Matthew 9:9-13 (NRSV)
The Call of Matthew
(Mk 2.13—17; Lk 5.27—32)
9 As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up and followed him.
10 And as he sat at dinner in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with him and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” 12 But when he heard this, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 13 Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.”
Matthew 9:18-26 (NRSV)
A Girl Restored to Life and a Woman Healed
(Mk 5.21—43; Lk 8.40—56)
18 While he was saying these things to them, suddenly a leader of the synagogue came in and knelt before him, saying, “My daughter has just died; but come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.” 19 And Jesus got up and followed him, with his disciples. 20 Then suddenly a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his cloak, 21 for she said to herself, “If I only touch his cloak, I will be made well.” 22 Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well. 23 When Jesus came to the leader’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, 24 he said, “Go away; for the girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. 25 But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl got up. 26 And the report of this spread throughout that district.
Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26 contain the story of the calling of Matthew and the story of the daughter of the leader of the synagogue and her healing and the story of the woman suffering from a hemorrhage. Each of the stories have their source in Mark.
Matthew 9:9-13 is a story about Jesus involving the call of Matthew and the matter of eating with sinners. The source of the story is Mark.[1] We can see how the disciple gathering by Jesus relates to the controversy he generated. Part of the ministry of Jesus in Galilee involves the testing and crossing of sacred boundaries in religion and culture. One cannot confine or domesticate the reign of God to any one piety or tradition. 9 As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man called Matthew. Mark 2:14 names him Levi, son of Alphaeus. Matthew is sitting at the tax booth. Only the gospel of Matthew connects the name Matthew with the tax collector that Jesus meets at his booth and recruits to be a disciple. This would make Matthew the only other disciple in the synoptics to have a description of his call in the narrative alongside that of Peter, Andrew, James and John (Matthew 4:18-22; Mark 1:16-20; Luke 4:38-5:11). And he said to him, “Follow me,” as Jesus said to the first disciples. And he got up and followed him. Given the social standing of those who collected taxes among the Jewish people for the Romans, Matthew may well have been ripe for a career change. The response is immediate. For him, this response represents a major career change! The point is to provide to the reader a typical or ideal Christian response.
Such a call places the mission of Jesus at odds with the prevailing religious and cultural mores of his time. Jewish contemporaries viewed tax collectors as crooked and unclean since they were the intermediaries of the Roman taxation system. Levi, as an occupant of a tax office, would have been a bottom feeder within this system. As such, he would not have profited like Zacchaeus from a taxation franchise but would have probably been a mere employee within such an operation. In this sense, Levi is in social double jeopardy. He is too low in the tax system to benefit from its graft. Yet, he receives the taint on his life and character by his association with it. To just such an outsider the invitation of Jesus to follow comes. Understandably, Matthew takes him up on the offer.
Few people make important life choices with any degree of decisiveness. We backtrack here and compromise there. We lack the courage to stand by our decisions. The result is that many of us remain in a continual state of anxiety. Thus, we may have the attitude of those without a plan for our lives. We have the day-to-day attitude of receiving whatever comes our way. We may have a fatalistic and defeatist attitude. We have no clearly defined opinion of the direction of our lives. We can then cling so strongly and stubbornly to an idea that we become fanatical. Our vacillation is a symptom that we can trace back to our fear of responsibility. Our indecision is the fruit.[2]
Is the risen Lord calling us to re-evaluate how we are spending our time, our lives, and our careers? Is he challenging us to break down and bust up the barrier between office and vocation, between what we do for a living and what we do to serve God? Is he inviting us to use our time, talents and treasures for more than business building and wealth creation? While we certainly can serve God wherever we are, we may be at a Matthew moment in our lives. We have been going along with what is familiar, but the risen Lord may call us to embark upon a path toward something greater. The greater issue is not so much career, but the call and challenge to become increasingly like Christ.
