Mark 5:21

The Gadarenes having desired Christ to leave their country, he did not stay to trouble them long, but presently went by water, as he came, back to the other side (Mar 5:21), and there much people gathered to him. Note, If there be some that reject Christ, yet there are others that receive him, and bid him welcome. A despised gospel will cross the water, and go where it will have better entertainment. Now among the many that applied themselves to him,

I. Here is one, that comes openly to beg a cure for a sick child; and it is no less a person than one of the rulers of the synagogue, one that presided in the synagogue-worship or, as some think, one of the judges of the consistory court, which was in every city, consisting of twenty-three. He was not named in Matthew, he is here, Jairus, or Jair, Jdg 10:3. He addressed himself to Christ, though a ruler, with great humility and reverence; When he saw him, he fell at his feet, giving honour to him as one really greater than he appeared to be; and with great importunity, he besought him greatly, as one in earnest, as one that not only valued the mercy he came for, but that knew he could obtain it no where else. The case is this, He has a little daughter, about twelve years old, the darling of the family, and she lies a dying; but he believes that if Christ will but come, and lay his hands upon her, she will return even from the gates of the grave. He said, at first, when he came, She lies a dying (so Mark); but afterward, upon fresh information sent him, he saith, She is even now dead (so Matthew); but he still prosecutes his suit; see Luk 8:42-49. Christ readily agreed, and went with him, Mar 5:24.

II. Here is another, that comes clandestinely to steal a cure (if I may so say) for herself; and she got the relief she came for. This cure was wrought by the way, as he was going to raise the ruler's daughter, and was followed by a crowd. See how Christ improved his time, and lost none of the precious moments of it. Many of his discourses, and some of his miracles, are dates by the way-side; we should be doing good, not only when we sit in the house, but when we walk by the way, Deu 6:7. Now observe,

1. The piteous case of this poor woman. She had a constant issue of blood upon her, for twelve years, which had thrown her, no doubt, into great weakness, had embittered the comfort of her life, and threatened to be her death in a little time. She had had the best advice of physicians, that she could get, and had made use of the many medicines and methods they prescribed: as long as she had any thing to give them, they had kept her in hopes that they could cure her; but now that she had spent all she had among them, they gave her up as incurable. See here, (1.) That skin for skin, and all that a man has, will be give for life and health; she spent all she had upon physicians. (2.) It is ill with those patients whose physicians are their worst disease; who suffer by their physicians, instead of being relieved by them. (3.) Those that are not bettered by medicines, commonly grow worse, and the disease gets the more ground. (4.) It is usual with people not to apply themselves to Christ, till they have tried in vain all other helpers, and find them, as certainly they will, physicians of no value. And he will be found a sure refuge, even to those who make him their last refuge.

2. The strong faith that she had in the power of Christ to heal her; she said within herself, though it doth not appear that she was encouraged by any preceding instance to say it, If I may but touch his clothes, I shall be whole, Mar 5:28. She believed that he cured, not as a prophet, by virtue derived from God, but as the Son of God, by a virtue inherent in himself. Her case was such as she could not in modesty tell him publicly, as others did their grievances, and therefore a private cure was what she wished for, and her faith was suited to her case.

3. The wonderful effect produced by it; She came in the crowd behind him, and with much ado got to touch his garment, and immediately she felt the cure wrought, Mar 5:29. The flux of blood was dried up, and she felt herself perfectly well all over her, as well as ever she was in her life, in an instant; by this it appears that the cure was altogether miraculous; for those that in such cases are cured by natural means, recover their strength slowly and gradually, and not per saltum - all at once; but as for God, his work is perfect. Note, Those whom Christ heals of the disease of sin, that bloody issue, cannot but experience in themselves a universal change for the better.

4. Christ's enquiry after his concealed patient, and the encouragement he gave her, upon the discovery of her; Christ knew in himself that virtue had gone out of him, Mar 5:30. He knew it not by any deficiency of spirits, through the exhausting of this virtue, but rather by an agility of spirits, in the exerting of it, and the innate and inseparable pleasure he had in doing good. And being desirous to see his patient, he asked, not in displeasure, as one affronted, but in tenderness, as one concerned, Who touched my clothes? The disciples, not without a show of rudeness and indecency, almost ridiculed his question (Mar 5:31); The multitudes throng thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me? As if it had been an improper question. Christ passed by the affront, and looks around to see her that had done this thing; not that he might blame her for her presumption, but that he might commend and encourage her faith, and by his own act and deed might warrant and confirm the cure, and ratify to her that which she had surreptitiously obtained. He needed not that any should inform him, for he had presently his eye upon her. Note, As secret acts of sin, so secret acts of faith, are known to the Lord Jesus, and are under his eye. If believers derive virtue from Christ ever so closely, he knows it, and is pleased with it. The poor woman, hereupon, presented herself to the Lord Jesus (Mar 5:33), fearing and trembling, not knowing how he would take it. Note, Christ's patients are often trembling, when they have reason to be triumphing. She might have come boldly, knowing what was done in her; yet, knowing that, she fears and trembles. It was a surprise, and was not yet, as it should have been, a pleasing surprise. However, she fell down before him. Note, There is nothing better for those that fear and tremble, than to throw themselves at the feet of the Lord Jesus; to humble themselves before him, and refer themselves to him. And she told him all the truth. Note, We must not be ashamed to own the secret transactions between Christ and our souls; but, when called to it, mention, to his praise, and the encouragement of others, what he has done for our souls, and the experience we have had of healing virtue derived from him. And the consideration of this, that nothing can be hid from Christ, should engage us to confess all to him. See what an encouraging word he gave her (Mar 5:34); Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole. Note, Christ puts honour upon faith, because faith gives honour to Christ. But see how what is done by faith on earth is ratified in heaven; Christ saith, Be whole of thy disease. Note, If our faith sets the seal of its amen to the power and promise of God, saying, "So it is, and so let it be to me;" God's grace will set the seal of its amen to the prayers and hopes of faith, saying, "So be it, and so it shall be, to thee." And therefore, "Go in peace; be well satisfied that thy cure is honestly come by, is effectually wrought, and take the comfort of it." Note, They that by faith are healed of their spiritual diseases, have reason to go in peace.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Mar_5:21; Mar_5:23; Mar_5:35; Mar_5:43

Jairus by name.

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A proper prayer

Better prayers, perhaps, had been offered. He would have shown more faith if he had prayed like the centurion (Luk_7:7). But, though he does not show such strong faith, yet it is a good prayer. For it is

(1) humble: he falls at Christs feet;

(2) believing: he feels Christ is omnipotent to heal;

(3) bold: he offers it in face of all the people, many of whom would be shocked that a ruler of the synagogue should acknowledge Jesus;

(4) loving, springing from a pure affection. Distress is a great schoolmaster. It teaches men many things; among the rest the greatest of all attainments-the power to pray. (R. Glover.)

A revived flower

And that bright flower bloomed in the vase of that happy home, more beautiful because the look of Jesus had given it new tints and the breath of Jesus had given it new fragrance. (J. Cumming, D. D.)

Jairus daughter

Jairus was a good man. His light was small, but real. It was feeble, but from heaven.

I. He had much to try his faith. One seems to see all the father in the tenderness of his words. Hope was over,-his daughter was dead. Thus is it with the believer. Instead of the relief he hoped for, all seems as death. Thus does the Lord try the faith He gives. Thus by causing us to wait for the blessing does He endear it.

II. The effect of this trial of faith. He did not distrust the power or willingness of the compassionate Saviour. His faith takes no denial, he still continues with Jesus. Faith hopes against hope. True faith partakes of his nature who exercises it, therefore in all, it is weak at times. But it partakes also of His nature who gives it, and therefore evinces its strength in the very midst of that weakness.

III. But wherever found, it is graciously rewarded. The scorners are without; but believing Jairus and the believing mother (Mar_5:40) are admitted. They see the mighty power of God put forth on behalf of their daughter. What an encouragement here to some anxious parent to put the case of their dear child in the hands of that same Jesus. How often has domestic affliction been the means of bringing the soul to the feet of Jesus. Mark the extreme tenderness of Jesus, Fear not, only believe. Be not afraid convicted sinner. My blood is sufficient, My grace and love are sufficient. (J. H. Evans, M. A.)

The Humane Society

I. The particular form of the Redeemers work.

1. Restoration from a special form of death.

2. Here was the recognition of the value of life-She shall live. It is not mere life on which Christianity has shed a richer value. It is by ennobling the purpose to which life is to be dedicated that it has made life more precious.

3. We consider the Saviours direction respecting the means of effecting a complete recovery. He commanded that something should be given her to eat. His reverential submission to the laws of nature.

II. The spirit of the Redeemers work.

1. It was love. He did good because it was good.

2. It was a spirit of retiring modesty. He did not wish it to be known.

3. It was a spirit of perseverance. Calm perseverance amidst ridicule. (F. W. Robertson.)

Not dead, but sleeping

Nature puts on a shroud at seasons, and seems to glide into the grave of winter. Autumnal blasts come sobbing through the trees, and leaf after leaf, shrivelling its fibres at the killing contact, comes drifting to the ground. The hedgerows where the May flowers and the dog rose mixed their scents are stripped and bare, and lift their thorny fingers up to heaven. The field where fat and wealthy-looking crops a while ago promised their golden sheaves, is now spread over with a coarse fringe of stubble, and seems a sort of hospital of vegetation. The garden shows no more its beauties, nor sheds forth its scent, but where the coloured petal and the painted cup of the gay flower were seen, there stands a blighted stem, or a drooping tuft of refuse herbs. The birds which carolled to the summer sky have fled away, and their note no longer greets the ear. The very daisies on the meadow are buried in the snow wreath, and the raw blast howls a sad requiem at the funeral of nature. But those trees, whose leafless branches seem to wrestle with the rough winds that toss them, are not dead. Anon, and they shall again be wreathed in verdure and bedecked with blossom. The softened breath of spring shall whisper to the snowdrop to dart forth its modest head, and shall broider the garden path again with flowers; the fragrance of the hawthorn bloom ere long shall gush from those naked hedge rows, and the returning lark shall wake the morning with a new and willing song. No, nature is not dead! There is a resurrection coming on. Spring with its touch of wizardry shall wake her from her slumbers, and sound again the keynote of the suspended music of the spheres. So also shall there arise out of the raging conflagration, in whose fevered heat the elements shall melt and shrivel like a scroll-even out of the very ashes which betoken its consumption-a new heaven and a new earth-an earth as ethereal and pure as heaven itself-and a heaven as substantial and as living as the earth. And consentaneously with the arising of these new worlds; the tombs shall open, and send forth the shrouded tenants, to enter on the inheritance which, in that new economy, shall be theirs. Can you believe that faded flowers shall revive at the blithe beckoning of the spring, that little leaves will quietly unfold at the mandate of the morning, and yet there shall be no spring to beckon the mortal back to life, and no morning to command the clay to clothe itself with the garments of a quickening spirit? Can you believe that the great temple shall arise with all its shrines rebuilded, and its altars purified after the final burning, but that there shall be neither voice nor trumpet to call forth the high priest from his slumber to worship at those shrines, and to lay a more enduring offering upon those waiting altars? Is the fuel to be ever laid, and none to kindle the burnt offering? Is the sanctuary to be prepared, and none to pay the service? Is the bridegroom to stand alone before the altar, and no bride to meet him at the nuptials? God forbid! The high priest is not dead-the bride has not perished-they are not dead, but sleep. Sound forth the trumpet, and say that all is ready, and then the corruptible will put on incorruption, and the mortal will put on immortality. Thus, when we lay our kindred in the earth, and follow to their final resting place the last remains of those who occupied a cherished chamber in our hearts-while nature finds it hard to dry the tear and quench the sigh-faith ever lifts the spirit from its sad despondency, by assuring us of a reunion beyond the grave-and robs the monster of one half his terrors-weakening his stroke and taking away his sting, by changing the mystic trance into which he throws his victims into a transient sleep, and speaking of a waking time of happiness and icy. Nature will look on death as an assassin who murders those we love; but Faith regards him as a nurse who hushes them to sleep, and sings a lullaby and not a requiem beside their bed. To faith it is a sleeping draught and not a poison which the visitor holds to the drinkers lips; for it hails the time when the lethargy of the sepulchre shall be cast off, and the spirit shall arise like a tired slumberer refreshed by sleep, to spend an endless morning in the energy of an endless youth. (A. Mursell.)

The death of the young encourages a spirit of dependence on God in the home life of this world

It brings the unseen Hand to bear very directly and potently on the souls deepest and most hidden springs. Let us suppose for a moment that there was a revealed ordinance of heaven that every, human being born into this world should live to three-score years and ten, and then quietly lie down to rest, and awake in eternity. Would it enrich or impoverish the life of the human world? I venture to think that it would impoverish it unspeakably. The passage of these little ones through the veil, of infants and children, of young men and maidens, of men and women in their prime, brings Gods hand very near, and keeps its pressure on the most powerful springs of our nature, our warmest affection, and our most constant and active care. It is not the uncertainty which is the strongest element of the influence, though no doubt that keeps us vigilant and anxious, and helps to maintain the full strain of our power. It is rather the constant contact with a Higher Will, which keeps us in humble, hopeful dependence, which gives and withholds, lends and recalls, by a wisdom which we cannot fathom, but which demands our trust on the basis of a transcendent manifestation of all-suffering and all-sacrificing love. (J. B. Brown, B. A.)

