Luke 6:7

the scribes and Pharisees watched him Luke 20:20. The followers of Shammai, at that epoch the most powerful of the Pharisaic Schools, were so strict about the Sabbath, that they held it a violation of the Law to tend the sick, or even to console them on that day. Hence what the Pharisees were waiting to see was whether He was going to side with them in their Sabbatic views, or with the more lax Sadducees, whom the people detested. If he did the latter, they thought that they could ruin the popularity of the Great Prophet. But in this, as in every other instance, (1) our Lord absolutely refuses to be guided by the popular orthodoxy of the hour, however tyrannous and ostensibly deduced from Scripture; and (2) ignores every consideration of party in order to appeal to principles.