¹⁶ “Are you still so dull?”^(A) Jesus asked them.

¹⁰ Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. ¹¹ What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them,^(A) but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”^(B)

¹² Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”

¹³ He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted^(C) will be pulled up by the roots. ¹⁴ Leave them; they are blind guides.^[a](D) If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”^(E)

¹⁵ Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.”^(F)

¹⁶ “Are you still so dull?”^(G) Jesus asked them. ¹⁷ “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? ¹⁸ But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart,^(H) and these defile them. ¹⁹ For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.^{(I) 20} These are what defile a person;^(J) but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.”

² Preach^(A) the word;^(B) be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke^(C) and encourage^(D)—with great patience and careful instruction. ³ For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine.^(E) Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.^{(F) 4} They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.^(G)