The death of the young imparts a consecrating influence to the home life

It brings heaven all round us when we know that at any moment the veil may be lifted, and a dear life may vanish from our sight, not, blessed be Christ, into the shades, but into the brightness which is beyond. And when the life has vanished it leaves a holy and consecrating memory in the home. Something is in the home on earth which also belongs to the home on high. Never does the home life and all its relations seem so beautiful, so profound, so sacred, as when Death has laid his touch on a little one, and gathered it as a starry flower for the fields of light on high. It makes the life of the home more anxious, more burdened by care and pain, but more blessed. The nearness at any moment of resistless Death makes us find a dearer meaning in the word, the whole family in heaven and on earth-a thought which saturates the whole New Testament, and is not dependent on one text for its revelation. We know then how precious is its meaning, and earth gains by its loss as well as heaven. (J. B. Brown, B. A.)

The death of the young lends a tender, home life interest to the life of the unseen world

The home, remember, is where the children are. There are those of us who never found the deeper meaning of the Fathers love and the everlasting home till a dear child had gone on before. The death of the little ones, while it ought to make the earthly life heaven-like on the one hand, is meant to make heaven home-like on the other. The Lord dethroned and discrowned Death by bearing the human form, living, through His realm of terror. The living Lord abolished death by living on through death, and flashing the splendours of heaven through the shades. The children, as they follow Christ through the gloom, make Death seem beautiful as an angel. Thenceforth we, too, have, not our citizenship only, but our home life in the two worlds. (J. B. Brown, B. A.)

Jesus stronger than death

And just remember, that when Jesus allows death to knock at your door, and to come in, it is not because death is stronger than He. It is because He has a good reason for permitting it. He is so completely the Master of death that He makes it His messenger to do His bidding; and when death comes to our dwelling and takes away one we love, let us bear in mind that death is not Jesus enemy but His messenger. He is like an angel; he takes away our friend in his bosom. He has no power at all over us without Jesus. (Anon.)

The healing of Jairus daughter

I. The ease brought before Jesus. A bodily disease as usual. No spiritual cases, though more important.

II. The persons who brought it. A ruler, etc. He had heard Christs teaching. He had seen His miracles. No mention made, etc., till distress.

III. The character in which he came-a parent.

IV. The manner in which he came. Reverently. Earnestly. Believingly.

V. At the request of Jairus, Christ arose and accompanied him. Christ encouraged such applications-He does so still (Expository Discourses.)

I. Christs restorative power transcends the ordinary expectations of mankind.

II. Christs restorative power is exerted on certain conditions.

1. Earnest entreaty.

2. A reverential spirit.

III. Christs restorative power accomplishes its object with the greatest ease.

IV. Christs restorative power confounds the scoffing sceptic with its result. Scoffing infidelity is destined to be confounded. There were scoffers in the days of Noah and they were confounded when the deluge came. There were scoffers in the days of Lot, and they were confounded when the showers of fire fell. There are scoffers now, and when they shall see Him coming in His glory with all His holy angels, these atheists, deists, and materialists, will be utterly confounded. (David Thomas, D. D.)

Death a sleep

Homer fittingly calls sleep the brother of death; they are so much alike. On the lips of Jesus, however, the word sleep acquires a richer and mightier import than it ever possessed before. Amply has His use of the term been justified in the last hour of tens of thousands of his devout followers. They laid themselves down to die, not as those who dread the night because of the remembrance of hours when, like Job, they were scared with dreams and terrified through visions, but like tired labourers, to whom night is indeed a season of peaceful refreshment. And how imperceptibly they sank into their last slumber! Their transition was so mild and gradual, that it was impossible for those who stood round their dying pillow to say exactly when it took place. There was no struggle, no convulsion. The angel of death spread his wide, white wings meekly over them, and then, with a smile upon their pallid countenance, serene and lovely as heaven itself, they closed their eyes on all terrestrial objects, and fell asleep in Jesus. And that sleep is as profound throughout as it was tranquil at the beginning. The happy fireside and the busy exchange-the halls of science and the houses of legislation-the oft-frequented walk and the holy temple-are nothing to them now. Suns rise and set, stars travel and glisten; but they see them not; tempests howl, thunders roll and crash; but they hear them not. Nothing can disturb those slumbers, till the day dawn and the shadows flee away. Then will the voice of the archangel sweep over Gods acre, and awake them all. Oh, wondrous awaking! what momentous consequences hang on thee! (Edwin Davies.)

Death a sleep

I. Sleep is rest, or gives rest to the body: so death.

1. Rest from labour and travail.

2. Rest from trouble and opposition.

3. Rest from passion and grief.

4. Rest from sin, temptation, Satan, and the law.

II. Sleep is not perpetual; we sleep and wake again; so, though the body lie in the grave, yet death is but a sleep; we shall wake again.

III. The sleep of some men differs very much from that of others: So the death of saints differs from that of the wicked.

1. Some men sleep before their work is done; so some die before their salvation is secured.

2. Some fall asleep in business and great distraction, others in peace.

3. Some dread the thought of dying, because of the dangers that lie beyond. But saints have no fear.

4. Some fall asleep in dangerous places, and in the midst of their enemies-on the brink of hell, surrounded by the spirits of perdition. But saints die in the view of Jesus; in the love and covenant of Jesus.

IV. A man that sleeps is generally easily awakened: So the body in death shall be much more easily awakened at the last day than the soul can now be aroused from its sleep of sin. (B. Keach.)

Why death of the godly is called sleep

The reason why the death of the godly is called a sleep in Scripture is this: because there is a fit resemblance between it and natural sleep; which resemblance consists chiefly in these things.

1. In bodily sleep men rest from the labours of mind and body. So the faithful, dying in the Lord, are said to rest from their labours (Rev_14:13).

2. After natural sleep men are accustomed to awake again; so, after death, the bodies of the saints shall be awaked, i.e., raised up again to life out of their graves at the last flay. And as it is easy to awake one out of a natural sleep, so is it much more easy with God, by His almighty power, to raise the dead at the last day.

3. As after natural sleep the body and outward senses are more fresh and lively than before; so likewise after that the bodies of the saints, being dead, have for a time slept in their graves as in beds, they shall awake and rise again at the last day in a far more excellent state than they died in, being changed from corruption to incorruption, from dishonour to glory, from weakness to power, from natural to spiritual bodies (1Co_15:42).

4. As in natural sleep the body only is said properly to sleep, not the soul (the powers whereof work even in sleep in some sort, though not so perfectly as when we are waking): so in death, only the bodies of the saints do die and lie down in the graves, but their souls return to God who gave them (Ecc_12:7), and they live with God even in death and alter death.

5. As sleep is sweet to those who are wearied with labour and travail (Ecc_5:12), so also death is sweet and comfortable to the faithful, being wearied and turmoiled with sin, and with the manifold miseries of this life. (G. Petter.)

Death of children

God cultivates many flowers, seemingly only for their exquisite beauty and fragrance. For when, bathed in soft sunshine, they have burst into blossom, then the Divine hand gathers them from the earthly fields to be kept in crystal vases in the deathless mansions above. Thus little children die-some in the sweet bud, some in the fallen blossom; but never too early to make heaven fairer and sweeter with their immortal bloom. (Wadsworth.)

Goeth in where the child was: Christ in the chamber of death

I. A good child is at home in either world, not sorry to go to the other world to get joy, and not sorry to come back to this world to give it.

II. We know not where the other world is, but it is evidently within range of the Saviours voice. Our dear dead are therefore safe and all their conditions ordered by the Saviours mercy.

III. Life is indestructible by death.

IV. On a universal scale Christ will be found to be the Resurrection and the Life to all who love Him.

V. He inflicts bereavement, but sympathises with its sorrow. He relieves these mourners here, to show that He pities all mourners. (R. Glover.)

Talitha cumi

He uses what were, perhaps, the words used every morning by her mother on waking her-Little one, get up. (R. Glover.)

The raising of Jairus daughter

I. The application which Jesus received.

1. By whom it was made.

2. The favour he implied.

3. The feeling which this ruler displayed.

(1) His reverence.

(2) His importunity.

(3) His faith.

II. The ready compliance of our Lord with the request made to Him. But as He went we are called upon-

1. To witness a strange interruption.

2. To listen to what seemed very discouraging information-Thy daughter is dead.

III. The wonderful result with which this visit was attended.

1. What our Lord saw.

2. What He said.

3. What He did. (Expository Outlines.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES

Mar_5:22. Rulers of the synagogue.—The synagogues had no clergy, but were managed by laymen, who conducted or superintended the services, and administered discipline. The rulers of Capernaum had already (Luk_7:3) approached our Lord on behalf of the centurion who built their synagogue. Now one of them comes to prefer a petition on his own account.

Mar_5:25. An issue of blood.—Hæmorrhage. See Lev_15:19-30.

Mar_5:36. As soon as Jesus heard.—For another reading see R.V. It is not easy to determine the exact shade of meaning which παρακούσας bears here. Dr. F. Field renders, “Jesus, making as though He heareth not the word spoken,” etc.

Mar_5:41. Talitha cumi.—St. Peter, who was present, would treasure in his memory the very words used.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Mar_5:21-43

(PARALLELS: Mat_9:1; Mat_9:18-26; Luk_8:40-56.)

Mar_5:21-24; Mar_5:35-43. Jairus’daughter.—

I. The faith of a father.—

1. It was Christward. “Behold, there cometh,” etc. He came to Christ when all human power was useless. He had confidence in the superhuman power of Christ. He had seen Christ cast out the fiend in the synagogue. He knew of the recovery of the centurion’s servant. These mighty deeds planted the seed of faith in his heart. Personal trial was needed to make it grow and bring forth fruit. Afflictions are blessings if they bring us to Christ.

2. It was humble. “Fell at His feet.” Jairus saw beyond the outward poverty of Christ. He, a man of rank and position, prostrate before Christ, conscious of his own inferiority. No place on earth higher than the feet of Jesus. To fall is to rise. Those who lie at His feet shall hereafter sit on His right hand.

3. It was earnest. “Besought Him greatly.” He knew, felt, begged, one thing. The blessing sought was precious. Only Christ could give it. Jesus delights to hear passionate prayer. Each tear is a jewel, each cry an oration. Cæsar said, “The voices of the distressed crying for my help make sweetest music in my ears.” A father delays granting the request of his darling child, not that he is heedless of its appeals, but he likes to hear its little voice. Jesus often delayed to answer, not that He disliked giving, but because He liked the asking.

4. It was imperfect. “Come, and lay Thy hands,” etc. His faith was inferior to that of the centurion. “Say the word only,” etc. Healing while being absent a mystery to Jairus. Instrumentality not essential to Christ. The secret of success was in Himself. Distance no disadvantage. Now that He has exchanged worlds He is still the same.

II. The death of a daughter.—She was twelve years old, and dying. A very trying age in which to lose her. There was mutual entwining of affections. They had arranged for her future. They had promised to themselves much comfort from her. How insecure are the most promising earthly objects! Jairus’ daughter, like a beautiful flower, fades in its budding. Her day closed early—night before noon. Her death full of pathos.

1. The death of a young daughter.

2. The death of an only daughter.

3. The death of a loved daughter.

4. The death of a good daughter. The fact that she was so beloved implies that she was all that could be desired.

III. The sympathy of the Saviour.—

1. It was prompt in its action. Jesus was ever ready to sacrifice personal enjoyment for the good of others.

2. It was new in its sphere (Mar_5:35). It is implied that death is incurable. Jesus, the Infallible Physician, can cure the disease of death. His power reaches to both sides of mortality—this and other side.

3. It was contemptuously treated. “Laughed Him to scorn.” What others called death Jesus called sleep; and as we with ease awake the sleeper, so Christ can awake the dead. Hitherto this power of Christ was unrevealed, hence the mockery. Their laughter was serviceable to Christ, for it proved the reality of her death. So Christ was no impostor. They unconsciously reared a platform on which He displayed His Divine power.

4. It was blessed in its results.

(1) Resurrection of the dead.

(2) Joy to the household.

(3) Impetus to the truth.

(4) Glory to Christ.—B. D. Johns.

Mar_5:25-34. The timid woman’s touch.—

I. Salvation is through Christ, not in human endeavours.—Here was a woman who had been an invalid for twelve years. In that time she had faithfully sought the best medical advice to be had, had done her utmost to obtain a cure, had spent all that she had in her endeavour to find relief. But it had done no good. It is not strange, indeed, when we consider the empiricism of medicine in that day, that this was so. To cure the disease of this woman there was a great variety of remedies. Among other things, she was to be set in a place where two ways met, with a glass of wine in her hand, and some one was to come up behind her and frighten her. Or seven ditches were to be dug, in which the shoots of grape-vines were to be burned, and then with a cup of wine in her hand she was to sit down in each. No wonder the poor woman “was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse.” This is the great lesson here: Men try to heal themselves of their sins by their own devices. They go to human advisers in their sense of need. One tells the sin-sick man, as Burns was told, to drive away his melancholy by gay company; another, as Theodore Parker did in Boston years ago, sneers at the idea of sin; another, as did Comte, tells men to worship humanity. Others hope by a pretty good sort of a life, as the phrase goes, to come out right, though without any very definite idea of how it is to be. Now, in opposition to all this, nothing is more plainly taught in Scripture than that salvation must be through Christ.

II. Salvation is through personal effort, and does not come by waiting.—There is danger of swinging from the error just considered to the opposite extreme, and doing nothing. Men sometimes make a wrong use of the doctrine of election, and persist in waiting for religious influences instead of coming to Christ without delay. They are practically fatalists. It was not so with this woman. She kept saying, “If I touch but His garments, I shall be made whole.” She evinced determination and perseverance. No one will fail to-day who comes to Christ in a similar spirit. “Him that cometh unto Me, I will in no wise cast out.” God appoints us something to do in receiving salvation. We must at least reach out our hand for it and accept it. We must shew such a desire for it as to seek it. God does not want heaven filled with puppets, to move only as He pulls the string. He wants Godlike men, men to be holy as He is holy, and this can be only as each man in the sovereignty of his own free-will decides for himself whether or not he will accept the salvation of Christ. But further than this, as man is made, God could not force salvation on us against our will. Salvation would be impossible without an acceptance on our part. It would not be salvation, but punishment, to be forced into heaven if we did not wish it or enjoy it.

