Jesus and Religious Bureaucracy

If one reads the Gospels without the piety template and then thinks about what is read, one comes to some interesting and unexpected conclusions. Jesus was human. He had human emotions. One of these emotions that Jesus had was anger. Yes, anger is a legitimate emotion for the Christian.

In the Gospels Jesus got mad at two categories of people. The first of these was the religious hypocritical bureaucracy. (I will talk about the second category Monday.)

Mark 3 tells us of one healing.

And he entered again into the synagogue; and there was a man there who had his hand withered. 2 And they watched him, whether he would heal him on the sabbath day; that they might accuse him. 3 And he saith unto the man that had his hand withered, Stand forth. 4 And he saith unto them, Is it lawful on the sabbath day to do good, or to do harm? to save a life, or to kill? But they held their peace. 5 And when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved at the hardening of their heart, he saith unto the man, Stretch forth thy hand. And he stretched it forth; and his hand was restored. 6 And the Pharisees went out, and straightway with the Herodians took counsel against him, how they might destroy him.

As is usual with Mark, a more human picture of Jesus is painted than in the other Gospel narratives of this incident, in Luke 6 and Matthew 12. Luke adds that this healing drove the Pharisees to "madness."

This incident shows us a common feature of bureaucracy. The rules become supreme over the people the rules are supposed to guide and help. It is difficult to take principles and make them into rules. But this is what a bureaucracy has to do to function. There is another surprise when you read the Gospels. Jesus did want, through us, to build a church, but it was not a church with a centralized bureaucracy.

I think that the principle of dedicating one day a week to get closer to God is an eternal principle. Only when religious bureaucracy gets involved does the principle become corrupted.

Religious bureaucracy makes Jesus angry. I suggest you avoid it.