Mark 7

"For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands in a special way, holding the tradition of the elders. When they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash. And there are many other things which they have received and hold, like the washing of cups, pitchers, copper vessels, and couches." vv.3-4

Read chapter 7.
This first part of the chapter is about traditions.  Getting caught up in traditions of man than what was really going on in their heart.  The argument going on here is not so much if peoples hands are clean or if they are cleaning household things well, but about if they were doing the ritual or ceremonial practice that was developed.   The Pharisees see that the Lord's disciples are not doing this and therefore must be unacceptable if Jesus were to be the Messiah.  The word for "washing" here is the Greek word for baptism.  This throws a little confusion here to understanding of the word baptism with what tradition seems like today.  It can't mean salvation as surely cups, pitchers, couches can't be saved.  It's not an immersion as that would ruin a couch if it were immersed in water or mean sparkling as that would hardly clean the dishes.  So what does it mean to baptize these things, inanimate objects?  It's hard to say.  I believe that baptism means identification and possibly here that these vessels were identified for a specific task, ritual, ceremony.  What do you think baptism of these things mean here?  What traditions do you see people get caught up with that leads to scrutinizing of others?