Pentecost 3
I will have mercy, and not sacrifice—that is, the one rather than the other. “Sacrifice,” the chief part of the ceremonial law, is here put for a religion of literal adherence to mere rules; while “mercy” expresses such compassion for the fallen as seeks to lift them up. The duty of keeping aloof from the polluted, in the sense of “having no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness,” is obvious enough; but to understand this as prohibiting such intercourse with them as is necessary to their recovery, is to abuse it. This was what these pharisaical religionists did, and this is what our Lord here exposes.
I want mercy and not sacrifice Jesus is quoting Hos 6:6, which critiques Israel for focusing on the letter of the law while ignoring its spirit. God desires His people’s faithfulness and steadfast love more than their ritual observances.
the righteous Refers to people who are perceived as being righteous. According to Jesus, true righteousness involves showing mercy toward outcasts.
Publicans is from the Greek word, telones; collector of public revenue; tax collector. One who farmed the taxes (e.g., Zacchaeus, Luke 19:2) to be levied from a town or district, and thus undertook to pay to the supreme government a certain amount. In order to collect the taxes, the publicans employed subordinates (Luke 5:27; 15:1; 18:10), who, for their own profit, were often guilty of extortion and embezzlement. In New Testament times these taxes were paid to the Romans, and hence were regarded by the Jews as a heavy burden. Tax collectors were frequently Jews and were hated and usually spoken of scornfully. Jesus was accused of being a “friend of publicans and sinners” (Luke 7:34).
Jews despised tax collectors for collaboration with Gentiles and for dishonesty. The placement of Matthew’s call (9:9–13) directly after Jesus has declared his right to forgive sins (vv. 1–8) and directly before the dinner for tax collectors and sinners (vv. 10–13) identifies Matthew as a sinner to whom Jesus offers forgiveness. As in 4:19, Jesus calls first for allegiance to his person (v. 9b). Confirming the genuineness of his own commitment (v. 9b), Matthew invites into his home—and into Jesus’ company—those with whom he is well acquainted and who, like him, need God’s forgiveness. “Sinners” (vv. 10–11) is a technical term embracing “those who live a flagrantly immoral life” and “those who follow a dishonourable vocation or one which inclines them strongly to dishonesty.”
The Pharisees were offended by Jesus’ intimate socializing with tax collectors and sinners (v. 11; the question is more an accusation than an inquiry). Those who react this way, says Jesus, only imagine themselves to be healthy and righteous (vv. 12–13). For the truly healthy are sick persons whom God has healed; and the really righteous are those whose unrighteousness God has forgiven and who remain aware of their spiritual poverty (5:3). In turn, that kind of person is the one who treats others mercifully (1:19; 5:7) and who desires for others to receive saving grace. The opposite reaction (v. 11) shows that one has never really understood forgiveness (cf. 18:21–35). By acknowledging his sin and receiving other sinners, Matthew is an example for the Pharisees!
The religiously unclean and socially disreputable are the very ones Jesus came to save (v. 13). The Pharisees insist that sinners become righteous to gain acceptance; Jesus insists that they be accepted as sinners. Thus he obeys Hosea 6:6—“I desire mercy.” Only when the Pharisees perceive their own sinfulness will they receive Jesus’ gospel of grace and rejoice over his love for society’s outcasts.
“On hearing this, Jesus said, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick’” (v. 12). This answer took direct aim at the argument contained in their question. It was like saying, “So you consider the publicans and ‘sinners’ to be sick, do you? You are right. And that’s exactly why I, the doctor, the good physician, am going to them to heal them. It would be foolish and wrong for me to stay away from these patients in need of my help! As for you, you are enjoying good health, aren’t you? Then what can I possibly do for you?”
