How we slip into Phariseeism

Most Christians simply ignore the Pharisees in the New Testament. I know I did for many years. Whenever I was reading those numerous passages where Jesus confronted the Pharisees, I just figured I’m not like them, so I’d read on. But eventually I began to notice that, whenever Jesus was confronting them, he was challenging me as well. He was confronting the Pharisee in me! Wow, that felt uncomfortable!

As I began to see more pharisaic tendencies in my own life, I felt I needed to study them more closely. And what I discovered amazed me. Did you know that most of the Pharisees in Jesus’ time were passionate about following God faithfully? That’s unnerving for Christians who care about serving Christ! But if we trace their history, they actually descended from a great revival just a few generations earlier, right after the Jewish exiles returned from Babylon.

There is not enough space here to tell of their incredible commitment, zeal, courage, and even martyrdom. That revival was simply amazing. But how did they move from a revival four centuries before Christ, to being hypocritical, judgmental, self-righteous Pharisees by the time of Christ? And how can you and I avoid the same downhill slide?

Their error was simple, but slippery. They reasoned like this:

If we don’t want to disobey God again like our forefathers did (we know that’s why they went into captivity in Babylon), then we need to be really, really careful to follow God’s commands. In fact, we don’t even want to come close to disobeying! So, let’s “build a fence” of extra rules to keep us further from the edge of disobedience. Let’s be extra cautious!

And so, they began adding extra, man-made rules to God’s commands. They called it putting a “hedge” around the Torah (God’s law). If we love God and want to obey him, then why not be extra cautious? Sounds reasonable enough. So that’s what they did.

For example, take the Sabbath commandment. God set up the Sabbath as a day for his people to enjoy. But the Pharisees missed the point of it, focused instead on the rule, and then began adding extra precautions. If you shouldn’t work, then you shouldn’t harvest your fields. So don’t even harvest a little bit. So one Sabbath day, Jesus and his disciples picked a few heads of grain for lunch, and the Pharisees jumped all over them for it. Jesus rebuked them; their man-made rule was simply wrong (Matthew 12:1-13).

Later Jesus challenged the Pharisees for all their man-made rules in general, because it always led them off the point of what God intended. He said, “Why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?” (Matthew 15:3, NIV) It’s as if we’re afraid God’s commands aren’t quite enough, and so we have to add more in order to improve on what God has done, so that our spiritual life will be stronger. Do we see how ridiculous that thinking is?

Yet many of us Christians make the same mistake. We start adding just a few rules, or a favorite doctrinal idea, well thought out (of course) and with good intentions. But then we begin paying more attention to our rules than the ones God has given (yes, I did this too). We begin forming opinions about other Christians and churches and groups on the basis of our favorite man-made rules and ideas that we have added on top of God’s Word. And pretty soon, we start thinking we are more spiritual or more faithful to God than others who don’t fit our ideas or rules. We are faithful and so they must be compromising! And then—look in the mirror—I have become self-righteous, proud, and judgmental. There is some Pharisee in me!

So that is where the Pharisees first began turning away from God and his Word ever so slightly, and it opened the door to many other errors.

More on this in future blogs!

Meanwhile, you can check out other topics on the right side of your screen here, and post your own comments below (to post comments, just sign in to Google—there is no cost and they will never give out your email address without your permission).

Here are a couple questions to get you thinking:

How have you been “turned off” or hurt by hypocrisy, judgmentalism, or self-righteous pride among Christians and churches?

What experiences have you had in encountering Phariseeism in the church, in others, or in yourself?

What experiences have you had with those who add man-made rules to what God has given us?