Destroying the Law?

I have not come to destroy the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfill them. Matthew 5:17

The accusation was out there. Jesus was destroying the Law. All that forgiveness running around! Forgiving tax collectors like Matthew. Absolving whores like Mary from Magdala. I mean, really now, like, you'd think just ANYbody could be forgiven!

The Pharisees didn't approve. It seemed to them like Jesus was destroying the Law, overturning it, doing away with it. Of course, He wasn't: He had come to fulfill it, to do it perfectly, both in doing what was required and by taking the punishment for man's breaking it.

Still, though, they saw "too much forgiveness" flowing freely, and they didn't approve. Why? They loved the Law. Not in the sense that the Psalmist loved the Law (like in Psalm 119). They loved the Law as a way to curry God's favor. Oh sure, sure, of course they needed forgiveness and God's grace and all that jazz. But still, they knew God liked 'em because they tried so hard to be good and only had occasional oopses. Not like those sinners. So from their perspective, Jesus had indeed come to destroy the Law.

But in reality, Jesus wasn't destroying the Law itself. He only came to destroy their kind of love of the Law, their reliance on the Law, their trust in the Law.