Bible Study series: Matthew 9:14-17. God is doing a new thing.
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In the next link to the original chapter, I comment more and offer the Greek text. At the bottom you will find a “Summary and Conclusion” section geared toward discipleship. Check it out!
In this post, links are provided for further study.
Let’s begin.
Scripture: Matthew 9:14-17
14 Then the disciples of John approached Jesus, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” 15 Then Jesus said to them. “The friends of the bridegroom cannot mourn while the bridegroom is with them, can they? But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken from them, and then they will fast.
16 And no one places a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for its patch pulls away and the tear gets worse. 17 Nor do they put new wine into old wineskins; or else the wineskins tear, and the wine spills out, and the wineskins are ruined. Instead, they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.” (Matt. 9:14-21)
Comments:
Mark 2:18-22 and Luke 5:33-39 also cover this event in Jesus’s ministry. Once again, Matthew trims some elements, though he stays a little more closely to Mark’s version.
14:
In the previous pericope (pronounced puh-RIH-koh-pea) or section, the Pharisees criticized Jesus’s behavior because he ate with tax collectors and sinners. The disciples of John did not like Jesus’s apparent free-wheeling and free-dealing license of living it up, while the disciples of John and the Pharisees don’t do such frivolous things. They fast and offer prayers. Fasting was commanded on special occasions (Lev. 16:29-34; 23:26-32; Num. 29:7-11). Individual fasts were done for God’s deliverance (2 Sam. 12:16-20; 1 Kings 21:27; Ps. 35:13; 69:10. Others fasted to turn aside calamity (Judg. 20:26; 1 Sam. 7:6; 1 Kings 21:9; Jer. 36:6, 9; 2 Chron. 20:3-4). Isaiah said fasting should be done accompanied by justice and good works and releasing those in bondage (Is. 58).
“disciples”: see v. 10 for more comments.
Let’s look at the practice of fasting from a biblical point of view. There are all sorts of ways to fast:
Eating no food, but drinking water, which is standard;
No food and no water, but only for a short time (Acts 9:9);
No delicacies (Dan. 10:3);
And anything in between.
In the OT the purposes of fasting were, as follows:
Preparing for God’s law (Ex. 34:28; Dt. 9:9, 18);
Preparing for the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:29, 31);
Showing grief at time of death (1 Sam. 31:13; 2 Sam. 1:12);
Showing remorse for sin (1 Kings 21:27; Neh. 9:1; Ps. 35:13);
Praying in time of national need (2 Chron. 20:3; Ezr. 8:21; Est. 4:16; Joel 2:15-17);
Praying for personal reasons (2 Sam. 12:16, 21; Neh. 1:4; Dan. 9:3-4);
But be warned: prophets criticized fasting for outward show (Is. 58:3-7; Jer. 14:12; Zec. 7:4-10).
In the NT, the purposes of fasting were as follows:
Jesus fasted to overcome temptation and prepare for his ministry (Matt. 4:1-11 // Luke 4:1-13);
Saul fasted after his conversion to humble himself and work out the massive change in his worldview (Acts 9:9);
Part of worship (Acts 13:2);
Preparing for ministry (Acts 13:1-3; 14:23);
Sending off for ministry (Acts 13:3; 14:23);
Jesus’s disciples did not fast while he was there, but when he was gone, they would fast (Matt. 9:14-15);
Jesus criticized fasting for its outward show (Matt. 6:16-18; Luke 18:9-14).
You can look up those verses to expand on those reasons. It is interesting, however, that nowhere does it say in the NT that believers should fast to prove their remorse and sorrow for sin. Forgiveness is not added to or enhanced by our outer show of works (fasting is a religious work). Forgiveness of sins is received by repentance and faith in Jesus (Acts 13:38).
15:
In this section about the old and the new, from here on, Jesus will be the center of these illustrations. He will be the bridegroom and the new.
Jesus is the bridegroom who is with them (see Immanuel, “God with us,” in 1:23). The kingdom of God has broken through, by his coming. While he is with the friends of the bridegrooms (literally “sons”), it would be out of place for them to be severe and austere with fastings and offering prayers of pleading and begging. It is time to celebrate. In Greek the question is formulated to expect the answer, “No, no one can make them fast.”
So when will the bridegroom be taken? It is his death on the cross and burial in the tomb. The wording that the bridegroom being taken away (cf. Is. 53:8) is a prediction of Jesus being arrested and crucified (cf. Matt. 10:16-33, 38; 12:38-40; 16:21; 17:9-13, 22-23; 20:28; 26:11) (Turner on 9:14-15). The disciples were scared. Would they also be arrested, as revolutionaries? No doubt they fasted, though not ritually, and offered prayers. The point is that the celebrations were about to be over. Now what happens at the resurrection and the ascension? They had to get on with the work of preaching Jesus and the kingdom of God. Then it will be time for regular fasting and prayer.