III. Salvation is through faith in Christ, and not by mere contact with Him.—Many are at church from Sunday to Sunday listening to the truths taught by the Saviour, without any personal interest in them or purpose to apply them. They are there from curiosity or habit, or because others are, and have no thought or wish to accept Christ for themselves. They cannot receive salvation in such a frame of mind. They must put forth the hand and touch Him. Contact is not enough. There was a spring in California where many came and drank. All admired its clear water and sought it in turn to slake their thirst. But one who knelt there with the rest saw what the others did not, recognised a vein of glittering gold lying beneath the water, put forth his hand, and made his fortune. The difference between the throngs in Christian lands, who do not accept Christ and those who do is a similar difference. The one fail to take Christ to themselves, though perhaps gathering around Him in admiration. The others see His infinite worth and eagerly take the treasure offered them.

IV. Salvation is by simple faith, and not by elaborate works.—We trust Jesus—that is all. The mode of expressing our trust is an insignificant matter. There was a certain young people’s society which had a warm discussion as to whether in their meetings the voting should be done by word of mouth or by a shew of hands. It was a question of absolute insignificance. The things of importance were that they should have a definite mind on the subjects considered, should make up their minds aright, and then should express their wills clearly. The method by which their will was expressed was immaterial, so long as it was expressed. So is it in regard to faith in Christ. It is of the utmost importance that we commit ourselves to Christ, but how that committal shall express itself is a matter of comparative indifference. We are like a party under guidance through a country infested by hostile Indians. Such a party is bound to follow its guide implicitly. It is its only hope. We must trust ourselves implicitly to the guidance of Christ. He alone knows what is best for us to do. He alone can guide us through the dangers of life, so that we shall come out safely at the last.

V. Salvation is through Divine love, and not by any mystical virtue.—The woman touched the border of Christ’s garment, that white fringe attached to the blue ribbon which bound His robe. She went to Christ very much as many, two centuries ago, went to King Charles of England to be healed of the king’s evil by his touch. But Christ called the woman out of the crowd and forced her to acknowledge her dependence upon Him, partly to teach her and us that He was personally concerned in her healing. It was not something with which His will had nothing to do. It was a result brought about by His knowledge of her need and her faith. She must see that Christ’s aid was His free gift, and not to be surreptitiously taken from Him; that He knew her desire and freely and lovingly gave her help.

VI. Salvation comes through confession, and not in secret.—It was a sore trial for the poor woman to be called to make an acknowledgment of Christ before that unsympathetic company. Why, then, was this sacrifice required of her?

1. It was for the good of others. It is important that the world know that we are saved by Christ. Sometimes Christ did not allow His healings to be heralded, because it was not safe for Him to excite too much publicity; but generally He did. There is no reason now why we should not confess Him, and every reason why we should. I have somewhere read a narrative of the escape of a large company from Malay pirates in the South Seas. A boat was discovered by two or three of the captives. They could easily step on board by themselves, silently drop down the river, and so escape. But they could not bear to leave behind the large company of their friends held in torture and danger of death. So they went back, told their friends their discovery and the possibility of escape it opened, and urged all to undertake it. At night the whole company, including babes in arms, slipped out, passing sleeping guards, tiptoed their way to the river, and so escaped. We honour the few who risked all their hopes rather than leave the rest behind. There are striking points of similarity in our duty to-day. To be sure, we risk nothing in helping others to escape from their sins; but, on the other hand, to find the way of escape ourselves, and to be unwilling to tell others of the way when we have found it, is such ungenerous conduct that we can scarcely conceive it possible in a Christian.

2. But this confession of Christ is required, not only for the good of others, but for our own good quite as much. How much this woman would have lost had not Christ obliged her to confess Him! She needed just this to be confirmed in her assurance of permanent healing. She needed spiritual blessing as well as physical aid. She needed to take a stand on Christ’s side for the sake of developing her character. She was thus brought nearer to her Lord. Many a despondent one, questioning his salvation, has instantly found peace when he came forward and confessed Christ by joining the Church.—A. P. Foster.

OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES

Mar_5:22-24; Mar_5:35-43. Various phases of faith.—

1. Supplicating faith heard by Jesus.

2. Eager faith tried by Jesus.

3. Sinking faith strengthened by Jesus.

4. Thankful faith perfected by Jesus.—J. J. Van Oosterzee, D.D.

Christ in His offices.—View Christ here as—

1. The Consoler (Mar_5:36).

2. The Revealer (Mar_5:39).

3. The Conqueror of death (Mar_5:42).

4. The True Man (Mar_5:43).

5. The Divine Physician, ready to apply to each applicant the remedy required.

Mar_5:23. “The point of death.”—I. The point of death is a point of mark. The sound mind contemplates it, not as at a distance, but as at hand. The believer keeps it in his eye. He knows it is not the goal, but only the starting-point into eternity.

II. The point of death is a point of moment—a momentous point indeed. It is such when a man-child is born into the world, and still more so when he is born a second time. Surely it is not less so when the moment strikes that fixes his eternal destiny!

III. The point of death is a point of interest. Life is the seed-time; when death comes, it is harvest—the time of reaping, and of reaping that very kind of grain which we have sown.

IV. The point of death is a point of reference. It refers man to the future—to the hell from which he is to flee, to the heaven for which he is to prepare, and within the one or other of which his eternity is to be passed. When, therefore, you are reading the folio pages of truth and duty, study also the marginal references, and be ready to meet thy God.

V. The point of death is a point of fact. The disease which is to carry us off may now be in our veins, the place where we are to die is mapped off, the machinery of the providence is all set up, and known unto God is the moment in which the wheels are to go round; so that man is as good as dead. It is only a question of a little time—so very little, that we may almost suppose it traversed.

VI. The point of death is the final point, the closing period in the last paragraph of the last chapter of life. It is the “finis” indeed. Does it not therefore become us to ascertain what kind of death we are all dying?

VII. In a word, the point of death ought to be the point of preference. There is no sin in Paul’s estimate, that departing to be with Christ is “far better.” Only we would need to see that our hope is on the right foundation; if not, departing must be far worse than to live, vexing and soul-harrowing as life often is. Your preference will not be unsafe, and unsound it cannot be, if you have by faith seen Jesus at the point of death, yea, dead for you. In that moment you have reached the point of life.—John Macfarlane, LL.D.

“The point of death.”—This is one point to which every one must come. The paths of earth run in very diverse ways, but they all pass at last “the point of death.” It is a point that lies hidden from view; no one knows the day or the hour when he will come to it, and yet somewhere along the sunny years it waits for every one. Sometimes this point is struck in early youth. Even the children should think about dying, not as a sad and terrible thing, but as a point to which they, must come, and for which they should prepare.—J. R. Miller, D.D.

The beginning of eternity.—O most dreadful point, which art the end of time and beginning of eternity! O last moment of life! O first of eternity! How terrible is the thought of thee, since not only life is to be lost in thee, but to be accounted for!… Admirable is the high wisdom of God, which hath placed a point, in the midst, betwixt time and eternity, unto which all the time of this life is to relate, and upon which the whole eternity of the other is to depend! O moment, which art neither time nor eternity, but art the horizon of both, and dividest things temporal from eternal!… O moment, in which the just shall forget all his labours, and shall rest assured of all his virtues! O moment, which art certain to be; uncertain, when to be; and most certain, never to be again! I will therefore now fix thee in my memory, that I may not hereafter meet thee in my eternal ruin and perdition!—Bishop J. Taylor.

Mar_5:25-34. The faith of this woman was—

1. Secretly nourished.

2. Courageously shown.

3. Immediately discovered.

4. Humbly acknowledged.

5. Nobly crowned.—J. J. Van Oosterzee, D.D.

By-errands in God’s service.—In His blessed path as the Healer He is ever willing to be arrested by the sons of men, counting this no detention, no trouble, no hindrance, but the true fulfilment of His heavenly mission. Opportunities such as these were welcome to Him; nor was He at any time too busy, too much in haste, to take up the case of the needy, however suddenly brought before Him. To Him no interruption was unwelcome which appealed to His love or power. I know not whether we prize our own by-errands sufficiently, our “accidental” opportunities of working or speaking for God. We like to plan, and carry out our plans to the end; and we do not quite like interruptions or detentions. Yet these may be, after all, our real work. Little can we guess, when forming our plans for the day, on what errands God may send us; and as little can we foresee, when setting out even on the shortest journey, what opportunity may cross our path of serving the Master and blessing our fellow-men. Whitefield, on his way to Glasgow, is drawn aside unexpectedly to tarry a night in the house of strangers. To that family he brings salvation. A minister of Christ misses the train which was to convey him to his destination. He frets a little, but sets out to walk the ten miles as best he may. He is picked up by a kind stranger in a carriage, a man of the world, who has not been in the house of God for years. He speaks a word, gives a book, thanks the stranger in the Master’s name for his kindness, and joys to learn some years after that he missed the train in order to be the messenger of eternal life to a heedless sinner.—H. Bonar, D.D.

Mar_5:25. Long affliction.—It pleases God to lay long and tedious afflictions on some of His servants in this life.

1. To manifest His great power, strengthening them to bear such long afflictions.

2. To magnify His mercy in delivering them at length out of them.

3. That He may make thorough proof and trial of their faith, patience, and other graces of His Spirit in them.

4. To wean them from this world, and to stir up in them a longing for heaven.

5. To make them more earnest in prayer to Him for deliverance. It is therefore no evidence of God’s wrath, nor any sufficient reason to prove such an one to be out of His favour, whom He so holds for a long time under the cross. Be well content, then, to bear afflictions, though of long continuance, submitting in this matter to the will of God, who knows it to be good and profitable for some to be kept long under discipline.—G. Petter.

Mar_5:26. God often the last resource of sorrow.—It is a great piece of infidelity for men not to think of God in afflictions until they have experienced the insufficiency of human remedies. What a mercy is it to be forced to have recourse to God, by misfortunes, diseases, or the ill-usage of men! See here a representation of those physicians of souls who, not acting in the name and in the spirit of Christ, do nothing else but feed and increase their maladies. Men are very far from doing as much for the health of the soul as for that of the body, and from giving all for eternal salvation, as they willingly spend all they have for temporal life. They are apt to seek out such physicians from whom they may suffer little or nothing, such as are likely to be most easy and gentle; and scarce will they hear speak of bestowing some slight alms. What wonder then, if such persons are nothing bettered, but rather grow worse!—P. Quesnel.

Mar_5:27-29. The means of grace.—It was not the hem of His garment that stanched her sickness. No; but it was the Divine power and the Divine love which lay beneath the garment. So with the means of grace; they are blessed to our souls because they are the channels through which the presence of the Lord Jesus comes to us to cleanse and to heal. The outward words of prayer cannot profit a man unless the heart rises with them. To say prayers without thought of God is to trust to an outward sign, not to the love and power of the Saviour. So also of the sacraments. The outward elements in the Eucharist are as the hem of His garment; we receive them in the hand and in the mouth: even as the woman touched His skirts. They are blessed to the soul, not because they are outward elements, but because through them there flows to us the virtue and the strength of that body and blood of which the elements are the Divinely appointed pledges and tokens and vehicles. And to this blessing two things are needful: the assured presence of Christ on His part; faith in His presence and in His love upon our part.

Soul-sickness.—By how much the soul is of more value than the body, by how much eternity outweighs time, by how much deliverance from everlasting misery and a title to eternal life transcend the comforts and pleasures of this world, by how much the favour and lovingkindness of the Lord are to be esteemed more than all that this earth can supply, just by so much is it more the part of a rational and immortal being to be in earnest about the prosperity of his soul than about the health of his body.

The distress of sin.—Our sins and troubles are not so grievous to us as was this woman’s infirmity to her; and yet they are greater evils. Our untempered, coarse, rude nature, our hard pride, our foolish running after men’s smiles and praises, our vanity in all things, our misconception of ourselves, our mistakes and foibles, our foolish faults and sins—do they distress us much?—H. W. Beecher.

Mar_5:29. The grace of Christ is the only remedy for all the most inveterate diseases of the soul. This will dry up the very fountain itself of sin, which is concupiscence, when the time of the perfect reign of charity shall come. It at present stops the course, the reign, and the dominion of concupiscence. The healing operation of grace alone can do all in a moment: the delays of it do not proceed from inability and necessity, but from dispensation and wisdom. When will it be, O my Saviour, that it shall drain in me the source of all sin, that it shall dry up that fountain of corruption and iniquity which I carry in my flesh and in my heart?—P. Quesnel.

Mar_5:30-34. Love in detection.—It was love, not harshness, which made the Lord detect this woman, who had, as it were, stolen from Him a blessing. Her faith was weak, and He would strengthen it. He would not suffer her to go away to her home without confessing Him as her Healer, and rendering Him thanks. He wished to give her His best blessing; she had only received a foretaste. Her humility might seem cowardice, and He would make her brave. Her silence might be want of gratitude, and He would teach her thankfulness. Not yet had she heard His voice or fully known all His love. But now that He has seen her and called her to Him, she is no longer timid, for she has “told before all the multitude for what cause she had touched Him, and how she was healed immediately”; and then the words are spoken which bring her His fullest blessing: “daughter,” etc.—Bishop Blunt.

