If only I may touch His garment, I shall be made well

 While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, "My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live."  So Jesus arose and followed him, and so did His disciples.  And suddenly, a woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years came from behind and touched the hem of His garment.  For she said to herself, "If only I may touch His garment, I shall be made well."  But Jesus turned around, and when He saw her He said, "Be of good cheer, daughter; your faith has made you well."  And the woman was made well from that hour.  When Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the flute players and the noisy crowd wailing, He said to them, "Make room, for the girl is not dead, but sleeping."  And they ridiculed Him.  But when the crowd was put outside, He went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose.  And the report of this went out into all that land.

- Matthew 9:18-26

Yesterday we read that as Jesus passed on from where He healed the paralytic (and disputed with some scribes), He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax office.  And He said to him, "Follow Me."  So he arose and followed Him.  Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples.  And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, "Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?"  When Jesus heard that, he said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.  But go and learn what this means:  'I desire mercy and not sacrifice.'  For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance."  Then the disciples of John came to Him, saying, "Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but Your disciples do not fast?"  And Jesus said to them, "Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them?  But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.  No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; for the patch pulls away from the garment, and the tear is made worse.  Nor do they put new wine into old wineskins, or else the wineskins break, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined.  But they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved."

While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, "My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live."  So Jesus arose and followed him, and so did His disciples.  And suddenly, a woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years came from behind and touched the hem of His garment.  For she said to herself, "If only I may touch His garment, I shall be made well."  But Jesus turned around, and when He saw her He said, "Be of good cheer, daughter; your faith has made you well."  And the woman was made well from that hour.  When Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the flute players and the noisy crowd wailing, He said to them, "Make room, for the girl is not dead, but sleeping."  And they ridiculed Him.  But when the crowd was put outside, He went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose.  And the report of this went out into all that land.   My study bible notes here that authority over life and death is in the hand of God alone (Deuteronomy 32:39; 1 Samuel 2:6).  Being of one essence with the Father, Jesus has this authority (John 5:21).  The healing of this woman demonstrates Christ's power to clean and to heal (see also this reading from chapter 8, in which He cleansed a leper).  In the Old Testament, hemorrhage such as the affliction suffered by this woman caused ceremonial defilement.  This necessarily imposed religious and social restrictions (as did leprosy), because contact with blood was strictly prohibited (Leviticus 15:25).   But this suffering woman, because she accounts herself unclean, approaches Jesus secretly -- and with great with.  Jesus brings her good cheer because of her faith.  He also corrects her thinking, because she could not hide her touch from Him -- and neither is she excluded from Him because of her illness.  The final correction in thinking comes because He exhibits her faith to all, so each might imitate her.

There are several things to note that are happening in this reading.  First of all, if we look at yesterday's reading, above,  we note that Jesus has just come from a head-to-head dispute with some Pharisees because He eats with sinners (tax collectors and others).  In the reading before that He disputed with some scribes over His power to forgive sins, and made a display of His stupendous healing power.   There is a continuity here, as in today's reading, before a ruler of a synagogue (who venerates Him in a form of prostration by kneeling or bowing before Him, translated as "worshiped"), Jesus praises a woman who is unclean according to religious law but has secretly touched Him in faith.  Each of these episodes signals to the leadership (present in the form of scribes, Pharisees, and this ruler of the synagogue -- identified elsewhere as Jairus) that Christ is indeed present with "new wine," so to speak.  The events challenge their thinking about who Jesus is and what He can do.  He has described His mission (in chapter 5, during the Sermon on the Mount) as coming not to destroy, but to fulfill the Law and the Prophets.  Each of these events in recent readings teaches us what it means to "exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees," and to fulfill the Law and the Prophets.  They are challenges to the understanding of the leadership who are present in various personae, and they also establish Jesus' identity as Messiah who is both human and divine.  The entirely surprising response of Jesus to this woman must have been astounding to all the crowd.  As the ruler of the synagogue is present and desperately urging Him to go to his daughter who "has just died," we can imagine the impact on Jairus.  Finally, in microcosm we see the tumultuous nature of Jesus' healing work, in that it turns upside-down the expectations of the people.  Jairus' house is filled with those who mourn.  There are flute players and a whole crowd of noisy wailers.  When Jesus tells them that the girl is merely sleeping, they ridicule Him.   We already know the importance of faith to healing, even in the friends or relatives of those who cannot ask for help themselves.  Here Jesus first takes action by having the loudly wailing (and ridiculing) crowd put outside. Again, He heals by touch, taking the little girl's hand so that she rises from where she sleeps.  Once again, as we noted in yesterday's reading and commentary, there is an image here prefiguring the Resurrection power of Christ which will become the central key to His identity as Lord (and thereby the fulfillment, or telos, meaning "end" in Greek), of the Law and the Prophets.  What we have is a hint of the understanding of the Church about Christ Himself as the central focal point of all of  Scripture.  In this identity as the One who is "the Resurrection and the life" (John 11:25), Jesus is the fullness by which all else is measured, and the light by which all of Scripture and spiritual history becomes viewed.  These glimmerings of what will be more fully expressed later teach us so, as they taught our forbears to view all of Scripture and the life of the Church and spiritual life to come.  To be the fulfillment is to be the telos, the absolute, the perfection of something.  His life shines the light of meaning for all else and becomes the standard by which we know and understand faith and the work of God in the world.  If Resurrection is present with Him, so our faith can bring us glimmers and meanings of this power.  Perhaps we, too, need a kind of resurrection in our lives, in any circumstance, as part of the healing of old wounds or deep traumas.  We call on Him in faith, knowing that He has displayed already His healing power that overcomes all obstacles and reaches where the world ridicules and loudly proclaims failure.  Let us remember His work that astonishes all expectations, and seek His way for us, even if we have to put "the crowd" outside to do so -- and change the way we think.