Defilement Penetrating the Body: A New Understanding of Contamination in Mark 7.15

Updated by: 
Shlomi Efrati
Research notes: 
reader checked 02/06/2014 SE
Reference type: 
Journal Article
Author(s): 
Furstenberg, Yair
year: 
2008
Full title: 

Defilement Penetrating the Body: A New Understanding of Contamination in Mark 7.15

Journal / Book Title || Series Title: 
New Testament Studies
Volume: 
54
Issue / Series Volume: 
2
Pages: 
176-200
Work type: 
Essay/Monograph
Abstract: 

Mark 7.15, which contrasts two modes of defilement, appears in the gospel as a response to the Pharisaic custom of washing hands before eating. In this article, it is argued that this custom embodies an innovative approach to ritual impurity. Hand washing, which originated, so it is argued, in the Greco-Roman practice, was promoted by the Pharisees along with other purity laws, but stands in contrast to the biblical priestly purity system. In this logion, Jesus rejects the Pharisees' new conception of ritual purity, which was designed to guard the self from impurity. This interpretation offers both a coherent narrative and a plausible understanding of the custom within its historical-social context.

Alternative title: 
NTS
URL: 
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=1816764&fulltextType=RA&fileId=S0028688508000106
Label: 
21/07/2008
Record number: 
4 089