Mark 7  New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised Catholic Edition

The Tradition of the Elders

7 Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, ² they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. ³ (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands,^[a] thus observing the tradition of the elders; ⁴ and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it;^[b] and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.^[c]) ⁵ So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not live^[d] according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?’ ⁶ He said to them, ‘Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written,

⁸ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.’

⁹ Then he said to them, ‘You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition! ¹⁰ For Moses said, “Honour your father and your mother”; and, “Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.” ¹¹ But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, “Whatever support you might have had from me is Corban” (that is, an offering to God^[e])— ¹² then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother, ¹³ thus making void the word of God through your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many things like this.’

¹⁴ Then he called the crowd again and said to them, ‘Listen to me, all of you, and understand: ¹⁵ there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.’^[f]

¹⁷ When he had left the crowd and entered the house, his disciples asked him about the parable. ¹⁸ He said to them, ‘Then do you also fail to understand? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, ¹⁹ since it enters, not the heart but the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) ²⁰ And he said, ‘It is what comes out of a person that defiles. ²¹ For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, ²² adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. ²³ All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.’

The Syrophoenician Woman’s Faith

²⁴ From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre.^[g] He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, ²⁵ but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. ²⁶ Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. ²⁷ He said to her, ‘Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.’ ²⁸ But she answered him, ‘Sir,^[h] even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.’ ²⁹ Then he said to her, ‘For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.’ ³⁰ So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

Jesus Cures a Deaf Man

³¹ Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. ³² They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. ³³ He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. ³⁴ Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’, that is, ‘Be opened.’ ³⁵ And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. ³⁶ Then Jesus^[i] ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. ³⁷ They were astounded beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.’