When the law gets in the way of human compassion Jesus simply disregards the law. He has found its meaning. As he says most clearly about picking and eating grain on the sabbath (see Mark 2:23-28), the law is not an end in itself. It’s a means to an end. The Law was made for humanity; humanity was not made for the Law, Jesus says (see Mark 2:27). That’s cataclysmic. It undercuts most of institutional religion since the beginning of time.
