NOTES for Luk 11:42-46
Jesus was quite demanding toward the Pharisees and the "lawyers" (teachers of the Torah), condemning much in their life. He is plainly condemning first of all the distortion of the system of priorities in spiritual life, which outwardly manifests itself as religious formalism.
Of course, there is nothing good for spiritual life in formalism by itself: it distracts from what matters most. But something else is worse: religious formalism provides an excellent justification for self-assertion. After all, by fulfilling all the required formalities, the one who fulfills them thinks he has every right to be proud of himself and of his achievements in spiritual life. Meanwhile Jesus reminds the people listening to Him of what matters most: justice and the love of God.
It would seem that justice and love are, in a certain sense, directly opposite things. But on closer examination the connection between them turns out to be quite clear. Indeed, if we follow the prophetic tradition (and it was the prophets who spoke most often and most extensively about God's judgment and about justice), justice can and must be connected not only with court proceedings, but also with making a decision as such. Making a choice and a decision in one situation or another, evaluating his own or someone else's actions, a person who wants to follow the Torah must first of all evaluate his own and others' actions with respect to their conformity to the norms and laws of the Torah, in particular to the commandments of the Decalogue.
A correct evaluation of one's own and others' actions, as well as of the situation as a whole, the right choice, and the resolve to follow it are, properly speaking, the foundation of normal everyday spiritual life. Meanwhile religious formalities often not only fail to help here, but directly get in the way, distracting attention from what matters most and shifting it to secondary things. Instead of thinking about whether a given action or decision conforms to God's commandment, the religious formalist begins thinking about whether it conforms to religious rules. And religious formalism distracts from the love of God no less: after fulfilling the prescribed religious rules, the one who has fulfilled them begins to think that he no longer owes anything to anyone.
Love, however, never limits itself to the framework of law and obligations: the one who loves is always ready to do more for the beloved than he is obliged to do. And the point is not even that the religious formalist withholds something from someone, although, of course, in reality that is almost always how things stand. The point is that, remaining what he is, such a formalist builds his relationship with God in the same way as with his neighbor. And he is ready to receive from Him as much as is prescribed. But what is prescribed is plainly not enough for any of us for salvation, so the formalist will have to forget about salvation. And about the Kingdom too.