The Pharisee accusation
The Pharisees persistently accused Jesus of breaking the law about the Sabbath. Most of these accusations relate to Jesus healing people on the Sabbath. The main passages concern the man with a withered hand in the synagogue (Matthew 12:10 & Mark 3:2), a man with dropsy [swelling] at a Pharisee’s house (Luke 14:1–6), the man at the pool of Bethesda (John 5:14); the man born blind in Jerusalem (9:14–16).
Matthew 12:10 “And a man was there with a withered hand. And they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”—so that they might accuse him.” (Matthew 12:10 ESV, parallel Mark 3:2)
Luke 14:1 One Sabbath, when he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully. 2 And behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy. 3 And Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?” 4 But they remained silent. Then he took him and healed him and sent him away. 5 And he said to them, “Which of you, having a son[a] or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” 6 And they could not reply to these things. (Luke 14:1-6)
John 5:7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” 9 And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the Sabbath. 10 So the Jews[d] said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.” 11 But he answered them, “The man who healed me, that man said to me, ‘Take up your bed, and walk.’” 12 They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk’?” 13 Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, as there was a crowd in the place. 14 Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you.” 15 The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. 16 And this was why the Jews were persecuting Jesus, because he was doing these things on the Sabbath. 17 But Jesus answered them, “My Father is working until now, and I am working.” (John 5:7-17 ESV)
13 They brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. 14 Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes. 15 So the Pharisees again asked him how he had received his sight. And he said to them, “He put mud on my eyes, and I washed, and I see.” 16 Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.” But others said, “How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?” And there was a division among them. 17 So they said again to the blind man, “What do you say about him, since he has opened your eyes?” He said, “He is a prophet.” (John 9:13-17)
Additional healings that happened on the Sabbath include a demon-possessed man in Capernaum (Mark 1:21–28), followed by Simon Peter’s mother-in-law in Peter’s home (Mark 1:29–31), a crippled woman in a synagogue (Luke 13:10–17).
It is clear that the synagogue incident was a set up where the man with the withered hand had been taken there to provoke Jesus (Matthew 12:10). This is unique also as the one occasion in the New Testament where “anger” is ascribed to Jesus (by Mark) as he saw the hardness of their hearts. And yet Christ did heal the man, and explained why: “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:11). The Law also had to be understood by the principle that God required mercy not sacrifice (12:7 citing Hosea 6:6).
His disciples in the grain field.
Another example is of an action not by Jesus himself but of his disciples, which Jesus defended with the answer that he, Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath:
Matthew 12:1 At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. (parallel Mark 2:23 Luke 6:1)
Mark 2:23 One Sabbath he was going through the grainfields, and as they made their way, his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. 24 And the Pharisees were saying to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25 And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: 26 how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” 27 And he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.” (Mark 2:23-28)
The Pharisees accused them of breaking the Sabbath because they were by the Pharisee definition “harvesting” and “threshing” (Luke 6:1–2). Although in fact rabbinical interpretation from shortly after the time of Christ quantifies the rule with harvesting as relating to harvesting operations such as binding grain into sheaves or bales. For orthodox Jews today gathering fallen fruit into piles, or placing them into baskets also falls under this heading. This is even true in a private enclosed yard where carrying is permitted. And yet there is nothing in in modern orthodox Jewish rules, and certainly nothing in the law of Moses, about eating fruit off a tree or a single fallen fruit. It is the gathering and harvesting which is prohibited. All the disciples did was pick and rub their hands to eat a few grain, no different from picking berries or fruit.
The important point here though is that in all three parallel accounts we have the answer that Jesus referred to Himself as the Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:8; Mark 2:28; Luke 6:5) We can see here Jesus laying the ground for the liberation of Christians from all regulations of the Law of Moses, including the Sabbath, which were first codified by the Jerusalem council in Acts 15, which put no Sabbath command on Gentile Christians – though it is evident that the Jewish churches in Judea and Galilee were continuing to observe the Sabbath – for reasons similar to Paul’s own advice to not offend where possible.
Conclusion
Jesus, who did no sin, did not break the Law of Moses in regard to the Sabbath or in any other respect. However in his teaching he did clearly lay the ground for the fulfillment of the Law in his death and resurrection, and therefore for the liberation of Jewish Christians from the Law under the new creation. Gentile believers were never under the law to begin with.
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