Because of the Hardness of Your Hearts
And Jesus answered and said to them, “Because of the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept.
Mark 10:5 NKJV
This passage from the Gospel of Mark features three encounters: the crowds, the Pharisees, and the disciples. After introducing Jesus as he travels, engaged with the crowds in teaching, the text draws our attention to the Pharisees’ question. We shift from a teaching to the masses to a more specific one, though we are told a crucial detail: they were questioning him “to test him” (v. 2). The Pharisees do not want to understand God’s will; they have already decided how they want to live. They are there only in search of a verse that would endorse their thinking and authorize them to continue. Jesus’ words shift the focus from marriage to the heart, and they are driven by an indignation that Mark has already shown us when, in the synagogue, Jesus looks at the Pharisees with anger, grieved by the hardness of their hearts. That hardness must be condemned without compromise. But at the same time, it is saddening, because it seems, from a human perspective, beyond remedy. While a paralyzed hand can be healed by a command, a hardened heart cannot. When the spring turns to stone, it no longer generates life. It generates only poison (Mark 7:21–22). The Pharisees are not violating the Bible. They are using it. They do so in three ways, which are still common today.
First, they turn a concession into a principle. In Deuteronomy 24, Moses did not command divorce; he regulated an already existing practice solely to protect women. It was a safeguard to curb harshness, not God’s ideal. They, however, turn it into doctrine: “If Moses allowed it, then it is God’s will.” Then they isolate a verse from the larger narrative, quoting Moses, who is only halfway through the story. But Jesus brings them back to the beginning, to Genesis. “In the beginning, it was not so.” We receive a fundamental hermeneutical principle: you cannot understand the heart of God by starting from the Fall. You must start from creation. A hard heart reads the Bible backward: it starts from its own wound, its own failure, its own culture, and works backward, looking for excuses. A tender heart starts from the Father’s plan and works downward into its own life to align with it. Finally, they use the letter to betray the spirit of the letter. Technically, they are right: that verse exists. But they use the letter of the law to kill the heart of the law, which was covenant and faithfulness—just as Paul would write (2 Corinthians 3:6). This is, unfortunately, a recurring danger.
The real problem isn’t the rule. Jesus is clear: “Because of the hardness of your hearts.” Sclerocardia is the stubborn refusal to believe in God’s promises, to allow oneself to be loved. It corrupts our feelings: it mistakes obsessive jealousy, blind violence, and oppressive possessiveness for love. It is the fruit of a heart incapable of loving because it is incapable of receiving love. None of us is immune. Everyone has secret corners where the cross has not yet been planted, and that is where we can fall into the Pharisees’ deception. We take what God has tolerated because of our hardness and turn it into doctrine to defend it. We even use the Bible to build dams around our hearts. But Jesus does not give us better rules for dealing with hardness. He promises us a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26). Only a tender heart can return to the plan. As long as it remains hard, the Bible remains a code of permissions. Mark concludes with a change of scene (v. 10). Out go the Pharisees. Inside, in the house, the disciples—who ask in order to understand—bring their own hardness to the Word. The casual listener uses this passage to argue. The disciple brings it into intimacy with Jesus and says, “Lord, my heart is still hard. Bring me back to your beginning.” The Pharisees leave with an answer that condemns them. The disciples remain in the house with an answer that transforms them. Choose where to be.
Weekly Bible Reading Plan #42
October 12, Isaiah 39–40; Colossians 4
October 13, Isaiah 41–42; 1 Thessalonians 1
October 14, Isaiah 43–44; 1 Thessalonians 2
October 15, Isaiah 45–46; 1 Thessalonians 3
October 16, Isaiah 47–49; 1 Thessalonians 4
October 17, Isaiah 50–52; 1 Thessalonians 5
October 18, Isaiah 53–55; 2 Thessalonians 1
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