“And he saith unto them, Are ye so without understanding also? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him;”
Are you so dull? he asked. Don't you see that nothing that enters a person from the outside can defile them? — the question Are you so dull? (houtōs asunetos este, are you also without understanding?) expresses Jesus' exasperation with the disciples' persistent failure to understand. The also may refer to the Pharisees who failed to understand — the disciples are failing in the same way as the opponents they have just observed being rebuked. The principle is restated in the negative: nothing that enters from outside can defile.
Church Fathers on Mark 7:18
But the intention of the Lord in saying this was to teach men, that the observing of meats, which the law commands, should not be taken in a carnal sense, and from this He began to unfold to them the intent of the law.
For that man is a faulty hearer who considers what is obscure to be a clear speech, or what is clear to be obscurely spoken.
For some things are joined to others in such a way as both to change and be changed, just as food, losing its former appearance, is both itself turned into our body, and we too are changed, and our strength is refreshed by it.
Read all 10 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS
Publish a reflection on this verse
No reflections on this verse yet. Be the first to write one!