Sought out.—Not because He did not know her did He seek her out, but because those who were with Him did not know her, and because He would not have her lose the honour, nor them the benefit, which the manifestation of her faith and its success might yield. This detection and manifestation were not designed to make her a gazing-stock, but to set her forth as an example and pattern, which might encourage others to come to the same almighty and exhaustless Fountain of strength and love for higher benefits and more spiritual gifts.

Mar_5:31. Two kinds of touch.—It is not because we surround and follow after Christ, in frequenting the services and even the sacraments of the Church, thronging to its teaching, interesting ourselves and taking our part in its works of piety and charity, sharing loudly and warmly in its controversies, watching closely its movements, rejoicing in its progress, and lamenting over its checks and hindrances—it is not because we do all this, and even more, that we are justified in taking ourselves out of the class of mere spectators of the redemptive work. As it must be a particular kind of wire to draw down the electric current from the thunder-cloud, so it is only a special kind of touch—the touch of faith—which draws forth healing virtue from Christ.

Mar_5:34. Not superstition, but faith.—What some of us would have sneered at as superstition Christ here dignifies by the name of faith. We pity the poor deluded devotees who crowd to Lourdes, or eagerly touch a relic or bow before a sacred image—we pity them and laugh at them; but perhaps God sees more that is worthy of love and Divine approbation in that faulty, superstitious worship than in our cold intellectual belief and our well-balanced creeds.

Faith is essentially a personal allegiance to Jesus Christ. Whoever is drawn to Him from any motive, whoever reverences and trusts Him in any way, touches the heart of Christian faith.

Imperfect faith.—Where this woman’s faith was imperfect ours may be complete. She came secretly, distrusting His willingness, believing only in His power to help. It is our privilege to come boldly to the throne of His grace, knowing that He is far more anxious than we to heal every sickness of our soul, and that He has provided in the Holy Communion a blessed means of spiritual contact with Himself.

Mar_5:35-36. Two views taken of the same case.—

1. There is the human view—the child is dead, trouble not the Master. Men see the outside; they deal with facts rather than with principles; they see the circumference, not the centre.

2. There is Christ’s view—only believe; man is called beyond facts, he is called into the sanctuary of God’s secret. We often put the period where God Himself puts only a comma: we say “dead,” when God Himself says “sleepeth.”—J. Parker, D.D.

Mar_5:36-43. Christ’s simplicity in miracle-working.—Our Lord in this miracle did His utmost to lower in the minds of the parents any sense of their obligation to Him for the kindness which He designed to shew them. He prepared it by a kind of Divine équivoque: “The maid is not dead, but sleepeth.” He would have it appear that He was doing nothing more than banishing sleep from the eyes of the slumbering damsel; that by this means He might, I think, put to shame those persons who arrogate to themselves so much praise for their insignificant services; whereas He lessened the immensity of His benefits by His modest way of conferring them.—Segneri.

Mar_5:37. Secret work.—Let us thus learn from Christ not to impart, except only to a few chosen persons, those works of God which we propose to undertake, for fear lest they should be obstructed. The Spirit of God would have us labour in secret as much as possible; whereas the spirit of the world continually affects noise and applause.—P. Quesnel.

Mar_5:39. Sleep the image of death.—Both are—

1. Preceded by weariness.

2. Accompanied by a rest.

3. Followed by a wakening.—J. J. Van Oosterzee, D.D.

Why did He thus speak?—Because so soon would He recall her spirit from the other world that it would be like an awakening from sleep—a sleep shorter than that of an ordinary night’s repose. Yes; but the Lord meant more than that by these words. He meant that the death of the body was not death, but only sleep. The word “death” He reserved for something more terrible—the death of the higher, truer life, the death of the spirit. That alone was death in the eyes of the Lord of life. He would have men think little of the decay of bodily powers, or of the corruption which followed on the dissolution of the outward frame, in comparison with the decay and death and corruption of the spiritual life. Death spiritual alone, in His sight, was worthy of the name of death, because life spiritual alone was worthy of the name of life.—Bishop Blunt.

Mar_5:40. Jesus with the dead.—

1. Notice, first, the solitude of Jesus in the midst of those men and women. He was the only man who had that great faith so that He could declare it. And how hard it is to be hopeful alone! A gloomy atmosphere depresses a man; the surroundings of mourning break the most courageous spirits. It was what Christ was which made Him able to stand alone; it was what He was that made Him the Leader of the human race. In the world disciples were faithless, in the garden disciples slept, on the Cross His friends deserted Him. Let us not be too indignant as we read of those facts. It was the condition of His success that it should be so. It was by that that He shewed Himself the Saviour of men, the Incarnate Son of God. It was that which put Him in advance of every position which any son of man had ever taken. Separating Him from all others, it placed Him where all others could come up to Him.

2. Notice, next, that though Christ felt His power, and asserted it only more boldly in the presence of those hopeless men and women, that power could not or did not work until they had all been put forth from the room. It shews us the distinction between two things that we often confuse. Unfavourable circumstances may hinder, but they cannot kill, true power. We cannot do in one moment what Jesus did—turn out all adverse influences—and so we let them tell us that they are all-powerful. The actions of Christ among those men were tokens of all His action everywhere. When He prepared the way for that miracle, quickly as it may have been done, it told the story that His power is never more truly present than when it is preparing the way for its own perfect working. It is not what we accomplish, but what we persist in for our God, which saves us. However unfavourable your circumstances, hindering great accomplishments, however hard the battle full of stubborn enemies and hard reverses, however small the gleanings of our poor sterile fields, the faith that fought on the one and worked on the other shall work salvation, and restore to the life of God its Father the soul that was dead in sin. That is a gospel to carry to the discouraged millions of the earth, and by it to nerve them to new effort.

3. After turning out all the other mourners and the minstrels, Jesus took the parents of the child, and entered into the room, and brought the child to life.Those parents by their presence seemed to form the connexion between the faithful Christ and the unbelieving world, for they had a relation to both. Doubtless to them the words of Jesus, “She is not dead, but sleepeth,”must have seemed very strange; they could not have meant all to them that they did to Him. And yet their parental love must have fastened on them with a hope which did not allow them to join in the scornful laughter with which others greeted them. They found a response in the deepest feelings of their hearts, which no others there appreciated; and so their presence was no hindrance to that miracle-working power of Christ. And, doubtless, in those wailings a hope kept alive by a parent’s love had yearned for something more, and was ready for it when it came.—A. Brooks.

Christ’s attitude towards earthly relationships.—Such a deed as He proposed to do must be done in silence, and yet not in loneliness. The parents were there; He regarded their claim to be present. Parents are the natural guardians of youth and infancy. This act is not at variance with what He elsewhere says about leaving father and mother for His sake, nor does it contradict what He says about the division and conflict which He introduces into family life. Divisions can only exist, or at least be permanent, where the presence and authority of Christ are disregarded by the parents on the one hand, or the child on the other. Where His presence is desired, though at first sight He may seem to disparage or lightly esteem blood relationship, yet in the end we shall find He has cemented earthly relationship, and bound father to child or child to father by closer ties, not of earth only, but of heaven too.—G. Walker.

Mar_5:41. “Talitha cumi” was a common term of endearment, used by loving mothers to wake their children. The old familiar words were what Jesus used. They seem to tell that in the glad waking, after the sleep of death, there will be nothing startling. It will all be just as natural as waking now. The old familiar love which has blessed us here will greet us there.

In the hand of God.—If God vouchsafe not to take our heart in His hand, it will never recover from its sin. The sacred humanity is as it were the hand and instrument of the Divinity, to which it is united in the person of the Word. It is from this humanity that our life proceeds, because it was in this that Christ died and rose again, and completed His sacrifice. He is man, since He takes this dead person by the hand; He is God, since He commands her to live and to arise, and is immediately obeyed.—P. Quesnel.

Mar_5:42-43. The order of conversion.—

1. To rise, by forsaking sin, its habits and occasions.

2. To walk a long time in good works.

3. To retire from the world, and to keep silence for some time.

4. To eat the living bread of the Eucharist. One ought to take great care not to give this bread to a dead person. That which ought to precede this Divine food, according to the order here intimated by Christ, is, that a man should rise, leave the bed wherein he was dead, and walk in the practice of virtue, with such edification as even to cause admiration in those whom he had before offended and scandalised by his sins.—Ibid.

Silence enjoined.—

1. It was better for the parents and better for the child to think, and not to talk, about this great blessing. It is seldom good, even for rulers and their families, to be the objects of interest, curiosity, and gossip.

2. The Lord did not want men to regard Him merely as One who wrought signs and wonders, healed the sick and raised the dead, but wished the report of His Divine teaching to precede or accompany the fame of His wonderful works.

3. The Lord would not needlessly multiply His marvellous works. Though the child’s life had been miraculously restored, it was not to be miraculously sustained.—Bishop Blunt.

The injunction as to food.—It is often said that this is a proof of Christ’s moderation and reason in the use of His miraculous powers. He who raised from the dead gave no miraculous supply of food. The lesson goes still further, as it shews how the miraculous power goes on, after its first exhibition, to affect all other methods of work. They who before mourned her as dead were now to give her food as living. Jesus had conquered those who laughed Him to scorn; and now those who, by their faithlessness, seemed to shut the poor girl away from life, were, because His power had intervened, to do all in their power to help her life. She was to walk through the world, meeting friends who once had mourned her, demanding and obtaining the tribute of their friendship in a better and richer way. So Jesus changes the world from a hopeless to a hopeful place.—A. Brooks.

Eternal life.—Faith itself and the new birth conduct us to eternal life, not merely, as once received, but as preserved (Luk_22:32; Act_13:43; Heb_3:14).—J. Milner.

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 5

Mar_5:25-34. A testimony to Jesus.—At Cæsarea Paneas there might been seen, as late as the middle of the fourth century, a house, in the courtyard or garden of which was a group in bronze, consisting of a standing figure and a woman prostrate at its feet. Julian, the Apostate Emperor of Rome, commanded this memorial to be overthrown by his soldiers and destroyed. It was a monument that bore testimony to the faith he had renounced. The house was believed to be that in which this woman, cured of the bloody issue, ended her days, and the group represented the Divine Healer and His fearing and trembling patient.

Mar_5:27. No going back.—When sinners sweep away every other delusion, and view Jesus as the only Saviour, they will persevere till they find. When Cortez went to conquer Mexico, he found that the soldiers were few and dispirited. The Mexicans were many, and the enterprise hazardous. The soldiers would have gone back to Spain, but Cortez took two or three chosen heroes with him, and went down to the seaside and broke up all the ships; and “now,” he said, “we must conqueror die. We cannot go back.” When it is death or life, heaven or hell, pardon or condemnation, the sinner will be as determined and courageous as these poor Spaniards or as this poor woman.

Mar_5:28. The ordinances of the Church may be compared to telephone wires, through which messages are all the while passing. You may climb up and put your ear to the wire, or hold it in your hand, but you will not hear a word of all the important messages that are flashing through it. But let an operator come with his instrument, and attach it, and he hears every word. So in the ordinances we touch the invisible wires that bind heaven and earth together. Along these wires messages are flying,—up from earth to heaven, prayers, praises, heart-cries, faith-filled desires; down from heaven to earth, answers of comfort, cheer, joy, and help, blessings of pardon, healing, life, peace.

Mar_5:34. Faith and omnipotence.—Here is an exhaustless reservoir of power, the power of omnipotence, and the means by which it may all be made available to feed our lives. The mill-owner stores up in a reservoir on the heights the water that shall run his mill. Then he needs only a channel or sluice-way that shall bring the water to his wheels. If it were an exhaustless reservoir, like the Atlantic Ocean for extent, he would have no fear that his mill would run dry. These miracles and this text teach the Christian that omnipotence and omniscience alone bound the reservoir of his spiritual graces, and that he has under his own control the width and depth of the channel called “faith,” which brings them into his life. When Franklin grasped the principle of electricity, he could not only draw the lightning from a single cloud—all the electricity in the earth and in all the clouds was at his command, and he could send it upon his errands. When James Watt mastered the principle of the expansive power of steam. not only the little cloud of vapour that issued from his mother’s tea-kettle was under his control, but all the steam that could be generated by the stored-up combustibles of the world was really his. When the Christian can grasp this truth of the power of faith, the infinite spiritual resources of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost are his. “All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth.” There is the reservoir. “All things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.” There is the channel that conveys the power into our lives and makes it available.

Mar_5:36. God seeking to save.—God beseeches men to be reconciled. He stands knocking—not we. Dr. Munhall in an address said there is not even a command to any sinner to pray before believing. A challenge came from a clergyman in the audience, who quoted Rom_10:13 : “Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” “Yes,” says Dr. Munhall, “but read the next verse: ‘How then shall they call on Him on whom they have not believed?’ ”

The seeking Saviour.—Mr. Moody was one night preaching in Philadelphia; near the pulpit sat a young lady, who listened with eager attention, drinking in every word. After he had done talking, he went to her. “Are you a Christian?” “No,” she replied, “I wish I were; I’ve been seeking Jesus for three years.” Mr. Moody replied, “There must be some mistake.” “Don’t you believe me?” said the distressed girl. “Well, no doubt you think you have been seeking Jesus; but, believe me, it don’t take three years for a seeking soul to meet a seeking Saviour.” “What am I to do, then?” “You have been trying to do long enough; you must just believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.” “Oh!” said the young lady, “I am so tired of that word, ‘Believe,’ ‘believe,’ ‘believe!’ I don’t know what it means.” “Then we’ll change the word, and say, ‘trust.’ ” “If I say, ‘I’ll trust Him,’ will He save me?” “I don’t say that, for you may say ten thousand things; but if you do trust Him, He certainly will.” “Well,” said she, “I do trust Him; but I don’t feel any better!” “Ah!” said Mr. Moody, “I see; you’ve been looking for feelings for three years, instead of looking to Jesus.” If the translators of the Bible had everywhere inserted “feelings” instead of faith,” what a run there would be upon the Book! But God does not say a word about feelings from Genesis to Revelation. With men “seeing is believing,” but with the believer “believing is seeing.” An orphan child was once asked by her little friend, “What do you do without a mother to tell your troubles to?” “Mother told me to go to Jesus; He was mother’s Friend, and He’s my Friend too,” was the simple reply. “But He is a long way off; He won’t stop to mind you.” Her face brightened, as she said, “I don’t know about that, but I know He says He will, and that’s enough for me.” And should not that be enough for us all?