Matthew 9:10-13 is a pronouncement story concerning eating with sinners. We read of how the disciple gathering by Jesus contributes to the controversy he will have with religious authorities. It may even seem like a mundane thing, yet, the company Jesus keeps generates controversy. Part of the ministry of Jesus in Galilee involves testing and crossing sacred boundaries in religion and culture. He shows and teaches us as readers that one can confine or domesticate the rule of God. 10 And as he sat at dinner in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with him and his disciples, for which see also Mark 2:15-17; Luke 5:29-32. We should note the importance of the inclusion of tax gatherers and sinners in the table fellowship, which guarantees participation in eschatological salvation. The participation is from God. It means the rescuing of the lost. Those who accept the message are no longer outcasts. They share in the salvation of the rule of God. The presence of salvation also relates to the removal of the barrier that separates from God.[3] The Pharisees condemn social intercourse with tax collectors and sinners. The second part of this passage centers on Jesus’ teaching about his ministry to societal outcasts. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” This act might have constituted a violation of ritual purity laws. Historically, the Pharisees were probably interested in Jesus because their group had much in common with his mission. Both were reform movements within Judaism that challenged the temple system and the ways in which that system had served to confine the expression of their faith. As a domestically based tradition, Phariseeism was very much concerned with table practice, the serving of meals and the extension of hospitality. Mark Twain called it “being good in the worst sense of the word.” Many of us look down at others: homosexuals, drinkers, fundamentalist Christians, loud teenagers, and so on. Jesus did not do that. Jesus invites us to be understanding with others and the issues with which they struggle. We all have them. He invites us to be an example of accepting love, so that others may wish to be like us. We can note again that his table fellowship with tax collectors and sinners was part of what surrounded the ministry of Jesus with ambivalence that led to rejection and offense of his person.[4]
The story arises out of the controversy Jesus had with the Judaism of his day and had continuing significance as the church in Israel continued in its struggle with Judaism. The matter of table fellowship remained a struggle within the early church, for even Cephas, who had come to Antioch, ate with Gentiles until representatives from James came into the city. He withdrew table fellowship out of his fear of those parts of the early church who thought that circumcision should still be an important Christian rite (Galatians 2:11-12).[5]
12 But when he heard this, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. This saying is a secular proverb that Jesus uses here to instruct the religious people of his day.[6] Jesus makes it clear that only by being willing to engage those who are considered impure can one reach them with a message of a better way of living. 13 Go and learn, a typical form of expression by Pharisees and scribes of the first century, what this means in Hosea 6:6, ‘I desire mercy (Ἔλεος, as in LXX, while Hebrew is chesed, a common translation because mercy was an important aspect of practicing covenant love and loyalty) not sacrifice.’ A saying not found in Mark’s account. By eating with persons who, though viewed as sinners whose near proximity might render one ritually impure, were nonetheless members of the covenant people, this saying is placing their entitlement to the covenant loyalty of other Jews above the need for other Jews to preserve the ritual purity that would allow them to participate in temple life. For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.” Jesus does not categorically deny the validity of the Pharisees' faith. Indeed, he refers to them as "the righteous." They are not outside the project of the rule of God. In fact, Jesus characterizes them as already inside. Therefore, he is not concerned with them. His concern is to broaden the circle to include those whom the Pharisees have placed outside, to expand the table, and to call more folks to live in the present reality of the rule of God. The saying reflects solid early Christian teaching concerning the reason God sent Jesus. Yes, Jesus came to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10) and Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners (I Timothy 1:15). The contrast between "religious folks" and "sinners" reflects Jesus' social habits: he elects to associate with toll collectors and prostitutes, but not in a way that meant he refused to associate also with the socially respectable. Jesus wants his contemporaries to see that the reality of the rule of God is near and among them, especially in those religious authorities have labeled as outsiders. We can see the rule of God in those with whom we associate around food, friends, and family. He wants his righteous contemporaries to see, know, and taste the goodness of the rule of God among us. Yet, Jesus gave offense due to those included in his table fellowship. The meals Jesus held or shared characterized his coming and the conduct of his disciples. When he accepted invitations from others, he made known his readiness to grant fellowship with him to those who issued the invitation. Others felt this to be especially scandalous in some cases because by his participation the table fellowship that he granted or accepted became a sign of the presence of the reign of God that he proclaimed and a sign of the acceptance of the other participants into the future community of salvation. The granting of acceptance of table fellowship by Jesus removed everything that separated people from God and his salvation. It meant the forgiveness of sins, so that table fellowship was a real symbol of fellowship with God and of participation in the future of the reign of God.[7]
I expect that there are people who would identify most closely with Matthew. I am afraid I am not one of those people. I have been in the church since I was ten years old. Every moment since I have thought of myself as a Christ or at least as someone trying to be one. Mom and Pastor Joe were instrumental in those early years.
