Mk 3:1-6
1[Jesus] entered the synagogue. There was a man there who had a withered hand. 2They watched him closely to see if he would cure him on the sabbath so that they might accuse him. 3He said to the man with the withered hand, “Come up here before us.” 4Then he said to them, “Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” But they remained silent. 5Looking around at them with anger and grieved at their hardness of heart, he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out and his hand was restored. 6The Pharisees went out and immediately took counsel with the Herodians against him to put him to death.
GRIEVED AT THEIR HARDNESS OF HEART: The Pharisees watch Jesus closely, ready to accuse him if he cures on a Sabbath. Jesus, in turn, accuses them of “hardness of heart” (Greek porosis tes kardias). Hardness of heart implies rebellion against the Lord, an unwillingness to listen to and be led by him. Alluding to the desert incidents when the Israelites quarreled with God and put him to the test, the psalmist wishes for an obedient heart: “O, that today you would hear his voice; do not harden your hearts as at Meribah, as on the day of Massah in the desert” (Ps 95:7-8). Elsewhere, Jesus declares that Moses permitted divorce and the writing of a bill of divorce in Israel “because of the hardness of your hearts” (Mk 10:5), which alludes to the people’s incapacity to live up to the will of God regarding the union of man and woman.
Here the Pharisees harden their hearts and close their minds against Jesus. They see Jesus as totally undermining their interpretation of the Law, their piety, and their actions. For them, Jesus breaks the tradition and confronts the authority. They do not rejoice that a man is delivered from a state of distress because it is done on a Sabbath. Ironically, they, the guardians of the Sabbath, determine to do harm and to kill—to let the man with a withered hand continue to suffer and to put Jesus to death. They reject life and redemption. This is the bitter fruit of that hardness of heart which provokes in Jesus both anger and godly sorrow.