Mark 7
1 The Pharisees and some teachers of the Law, who had come from Jerusalem, gathered around him.
2 They saw that some of his disciples were eating bread with defiled hands—that is, without washing them.
3 For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat without washing their hands up to the wrist, following the tradition of the elders.
4 When they return from the marketplace, they do not eat without sprinkling themselves; and they observe many other things they have received: ritual washings of cups, pitchers, and bronze vessels.
5 So the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law asked him, “Why don’t your disciples follow the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with defiled hands?”
6 He replied, “Isaiah prophesied well about you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.
7 They worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines human commandments.’
8 You have abandoned God’s commandment and hold on to human tradition.”
9 He also said to them, “You do a fine job of rejecting God’s commandment in order to keep your own tradition!
10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever curses their father or mother must be put to death.’
11 But you say, ‘If someone tells their father or mother, “What you might have received from me is Corban”—that is, an offering—’
12 you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother.
13 You nullify the word of God by the tradition you have handed down; and you do many things like this.”
14 Calling the crowd to him again, he said to them, “Listen to me, everyone, and understand.
15 Nothing outside a person that enters them can make them defiled; rather, what comes out of a person is what makes them defiled.”
17 When he left the crowd and went into a house, his disciples asked him about the parable.
18 He said to them, “Are you also so lacking in understanding? Don’t you see that nothing entering a person from outside can make them defiled?
19 For it doesn’t enter their heart, but their stomach, and then goes out into the latrine.” In this way he declared all foods clean.
20 And he said, “What comes out of a person is what makes them defiled.
21 For from within, from people’s hearts, come evil thoughts: sexual immorality, theft, murder,
22 adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, indecency, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness.
23 All these evils come from within and make a person defiled.”
24 He left there and went to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and didn’t want anyone to know, but he could not remain hidden.
25 For as soon as a woman whose little daughter had an impure spirit heard about him, she came and fell at his feet.
26 The woman was Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to drive the demon out of her daughter.
27 He said to her, “First let the children eat their fill, because it isn’t right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”
28 But she replied, “Yes, Lord; but even the little dogs under the table eat some of the children’s crumbs.”
29 Then he said to her, “Because of what you have said, you may go; the demon has left your daughter.”
30 She went home and found the child lying on the bed, and the demon had left.
31 Leaving the region of Tyre again, he went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the region of the Decapolis.
32 People brought him a man who was deaf and could barely speak, and they begged him to lay his hand on him.
33 Jesus took him aside, away from the crowd, put his fingers in the man’s ears, and, spitting, touched his tongue.
34 Then he looked up to heaven, sighed, and said to him, “Ephphatha”—that is, “Be opened.”
35 The man’s ears were opened, his tongue was immediately loosened, and he spoke clearly.
36 Jesus ordered them not to tell anyone, but the more he ordered them, the more they proclaimed it.
37 They were utterly amazed and said, “He has done everything well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”
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