Therefore, I have probably never thought of myself as among the "lost." Of course, that means I probably have not thought too much about myself as among the "found." I suppose you must be lost in order to be found. I cannot point to anytime in my life when I in any real sense of the word was lost from Jesus and the church. I have always been here.
However, I am sure some people who read this story can identify with Matthew and the lost. When you sing “Amazing grace,” you really mean it when you sing, “I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
I will be honest with you. Something about me envies those of you who were lost and have been found by Christ. I envy you because you have experienced one of the great miracles of the Christian faith, the miracle of the way that God graciously reaches out to seek and save the lost. When Jesus says that he has come to seek and to save the lost, he is exemplifying one of the great claims of the faith of Israel. That is what the Old Testament prophets saw themselves as doing. They were proclaiming God’s word to the lost, the lost sheep of the house of Israel, those within Israel who had forgotten, or perhaps had never heard, the truth that they are chosen by God, selected for a special mission in the world. Jesus is acting like one of those Old Testament prophets, proclaiming and enacting the kingdom of God for the lost.
I would like to say that I see myself with Jesus, inviting the lost to come to Christ. After all, I am a preacher. I hope I have stood with Jesus in order to make that invitation more often than I think.
The challenging word for me is that I may be among the Pharisees more often than I care to admit. I do not need a physician to heal the sickness of my soul. God help me to see that I may well be more lost than I know. In fact, behind the words of Jesus is the implication that sometimes the sickest of the sick are those who do not know how sick they really are. Have I, who speak a great deal about grace, truly experienced it to the depths of my being? When I hear words like conversion, repentance, and change, have I experienced grace in my own life in a radical, utterly life-changing way?
In May of 1945, American troops entered the German town of Nordhausen. With them was a young soldier, Stephen Shields. There, they liberated the infamous concentration camp where thousands of Hungarian Jews had been murdered. At Nordhausen, there were no gas chambers. Rather, prisoners were simply worked to death in an ammunitions factory, starved and exhausted, and then their bodies were dumped in ovens and buried in mass graves.
Battle-hardened soldiers were stunned at what they saw in Nordhausen. A few hundred prisoners were all that remained and these were walking skeletons. The skeleton-like figures had not the strength even to speak. When the liberators opened the doors of the camp, the prisoners silently moved toward the doors and started walking toward the town of Nordhausen. “Hundreds, perhaps thousands of the former inmates were walking toward the town in a great mass, through the fields and on either side of the road. They were almost totally silent. The only sound they made was the rustling of their long, ragged coats against the grass of the fields. They looked like an army of scarecrows, a phalanx of living cadavers.”
