1 Then the scribes and Pharisees from Jerusalem came to Jesus and said,
2 "Why do your disciples violate the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands whenever they eat bread."
3 He answered them, "And why do you violate the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition?
4 For God gave the command, 'Honor your father and your mother,' and, 'Anyone who speaks evil of father or mother, let him be put to death.'
5 But you say, 'If anyone says to his father or mother, "Whatever help you might have had from me is a gift to God," then he shall by no means honor his father or his mother.'
6 And so you have made the commandment of God void for the sake of your tradition.
7 Hypocrites! Isaiah prophesied rightly about you when he said,
8 'This people comes near to me with their mouth and honors me with their lips, but their heart is distant, far from me.
9 It is to no purpose that they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commands of men.'"
10 Then he summoned the crowd and said to them, "Listen, and understand.
11 A man is not made unclean by what enters his mouth; it is what comes out of the mouth that makes a man unclean."
12 Then his disciples approached and said to him, "Are you aware that the Pharisees took offense when they heard what you said?"
13 He replied, "Any plant that my heavenly Father did not plant will be pulled up by the roots.
14 Leave them alone; they are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a ditch."
15 Peter responded, "Tell us the meaning of this parable."
16 Jesus said, "Are even you still lacking understanding?
17 Do you not yet realize that everything entering the mouth passes into the stomach and is cast out into the latrine?
18 But what comes out of the mouth comes from the heart, and that is what makes a man unclean.
19 For from the heart come evil reasonings, murders, adulteries, acts of sexual immorality, thefts, false testimony, blasphemies.
20 These are the things that make a man unclean; but eating with unwashed hands does not make a man unclean."
21 Leaving there, Jesus withdrew into the region of Tyre and Sidon.
22 And look, a Canaanite woman from those parts came out and called to him loudly, "Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David! My daughter is cruelly tormented by a demon."
23 But he gave her no answer at all. His disciples came and kept urging him, "Send her off, because she keeps shouting after us."
24 He replied, "I was sent to no one but the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
25 But she came and bowed down before him, saying, "Lord, help me!"
26 He answered, "It is not good to take the bread belonging to the children and toss it to the little dogs."
27 "Yes, Lord," she said, "for even the little dogs eat some of the crumbs falling from their masters' table."
28 Then Jesus answered her, "Woman, your faith is great! Let it happen for you just as you wish." And from that hour her daughter was healed.
29 Moving on from there, Jesus came alongside the Sea of Galilee; he went up the mountain and was sitting there.
30 Large crowds came to him with the lame, the blind, the mute, the maimed, and many others besides; they set them down at Jesus' feet, and he healed them.
31 As a result the crowd was amazed, seeing mute people speaking, maimed people made sound, lame people walking, and blind people seeing; and they gave glory to the God of Israel.
32 Jesus called his disciples to him and said, "My heart goes out to the crowd, because they have already stayed with me three days and have nothing to eat; and I do not want to send them off hungry, or they may collapse on the way."
33 His disciples said to him, "Where in a deserted place would we find enough loaves to satisfy such a large crowd?"
34 Jesus asked them, "How many loaves have you got?" They answered, "Seven, and a few little fish."
35 He instructed the crowds to recline on the ground.
36 Then he took the seven loaves and the fish, gave thanks, broke them, and kept handing them to his disciples, and the disciples to the crowd.
37 They all ate and were filled; and they picked up what remained of the fragments, seven hampers full.
38 Those who had eaten numbered four thousand men, not counting women and children.
39 After dismissing the crowds, he boarded the boat and came into the region of Magdala.