This may be described as that which is handed down as oral teaching. It may be from God, as in 2 Thessalonians 2:15; 2 Thessalonians 3:6; and 1 Corinthians 11:2 (where it is translated “ordinance”), instruction handed down before the word of God was complete. Or it may be from man, as was the tradition of the elders of Israel, which was strongly denounced by the Lord, and declared to be a subverting of the commandments of God (Matt. 15:2-6; Mark 7:3-13; Gal. 1:14). In Colossians 2:8 it is the mere teaching of the moralists, of which much has survived to the present day. What man institutes, man holds to most tenaciously.