Disputes broke out especially respecting a number of external practices introduced by tradition, which neither Jesus nor his disciples observed.[1] The Pharisees reproached him sharply for this. When he dined with them, he scandalized them much by not observing the customary ablutions. "Give alms," said he, "of such things as ye have; and behold, all things are clean unto you."[2] That which in the highest degree hurt his refined feeling was the air of assurance which the Pharisees carried into religious matters; their paltry worship, which ended in a vain seeking after precedents and titles, to the utter neglect of the improvement of their hearts. An admirable parable rendered this thought with infinite charm and justice. "Two men," said he, "went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other."[3]
[Footnote 1: Matt. xv. 2, and following; Mark vii. 4, 8; Luke v. sub fin. and vi. init., xi. 38, and following.]
[Footnote 2: Luke xi. 41.]
[Footnote 3: Luke xviii. 9-14; comp. ibid., xiv. 7-11.]
A hate, which death alone could satisfy, was the consequence of these struggles. John the Baptist had already provoked enmities of the same kind.[1] But the aristocrats of Jerusalem, who despised him, had allowed simple men to take him for a prophet.[2] In the case of Jesus, however, the war was to the death. A new spirit had appeared in the world, causing all that preceded to pale before it. John the Baptist was completely a Jew; Jesus was scarcely one at all. Jesus always appealed to the delicacy of the moral sentiment. He was only a disputant when he argued against the Pharisees, his opponents forcing him, as generally happens, to adopt their tone.[3] His exquisite irony, his arch and provoking remarks, always struck home. They were everlasting stigmas, and have remained festering in the wound. This Nessus-shirt of ridicule which the Jew, son of the Pharisees, has dragged in tatters after him during eighteen centuries, was woven by Jesus with a divine skill. Masterpieces of fine raillery, their features are written in lines of fire upon the flesh of the hypocrite and the false devotee. Incomparable traits, worthy of a son of God! A god alone knows how to kill after this fashion. Socrates and Molière only touched the skin. He carried fire and rage to the very marrow.
[Footnote 1: Matt. iii. 7, and following, xvii. 12, 13.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xiv. 5, xxi. 26; Mark xi. 32; Luke xx. 6.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xii. 3-8, xxiii. 16, and following.]
But it was also just that this great master of irony should pay for his triumph with his life. Even in Galilee, the Pharisees sought to ruin him, and employed against him the manoeuvre which ultimately succeeded at Jerusalem. They endeavored to interest in their quarrel the partisans of the new political faction which was established.[1] The facilities Jesus found for escape in Galilee, and the weakness of the government of Antipas, baffled these attempts. He ran into danger of his own free will. He saw clearly that his action, if he remained confined to Galilee, was necessarily limited. Judea drew him as by a charm; he wished to try a last effort to gain the rebellious city; and seemed anxious to fulfill the proverb—that a prophet must not die outside Jerusalem.[2]
[Footnote 1: Mark iii. 6.]