Let’s take a step back. The image of the groom and wedding often comes in the context of messianic times (Is. 54:5-6; 62:4-5; Jer. 2:2; Ezek. 16; Hos. 2:14-23). Even in Judaism at the time of Jesus the association between the metaphor of wedding and the Messianic Age was known. God is portrayed as the bridegroom of his people. Fasting was appropriate to usher in the Messianic Age, but now it is here at its beginning. No need to fast to bring it in. Jesus is hinting—for those with enough biblical knowledge—that the Messiah is right here, in front of them. While he is, let’s celebrate. Matthew and other NT authors use the “already” and “not yet” aspect of the kingdom through the wedding and marriage imagery. It is already here, but it is not here in its fulness: (Luke 12:35-36; Matt. 22:1; 25:1; Eph. 5:23-33; Rev. 19:7; 21:2). Those verses in the Revelation describe the kingdom that is here in its fulness.
5 The Kingdom of God: Already Here, But Not Yet Fully
16:
The next illustration is deliberately designed to look absurd. No one puts an unshrunk patch on an old garment.
In this verse, the new and the old don’t fit or match. Jesus is the new, and the old is Judaism and the old law. The way of the Pharisees, with their interpretations and maintaining the traditions—one interpretation piled on top of another—has to be thrown out. Or at least the new garment cannot be used to repair the old. There’s a mismatch.
17:
Wineskins were made of treated and groomed animal skins, and the neck of the animal was used for the opening of the large container. After a while, the skin became brittle. Putting in new wine, which expanded with fermentation, would burst the old brittle skin.
Obvious parallel: Jesus is the new wine, and old Judaism is the brittle wineskin. God is doing a new thing. You see, you have to imagine Pharisees and teachers of the law roaming the country and going into towns—sometimes living in them—dishing out rules and regulations on how to keep the law. They read their history in the Hebrew Bible. They knew that God had judged their nation because the ancient Israelites broke the laws of the covenant (together called the law of Moses). So their motives were honorable. But things just got too complicated.
Now Jesus comes along, to take God’s way with man in a new direction. He is currently ushering in the new kingdom, the new covenant. God is in the process of leaving behind the old. With the cross, the resurrection and the ascension, the departure from the old will be completed, and the new direction will go full force.
What Does the New Covenant Retain from the Old?
Jesus’s point here is that old Judaism is on the way out. In Matthew, when national Israel rejects its Messiah, God will place Judaism and the whole Levitical system under judgment (Matt. 21:33-45), though numerous individual priests (Acts 6:7) and thousands of Jews of Jerusalem and Judea converted (Acts 2:41; 4:4; 21:20). God loves people, but he is not enamored with systems.
This verse drives home the previous one. New wine is for a new container. Discard the old, brittle container. The old religious system and the establishment in Jerusalem will keep the old because it is comforting and intoxicating. However, it is better to choose the new wine. It will open up a great horizon as to who God is.
Gospel and law are brought together only in Jesus. Jesus has not come to amalgamate Judaism with Christianity. New forms are needed. The OT has not been annulled but fulfilled, and this requires the Torah of the Messiah, a new set of ethical norms and gospel practices established by Jesus. The Palestinian church did not realize the fullness of what Jesus meant and considered themselves the new messianic sect of Judaism. It was not until the Gentile movement had begun that they gradually understood the enormity of this truth (Osborne, comment on 9:17).
One needs new containers that are more flexible. So too the new age Jesus inaugurates brings new practices appropriate to the changed circumstances, most notably in this context the joy of celebration rather than the sorrow of fasting. “Both” at the end of v. 17 refers to both “wine” and “wineskins” (the two nearest antecedents), not to the old and the new, despite the popular view that sees Matthew redacting his sources in a more conservative direction to make Jesus say that the old is preserved by means of the new. (Blomberg, comment on 9:16-17)
GrowApp for Matt. 9:14-17
1. Jesus’s point is that the new must replace the old and be put in a new container. Read Isaiah 43:18-19. What new thing is God doing in your life?
RELATED
9. Authoritative Testimony in Matthew’s Gospel
1. Church Fathers and Matthew’s Gospel
2. Archaeology and the Synoptic Gospels
14. Similarities among John’s Gospel and the Synoptic Gospels
1. The Historical Reliability of the Gospels: Introduction to Series
SOURCES
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