Mar_5:39. Only sleeping.—Is it no comfort to be told that the friend you thought to be dead only sleeps? There was a time when Christians took great consolation from this very truth—when it made them ready to die, and resigned to see those near to them die at the call of God. Go look at the catacombs of Rome, and see, in the records which those faithful caverns have preserved of the creed and life of our Christian forefathers, how the early Christians thought of death. The inscriptions are full of faith. Here a mother “sleeps in Jesus”; there a child “sleeps in Jesus”; husband, wife, and friend—they all “sleep,”—there is no sign of death in the catacombs. And I would rather visit now their grim and unadorned recesses, with the feelings suggested by the simple stones which tell how faithful Christians died as well as lived in the comfort of their faith, than go into our gay modern cemeteries, with their costly classic, not Christian, ornaments, telling of the unrest of broken-hearted survivors, rather than of the peaceful sleep of the dead in Christ. Our martyred forefathers of the early Church may teach us how to live, to die, to bury, and to mourn for our dead. “She is not dead, but sleepeth”. The sleep is long—it is too deep for us to break—our loved one may not be awakened by the call of affection or the cry of anguish; but still she only sleeps—she is not dead.

Sleep—and death.—There is in the German a beautiful fable which represents the angel of slumber wandering over the earth in company with the angel of death. As the evening draws near they approach a village and encamp upon one of its hills, listening to the curfew as it “tolls the knell of parting day.”At last the sounds cease, profound silence reigns round about, and the dark mantle of night covers the earth. Now the angel of sleep rises from her bed of moss, and, stepping forward to the brink of the height, silently scatters the unseen seeds of slumber. The evening wind noiselessly wafts them out over the habitations of weary men. Sweet sleep settles down upon all the inhabitants of the village, and overcomes them all, from the old man who nods in his chair to the infant resting in its cradle. The sick forget their pain; the afflicted, their anguish; even poverty is oblivious of its wants. All eyes are closed. After her task has been performed, the angel of slumber turns to her sister and says: “When the morning sun appears, all these people will praise me as their benefactor and friend. How delightful it is to go about doing good so silently and all unseen! What a beautiful calling we have!” Thus spoke the angel of sleep; but the angel of death gazed upon her in silent sorrow, and a tear, such as the undying shed, stood in her earnest eye. “Alas!” said she, “I cannot rejoice, like you, in the gratitude of men. The earth calls me its enemy, and the destroyer of its peace.” “O my sister!” replied the angel of slumber, “at the great awaking of the resurrection morning the souls of the blessed will recognise you as their friend and benefactor. Are we not sisters, and the messengers of our common Father?” They ceased to speak, but the eyes of the death-angel glistened with tears as they both fled out into the darkness of the night.

Mar_5:41. Make for the higher.—Nineteen centuries have passed since the Saviour spoke these words, but they are as full of meaning now as they were then to every girl who hath ears to hear. “Talitha cumi,”—My child, arise; get up from any slothful habit, from any frivolous, idle, selfish habit you have formed. My little lamb, mount up, be better this year than you were last year. Let His voice reach your innermost heart and awake you from the sleep of indifference. Not long ago an interesting memoir was written of one who heard words very similar to those which the Saviour spoke to the daughter of Jairus, and who acted upon them. An early friend of Catherine Spooner, who became Mrs. Tait, wife of the late Archbishop of Canterbury, remembers that in the flush of her bright girlhood, when every innocent delight was poured into her cup, she once told her how she had heard in her inmost heart, amidst all these joys and pleasures, a hidden voice saying, “Make for the higher.”This aspiration and consecration of her life was never lowered. In the sphere of activity and social intercourse, where the providence of God placed her, “Make for the higher” hallowed and sweetened all lower things for her.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

6. Conflict of Jesus with desponding Unbelief on the Sick-bed and Bed of Death; Healing of the Woman with the Issue of Blood; Restoration of Jairus’ Daughter; and Triumph of Jesus over the Healing Art, and the World’s Lamentations for the Dead. Mar_5:21-43.

(Parallels: Mat_9:1; Mat_9:18-26; Luk_8:40-56)

21And when Jesus was passed over again by ship unto the other side, much people 22gathered unto him; and he was nigh unto the sea. And, behold,9 there cometh one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name; and when he saw him, he fell at his feet, 23And besought10 him greatly, saying, My little daughter lieth at the point of death: 1 pray thee, come and lay thy hands on her, that she may be healed; and she shall live. 24And Jesus went with him; and much people followed him, and thronged him. 25, And a certain woman,11 which had an issue of blood twelve years, 26And had suffered many things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse, 27When she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind, and touched his garment. 28For she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole. 29And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up; and she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague [scourge]. 30And Jesus, immediately knowing [having known] in himself that virtue had gone out of him, turned him about in the press, and said, Who touched my clothes? 31And his disciples said unto him, Thou seest the multitude thronging thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me? 32And he looked round about to see her that had done this thing. 33But the woman, fearing and trembling, knowing what was done in12 her, came and fell down before him, and told him all the truth. 34And he said unto her, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague [scourge]. 35While he yet spake, there came from the ruler of the synagogue’s house certain which said, Thy daughter is dead; why troublest thou the Master any further? 36As soon as Jesus heard13 the word that was spoken, he saith unto the ruler of the synagogue, Be not afraid, only believe. 37And he suffered no man to follow him, save Peter, and James, and John the brother of James. 38And he cometh14 to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and seeth the tumult, and them that wept 39and wailed greatly. And when lie was come in, he saith unto them, Why make ye this ado, and weep? the damsel is not dead, but sleepeth. 40And they laughed him to scorn [jeered him]. But when he had put them all out, he taketh the father and the mother of the damsel, and them that were with him, and entereth in where the damsel was lying.15 41And he took the damsel by the hand, and said unto her, Talitha cumi; which is, being interpreted, Damsel, (I say unto thee,) arise. 42And straightway the damsel arose, and walked; for she was of the age of twelve years. And they were astonished with a great astonishment. 43And he charged them straitly that no man. should know it; and commanded that something should be given her to eat.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

See on the parallels.—Mark connects the return from Gadara with the narrative of the first raising of the dead, in accordance with his own principle of arrangement. According to the more exact account of Matthew, we must place in the interval the healing of the paralytic, the calling of Matthew, and the offence taken by the Pharisees and John’s disciples at Jesus’ eating in the house of the publican. In his presentation of the events that now follow, we once more observe the exact delineation of Mark. Concerning his little daughter (θυγάτριον), the father here says ἐσχάτως ἔχει and in an appeal which announces itself at once by an ὅτι. In the account of the woman with an issue, Mark makes it very prominent that she had suffered much from many physicians, which Luke, the physician, much more gently intimates. And the woman’s healing is emphatically expressed: The fountain of her blood was dried up; she felt in her body (in her feeling of bodily vigor) that she was delivered from her plague (scourge). He does not (like Luke) expressly mention Peter as the one who replied to the Lord’s question as to who touched Him, “Thou seest the multitude,” etc.; but he records once more that Jesus turned and looked round to find out who had done this. We see how the woman comes forward trembling with fear, falls down before the Lord, and confesses all. We see Jesus separating Himself, with Jairus and the three elect disciples, from the multitude, in order to go into the house of death. The tumult of the lamentation for the dead is here vividly depicted. He defines accurately the group of those who enter; we hear the original Talitha cumi; we see the damsel at once, after her restoration, arising and walking, as she was able, being twelve years old; and hear how rigorously Jesus charged the people not to make much rumor about the miracle (which in itself could not be concealed); and finally, how He commanded that they should give the maiden food. Here and there Luke, and here and there Matthew, approximate to Mark’s description.

Mar_5:21. He was nigh unto the sea.—Meyer: “Here there is a discrepancy with Matthew’s account, according to which Jairus entered the house of Jesus in Capernaum.” But it was neither in Jesus’ house, nor in that of the publican Matthew; for the transaction with the Pharisees and the disciples of John doubtless took place after the meal in a public place. Hence there is no discrepancy in the narratives.

Mar_5:23. My little daughter.—(Tender expression of the troubled father).—That Thou mayest come (ἵνα ἐλθὼν ἐπιθῇς).—The ὅτι and the ἵνα give vivid reality to his urgent words; they are to be referred to the kneeling and cry for help (παρακαλεῖ). Hence there is nothing to be supplied in the text.

Mar_5:26. Had suffered many things from many physicians.—“How various were the prescriptions of Jewish physicians for women in that case, and what experiments they were in the habit of making, see in Lightfoot, p. 614.” Meyer. Comp. also the article Krankheiten in Winer. “She probably suffered from a chronic hæmorrhage in the womb, and its long continuance endangered life.” See also the article Reinigkeit. “Such a woman was, according to Lev_15:25, through the whole time unclean, and was required, after the evil had passed away, to bring on the eighth day an offering for purification.” On the strong Oriental abhorrence of such persons, see the same article.

Mar_5:28. For she said,—thinking in audible words.—Touch but His clothes.—That the more precise “hem of His garment,” occurring in Matthew and Luke, is wanting in Mark, gives no warrant for conjectural emendation.

Mar_5:29. The fountain of her blood.—Not euphemistic description of the womb, but vivid description of the cause of the evil; the blood being represented as flowing from a fountain.—She felt in her body.—Euth. Zig.: As her body was no longer moistened, etc. But here there is something greater signified: she experienced the healthy feeling of new life.

Mar_5:30. Virtue had gone out of Him.—Meyer maintains that Jesus perceived the flowing of His virtue after it took place; a simultaneous knowledge of it being thought at variance with the words. But, on the contrary, it must be observed that the simultaneousness of the knowledge is declared in the ἐπιγνούς; first by the ἐπι, and then by the Aorist. The opposite explanation might be made to favor a magical interpretation of the event, and Strauss’ criticism upon it. Yet Meyer himself refers with an emphatic note of exclamation to Calovius: “Calovius quoted the passage against the Calvinists: vim divinam carni Christi derogardes.”

Mar_5:38. Them that wept.—A scene of Jewish ceremonial lamentation over the dead, in which Mark omits the minstrels (see Matthew), and lays less stress than Luke upon the weeping and bewailing, but only to give more prominence to the tumult and mechanical liturgical cries (by ἀλαλάζειν). On the Jewish lament for the dead, see Grotius on Matthew, and Winer’s article Trauer.

Mar_5:41. Talitha cumi, טָלִיתָא קוּמִי.—Similar original Aramaic words occur in Mark, Mar_3:17; Mar_7:11; Mar_7:34; Mar_14:36.

Mar_5:42. She was of the age of twelve years.—Reason for the statement that she arose and walked at once. Bengel: Rediit ad statum, œtati congruentem.

Mar_5:43. That no man should know it.—That is, should know the occurrence in its precise characteristics, viz., the way and manner of the restoration of the dead. On the motive of this prohibition, see Meyer.16—That something should be given her to eat.—Theophylact: That the raising might not be regarded as only an appearance. Meyer: In order to show that the child was not merely delivered from death, but from sickness also. Chiefly, however, because she was in need of strengthening by food.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. See on the parallels.—The touching of Christ’s garment, and the conscious issuing of a divine virtue from Him as the result, are a testimony to the living unity and reciprocal influence of the divine and human natures in His personal consciousness; in which the human nature was not (as the old dogmatics taught) merely in a passive relation.

2. Two miracles of healing were wrought on diseased women. Otherwise, they are mainly male sufferers who are adduced as examples of His healing acts. Not that other instances were wanting; for the very first healing recorded by the Evangelists took place on a woman, Peter’s wife’s mother. Luke mentions some women who were dispossessed of devils, Mar_8:2. But the deliverance of Mary Magdalene from seven devils we regard, after the analogy of Mat_12:45, as a symbolical expression of an essentially great conversion.—The woman with an issue of blood, the dead maiden: progression in the manifestation of suffering in the female sex. That the former had been afflicted twelve years and the latter was twelve years old, was a coincidence from which rash criticism has vainly sought to extract ground of suspicion.

3. We term this narrative a history of victory over despairing unbelief. This appears in the comfortless wail of the Jewish lament over the dead; in the circumstance that the people around the dead maiden laughed at the Lord, when He declared that she was not dead, but slept; but especially in the message which they sent to the ruler of the synagogue, Why troublest thou the Master any further? wherein there is an evident tone of bitter and almost ironical unbelief. The faith of Jairus itself appears, at first, as only a fruit of distress. Hence it, was subjected to a severe test, that period of deep anxiety during Christ’s delay while He cured the woman with the issue of blood. The weak germ of Jairus’ faith was encompassed by desponding unbelief. Even the faith of the sick woman struggles with the despondency into which a long series of disappointed acts of trust in physicians had thrown her. She does not venture to bring her distress publicly before the Lord’s notice; the rather as, being ceremonially unclean, she had in a forbidden manner mingled with the crowd, and as her malady was of such a kind as shame would not allow her to speak of. Hence her faith must be brought to maturity by a public confession, even as that of Jairus by a season of delay.

