Corban

Corban, properly an offering to God in fulfilment of any vow. This might either be of some possession devoted to God, redeemable by an equivalent in money, or it might be a pledge to deprive one's self of something lawful in itself, as wine, for a longer or shorter period. A man might so interdict himself by vow, not only from enjoying anything himself, but also from giving it to others, and thus many of the old Jews juggled their consciences into getting rid of natural responsibilities, as the support of decayed parents, and the like. It was this miserable selfishness, under the thin garb of religious hypocrisy, that our Lord rebukes in the Scribes and Pharisees (Matt. xv. 5; Mark, vii. 11).