Despite all the horrible scenes which were encountered at the camp, Shields says that the worst sight he saw was shortly thereafter. On the road between the concentration camp and the little village, the ghostly prisoners were encountered by two German teenagers, “They appeared to be about 15 years old, and each wore the brown uniform of the Hitler Youth. They were blond, pink-cheeked, and healthy looking. As they passed along our column, when they were almost opposite my jeep, they suddenly saw the vanguard of the starving Jews, who were coming up behind us and were now walking on the highway. The two boys stopped in their tracks, then, incredibly, they began to laugh. They nudged each other, pointed at the Jews, made comments, and continued to laugh uproariously. It was as if the devil himself were hurling a final insult at those tormented people. We were dumb- founded and enraged. In desperation I turned to the lieutenant. “Sir! What should we do? Shoot them?” Shields remembered that incident as the worst experience of all of the war, a vivid depiction of the banality of human evil.[9]
Matthew 9:18-26 is a story of the healing of the daughter of the leader of the synagogue and the healing of a woman. The source is Mark. Here is another story that provides scholars with fertile ground for a discussion of the relationship between the first three gospels.[10]
18 While he was saying these things to them, suddenly a leader of the synagogue, Matthew neglecting to identify as Jairus, came in and knelt before him, saying, “My daughter has just died. Mark and Luke state that the girl is sick or near death (Mark 5:22-23; Luke 8:41-42). In Matthew the child is already dead, so Matthew skips the account in which messengers from Jairus’ house come out to announce that the girl has died (Mark 5:35-36; Luke 8:49-50). But come and lay your hand on her, and she will live.” People in deep distress, even one confronted with the death of a daughter, have faith in the power of Jesus. The leader of the synagogue is not just one of the crowd. He is a respected, powerful synagogue leader. This community and synagogue leader undoubtedly used his personal importance to part the crowd before him and stride directly up to Jesus. Yet, once he reaches Jesus, the moment transforms this leader into nothing more than a desperate father. This leader is an illustration of the age‑old wisdom: stay with the one who brought you to the dance. His faith is up front. As the president of a local synagogue, he goes out on a limb by crediting Jesus with special power or resources. 19 And Jesus got up and followed him, with his disciples.
20 Then suddenly a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years. If ever there were a direct opposite to the respectable figure of Jairus, this woman is it. First, she is, of course, a woman — but more than that, she appears to be alone. She is unclean. In other words, for twelve years Jewish tradition has banned this woman from sites of public worship or any contact with sacred or holy places and things. The woman remains forever anonymous; she is poor, sick, and unclean due to both her gender and her illness. The woman's illness prevents her from being active in the community since it always renders her as ritually impure, according to Leviticus 15:25-27. In effect, her condition segregates her and places her "outside" the people of God.[11] In addition, not only is the woman ill, but she is also poor. The woman has not only suffered greatly physically, but has also wasted her money, and instead of getting better, has gotten worse. Physicians have been unable to help her, but now the true physician will remedy her situation.[12] Here is a reminder that in the ancient world, the doctor and priest were in close relation and both were to act in respect for and preservation of life. The doctor does not always heal. In fact, if the doctor were an absolute in this matter, he or she would become an unpleasant stranger.[13] We need to pay attention to the structure of how this healing takes place. She came up behind him and touched the fringe of his cloak. With its mention of the tassels, depicts Jesus as a Jew faithful to the Law in contrast to other people. She was thinking that if she touched his cloak, Jesus would make her well. We find Matthew emphasizing the shyness of the woman. Oral tradition forbade a woman from touching the tallith of someone who was not a member of her family. Nevertheless, the fringe of the garment of Jesus is exactly what this woman reaches out for as she seeks healing. 21 For she said to herself, “If I only touch his cloak, I will be made well.” 22 Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well. Matthew emphasizes the words with Jesus promises her healing because of her faith. Jesus speaks the restorative words of healing and peace to her. The restorative words of Jesus finalize her healing. The story of the hemorrhaging woman serves as an example of the kind of faith true disciples must maintain. What does all that say about faith? Who knows! We might venture at least this much. Faith is the conviction that resources are present to meet the needs of this moment. The story of this woman is one of long illness, personal struggles, failure to find healing, and enforced poverty. However, all these negatives only serve to point up her story's positive thrust and focus ‑‑ her tremendous faith in Jesus. Despite her appearance, her gender and her status, this woman surprisingly provides an ideal model of faithfulness. The issue of faith becomes a highly personal question. Do you or do you not believe that you have the resources you need to face the challenges of your life as a follower of Jesus? We might have a general answer. Of course, our faith is in Jesus. Yet, when a moment comes that calls for that faith we say we have in general, what is our response? Our Yes may come hesitatingly and fearfully. Yet, in our better moments, the faith is there.
This woman is desperate and lonely. Do we truly see the desperate and lonely people around us? Do we see ourselves as in that situation? We know that the living Christ responds with compassion because Jesus of Nazareth responded with compassion. The followers of Jesus today are the hands and feet of Jesus as they respond to the desperate and lonely today.
