Jerusalem Job(Book)

8/9/2019 Jerusalem Job(Book)

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JESUS JESUS

heart, and the good man is content that it should bethere, visible only to the Father in heaT7eri.3. Th e later teaching of Jesus will be referred t o in

another connection. We pass, therefore, from the

19.Healingministry :evidence.

teaching to the healing ministry. Indoing so we make a transition from asubject which is universally attractive toone which is distasteful to many because

of its association with the idea ofmimcb. The distasteis felt not only by those who do not believe in th emiraculous, but also by not a few who, whilst not ad-herents of the naturalistic school, have no sympathy withthe apologetic value attached to 'miracles ' as credentialsof revelation. Th e following statement will not bringus iuto collision with this feeling. The mirucuZoousnessof the healing ministry is not the point in question :what we are concerned with is the question of fact.Now, as to this, the healing ministry, judged bycritical tests, stands on as firm historical ground as thebest accredited parts of the teaching.

Th e tripb tradition--i.e., the narrative common to allthe three Gospels-contains no less than nine reports ofhealing acts, including the cases of the leper, themadman of Gergesa, and the dead daughter of Jairus.Then, in most of t he reports the action of Jesus is sointerwoven with unmistakably authentic words (e.g., inthe case of the palsied man) t hat the two elements

cannot be separa ted: we must take the story as itstands or reject it entirely. Th at th e healing ministrywas not only a fact but a great outstanding fact, isattested by the popularity of Jesus, and by the varioustheories which were invented to account for the remark-able phenomena. Mk. givesa realistic, lifelike descrip-tion of the connection between healing acts and the fameof Jesus. The cure ofa demoniac in the synagogue ofCapernaum (Mk. 123 ) creates a sensation even greaterthan that produced by the discourse of the new preacher.They remark to one another not only on the newdoctrine, but also on the authority which Jesus wieldsover unclean spirits (127). The result is that in theevening of t he same Sabbath day, after sunset, thepeople of the town gather at the door of the housewhere Jesus resides, bringing their sick to be healed

(132). So, again, on his return to Capernaum, afterhis preaching tour in Galilee, the report speedily spread-ing that he had come back, a crowd assembles so largeand dense as to make access to him impossible except

through the roof of the house (21-4). Fresh recollec-tions of the synagogue-sermon, but still more of theSabbath-evening cures, explain the popular enthusiasm.Th e theories were various and curious. Th e relations ofJesus had their theory, not so much indeed about thehealing acts as about the healer. Mk. reports (it isone ofhis realisms) that they thought him out of hissenses (321). Much benevolence had made hini mad.Th e beneficent deeds must have been there, else themadness would not have been imputed. Th e Pharisees,more suo, put a less friendly construction on the puzzlingphenomena, seeing in them not the acts ofa man moreendowed with love and with power over diseases(physical and mental) than was good for his own healthof body and mind , but the acts ofa man in league withthe prince of darkness, an incarnation of Beelzebub( B E E A@ ~OD ,p , Mk. 322). [See BEELZEBUL.]Thiswas a very unlikely theory, as Jesus pointed out ; butthe thing to be noted is the existence of the theory,showing, as it does, that there were facts imperiouslydemanding explanation of some sort. Yet anothertheory, too curious to be an invention of the evangelistswho report it (Mk. 616 Mt. 14z),originated in the palaceof Herod the murderer of the Baptist, and in his ownguilt -haunted mind. This Jesus of whose marvellousworks I hear is John risen again, the mysterious powersof the other world manifesting themselves through theresurrected man. Th e theory is perhaps absurd, yetby its very absurdity it witnesses to extraordinary facts

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arresting general attention, and forcing their way, how-ever unwelcome, into kings' houses.

The healing ministry of Jesus presents a problem atonce for exegesis, for theology, and for science. Th e20. Interpre- question for exegesis is, What do thetation. reports necessarily imply ? Was the

leper cured, or only pronounced clean?Was the bread that fed the thousands miraculouslyproduced, or drawn forth by the bearing of Jesus fromthe stores in possession of the crowd; or is the storymerely a symbolic embodiment of the life-giving powerof Jesus in the spiritual sphere? Was the daughter ofJairus really dead ? For theology the question is, Whatbearing has the healing ministry on the personality ofJesus? Here is certainly something to wonder at , tostart the inquiry : Wh at manner of man is this? Is itonly a question as to the manner of the man, ofaman fully endowed with powers not unexampledelsewhere, at least in kind, though lying dormant inordinary men? Or do the phenomena take us outsidethe human into the region of the strictly divine? Forscience the question is, Can the acts ascribed to Jesusbe accounted for by any known laws ofnature-e.g., by'moral therapeutics,' or the emotional treatment ofdisease? Care must be taken in attempting to answerthis question not to understate the facts. In the caseofdemouiacal possession, for example, it is making theproblem too easy to say that t hat was a merely im-aginary disease. The diseases to which the name isapplied in the Gospels were in some cases seriousenough. Th e 'demoni ac' of Gergesa was a ravingmadm an ; the boy at the foot of the hill of Tr ans-figuration was the victim of aggravated epilepsy. Th eonly door of escape open for scientific scepticism insuch cases is doubt as to the permanence of the allegedcure.

There is one thing about which we may have com-fortable certainty. Whether miraculous or not, whether... the works of a mere man, or of oneinga;tnf who is a man and more, these healing

acts a re a revelation of the love of Jesus,a manifestation of his 'enthusiasm ofharacter.

humanity,' to be placed beside the meeting with thepublicans of Capernaum as an aid to the understandingof his spirit and aims. By that meeting he showed hisinterest in a despised class of men; by the healingministry he showed his interest in a despised part of

human nature, the body, and so' evinced the healthycatholic nature of his conception of redemption. Hewas minded to do all the good in the world he could.He was able to heal men's bodies aswell as their souls ;and he did it, thereby protesting against that pagannotion of the body, a s something essentially evil andworthless, which underlies all modes of asceticism, andagainst a false spiritualism which regards disease of the'body as essential to the health of the soul. Th e heal-ing ministry shows Jesus, not as a thaumaturge benton creating astonishment, but as in a large, grand,human way the friend of men, bearing by sympathytheir sicknesses as well as their sorrows and sins as aburden in his heart14. The conjz'ct with the rehgious Zeaders of Zsrael,

called in the Gospels ' scribes and Pharisees,' formed a22. Pharisaic very essential pa rt of the public life ofhostility. Jesus. It soon brought that life to atragic end. Th e Gospel of Lk. bytoning down that -aspect, omitting much of Christ'spoleniic against Pharisaisrn, and mitigating the asperity1 Such is the view of Christ's healing ministry presented in

Mt.:witness the prophetic citation in 8 17. There IS no desirein the first Gospel to magnify the miracle. Peter's mother-in-law simply suffers from a feverish attack. The sympathy ofJesus is the point of interest, which was the same whether thefever was severe or slight. In Lk. it is agreat fever (4 38)and throughout this Gospel care is taken to magnify the poweras well as the benevolence ofJesus. Mk., on the other hand,goes so far as to say that Jesus was not able to do any mightyworks in Nazareth, because of the unbelief of the people (655').

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Jerusalem Job(Book)

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