4. As Christ’s work of salvation assumed a specific form in many acts of blessing in favor of the male sex, so also Christianity has wrought immeasurable specific benefits for the female. Here we see, first, a wretched sick woman, lost in the crowd; and Christ delivers her not only from her sickness, but also from the morbid dread and fear of her feminine consciousness. Even shame required redemption and sanctification by the Spirit of truth. And so the female sex has been redeemed from the reproach of inferiority, impurity, the rude contempt of man’s prejudice, and the ban of self-depreciation.

5. Reischl: “The woman was afraid; partly ashamed on account of the nature of her malady, partly disturbed by the consciousness of impropriety, as having, while Levitically unclean, mingled with the people, and even touched the great Teacher Himself.” In the last point she forms a contrast to the leper, whom the Lord Himself touched. Under the veil of diffidence, however, there was a touch of womanly boldness, which was excused by the faith that the touching of Christ would heal her.

6. “Daughter, be of good courage, thy faith hath saved thee: go in peace.” Thus He blessed her in the same manner as He had blessed that palsied man. And in fact we must connect together these two petitioners for help, in order that we may see two characteristic forms of faith in the male and in the female contrasted. Both applicants pressed through with confidence, and seized their deliverance almost by force: the man did it in man’s fashion, entering through the roof like a robber; the woman in woman’s fashion, as it were, like a female thief. But both were recognised by the Lord, as showing the pure spirit of confidence.” (Lange’s Leben Jesu, ii. 682.) But the faith of this woman had a superadded conflict to maintain with her timorous natural feeling confronting the fearful power of prejudice.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

See on the parallels.—The miracles of Christ a wonderful connected chain.—New life added to new life in the way of Christ, until the great word is fulfilled, Behold, I make all things new!—Christ at once ready to help the man who comes from the powerful party of His opponents.—The ruler of the synagogue at the feet of Jesus; or, the victory of the Gospel over party spirit.—The triumph of Christ over the whole domain of sickness and death, a sign also of His supremacy over all natural means of help and human skill in healing.—Christ the Physician of physicians (as the Preacher of preachers, the Teacher of teachers, the Judge of judges, the Prince of kings).—Christ’s divine power the sign of salvation to all the despondency, little faith, and unbelief of man.—Christ in our history the conqueror of all hindrances to His own work and man’s faith.—The woman with the issue, and the dead maiden; or, Christ the Helper in all suffering; whether secret or public.—Christ the Prince of salvation in the domain of secret sorrows and silent sighs.—Hearing and answering all the sighings of faith.—The test to which the faith of the ruler and of the woman was subjected: 1. The element common to both: they were wanting in the full surrender of trust. Both must be set free from fear and despondency. 2. The difference: the spiritual ruler must retire, wait, submit, despair of all signs for hope, and then in his despair learn to believe. He scarcely believed in the invigorator of the sick, and now He must believe in the awakener of the dead. He must, at the same time, in humility yield precedence to a poor unclean woman, and in the case of a seeming religious impropriety.—The woman must come forward and confess.—Even amidst the pressure of thousands the Lord perceives the silent and gentle touch of a single believer.—Internal union with Jesus high above the external.—The hastening and the delaying of Jesus sublime above the haste and delay of the world.—Christ purposed here to effect, not the healing of the sick, but the raising of the dead.—Twice (in the history of Lazarus too) He first yielded the point to death, that He might approve Himself afterwards his conqueror.—With the Lord the spiritual is everything, and the edification of the inner life the great concern.—The gradually progressive manifestation of Christ’s power in raising the dead, a sign and symbol of the great and universal resurrection.

Starke:—Quesnel.:—God has His own times and seasons; He delays and yet helps. Have patience, and walk in the way He marks.—Hedinger:—Daring wins.—Quesnel:—Men are slow to do for the healing of the soul what they are ready enough to do for the cure of the body.—Cramer:—Medicines are not to be despised, Sir_38:1; but God does not always see fit to prosper them.—To use them is not displeasing to God, but ungodly trusting in them is.—The humility of the woman.—Canstein:—Shame and fear would keep us back from Christ, but faith presses near to Him with a right and laudable shamelessness.—Osiander:—In our sickness we should put our trust, not in medicine, but in God.—Faith is stronger than all earthly medicaments.—The Lord is not ignorant what benefits we have received from Him, and He will demand an account of all the good deeds lie has done to us.—Bibl. Wirt.:—Tempted souls think that God takes no care of them, but He faithfully remembers their case; the deeper they are in misery, the more graciously does His compassionate eye rest upon them.—Canstein:—To acknowledge our own weakness and God’s power, is to speak the truth indeed.—What God has done for us in secret we should publicly speak of to His glory.—Go in peace.—Hedinger:—Reason despairs at sight of death.—In perfect faith there is no fear.—Quesnel:—Let us learn from Christ to confide only to a few elect ones the works of God which we have to do, that those works may not be thwarted.—To sorrow in secret over our dead is Christian, but to howl and cry is heathenish.—Hedinger:—God’s wonderful works must have devout and attentive witnesses: away with tumult!—Nova Bibl. Tub.:—Why do ye mourn, ye parents, over the departure of your children? Jesus will one day lay His mighty hand upon them, raise, them, and give them back to you.

Lisco:—The question of our Lord was designed to free the woman from her false fear of man.—The delay of help, and the message, were severe tests of Jairus’ faith; but the healing of the woman strength ened his faith again, as did the word of Jesus, Mar_5:36;—Braune:—The urgency and continuance of her malady, the vanity of all human help, the lack of substance, were three steps which brought the sick woman to faith; and the feeblest cries of the believing heart were understood by her Lord.—The Jews received this custom of lamentation from the Romans [Qy.: see Jer_9:17]. This purchased grief was intended to make the occasion of death important, to distribute the impressions of sorrow over many, and lighten the grief of the friends. Thus it was mere heathenish vanity.—Schleier-macher:—The more mighty love is in those who can help others, and, on the other hand, the more longing and trust there is in those who need help, the more good will be the result in the particular case, though we may not be able to show how, and the beginnings of cause and effect may be concealed from us.—It is always the case that from those whom God has called to do good, many influences proceed which they themselves do not in the special cases know of. But how much more efficacious would charity be, if those from whom the influences proceed did not think so much about those which they themselves receive!—How important it is for the general order of the community that we should not neglect our own individual personal relations!—Christendom has now still to press through the world violently with its blessings.—Although the power of Christ is continually entering more and more into the order of nature, yet that which Christianity has wrought in the world from its beginning is the greatest miracle that we know; but we must be careful to distinguish from it the internal miracle, which only those see who live in internal fellowship with the Redeemer.—Bauer:—Mark how He does not break the bruised reed, or quench the smoking flax!

Footnotes:

[9]Mar_5:22.—The ἰδού not in B., D., L., Vulgate, Versions, Tischendorf, Meyer; bracketed by Lachmann.

[10]Mar_5:23.—The Present παρακαλεῖ, Tischendorf, after A., C., L.

[11]Mar_5:25.—Τὶς wanting in A., B., C., Vulgate, Versions, Lachmann, Meyer.

[12]Mar_5:33.—’Επ’ wanting in B., C., D., Syriac, Coptic, Tischendorf; bracketed by Lachmann.

[13]Mar_5:36.—Παρακούσας, Tischendorf, after B., L., Δ.

[14]Mar_5:38.—The Plural ἔρχονται has most support, viz.: A., B., C., D., F., Versions, Lachmann, Tischendorf.

[15]Mar_5:40.—The ἀνακείμενον (Elzevir) is set aside by Tischendorf, after B., D., L., Versions; bracketed by Lachmann.

[16]Meyer mutes the motive to be, a desire on the part of Christ to repress the tendency to fanatical expectations and tumults concerning the Messiah, among the Jews.—Ed.

Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CHAPTER 5:21-43 (Mar_5:21-43)

WITH JAIRUS

"And when Jesus had crossed over again in the boat unto the other side, a great multitude was gathered unto Him: and He was by the sea. And there cometh one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name; and seeing Him, he falleth at His feet, and beseecheth Him much, saying, My little daughter is at the point of death: I pray Thee that Thou come and lay Thy hands on her, that she may be made whole, and live. And He went with him; and a great multitude followed Him, and they thronged Him. And a woman, which had an issue of blood twelve years, and had suffered many things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse, having heard the things concerning Jesus, came in the crowd behind, and touched His garment. For she said, If I touch but His garments, I shall be made whole. And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her plague. And straightway Jesus, perceiving in Himself that the power proceeding from him had gone forth, turned Him about in the crowd, and said, Who touched My garments? And His disciples said unto Him, Thou seest the multitude thronging Thee, and sayest Thou, Who touched Me? And He looked round about to see her that had done this thing. But the woman fearing and trembling, knowing what had been done to her, came and fell down before Him, and told Him all the truth. And He said unto her, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague. While He yet spake, they come from the ruler of the synagogue's house, saying, Thy daughter is dead: why troublest thou the Master any further? But Jesus not heeding the word spoken, saith unto the ruler of the synagogue, Fear not, only believe. And He suffered no man to follow with Him, save Peter, and James, and John the brother of James. And they come to the house of the ruler of the synagogue; and He beholdeth a tumult, and many weeping and wailing greatly. And when He was entered in, He saith unto them, Why make ye a tumult, and weep? the child is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed Him to scorn. But He, having put them all forth, taketh the father of the child and her mother and them that were with Him, and goeth in where the child was. And taking the child by the hand, He saith unto her, Talitha cumi; which is, being interpreted, damsel, I say unto thee, Arise. And straightway the damsel rose up, and walked; for she was twelve years old. And they were amazed straightway with a great amazement. And He charged them much that no man should know this; and He commanded that something would be given her to eat." Mar_5:21-43 (R.V.)

REPULSED from Decapolis, but consoled by the rescue and zeal of the demoniac, Jesus returned to the western shore, and a great multitude assembled. The other boats which were with Him had doubtless spread the tidings of the preternatural calm which rescued them from deadly peril, and it may be that news of the event of Gadara arrived almost as soon as He Whom they celebrated. We have seen that St. Mark aims at bringing the four great miracles of this period into the closest sequence. And so he passes over a certain brief period with the words "He was by the sea." But in fact Jesus was reasoning with the Pharisees, and with the disciples of John, who had assailed Him and His followers, when one of their natural leaders threw himself at His feet.

The contrast is sharp enough, as He rises from a feast to go to the house of mourning, from eating with publicans and sinners to accompany a ruler of the synagogue. These unexpected calls, these sudden alternations all found Him equally ready to bear the same noble part, in the most dissimilar scenes, and in treating temperaments the most unlike. But the contrast should also be observed between those harsh and hostile critics who hated Him in the interests of dogma and of ceremonial, and Jairus, whose views were theirs, but whose heart was softened by trouble. The danger of his child was what drove him, perhaps reluctantly enough, to beseech Jesus much. And nothing could be more touching than his prayer for his "little daughter," its sequence broken as if with a sob; wistfully pictorial as to the process, "that Thou come and lay Thy hands upon her," and dilating wistfully too upon the effect, "that she may be made whole and live." If a miracle were not in question, the dullest critic in Europe would confess that this exquisite supplication was not composed by an evangelist, but a father. And he would understand also why the very words in their native dialect were not forgotten, which men had heard awake the dead.

As Jesus went with him, a great multitude followed Him, and they thronged Him. It is quite evident that Jesus did not love these gatherings of the idly curious. Partly from such movements He had withdrawn Himself to Gadara; and partly to avoid exciting them He strove to keep many of His miracles a secret. Sensationalism is neither grace nor a means of grace. And it must be considered that the perfect Man, as far from mental apathy or physical insensibility as from morbid fastidiousness, would find much to shrink away from in the pressure of a city crowd. The contact of inferior organizations, selfishness driving back the weak and gentle, vulgar scrutiny and audible comment, and the desire for some miracle as an idle show, which He would only work because His gentle heart was full of pity, all these would be utterly distressing to Him who was

"The first true gentleman that ever breathed,"

as well as the revelation of God in flesh. It is therefore noteworthy that we have many examples of His grace and goodness amid such trying scenes, as when He spoke to Zacchaeus, and called Bartimaeus to Him to be healed. Jesus could be wrathful but He was never irritated. Of these examples one of the most beautiful is here recorded, for as He went with Jairus, amidst the rude and violent thronging crowds, moving alone (as men often are in sympathy and in heart alone amid seething thoroughfares), He suddenly became aware of a touch, the timid and stealthy touch of a broken-hearted woman, pale and wasted with disease, but borne through the crowd by the last effort of despair and the first energy of a newborn hope. She ought not to have come thither, since her touch spread ceremonial uncleanness far and wide. Nor ought she to have stolen a blessing instead of praying for it. And if we seek to blame her still further, we may condemn the superstitious notion that Christ's gifts of healing were not conscious and loving actions, but a mere contagion of health, by which one might profit unfelt and undiscovered. It is urged indeed that hers was not a faith thus clouded, but so majestic as to believe that Christ would know and respond to the silent hint of a gentle touch. And is it supposed that Jesus would have dragged into publicity such a perfect lily of the vale as this? and what means her trembling confession, and the discovery that she could not be hid? But when our keener intellects have criticized her errors, and our clearer ethics have frowned upon her misconduct, one fact remains. She is the only woman upon whom Jesus is recorded to have bestowed any epithet but a formal one. Her misery and her faith drew from His guarded lips, the tender and yet lofty word Daughter.

