In all four gospels we find Jesus having a real go at the group known as the Scribes and Pharisees. He didn’t like their religion. He didn’t agree with their religion. Jesus’ own religion was very different. Let me try to contrast both.
The religion practised by the Scribes and Pharisees emphasised a distant and demanding God, a God removed from human experience. The religion practised by Jesus emphasised a loving God, a God who offers friendship, a God who is personally involved in the lives of his people.
The religion practised by the Scribes and Pharisees focused on observance of the law, on keeping rules and regulations. The religion practised by Jesus focused on relationships, on being in right relationship with ourselves, with other people and with God
The religion practised by the Scribes and Pharisees was about making ourselves holy by our own efforts, by fasting, by penances, by acts of purification, by ritual sacrifices, by saying long prayers. The religion practised by Jesus was about accepting salvation as God’s gift, a gift given to us in Jesus himself and through our surrender to the action of the Holy Spirit.
The religion practised by the Scribes and Pharisees was judgemental and exclusive. It created distinctions and divisions between people on the basis of a hierarchy of holiness. The religion practised by Jesus was compassionate and inclusive. It sought to break down barriers between people by creating a community of equals.
The religion practised by the Scribes and Pharisees was restrictive, burdensome and oppressive. The religion practised by Jesus was liberating, life-giving and challenging.
In summary, the religion practised by the Scribes and Pharisees was a requirements religion. The religion practised by Jesus was a relationship religion.
What is our religion? Is it the religion of the Scribes and Pharisees or the religion of Jesus? I think that for many of us our experience of religion is a mixture of both. This mixture of both can be a cause of the struggle that is going on inside each one of us. We desire the relationship religion of Jesus but something within pulls us into the requirements religion of the Scribes and Pharisees. Whatever this something is, it needs to be named, faced and dealt with. Because Jesus is clear that the two religions cannot exist together. To try to integrate both does not work.
He says, “No one sews a piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak; if he does, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and the tear gets worse. And nobody puts new wine into old wineskins; if he does the wine will burst the skins and the wine is lost and the skins too. No! New wine, fresh skins!” (Mark 2:21-22).