“Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice.” (Matthew 23:3)
It is far too facile to dismiss the scribes and Pharisees. But Jesus does not dismiss them so easily, and in his criticism, he implies that their actual teachings are to be embraced: “do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you.” Indeed, it is not their beliefs or principles that Jesus rejects, but the disjunction between their words and their deeds. So, we need to pause a little bit over this teaching instead of rushing to a snap judgment.
One helpful tool is to follow the well-known Ignatian spiritual practice to pray over a biblical passage by imagining yourself in the scene. In other words, I would imagine this passage—the setting, the action, the people involved, and so forth—and then I would place myself in the scene. So, at a first glance of today’s Gospel reading, I want to imagine myself as being one of Jesus’s disciples listening to him excoriate the scribes and Pharisees for saying the right things while doing the wrong ones.
I say “want to imagine” because that is the easier route to take. I would be one of the disciples, not those hypocritical religious authorities—or so I tell myself to appease my conscience. But as a spiritual director once told me, it is often more insightful to imagine yourself in different ways in a scene, to see yourself as the different groups of people who populate a particular passage. And from that point of view, while I might want to regard myself as a disciple, if I’m honest, I am often very much like the scribes and Pharisees—my language might sound beautiful, but my actions do little to alleviate the burdens on the poor and oppressed. In fact, many of my actions probably increase these burdens.
This Lent, let us pray that we may become fully integrated disciples so that there are no contradictions between our words and deeds.
