New Testament · Gospel

Matthew 9:11

The Doctor for the Sick

When the Pharisees saw this, they asked His disciples, “Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” Matthew 9:11 · Berean Standard Bible
What It Means

Matthew 9:11, in plain English

The Pharisees spotted this and asked Jesus' disciples, 'Why does your teacher eat with those kinds of people?'

Why it's here

For the Pharisees, your dinner companions defined your reputation. Jesus was ruining His by their standards.

Who's speaking

The Pharisees, criticizing Jesus indirectly.

Where it sits in the story

The religious establishment couldn't understand why a holy teacher would associate with unholy people.

A Closer Look

The scholarly reading

The Pharisees challenge Jesus' disciples, asking why their teacher eats with telonai kai hamartoloi, revealing their boundary-maintenance theology.

Language and setting

The Pharisees' question is not mere curiosity but a formal challenge to Jesus' credentials as a rabbi, since rabbis were expected to maintain ritual purity.

Voice

The Pharisees, questioning Jesus' behavior through His disciples.

Significance

This confrontation crystallizes the fundamental conflict between Jesus' inclusive kingdom and the Pharisees' exclusionary piety.

In context

Matthew 9:9–13

9As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax booth. “Follow Me,” He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him.

10Later, as Jesus was dining at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with Him and His disciples.

11When the Pharisees saw this, they asked His disciples, “Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

12On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.

13But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Read all of Matthew 9 — Jesus eats with sinners, forgives the paralyzed, and raises the dead. The religious leaders are horrified; the broken are set free.

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