Mark 2:23

And it came to pass, that he was going on the sabbath day through the grainfields; and the disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears.

THE CHARGE OF SABBATH-BREAKING

The Pharisees blew this incident up as a violation of the sabbath. It was, of course, a violation to thresh wheat on the sabbath; but the charge that Jesus' disciples' plucking a few ears of wheat, shelling them in their hands, and eating a bite as they passed along - the charge that made such actions threshing wheat on the sabbath was absolutely ridiculous. It would have been just as reasonable, if they had knocked off a little dew on the ground, as they walked along, to have charged them with irrigating land on the sabbath! It is crystal clear that Jesus' disciples did not in any sense whatever violate the sabbath laws of God; what they did violate was the silly Pharisaical rules which those hypocrites had imposed upon people INSTEAD of God's law.