Matthew 15:6-9 - Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you: ’These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.   They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.’ 

What were the religious traditions to which Jesus referred?  They had several main components.

1)    TRADITIONAL RELIGIOUS HOLIDAYS (see Galatians 4:10-11; Colossians 2:16-17) – they had numerous special celebrations throughout the year, and they scrupulously observed the Sabbath Day every week.  Of course, different religious denominations within their religion disagreed about some of the specific rules for the Sabbath or the occasions for other holidays, just like denominations and churches today.

2)    TRADITIONS ABOUT THE HOUSE OF WORSHIP – Again, the Jews were deeply divided about this, with some insisting that the great Temple was the proper location for worship, many others spent their Sabbaths at the Synagogue, and the Samaritans insisted on worshipping on a particular mountain.  (John 4:40)  All the groups followed their own traditions.  They always observed the same customs about how to arrange the items in the Temple, how to arrange the seating in the synagogues, etc. (See also Matt 23:29). Jesus said they were all wrong (John 4:23).

3)    TRADITIONS ABOUT THE PRIESTS OR PROFESSIONAL MINISTERS – They had traditions about their religious leaders – they expected them to be full-time, professional clergy.  The group called Sadducees followed the priests at the Temple, who were descended from Aaron and the Levites.  The group called the Pharisees followed the professional Rabbis or “teachers of the Law” who taught in the Synagogues – they claimed to be following a tradition started by Ezra the Scribe (the hero of the book of Ezra in the Old Testament). 

4)    TRADITIONS ABOUT HOW TO WORSHIP – They had their own traditions about how to worship God, but nobody cared about what God Himself wanted from their worship.  Some of the groups insisted on offering animal sacrifices at the Temple in Jerusalem; other groups “worshipped” by singing and listening to sermons in the synagogues.  They also had traditions about which version of the Scriptures they would use in their meetings.  The Sadducees and the Samaritans accepted only the first five books of the Old Testament, but they had slightly different versions; the Pharisees accepted the rest of the Old Testament as well.  Jesus told the Samaritan Woman that God instead wants people who worship in Spirit and Truth, that is, according to God’s revelation.  (John 4:23)

5)    TRADITIONS ABOUT FOOD AND DRINK – They had developed many traditions about what foods were clean and unclean.  Some of these came from Leviticus, but others were inventions of men.  They had rules about when they could eat food, when they had to fast, etc.

6)    TRADITIONS ABOUT TITHES AND OFFERINGS – See Matthew 23:23-24.

Jesus ignored their traditions and treated them as something worthless.  He healed on the Sabbath, which their traditions forbid.  He let his disciples violate some of the food laws, eating with unwashed hands. 

The problem persists today.  In the “Christian” regions, where people attend the same church from childhood, they often cling the tradition of their denomination and refuse to seek God for His will or plan about how we should do thing.  We cannot be passive and blindly follow the ways we have always seen things done.  We see each of the types of traditions listed above in Christianity today.  Where did these Christian traditions come from?  Men invent all traditions.  Jesus gives us the same challenge today.  We need to follow what God says and not always stay with what is familiar to us.  He has new blessings for us, new revelations to show us.  We need to let go of our traditions – all of them – and hold on to the commands of God instead.