23 When Jesus came to the leader’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd making a commotion, he was seeing the beginning of the funeral. The funeral is not only for the family that is experiencing acute grief; it is for all whom lives this death touches. All of us are either dealing with past grief or else preparing to grieve. The sun may shine for you today. However, life being what it is, you know that tomorrow may bring clouds. The public expression of grief is a powerful reminder of the sting of death. The occasion took place at the man’s house. We see the type of sorrow one would expect when a young person dies. Some people protest that funerals are barbaric holdovers from the past. Some would encourage us to celebrate the life rather than mourn the death, and so on. Celebrate the life, of course, but face up to the death of that life. Weep all the tears you have in you to weep because whatever may happen next, if anything does, this has happened. Something precious and irreplaceable has ended and something in you has ended with it. Funerals put a period after the sentence’s last word. They close a door. They let you get on with your life.
Surprisingly, 24 he said, “Go away; for the girl is not dead but sleeping.” As if to throw seeds of doubt into the crowd, Jesus suggests that the little girl is not dead. She is only sleeping. This red herring type of suggestion will allow the crowd to doubt the miraculous event about to take place —, which appears to be Jesus’ intent. Yet, sleep is the same thing Jesus said when his friend Lazarus died. Death is not any more permanent than sleep is permanent is what he meant apparently. That is not to say he took death lightly. When he heard about Lazarus, he wept, and it is hard to imagine his doing any differently here. However, if death is the closing of one door, he seems to say, it is the opening of another one. And they laughed at him.The leader of the synagogue does not allow the attitude of the crowd to make him backtrack on his confidence in Jesus. He does not say much, but he does not say "forget it," either. Jesus was face to face with the cult of death. Death was something that they all thought a self-evident law of reason and custom to regard as an unassailable face. Jesus denied both in saying that she only sleeps. 25 But when the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took her by the hand, and the girl got up. This story emphasizes what faith is and what faith can experience. 26 And the report of this spread throughout that district. As Matthew relates the story, the emphasis is upon the wonder working power of Jesus that points to the divine sanction of the authority of Jesus. Jesus has great confidence in his resurrection power.
This man is religious, respectable, and educated. He might be like a middle-class person in our world. He is also a desperate father. Beyond the external appearances of security and means, he had an anxious inner life. We know the living Christ turns to similar such persons today with compassion because Jesus of Nazareth responded with compassion.
In the crisis of the moment, Jesus invites the leader of the synagogue to have faith. It was fashionable to emphasize, as James Fowler, Paul Tillich and others were doing, that faith in its formal structure is the same whether you believe in Buddha, Allah, Moses, Jesus, Big Ernie or even in yourself. Fair enough, but we must face the content question. Who really can supply the resources for which the human heart aches?
This story also highlights the great power Jesus had. He will face great adversity in the course of his life that will lead him to the cross. He will remain in relationship with his heavenly Father and he will remain faithful, living out his life in obedience to the call of God upon his life. Yet, his life also exhibits power. Most of us recognize that life is about facing adversity and overcoming obstacles. Yet, if you want to have a test of the character of a person, give the person power.[14] How will the person use the power they have? The police officer has power. The FBI and other law enforcement agencies have resources at their disposal to exert great power that can destroy the lives of innocent people. The movie “Richard Jewell” (2019) demonstrates such abuse in a powerful way. The politician and bureaucrat have the power of government behind them. Abuse of that power can bring great damage to citizens who have done nothing to deserve it. Jesus throughout the course of his life shows how to use the power one has to give direction to the lost, healing to the sick, forgiveness to the sinner, and liberation to those imprisoned.
[1] This story becomes an interesting an interesting moment in the discussion of the relationship between the first three gospels. In Mark, the name of this disciple is Levi. The change, according to some, occurs because Levi does not occur in any of the lists of the disciples. Luke calls him Levi, while Mark calls him “Levi, son of Alphaeus” (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27). Neither Luke nor Mark lists a Levi among the twelve apostles, though all three synoptic gospels refer to a son of Alphaeus among them — James son of Alphaeus (Matthew 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:15). The absence of Levi from Mark and Luke’s lists is understandable in that they both make it clear that the twelve apostles were chosen out of a much larger group of disciples (Mark 3:13-14; Luke 6:13). Matthew, however, does not say this. Although Matthew 5:1 mentions an indeterminate number of disciples with Jesus at the Sermon on the Mount, 10:1-2 simply states that he summoned his twelve disciples, and then lists the names of the twelve apostles as if the two groups comprised the same 12 people. If this were Matthew’s view, it might explain why he replaced the name Levi with the name of someone listed among the twelve. This begs the question, however, of why he did not rename Levi James son of Alphaeus in that Mark calls him Levi the son of Alphaeus. Ancient tradition would say that Matthew calls the tax collector Matthew for a very simple reason — he recognized the story as being about himself.
