Keep yourself nice

Haiku for a polite and ordered world

Is righteous living

about keeping yourself nice?

Jesus says there’s more.

The holy people

observe the old tradition:

wash before you eat.

Always wash your hands

before you eat. Good practice,

enshrined in the law.

Other rules as well;

the washing of cups and pots

and kettles of bronze.

Pharisees object

to the careless disciples

and their defiled hands.

Isaiah knew it;

the faithless hypocrisy

behind your worship.

You care about rules

much more than you care about

what God is wanting.

It’s time to get real!

It’s the things you do and say

that make you defiled.

Always there is more

than the narrow, centred fears

of the self-righteous.

© Ken Rookes 2018