounded his offensiveness by eating with tax collectors, and others viewed as intolerably sinful by the critics of Jesus.

Table fellowship was important in Jewish society, especially to the Pharisees, and eating with less observant Jews infringed on their ritual purity. The category of “sinner” could include immoral individuals, but in this case, it was applied to Jewish men simply considered ritually impure, regardless of any moral failure.

The sect of the Pharisees adhered strictly to the Mosaic Law and the body of oral traditions that developed in later centuries for interpreting the regulations of the Torah, the ‘Tradition of the Elders’, which often concerned ritual purity and dietary restrictions.

The concluding statement of Jesus emphasized that his Messianic mission is about redemption, not condemnation or destruction. The version of this story recorded in the Gospel of Matthew adds the following:

• “Go and learn what this means, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance!” – (Matthew 9:9-13).

• “For I desire goodness and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings” – (Hosea 6:6-7).

• “With what should I come before Yahweh, and bow myself before the high God? Should I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?  Will Yahweh be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Should I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has taught you, O man, what is good, and what Yahweh requires of you, but to do justly, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” – (Micah 6:6-8).

God does not reject animal sacrifices entirely in this passage from the Book of Hosea, but He preferred righteous deeds and mercy from His people over religious rituals.

MERCY TRIUMPHS

Acts of mercy are superior to the Levitical rituals valued by his Jewish opponents. Jesus expressed the same idea in his ‘Sermon on the Mount’, and later, in his denunciation of the Scribes and Pharisees:

• “Blessed are the merciful, for they will obtain mercy” – (Matthew 5:7).

• “Alas for you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you tithe the mint and the anise and the cummin, and have dismissed the weightier matters of the law, justice, mercy, and faith. It was necessary to do these, but those not to dismiss” - (Matthew 23:23).

By calling sinners to repent and turn from their sins, Jesus was fulfilling his role as the ‘Servant of Yahweh’ sent by God to restore Israel and bring salvation, life, and mercy to the nations of the Earth:

• “And now declares Yahweh, who formed me from the womb to be his Servant, to bring Jacob again to him, and that Israel be gathered for him. For I am honourable in the eyes of Yahweh, and my God is my strength. Yes, He declares, it is too light a thing that you should be my Servant to lift the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel? I will also give you for a light to the Nations, that you may be my salvation to the ends of the earth” - (Isaiah 49:5-6).

• “And again, Isaiah declares, There will be the root of Jesse, And he that arises to rule over the nations. On him the Gentiles will hope” - (Romans 15:12, Isaiah 11:10).

Whether forgiving sins or healing the sick, Jesus came to redeem the lost and restore men to all that God originally intended for humanity. On this day, Jesus demonstrated mercy by healing the paralytic man, forgiving the tax collector, and welcoming ritually unclean men into his fellowship. And so, the Servant of Yahweh restored a son of Israel to the Covenant Community.

The mercy granted to the tax collector provides us with a concrete demonstration of what it means to have “mercy rather than sacrifice.” We emulate the God who made all men by doing the same, especially to the marginalized and the enemy:

• “You have heard that it was said, You will love your neighbour and hate your enemy. But I say to you, Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the just and the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?  And if you salute your brethren only, what do you more than others? Do not even the Gentiles the same? You, therefore, will be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” – (Matthew 5:43-48).

[Note: Text printed in small capital letters represents quotations of or allusions to Old Testament passages]

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SEE ALSO:

• Overflowing Righteousness - (Mercy and love are the defining characteristics of the followers of Jesus, and they reflect the nature of his Father – Matthew 5:43-48)

• His Kingdom - (Jesus proclaimed a new political reality, the Kingdom of God, which bears little resemblance to the political systems and regimes of this age)

• Forgiving Sin - (Jesus healed a paralytic, and by doing so, he demonstrated the authority of the Son of Man to discharge sins – Mark 2:1-12)

• La Miséricorde, pas le Sacrifice - (Le pardon relie l'appel du publicain à la guérison du paralytique-l'autorité de Christ pour pardonner les péchés et restaurer les hommes - Marc 2:13-17)