So much better is the faith which seeks for blessing, however erroneous be its means, than the heartless propriety which criticizes with most dispassionate clearness, chiefly because it really seeks nothing for itself at all. Such faith is always an appeal, and is responded to, not as she supposed, mechanically, unconsciously, nor, of course, by the opus operatum of a garment touched (or of a sacrament formally received), but by the going forth of power from a conscious Giver, in response to the need which has approached His fullness. He knew her secret and fearful approach to Him, as He knew the guileless heart of Nathaniel, whom He marked beneath the fig-tree. And He dealt with her very gently. Doubtless there are many such concealed woes, secret, untold miseries which eat deep into gentle hearts, and are never spoken, and cannot, like Bartimaeus, cry aloud for public pity. For these also there is a balm in Gilead, and if the Lord requires them to confess Him publicly, He will first give them due strength to do so. This enfeebled and emaciated woman was allowed to feel in her body that she was healed of her plague, before she was called upon for her confession. Jesus asked, Who touched My clothes? It was one thing to press Him, driven forward by the multitude around, as circumstances impel so many to become churchgoers, readers of Scripture, interested in sacred questions and controversies until they are borne as by physical propulsion into the closest contact with our Lord, but not drawn thither by any personal craving or sense of want, nor expecting any blessed reaction of "the power proceeding from Him." It was another thing to reach out a timid hand and touch appealingly even that tasselled fringe of His garment which had a religious significance, whence perhaps she drew a semi-superstitious hope. In the face of this incident, can any orthodoxy forbid us to believe that the grace of Christ extends, now as of yore, to many a superstitious and erring approach by which souls reach after Christ?

The disciples wondered at His question: they knew not that "the flesh presses but faith touches;" but as He continued to look around and seek her that had done this thing, she fell down and told him all the truth. Fearing and trembling she spoke, for indeed she had been presumptuous, and ventured without permission. But the chief thing was that she had ventured, and so He graciously replied, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole, go in peace and be whole of thy plague. Thus she received more than she had asked or thought; not only healing for the body, but also a victory over that self-effacing, fearful, half morbid diffidence, which long and weakening disease entails. Thus also, instead of a secret cure, she was given the open benediction of her Lord, and such confirmation in her privilege as many more would enjoy if only with their mouth confession were made unto salvation.

While He yet spoke, and the heart of Jairus was divided between joy at a new evidence of the power of Christ, and impatience at every moment of delay, not knowing that his Benefactor was the Lord of time itself, the fatal message came, tinged with some little irony as it asked, Why troublest thou the Teacher any more? It is quite certain that Jesus had before now raised the dead, but no miracle of the kind had acquired such prominence as afterwards to claim a place in the Gospel narratives.

One is led to suspect that the care of Jesus had prevailed, and they had not been widely published. To those who brought this message, perhaps no such case had traveled, certainly none had gained their credence. It was in their eyes a thing incredible that He should raise the dead, and indeed there is a wide difference between every other miracle and this. We struggle against all else, but when death comes we feel that all is over except to bury out of our sight what once was beautiful and dear. Death is destiny made visible; it is the irrevocable. Who shall unsay the words of a bleeding heart, I shall go to him but he shall not return to me? But Christ came to destroy him that had the power of death. Even now, through Him, we are partakers of a more intense and deeper life, and have not only the hope but the beginning of immortality. And it was the natural seal upon His lofty mission, that He should publicly raise up the dead. For so great a task, shall we say that Jesus now gathers all His energies? That would be woefully to misread the story; for a grand simplicity, the easy bearing of unstrained and amply adequate resources, is common to all the narratives of life brought back. We shall hereafter see good reason why Jesus employed means for other miracles, and even advanced by stages in the work. But lest we should suppose that effort was necessary, and His power but just sufficed to overcome the resistance, none of these supreme miracles is wrought with the slightest effort. Prophets and apostles may need to stretch themselves upon the bed or to embrace the corpse; Jesus, in His own noble phrase, awakes it out of sleep. A wonderful ease and quietness pervade the narratives, expressing exactly the serene bearing of the Lord of the dead and of the living. There is no holding back, no toying with the sorrow of the bereaved, such as even Euripides, the tenderest of the Greeks, ascribed to the demigod who tore from the grip of death the heroic wife of Admetus. Hercules plays with the husband's sorrow, suggests the consolation of a new bridal, and extorts the angry cry, "Silence, what have you said? I would not have believed it of you." But what is natural to a hero, flushed with victory and the sense of patronage, would have ill become the absolute self-possession and gentle grace of Jesus. In every case, therefore, He is full of encouragement and sympathy, even before His work is wrought. To the widow of Nain He says, "Weep not." He tells the sister of Lazarus, "If thou wilt believe, thou shalt see the salvation of God." And when these disastrous tidings shake all the faith of Jairus, Jesus loses not a moment in reassuring him: "Fear not, only believe," He says, not heeding the word spoken; that is to say, Himself unagitated and serene. [Unless indeed the meaning be rather, "over hearing the word," which is not its force in the New Testament (Mat_18:17, twice)].

In every case some co-operation was expected from the bystanders. The bearers of the widow's son halted, expectant, when this majestic and tender Wayfarer touched the bier. The friends of Lazarus rolled away the stone from the sepulchre. But the professional mourners in the house of Jairus were callous and insensible, and when He interrupted their clamorous wailing, with the question, Why make ye tumult and weep? they laughed Him to scorn; a fit expression of the world's purblind incredulity, its reliance upon ordinary "experience" to disprove all possibilities of the extraordinary and Divine, and its heartless transition from conventional sorrow to ghastly laughter, mocking in the presence of death -- which is, in its view, so desparate -- the last hope of humanity. Laughter is not the fitting mood in which to contradict the Christian hope, that our lost ones are not dead, but sleep. The new and strange hope for humanity which Jesus thus asserted, He went on to prove, but not for them. Exerting that moral ascendency, which sufficed Him twice to cleanse the Temple, He put them all forth, as already He had shut out the crowd, and all His disciples but "the elect of His election," the three who now first obtain a special privilege. The scene was one of surpassing solemnity and awe; but not more so than that of Nain, or by the tomb of Lazarus. Why then were not only the idly curious and the scornful, but nine of His chosen ones excluded? Surely we may believe, for the sake of the little girl, whose tender grace of unconscious maidenhood should not, in its hour of reawakened vitality, be the centre of a gazing circle. He kept with Him the deeply reverential and the loving, the ripest apostles and the parents of the child, since love and reverence are ever the conditions of real insight. And then, first, was exhibited the gentle and profound regard of Christ for children. He did not arouse her, as others, with a call only, but took her by the hand, while He spoke to her those Aramaic words, so marvelous in their effect, which St. Peter did not fail to repeat to St. Mark as he had heard them, Talitha cumi; Damsel, I say unto thee, Arise. They have an added sweetness when we reflect that the former word, though applied to a very young child, is in its root a variation of the word for a little lamb. How exquisite from the lips of the Good Shepherd, Who gave His life for the sheep. How strange to be thus awakened from the mysterious sleep, and to gaze with a child's fresh eyes into the loving eyes of Jesus. Let us seek to realize such positions, to comprehend the marvelous heart which they reveal to us, and we shall derive more love and trust from the effort than from all such doctrinal inference and allegorizing as would dry up, into a hortus siccus, the sweetest blooms of the sweetest story ever told.

So shall we understand what happened next in all three cases. Something preternatural and therefore dreadful, appeared to hang about the lives so wondrously restored. The widow of Nain did not dare to embrace her son until Christ "gave him to his mother." The bystanders did not touch Lazarus, bound hand and foot, until Jesus bade them "loose him and let him go." And the five who stood about this child's bed, amazed straightway with a great amazement, had to be reminded that being now in perfect health, after an illness which left her system wholly unsupplied, something should be given her to eat. This is the point at which Euripides could find nothing fitter for Hercules to utter than the awkward boast, "Thou wilt some day say that the son of Jove was a capital guest to entertain." What a contrast. For Jesus was utterly unflushed, undazzled, apparently unconscious of anything to disturb His composure. And so far was He from the unhappy modern notion, that every act of grace must be proclaimed on the housetop, and every recipient of grace however young, however unmatured, paraded and exhibited, that He charged them much that no man should know this.

The story throughout is graphic and full of character; every touch, every word reveals the Divine Man; and only reluctance to believe a miracle prevents it from proving itself to every candid mind. Whether it be accepted or rejected, it is itself miraculous. It could not have grown up in the soil which generated the early myths and legends, by the working of the ordinary laws of mind. It is beyond their power to invent or to dream, supernatural in the strictest sense.

This miracle completes the cycle. Nature, distracted by the Fall, has revolted against Him in vain. Satan, entrenched in his last stronghold, has resisted, and humbled himself to entreaties and to desparate contrivances, in vain. Secret and unspoken woes, and silent germs of belief, have hidden from Him in vain. Death itself has closed its bony fingers upon its prey, in vain. Nothing can resist the power and love, which are enlisted on behalf of all who put their trust in Jesus.

William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.

5:21-43 Two healing miracles are connected by the need for faith (5:34, 36). The story of Jairus’s daughter brackets the story of the healing of the woman who had constant bleeding (5:25-34; see Mark Book Introduction, “Literary Features”), during which Jairus’s sick daughter died (5:35-43).

5:21-22 As Jesus arrived in Galilee on the other (i.e., west) side of the lake, . . . a leader of the local synagogue named Jairus approached him. Jairus organized the worship services at the synagogue (cp. Acts 13:15) and represented the Jewish community to the outside world.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Mar_5:21-24. See on Mat_9:1; Mat_9:18. Comp. Luk_8:40-42, who also keeps to the order of events.

παρὰ τὴν θάλ.] a point of difference from Matthew, according to whom Jairus makes his appearance at Capernaum at the lodging of Jesus. See on Mat_9:18.

Mar_5:23. ὅτι] recitative.

τὸ θυγάτριόν μου] Comp. Athen. xiii. p. 581 C; Long. i. 6; Plut. Mor. p. 179 E; Lucian, Tox. 22. This diminutive expression of paternal tenderness is peculiar to Mark. Comp. Mar_7:25. It does not occur elsewhere in the N. T.

ἐσχάτως ἔχει] a late Greek phrase. See Wetstein and Kypke, also Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 389.

ἵνα ἐλθὼν κ.τ.λ.] His excitement amidst grief and hope speaks incoherently. We may understand before ἵνα: this I say, in order that, etc. This is still simpler and more natural than the taking it imperatively, by supplying volo or the like (see on Mar_12:19).

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mar 5:21-43 . The daughter of Jairus and the woman with bloody issue (Mat 9:18-26 , Luk 8:40-56 ).

Mar 5:21 . ὄχλος πολὺς : the inescapable crowd, in no hurry to disperse, gathers again about Jesus, on His return to the western shore. ἐπʼ αὐτόν : not merely to , but after Him, the great centre of attraction ( cf. πρὸς α ., Mar 2:13 , Mar 4:1 ). παρὰ τ . θ ., by the sea (here and there); how soon after the arrival the incident happened not indicated ( cf. Mat 9:18 for sequence and situation), nor is the motive of the narrative. Weiss suggests that the Jairus story is given as another instance of unreceptivity, Mar 5:40 (Meyer).

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21–24. The Petition of Jairus

21. unto the other side] i. e. the western side of the Lake, near Capernaum.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And when Jesus was passed over again,.... Over the sea of Tiberias, that part of it which was necessary to go over from the country of Gadara, to Capernaum,

by ship, or "boat",

unto the other side. This may seem to some unnecessary to be added; and it may be asked, what way but by ship, or boat, could he have gone over to the other side of the sea of Galilee? To which it may be replied, there was a bridge at Chammath of Gadara (m), over an arm of this sea, over which Christ and his disciples might have passed, and have gone by land to Capernaum; so that this phrase is very necessarily and significantly used:

much people gathered unto him; who had before attended on his ministry in these parts, and had seen his miracles; as the casting out of an unclean spirit from a man, healing the centurion's servant, curing the man sick of the palsy, and Simon's wife's mother of a fever, and a man that had a withered hand:

and he was nigh unto the sea; he seems to have been at Capernaum, which was nigh unto the sea, and in the house of Matthew or Levi, whom he had called at the sea side from the receipt of custom; see Mat 9:9.

(m) T. Hieros. Erubin, fol. 22. 4.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

21 And when Jesus was passed over again by ship unto the other side, much people gathered unto him: and he was nigh unto the sea.

Ver. 21. He was nigh unto the sea] Here, and now, it was that Levi made him a great feast; whereof see Mar 2:15-16.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

This whole history also is recorded both by Matthew and Luke, and we have already fully opened the several passages of it mentioned by all the evangelists, to which we refer the reader. (See Poole on "Mat 9:18", &c.), Christ was now come over again into Galilee, where though the temple was not, yet there were synagogues, where the people did ordinarily assemble to worship God. Nor were they without order in these synagogues; they had one whom they called the ruler of the synagogue, who directed and ordered the affairs of that particular synagogue. It is more probable that Jairus (here mentioned) was in that sense so called, than because he was one of the court of twenty-three which the Jews are said to have had in every city.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Jesus now crosses over the sea again, and apparently in the same boat, to the other side, the opposite shore, near to Capernaum. St. Matthew (Mat_4:13) distinctly tells us that he had left Nazareth, and was now dwelling at Capernaum, thus fulfilling the ancient prophecy with regard to Zebulun and Nephthalim. The circumstances under which he quitted Nazareth are given by St. Luke. (Luk_4:16-31) St. Matthew (Mat_9:1) calls Capernaum his own city. Thus as Christ ennobled Bethlehem by his birth, Nazareth by his education, and Jerusalem By his death, so he honored Capernaum by making it his ordinary residence, and the focus, so to speak, of his preaching and miracles. When Jesus returned, a great multitude was gathered unto him; and he was by the sea. St. Luke says that the people welcomed him, for they were waiting for him. Again he placed himself by the sea, probably for the conveniences of addressing a multitude, and of relieving himself of the pressure, as before, by taking refuge in a boat.

Vers. 21-24, 35-43. The maiden"s spirit recalled.

