Healing and Superstition
Image: Martineric @ Flickr
Mark 5:21-43 Expand passage
21When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake. 22Then one of the synagogue rulers, named Jairus, came there. Seeing Jesus, he fell at his feet 23and pleaded earnestly with him, "My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live." 24So Jesus went with him.
A large crowd followed and pressed around him. 25And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse.27When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28because she thought, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed." 29Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
30At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?"
31"You see the people crowding against you," his disciples answered, "and yet you can ask, 'Who touched me?' "
32But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. 33Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering."
35While Jesus was still speaking, some men came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue ruler. "Your daughter is dead," they said. "Why bother the teacher any more?"
36Ignoring what they said, Jesus told the synagogue ruler, "Don't be afraid; just believe."
37He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John the brother of James. 38When they came to the home of the synagogue ruler, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly. 39He went in and said to them, "Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep." 40But they laughed at him.
After he put them all out, he took the child's father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. 41He took her by the hand and said to her, "Talitha koum!" (which means, "Little girl, I say to you, get up!" ). 42Immediately the girl stood up and walked around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. 43He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.
The Editor of Crossring assures me that it was a coincidence that I was assigned two passages about healing, given that I happen to work in a hospital. However, whilst preparing, I noticed that the gospel writer clearly doesn’t have a wonderful opinion of the doctors of his day. He refers to the woman in the passage as having ‘suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she had grown worse’. Maybe someone is trying to tell me something…
We’ve now reached over half way in this year’s Mark Marathon, and as I was reading through the gospel thus far (with the help of a commentary) I was struck by the fact that Jesus considers that his primary goal is to preach. When he is first mobbed by the crowd seeking healing (Mk 1v37-38) he withdraws from that place and goes somewhere else. Mark continually emphasises that as the crowd drew round him in various places, he began to teach them. Perhaps I should have read Simon Lucas’ article ‘Listening to God’s word’ more carefully, as he makes this very point. However while he often withdrew from the crowds, I don’t doubt his compassion for the sick in first century Palestine or for those who are ill today. Illness is a result of the fall, and Christ is deeply saddened and angry by anything that happens as a result of sin. However faith healing can take on mystical, magical properties which can detract from its real purpose: to glorify God and restore his natural order. Jesus tries to dispel these myths in this passage.
The first example is found in how he reacts to the woman. Western medicine and western ideas mean we no longer regard menstrual bleeding as being unclean, however in the Ancient Jewish world this illness would have caused not only physical but also conjugal, social and spiritual suffering for her. There was physical suffering because of the bleeding and also the chronic anaemia. Conjugal because she would have been unable to have children and may have been divorced by her husband, as he would have made himself unclean by touching her. Similarly she would have been a social outcast, and because she was unclean she would not be able to attend temple. She was desperate for a cure. And in a mixture of fear, hope and superstition she came behind him to touch his cloak and was healed. She was correct in her belief that he could heal her if she simply touched him, however it was not his clothing that held the power, but his divine authority to heal. Jesus is aware of how superstition in healing can become entangled with true belief and is anxious to curtail this where possible. Not only because his tunic does not have any magic powers, but also because superstition gets in the way of complete healing. If the woman had simply gone her own way, she would not have encountered Christ properly, or heard him say ‘Daughter, go in peace, your faith has healed you’. I think that his words would have completed the healing of the mental anguish which doesn’t fully disappear even with complete physical healing. Modern medicine is amazing, but only Christ can completely heal. By resorting to superstition we lose some of the power of encountering Christ face to face.
The second example, where Jesus shows that he is not a magician seeking the crowds is that he keeps the healing of the little girl as quiet as possible. This is perhaps in contrast to the resurrection of Lazarus and the widow’s son. I am not sure why this was done in private and the other two so much in public; perhaps Lazarus was raised later in his ministry, when he was not so concerned about keeping his more spectacular healings secret. But for whatever reason he only takes the child’s parents with him into her bedroom. And again it doesn’t take any magical rituals to raise her – he simply takes her by the hand and says to her ‘little girl, get up’. All very natural and ordinary, yet with supernatural results.
In the same way that Jesus spoke to the girl naturally, in her own tongue, so he will work in our own lives in a very natural way, if we are open to this. As a teenager and in my early twenties, I thought that I would be changed and become more on fire for Christ through going away to conferences and going to meetings. Maybe I had an almost supernatural belief that if I sang loud enough, raised my arms and came up to the front at the altar call, something amazing would happen. But surprisingly enough these experiences, while very good for my Christian life, did not always ensure that I would not be grumpy with my parents, leave my homework books in my locker and fall asleep in Chemistry lesson. Or that I would tie myself up in knots about boyfriends and exams. The memories that stay with me now of things that formed me are of friends who were there for me when I doubted, teachers who encouraged in the Christian Union and parents who funded the conferences (and put up with the miracles and the lost books!). These are people who Christ has worked through, but maybe not with amazing miracles. He can heal us of worries and burdens every day in a natural way, not just as a once off at a large gathering with music and speaker. It’s easy to forget this though, when we seem surrounded by difficulties.
There will be times though, that the difficulties seem too great. Although I am fortunate to have never suffered for my faith, or faced the death of a parent, I can see every day the effects of suffering on individuals and families. In the same way that the little girl was not dead, but ‘asleep’, those who have died are not dead, but asleep, and will be raised, fully healed, in the life to come. All of creation will be restored to its natural order. Jesus’ healings and other miracles point to a time when his salvation for us will be fully revealed, and when we will be with him forever.
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