Of course, Jesus wasn’t conceding for a moment that the Pharisees and scribes really were spiritually healthy. He was using what we might call “holy irony” in order to drive a barb into their consciences. The point of his irony was: “You imagine yourselves to be strong and well—not poor sinners who are in need of a Savior. I have come among you to seek and to save those who are lost. But you sin, first of all, by denying you are sinners in need of a Savior, and then by your hardheartedness in denying my healing, saving services to those who feel their sin. You are doubly guilty; or to go back to the picture I used before, you are even sicker than the people to whom you would deny my healing service.”
But our Savior left nothing undone for those who, in their vast self-conceit, thought they could do without him. He continued: “But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners” (v. 13). Quoting Hosea 6:6 helps to drive home the point. The words quoted were originally spoken to unrepentant Israel. But the Israelites of that time were still scrupulously bringing the required sacrifices to God. So what could be wrong with them? Everything, God told them. They were sinners who had experienced God’s mercy, and that divine mercy should have made them merciful in all their attitudes and actions in regard to their fellow men. God did not want mere sacrifice, mere going through the motions of worship, as had to be the case when their hearts had become unmerciful.
In applying that to the Pharisees and scribes, Jesus was telling them: “You show yourselves heartless and insensitive to the needs of your fellow sinners. You begrudge them the healing that I, the merciful physician, would bring them. In doing so, you only expose yourselves as such who are really godless at heart, in short, sick unto death.”
Now Jesus restated in literal terms what he had already presented in figurative language: “I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” His point is the same, however. He had come into the world to call sinners to faith in himself, that they might find forgiveness and eternal life through him. Sinners made conscious of their damning guilt could be won by his invitation. But those who imagined they were righteous and could stand before a holy God on their own record—they would turn a deaf ear to his invitation: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened” (Matthew 11:28), unless God in mercy broke down their terrible conceit and crushed their proud hearts, as Jesus was striving to do here.
But teachers should not become so incensed by the terrible conceit and hardheartedness of Jesus’ enemies that they focus the children’s attention only on that. They should save time and energy for the positive side of the picture, for the comfort and assurance that lies in the words through which Jesus presents himself as the healer of the sick, as the one who justifies sinners before God. They should let the child realize: “I am one of the sick; I am a sinner.” By doing so, they will counteract the bent toward self-righteousness which is strong even in children. This self-righteousness is encouraged by concentrating too much on the wicked conduct of the Pharisees and scribes in such a way that the children will be inclined to say: “Oh, I would never do that!”—a choice expression of spiritual conceit. But presenting Jesus as their good physician, who lovingly heals their sickness under sin, will lead them to say humbly and thankfully:
“What our whole faith must rest upon
Is grace alone, grace in His Son”
Ver. 12. ὁ δὲ α. εἶπεν: to whom? Were the fault-finders present to hear?—οὐ χρείαν, etc.: something similar can be cited from classic authors, vide instances in Grotius, Elsner, and Wetstein. The originality lies in the application = the physician goes where he is needed, therefore, I am here among the people you contemptuously designate publicans and sinners. The first instalment, this, of Christ’s noble apology for associating with the reprobates—a great word. Ver. 13. πορευθέντες μάθετε: a common expression among the Rabbis, but they never sent men to learn the particular lesson that God prefers mercy to sacrifice.—καὶ οὐ, does not imply that sacrifice is of no account.—ἔλεος (ἔλεον in T. R., a correction by the scribes), accusative neuter. Masculine nouns of 2nd declension are often neuter 3rd in N. T. and Sept.—ἦλθον: Jesus speaks as one having a mission.—ἁμαρτωλούς: and it is to the sinful, in pursuance of the principle embodied in the prophetic oracle—a mission of mercy. The words ἰσχύοντες, ver. 12, and δικαίους, ver. 13, naturally suggest the Pharisees as the class meant. Weiss, always nervously afraid of allegorising in connection with parabolic utterances, protests, contending that it is indifferent to the sense of the parable whether there be any “whole” or righteous. But the point is blunted if there be no allusion. καλέσαι here has the sense of calling to a feast.