The Old Covenant

1For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect.

2For then would they not have ceased to be offered? For the worshipers, once purified, would have had no more consciousness of sins.

3But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year.

4For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.

1And God spoke all these words, saying:

2“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.

3“You shall have no other gods before Me.

4“You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth;

5you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,

6but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

7“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain.

8“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

9Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

10but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.

11For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.

12“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you.

13“You shall not murder.

14“You shall not commit adultery.

15“You shall not steal.

16“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

17“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”

5Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands?”

6He answered and said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honors Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me.

7And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

8For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men—the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.”

9He said to them, “All too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition.

10For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’

11But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is Corban”—’ (that is, a gift to God),

12then you no longer let him do anything for his father or his mother,

13making the word of God of no effect through your tradition which you have handed down. And many such things you do.”

18But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.