Reading
Mark 5:21-34
21 When 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. 22 Then one of the synagogue leaders, named Jairus, came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet. 23 He 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.” 24 So Jesus went with him.
A large crowd followed and pressed around him. 25 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26 She 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. 27 When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28 because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” 29 Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
30 At 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?’ ”
32 But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. 33 Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34 He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”
Meditation
Rejected by the Gadarenes, Jesus moves to the western side of the Sea of Galilee and is immediately surrounded by the crowd. A synagogue leader approaches him to ask for the healing of his seriously ill daughter. The synagogue leaders were officers who presided over the group of elders and took care of administrative details, such as deciding who would read and pray the scriptures during service. The position was held in high regard.
To restore life to his daughter who is dying, Jairus strips himself of the role he plays and completely entrusts himself to Jesus. The laying on of hands, requested by Jairus, is a gesture that recurs frequently in the Gospel of Mark and serves to transmit the healing force.
Within this episode, another one is embedded. That of a woman suffering from continuous bleeding which, in addition to causing her a long-suffering, made her ritually impure (Lv 15:25-27); she was prevented from any act of worship and any contact with people; her life was therefore deprived of a relationship with God and with humanity. The failure of the numerous and costly medical therapies to which she has undergone leads to putting all faith in healers. Respectful of the prohibition established by law for her ritual impurity, the woman does not touch Jesus directly, but she merely touches his cloak.
Jesus' question - "Who touched my cloak?" - It is not a reproach, nor is it due to ignorance, but to the will to bring out the figure of the woman from the indistinct background of the crowd so that she can give testimony of her faith. While the woman prostrates herself before Jesus, recognizing him in this way as Lord, he recognizes her as her daughter (v. 34), generated by the faith.
Both in the case of Jairus - who asks Jesus to lay his hands on his sick daughter - and in the case of the woman with a hemorrhage, the intimate conviction is rewarded that physical contact with Jesus, for those who believe, has the power to heal. That it is the faith - which lies behind the physical gesture - that causes the healing is attested by the words of Jesus: "Daughter, your faith has saved you" (v. 34). The woman is not simply healed by her faith, but she obtains integral salvation, of the body and of the soul.
Jesus agrees to approach and lets himself be approached by what is impure, a dying twelve-year-old (touching a corpse determined a ritual impurity) and a woman suffering from a hemorrhage for twelve years. The number twelve that unites the two events seems to give different faces to the experience of human frailty, which manifests itself in illness and death. The compassion of Jesus is above the norms of the law and he takes upon himself suffering and humiliation, just like the Servant announced by the prophet Isaiah (Is 52-53).
The woman who is the protagonist of this miracle demonstrates that even the slightest contact with Jesus is enough to "snatch" salvation from him. It is not essential to have mystical experiences, but even a faith as small as a mustard seed (Mt 17:20) will be able to re-establish our communion with God and heal our relationships with men.
Prayer
Raise in us, Lord, the faith capable of removing all fear; so that we can joyfully serve you and glorify your holy name. Amen.
- Rev. Dr. Luca Vona