[2] Johann Arnold, Seeking Peace (Pennsylvania: The Plough Publishing House, 1998), 140.
[3] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 332.
[4] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 2, 335-6.
[5] Galatians 2:11-12 11 But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood self-condemned; 12 for until certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But after they came, he drew back and kept himself separate for fear of the circumcision faction.
[6] There is a parallel in Gospel Fragment 1224 5:2, which says, “Those in good health don’t need a doctor.” Some scholars think it may reflect an earlier version of the saying than we find in Mark.
[7] Pannenberg, Systematic Theology Volume 3, 284-5.
[8] Inspired by William Willimon, Pulpit Resource 1999
[9] American Heritage, December, 1989, p. 83–93, “Triumph and Tragedy.” by Stephen Shields
[10] The briefer account in Matthew places greater emphasis upon the shyness of the woman and the promise of Jesus that healing has come through faith. In verse 23-25, Matthew also has a briefer account than Mark on the healing of the daughter. It also removes many of the elements that focus upon the miracle. Matthew’s version is very similar to those of Mark and Luke, although he abbreviates both parts of the story fairly substantially. According to Mark, the woman with the hemorrhage is said to be immediately healed upon touching Jesus (5:29), but Jesus still tells her to “go in peace, and be healed” in verse 34, as if he did not know she had been healed already. Also, Mark and Luke make much over the fact that Jesus doesn’t see the woman he has healed in the crowd but simply feels power coming out of him and needs to stop and ask who has touched him (Mark 5:30-33; Luke 8:43-47). Matthew solves both problems of Jesus seeming to have insufficient knowledge of events, by simply having Jesus see the woman right away and declare her healed as soon as she touches him (Matthew 9:22).
One final aspect of this dual miracle account is unusual in Matthew, namely its placement following Jesus’ teaching on fasting. Mark’s order of events (followed by Luke) proceeds from the calling of Levi, to three teachings (on the inclusion of outcasts, fasting, and the Sabbath), the healing of the man with a withered hand and the listing of the twelve (Mark 2:15-3:19; Luke 5:29-6:16). The raising of the child and the healing of the woman with the hemorrhage do not occur in Mark until chapter 5:22-43 and in Luke until chapter 8:40-56. Matthew follows Mark’s order up to the teaching on fasting but then inserts the resurrection and healing story of Matthew 9:18-26, the healing of two blind men, a mute, and only then proceeds to the list of the twelve apostles. Matthew postpones the teaching on the Sabbath and the healing of the man with withered hand until chapter 12:1-14. For some scholars, Matthew’s transposition of these two miracle stories seems odd in that Jesus’ teaching on the Sabbath, which places mercy for the man with the withered hand above considerations of correct Sabbath observance, would seem to flow well from Matthew’s citation of Hosea 6:6, and he is the only evangelist who cites Hosea 6:6! Perhaps Matthew did not want to follow a story in which Jesus’ respect for ritual purity laws was questioned with a story that called into question his respect for the Sabbath. Instead, these two controversial teachings on Jewish law are separated by stories of Jesus’ miracles, one involving the resurrecting of a prominent Jewish leader’s child, perhaps so that Jesus’ power as a miracle worker might demonstrate his divinely sanctioned authority.
[11] (Francis Moloney, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary, [Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 2002], 107).
[12] (Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark's Story of Jesus, [New York: MaryKnoll, 2003], 201).
[13] Barth, Church Dogmatics III.4 [55.1] 361.
[14] “Nearly all men can stand adversity,” said Abraham Lincoln, “but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.”
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