“... Here the disciples ask questions about the trio of fasting, prayer and almsgiving, a traditional combination in both early Jewish and Christian piety (cf. e.g. Tob. 12.8; Matt. 6.1–18; 2 Clem. 16.4), and about the topic of clean and unclean foods. Rather than explicitly condemning the trio (as happens in GTh 14), here Jesus deflects the questions, probably thereby relativising these practices. Traditional Jewish and Jewish-Christian piety which consists of fasting, prayer, almsgiving and kosher eating should be rejected in favour of a simple, two-part moral code about words and deeds, involving an approximation to the ninth commandment and the golden rule in its negative form. The motivation to this ethical living is grounded in the omniscience of the divine or in the future revelation of deeds (6.4–6). GTh 6 (in conjunction with 14) thus belongs in a group of sayings critical of the institutions and customs of traditional Judaism, and of the strands of Christianity which inherited those institutions and customs from Judaism (cf. OT Scripture in GTh 52; circumcision in 53, the temple in 71; perhaps ritual washing in 89). ...”