שבת – σάββασιν (sabbasin) The Sabbath was a day of rest and prayer demanded by the earliest Hebrew traditions. A wide range of rules have been formulated over the centuries, and in different times and places, different sets of rules have been followed. Even today, disagreements crop up between conservative and liberal Jews regarding what can be tolerated on the Sabbath.
Deuteronomy makes a distinction between plucking the heads of grain and scything a field, saying that doing the first in a neighbor’s field is okay, but the second is akin to harvesting their field and that’s not okay. For the Pharisees to get wound up about something that was only marginally like getting busy on the Sabbath seems like pedantry. The real issue for the Pharisees is that they are the ones in authority, and are the final judge for what is kosher and what is not.
The setting shows that this is not Anointed Jesus, but Jesus in the Fields, the monstrous Rebel Jesus. His foolish response to the scribes says the quiet thing loud.