MATTHEW XV. 5—22 63 and chief commandment, which says, “ Honour thy father and thy mother,” ete, and on account of their avarice and covetousness they made children rebel against their parents; saying that ifa man said or did anything worthy of his father and his mother, it was thus lost what he was doing ; like this, that the gift of my hands is like the gift of the evening and of the morning; for at both times something was brought in the order of the offerings; or let this be accounted by thee as a gift, and not as a necessary obligation, as ye have supposed, when ye expect to receive from me compensations for birth and education; and honours from me are not due to you, not even one, if I do not wish to honour you; and ye do not suffer him to do aught for his father or his mother, See above, words, and here, deeds ; and about this I said that the answer was wanting : and here he has com- pleted it. One must wonder how they did not fear that the very same things would be repaid to them by their children. Others say, that because the priests and doctors of Israel taught the people, that the priests and Levites were more honourable and higher than natural fathers, and that because of this children ought not to honour nor to help their parents by words or deeds, even if they were poor, or were asked by their parents for anything as was proper, they replied, We have no duty towards you, but we have a right to take from you, because we are greater than you in honouring the priests and the House of God. And if it should happen that any of them gives anything to his father or to his mother, he says that it is as a gift, and I am acting graciously towards thee, because I have no duty towards thee. Again, they say that it is a man's duty to honour his parents as long as he does not take a wife, nor children are born to him; and after he has children, his father has no power over him, nor duty at all, because he also is himself a father, and as for him, whatever is given to him by his son is of grace and as a gift, and not as a duty. Thus it is written in their own annals, which Philo wrote, what our Lord called traditions. Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up; but He spoke about those traditions which were imagined by the doctors of the Pharisees, for He does not reject the ten commandments, that He should say that they were surely abolished and dissolved by necessity, even if they contend a myriad times against the truth. Others say whether or not it is to be understood about the laws of uncleanness, an idea arose, as in the prophet He testified about them, that I gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments, etc. Our Lord delays the cure of the daughter of the Kanaantte, because He f37a Ps, 141.2 £37b Exek.20.25