Pedantic Bible Readers

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Mark 2:25-26

And he said to them, Have you never read what David did, when he had need, and was an hungered, he, and they that were with him?…

The scribes and Pharisees were great readers of the law. They made notes of very little importance, but still very curious notes — as to which was the middle verse of the entire Old Testament, which verse was half-way to the middle, and how many times such a word occurred, and the size of the letter, and its peculiar position. According to Pharisaic interpretation, to rub an ear of corn is a kind of threshing, and, as it is very wrong to thresh on the Sabbath day, therefore it must be very wrong to rub out an ear or two of wheat when you are hungry on the Sabbath morning.

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