Matthew 8a

The Gospel according to Matthew

1-2.  The ancestry and birth of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of David, Son of Abraham.

3-4.  Jesus’ ministry begins; John’s baptism, Satan’s temptations, first disciples called.

5-7.  A summary of Jesus’ teachings; Sermon on the Mount, crowds were astounded.

8-9.  A summary of Jesus’ healings; the authority of Jesus is questioned and defended.

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Matthew wrote a section on the teachings of Jesus, chapters 5-7, and closed it off with this statement: “Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.” The object of the next section is to confirm that personal ‘authority’, not by more teachings but by healings. In other words, the proof is in the pudding.  

8: 1-4.     When Jesus had come down from the mountain, great crowds followed him, and there was a man with a skin disease who came to him and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” He stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing. Be made clean!” Immediately his skin disease was cleansed. Then Jesus said to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”

It is not the astounded crowds that question Jesus’ authority, they follow him down the mountain to see what will happen next. A man with a skin disease shows up and kneels before Jesus. At this point, the term ‘Lord’ probably is just a term of respect, like ‘Sir’. The word is not yet out; but he has heard that Jesus has healing powers (see Matthew 4: 23-25).

It is not certain What he asks to be healed of, but he does ask to be made ‘clean’. That word has physical (healed) and religious (acceptable) connotations. It may have been leprosy, but the Greek word here covers a wide range of skin diseases. The man seems sure that Jesus can heal him, the question is, ‘Will he?’ Perhaps this story comes first because Jesus’ response is so full of meaning. Skin diseases were notoriously difficult to heal, yet Jesus does it by touch and by command.  

People with skin diseases were clearly prohibited by the Torah (Law) from even coming close to other people, let alone touching them or being touched by them. So Jesus’ first movement (touch) is a direct take-down of long-standing rules that restricted skin-diseased persons from any contact with ritually clean persons. But, it is Jesus’ commanding word that leads “immediately” to the man being “cleansed.” 

Now, listen to Jesus’ instructions. First, he tells the man “say nothing to anyone.” Why not? Jesus’ fame has already begun to spread (Matthew 4: 24). He has talked about the coming persecution (Matthew 5: 11), and will revisit that concern again soon (Matthew 10: 16-39). He knows that John the Baptist is attracting too much attention from the authorities and, in fact, he soon will be executed (Matthew 14: 1-12). Jesus’ response to John’s death shows that he is wary: “Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself“ (Matthew 14: 13).  

Jesus has a mission, and he has an idea of how it will end, but in the meantime he has to teach and heal, and especially to train his disciples to carry on his work. If that schedule is rushed, then it will be difficult to fulfill his mission. He knows the crowds, and how they can be worked up, even incited to riots, so he does not want to bring his movement to a premature climax. Thus, the warning: “Tell no one.”

That interpretation helps us understand the last line. Is Jesus instructing the man to go and show himself to the priest so that the priest will know that Jesus has great power to heal? Not likely, given what Jesus just said before. Go back to the plea of the man before he was healed, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.” Previously, I indicated that the word ‘clean’ has multi-layered meanings. The penultimate goal of the man is to be healed, but his ultimate goal is to be admitted back into society so that he can get on with a normal life. That is why he has to show himself to the priest. Without the priest’s authentication, the man will not be welcome anywhere. 

8: 5-9.   When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, in terrible distress.” And he said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion answered, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed. For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me, and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and the slave does it.” 

Notice the term ‘authority’ again, and the implication of the Centurion’s statement, “I am also man under authority.” The point is not that Jesus is a man like him; but that the Centurion is in a chain of command and thus knows that Jesus can delegate his authority. This is the issue that Matthew wants to address. Jesus took control of the situation with the skin-diseased Jewish man. Now what will he do here on the fringes of Jewish territory in Capernaum, on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee?

As a non-Jew, the Centurion would fall into the category of ‘dogs’ that Jesus talked about earlier (Matthew 7: 6). Jesus’ later (Matthew 15: 21-28) encounter with another non-Jew, the Canaanite woman who wanted him to cast out a demon from her daughter, showed that this was not a hard-and-fast category. When he tested her and saw her faith, he healed the girl. Here, we may have the same. For that reason, some scholars surmise that Jesus’ response may be a question. The NIV translates this verse as: “Shall I come and heal him?” The Centurion’s reply seals the deal.

8: 10-13.     When Jesus heard him, he was amazed and said to those who followed him, “Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and will take their places at the banquet with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” And Jesus said to the centurion, “Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.” And the servant was healed in that hour.

Jesus has once already called the disciples, "you of little faith" (Matthew 6: 30), and soon he will do it again and again (Matthew 8:26, 14:31; 16: 8, 17: 31). Here Matthew tells this story to being to make the point that it is not ancestry that qualifies a person for the kingdom, but rather it is faith.

Remember that Jesus said the gate was narrow and the road difficult on the path to the kingdom, and that most people were not on that path (Matthew 7: 13-14). Here Jesus talks about a great banquet at the end of that road, which is a common Jewish trope, but warns that some of the "heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness." The implication is that those who gain a place at the table with the Partriarchs, whether they are Jews or not, will do so because of their faith. Keep this in mind as we read further in Matthew's gospel.

It is this kind of reversal, Jesus’ tendency to turn things upside down that made the authorities mark him as a radical. A ‘leper’ is not immediately chased away, instead Jesus reaches out and touches him. A Gentile bows to this Jew, and Jesus does not turn away to avoid him. The future is also turned upside down; the children of God will be sent away from the table while ‘unclean’ Gentiles get to sit with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This vision was not without precedent. Foreigners and eunuchs were invited by God (Isaiah 56: 1-8), and God once equated Israel, Egypt, and Assyria “on that day” at the end of time (Isaiah 19:34-35). However, passages like these were seldom quoted, just as we ignore ones that we don’t like.   

8: 14 -17.    When Jesus entered Peter’s house, he saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever; he touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she got up and began to serve him. That evening they brought to him many who were possessed by demons, and he cast out the spirits with a word and cured all who were sick. This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah, “He took our infirmities and bore our diseases.”

It’s been a long day, or a long series of healings, so Jesus heads to Peter’s house to relax and get supper. However, there they find Peter’s mother-in-law is ill. This is another healing, but do we need another healing story? Not unless there is a different point to be made. First, notice that the person who was touched by Jesus then gets up and begins to serve him. We cannot say often enough that people are not saved and/or healed for nothing. The undeserved blessings of salvation and healing are not to be hoarded. They are to be used to serve Jesus by helping others. Are we doing that?

Second, Matthew pushes a little further in the direction of the prophetic authority that Jesus has. In this case, Jesus has authority to cast out demons and cure all who are sick. Matthew quotes from Isaiah 53. The whole passage, actually beginning in Isaiah 52: 13, is about God’s ideal servant who is coming soon. This is where we get the picture of the servant as “despised and rejected by others, a man of suffering.” 

It is not other people who are suffering; Matthew applies Isaiah’s prophecy to God’s ideal servant, Jesus, and thus to his followers. But, the gospel writers do not understand this dynamic until after the resurrection. We still struggle with it today. Should we suffer for others, or make others suffer for us?