PKOFAXIXG, PROFANITY
PROFAXIXG, PKOFAXITY
I O-:
2. The sin. — Tlie sin of profaning consists in treating sacred tilings witli irreverence or con- tempt, and in the Bible the charge of profanation is found especially in connexion with the desecra- tion or violation of the Snbbath, of the Temple, or of tJie name of God Himself. In a study of Christ's life and teaching the sin of profaning comes up for consideration under each of these heads. (1) Pro- fan'uig t)ie Sabbath. — It is significant that the only occasion of tlie use of the word ' profane " (jif^TiXou) in the Gospels is in relation to a charge of Sahbatli- breaking brought against Jesus (Mt I2''). For, tliough it is Our Lord Himself who emi)loys the word, and employs it of the action of tlie priests under the Mosaic Law, He evidently does so with reference to an accusation of which He was the object.* And this, we must remember, was no soli- tary case. There was nothing that more frequenth' brought Jesus into hot collision with the ecclesi- astical authorities than the question of Sabbath observance (with Mt \2^^- cf. v.i^w-, Mk l-^*- 2^«- S-^-, Lk 6'ff«ff- ISi*-^- U3ff.^ jn 59ff- is. i8 7.--^ gusr. . notg
esp. tlie Johannine passages). In their eyes He was repeatedly guilty of a profanation of the holy day. And, though on this occasion He defends Him- self by appealing to Jewish law and history, thus meeting His accusers on their own ground. He immediately passes from this arfjiimentum ad homiiiem to state the great principles on which He really stood in His free, though reverent (cf. Lk 4'*), use of the daj- — that God desires mercy rather than sacrifice (v."), and that ' the Son of Man is Lord of the sabbath ' (v.®). In other words, He shows that the charge of Sabbath profanation, as brought against Him, rested on a wrong concep- tion of Sabbath sanctity; and the chai'ge of breaking a Divine law, on an entirely false idea of Gods meaning ami purpose in giving the Law (cf. Mk 2-" ' The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath '). There is a profanation according to the letter that is not a profanation according to the spirit ; and there is a seeming transgression of the commandment that is in reality a revelation of the benignity of the Law itself and the 'philan- thropy" of Him who gave it. See, further, Sabb.ath.
(2) Profaning the Temple. — Jealous as the Jewish authorities were, after their slavish fashion, in the guardianship of the Sabbath, they were not less jealous in defending the sanctity of the Temple against the least taint of what they regarded as prof.anation. The Temple police were ever on the alert. For any foot of Gentile or Samaritan to pass beyond the Court of the Gentiles meant death to the transgressor. And Josephus tells us how at one period the Samaritans were altogether excluded from the Temple enclosure because of an act of lirofanation committed by some of their people {Ant. XVIII. ii. 2). The indignation shown by the chief priests and scribes at the hosannas of the children in the Temple was apparently due not merelj^ to the hailing of Jesus as the Son of David, but to the raising of tliose joyful sliouts within the consecrated building (Mt 21^^). But, as Jesus in meeting the charge of Sabbath-breaking showed how misplaced the Kabbinic and Pharisaic ideas of sanctity were, so in connexion with the Cleansing of the Temple (Mt 2I'-'- = Mk IV^«- =Lk 19«*-, Jn 2'^*), He showed how low and poor were their views on the subject of profanation.
The presence of the stall-keepers and cattle- drovers and money-changers was strictly within the letter of the Law, since it was in the Court
* It is an interesting coincidence that in the LXX account of the incident at Xob (1 S 21-»), to which Jesus alludes in the preceding verse, ^£pr>.oi ka^oi is Ahinielech's expression for 'common bread,' as distinguished from kyiu itprn or 'shew- bread.'
of the Gentiles that this market was held, i.e. outride of the .-^cred area proper. For the Temple authorities this was quite enough ; they liad no compunctions alx)ut a traffic that was technically legal— least of all as the rents ]iaid h\ the traders for the privilege of using the Temple court as a bazaar passed into tlieir own pockets. To Jesus this was an illustration of the readiness of the Jewish leaders ' to blend religious rigorism and utt«r worldliness,' or, in His own words on another occasion, to ' strain out the gnat and swallow the camel ' (Mt 23-^). Thus they had made His Fathers house ' an house of merchandise ' ( Jn 2^"") ; nay, a very ' den of robbers ' (Mt 2P^ ) — an allusion either to the greed and extortion of the high-priestly family as landlords of the enclosiu'e, or to the shameful and notorious cheating practised by the privileged traders on the ignorant country i>eople who came up to the Feasts. Moreover, this was ' the house of jirayer ' (Mt 2P^ ) — the place to which pions folk came up for purjxises of detachment and recollection and communion with God. And bj- reason of these abuses, such worshippers had first to make their way througii the distracting scenes of this profane bazaar ; and even as they knelt at prayer on the other side of the lx)undary, to have their ears filled with the noisy cries of the mer- chants, the bleating of innumerable sheep, and the lowing of excited cattle.