More Controversy with the Pharisees: Jesus implied in the previous section (5:27–39) that his authority superseded the rules of ritual purity. Jesus demonstrates in this section that he has authority over the Sabbath. This is seen in the first episode where Jesus’ disciples picked and ate grain on the Sabbath (6:1–2), an action that Jesus defended against the charge that such activity amounted to “work” on the Sabbath (6:3–5). It reappears in the second episode when Jesus heals the man wit the withered (or paralyzed) hand and is accused of breaking the Sabbath (6:6–11).

6:1–5 When one Sabbath Jesus and his disciples walked through the grainfields and began to pick some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands and eating the kernels, they were doing what was permitted in the law of Moses …