This narrative is a striking example of intercession, and of its appreciation and reward by the Lord Jesus. The suppliant, Jairus, pleaded for his daughter, and he did not plead in vain. Jesus wrought upon his behalf one of the three miracles of raising from the dead which have been recorded by the evangelists.

I MAN IS TROUBLED, AND JESUS IS COMPASSIONATE. The distress of a father"s heart, when his child lies at the point of death, is intense indeed. Jesus comprehended and entered mentally into all relations and all experiences of humanity, for he was himself the Son of man. How touching in its simplicity is the record of our Lord"s response to the ruler"s appeal: "He went with him "! He is ever the same, "touched with a feeling of our infirmities." He will go with us to the house of mourning, to the chamber of sickness, to the bed of death; and his presence will lighten the sufferer"s load and soothe the sufferer"s heart.

II MAN IS IN HASTE, AND JESUS LINGERS. The entreaty of the father and the concern of the thronging multitude are vividly portrayed. How natural that, in so critical a case, there should be a general anxiety to reach the abode where the dying maiden lay! Yet the great Physician pauses to entertain another application for relief, to speak words of grace to another to a timid, downcast spirit. There is no haste in Christ"s methods. It often seems to those who seek him that he delays his succor. In their impatience they may think themselves unheeded. But it is not so; the Divine leisure with which the Lord of grace is wont to act should awaken our admiration and our confidence.

III MAN DESPAIRS, AND JESUS REASSURES. There was a limit to the faith which was cherished towards Christ. It was thought that he could heal the sick, but it was not dreamt that he could raise the dead. When the little maiden had breathed her last, the household was abandoned to hopeless grief. But this was the moment when the Divine Friend displayed the deepest tenderness of his nature. "Fear not, only believe." Such were his words of comfort, fitted to soothe and to inspire desponding hearts with heavenly hope. Let us learn the lesson that, where Jesus is, there is no place for despair. These words of his come to us when downcast, cheerless, and oppressed beneath the cares and woes of life.

IV MAN IS AGITATED, AND JESUS IS CALM. There is a sublime contrast between the demeanour of the friends of Jairus and the demeanour of Jesus. A tumult of weeping and wailing is quite in accordance with Eastern manners, and it is in accordance with human nature that the same persons who bewailed the maiden"s death should, when another turn was given to their excited dispositions, have laughed the Lord to scorn. How noble and dignified in such a scene appears the demeanour and the language of Christ! He rebukes the noisy crowd and puts them forth, and with tranquil and authoritative mind leads the parents, with the three favored apostles, into the sad chamber of death. "The world is for excitement, the gospel for soothing." There is but One whose presence can banish alarm and disquietude, and can shed a sweet calm over the dwelling agitated by fear and anguish.

V MAN IS POWERLESS, AND JESUS IS MIGHTY TO HELP AND SAVE. The anxiety of the parents, the lamentations of the mourners, were vain and powerless to save the child from death or to recall her to life; but the touch and the call of Christ summoned back the spirit that had fled. In the deepest woe the grace and might of Jesus are most conspicuous. He is able to quicken such as are dead in trespasses and sins, to breathe upon them the breath of life. The soul that hears his word, "Arise!" awakens from the long, deep lethargy of sin and lives anew.

VI MAN IS AMAZED, AND JESUS IS COLLECTED AND CONSIDERATE. No wonder that the parents of the girl were overwhelmed with astonishment. And how like the Lord, to display an interest so tender in the reanimated damsel as to direct that she should be supplied with food! And how like him, too, instead of seeking to increase his fame and favor with the people, to arrange that the miracle should for the present, as far as possible, be concealed! Wisdom, consideration for others, were apparent in his whole demeanour.

PRACTICAL LESSONS.

1. The incident gives us a beautiful representation of the power and the love of a Divine Saviour.

2. And an example of the necessity and the advantage of faith in Jesus, in order to spiritual life and blessing.

3. And a striking instance of the efficacy of intercessory prayer. We may well be encouraged to imitate the believing and urgent entreaties of Jairus.

Vers. 21-34. Ministries broken in upon.

Seldom do we find Christ going straight through with a course of teaching or work. Interruptions constantly occurring; many ministries making up the one great ministry. The more intimate connection of Ver. 21 is given in Mat_9:18 ("while he yet spake these things"). Not that Matthew means that Christ was still at table, nor that Mark"s order is wrong. The feast of Matthew (Mar_2:15) is not stated by Mark to have taken place in immediate succession to the conversion, but is narrated in the second instead of the fifth chapter, because of the obvious connection of the two events. Accepting, therefore, the order of the first Gospel, we see

I CHRIST INTERRUPTED.

1. In his teaching. (Ver. 21; Mat_9:18) Yet how full of interest the subjects eating with publicans, and fasting! How significant these breaks! How natural, in a world so full of disturbing and changing influences as this!

2. In his intended mercy. As he goes to the ruler"s house the incident of the woman in the crowd takes place (vers. 25-34), and he is delayed. Yet the prayer of Jairus was urgent, and broken with apprehensive emotion. Only this was still more pressing, for it was actual, present, long-endured suffering and shame; a demand of faith on behalf of its own possessor (not, as in Jairus"s case, for another).

II FRAGMENTS THAT MAKE A GRANDER WHOLE. We have no time to lament the breaking off the seeming incompleteness ere we are astonished at the commentary which is furnished in the incidents that follow. He is the great Physician to the ruler"s daughter, the woman with the issue, and the two blind men alike; the Bringer of joy, too, to many by his healing mercies and gracious words. All need him, if they only knew it; and, participating in the blessings of his presence, they cannot mourn or fast, but must needs rejoice. And so in the case of the ruler; the delay really rewarded his faith by an actual illustration of Christ"s power, and so sustained him in the higher exercise of faith. "My daughter is even now dead: but come and lay thy hand upon her, and she shall live". (Mat_9:18) This is a picture of many lives. We cannot escape interruptions. Yet are we not therefore to abandon unity of purpose. We may fail to finish all we seek to do, or to do it as we would; but God holds the connecting harmony, and will reveal it at last or even sooner. The sermon broken off, the merciful intention delayed or frustrated, may prove greater blessings in the event than if suffered uninterruptedly to proceed to a visible or immediate completeness within themselves. The life or work divinely interrupted, but pursued with unity of faith and purpose to the end, will be a grander, more Divine thing than otherwise it could possibly have been.

LESSONS.

1. How infinite the resources of the Saviour!

2. His teaching is inseparable from action and life. M.

Vers. 21-43. Jairus"s daughter; or, the uses of bereavement.

I DISCOVERING THE NEED OF A SAVIOUR.

II PERFECTING THE SPIRITUAL LIFE OF THE BEREAVED.

III REVEALING THE INFINITE MERCY, SYMPATHY, AND POWER OF CHRIST. M.

Vers. 21-43. Jarius"s daughter; or, the course of a true faith.

I ORIGINATED BY MANY CIRCUMSTANCES EVIDENT AND OBSCURE. The general ministry of Christ, Perhaps Jairus had been a witness of the centurion"s faith.

II CALLED INTO EXERCISE BY GREAT AFFLICTION AND NEED.

III TRIUMPHING OVER DIFFICULTIES.

IV REWARDED BY INEFFABLE ANSWERS AND CONFIRMATIONS. M.

Vers. 21-43. Avowed and hidden faith.

The two incidents here grouped together show that in the neighborhood of Capernaum faith in Jesus" power to heal has been established; nor is it to be wondered at, seeing the many instances of healing with which the people must be acquainted. The picture is striking. The "Teacher" has returned from his sail across the lake, where truly "the power proceeding from him had gone forth," even the stormy wind yielding to it. A crowd gathers around him. He is standing by the sea speaking, when "one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name," who had come seeking him, "and seeing him, he falleth at his feet," making supplication for his "little daughter," who is "at the point of death." Yet does he believe that if the hands of the Healer be laid upon her she shall "be made whole and live." Therefore his earnest entreaty, "Come thou." He who would that children should come to him refused not to go to them a single child"s life is precious in his sight. Presently the sad tidings are brought, "Thy daughter is dead." Why, therefore, should the Master be troubled any further? The faith of the father might well fail since now all hope of recovery is cut off. Is this man mighty enough "in hope" to believe "against hope"? Perhaps not without the strengthening word," Fear not, only believe, and" (as St. Luke taught) "she shall be made whole." Truly "belief cometh of hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ." Then, as on another occasion, (cf. Luk_7:11-17) the word of command is uttered to the dead by the "Lord of both the dead and the living," and another handful of the firstfruits of his resurrection power is plucked by his hand. Thus is the resurrection presented to us as the awaking of a little child, for in his view the dead "but sleepeth." Who can wonder that "they were amazed straightway with great amazement"? But this instance of open and avowed faith is for ever intertwined with an example of hidden faith of equal strength, though less obtrusive. The faith of the woman was hidden "within herself," its ingenuity only was showed, in that she came "in the crowd behind, and touched his garment. Surely this was not faith in the touch which was the supposed appropriate medium, the contact judged to be needful by the many that "pressed upon him that they might touch him." This, if a suitable sign, was not a necessary one, as the faith at least of one declared; "but say the word, and thy servant shall be healed." All faith in the nostrums of physicians had died out from this woman"s heart, for she had "suffered many things" of them, and was "nothing bettered, but rather grew worse." But in this Healer she did believe, and her faith, which the Lord detected as truly as he "perceived in himself" that the healing power which could proceed from him alone "had gone forth," he amply rewarded. "Who," of the many thronging me, "touched me" with that touch of faith? Faith was united with humility and truth; and "trembling and fearing, she fell down and confessed all." Once more, and for the instruction of the needy in all time, Jesus points to the "faith" thus honored: it "hath made thee whole." Yes, the faith instrumentally, as our fathers have said, the touch mediately; but in reality, "I have healed thee in response to thy faith I, who only can say, "Go in peace, and be whole of thy plague. Hence are we to learn:

1. The power of Christ to raise the dead and heal the sick, so that we may sleep calmly in death till he bid us arise.

2. His pitiful consideration towards even struggling faith, whether assailed by the rude doubt, "it is too late," or is too timid to declare itself openly. So that they of little faith need not doubt.

3. The true attitude of suffering in its confident approach to Christ for healing and help; even patient trustfulness, fearing not, and though persistent, yet humble.

4. The real support of all faith, the word of Christ, with such patient consideration of his works as leads to an apprehension of his Divine ability. May we not now stretch out our hand and touch him? G.

Vers. 21-43. Parallel passages: Mat_9:18-26 Luk_8:41-56. Touching in the throng.

I The woman with an issue of blood.

1. A painful disease. The woman mentioned in this section had been a sorely afflicted sufferer. For twelve long and weary years she had suffered from a painful and weakening malady (en rusei , the preposition en here resembles the beth essentive of Hebrew, denoting in the capacity, character, or condition of, i.e. in the condition of an issue). During that time, we may well suppose, she had sought every means of cure; and found none. During that time she had applied to various physicians; but obtained no relief. During that time she had, no doubt, taken many a bitter draught and many a nauseous drug; but all to no purpose. During that time she had, doubtless, submitted to many severe experiments or even some harsh operations; but all in vain. During that time she had expended much, yea, all her means; she "had spent," we are told, "all her living upon physicians," and that in addition to her sufferings, as is implied by the prepositional element in the word (prosanalwsasa) employed by St. Luke; while St. Mark tells us plainly in this passage that she "had suffered many things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had." And now she remains poor and destitute, diseased and weak, and miserable as ever; for she "was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse;" "neither could be healed of any." What is she now to do? Where is she to seek relief? To whom can she further go? Is there any application she can yet make? Or is there any remedy still remaining to be tried?

2. One resource yet remains. She has tried all the physicians; she has tried all means of cure that have been prescribed, or suggested, or that she has ever heard of; she has, besides, spent her all in quest of health. Still one, and only one, remains to be tried. She has heard of a wondrous Man who goes about continually, doing good; she has been told of most wonderful cures he has effected; of diseases, previously deemed incurable, which he has healed; of sufferers whom, when all else failed, he has relieved. She has never seen him, it is true she has only heard of him; but what of that? Though she has not seen him, she has no reason to doubt the reports she has heard of him; she has no reason to doubt the greatness of his power and the might of his mercy, in accordance with these reports; she believes the accuracy of these reports, she has somehow confidence in their correctness. She has schooled herself into faith in his power to effect her cure and heal her disease.

3. Obstacles to be overcome. A difficulty here presents itself. Her disease is peculiar such a one as she is loth to name in public. She cannot bring herself to talk of it in presence of so many people; womanly delicacy forbids her. Besides, it was such a disease as caused ceremonial uncleanness, so that her contact was polluting. People would, not without reason, upbraid her for coming among them, or thrust her away from them, as impure and contaminating.

4. A happy thought. A happy thought occurred to her in her difficult position a thought which we may regard at once as the outcome of strong faith, and the suggestion of deep affliction. It flashed on her mind as a bright idea. She had heard that the great Physician, to whom her thoughts now turned, often accomplished his cures and conferred health by a touch. She naturally infers that if she could but touch him even stealthily, her cure would be effected. Accordingly she conceived the thought of stealing a cure; she thought within herself, "If I may touch but his clothes," or his garment, or even the border of it, "I shall be whole.

5. Pressure of the crowd. Our Lord at this time was on his way to the house of Jairus, the ruler of the synagogue, in order to cure his daughter. The crowd that followed him on the occasion was unusually large. It was drawn together by respect for the distinguished official whose daughter was so ill, as also by the remembrance of past miracles, and the prospect of seeing the performance of another. Dense as the crowd was, she kept to her purpose, pressing onward through it, and elbowing her way till she had got up to his very side.

6. The cure effected, but concealment impossible. She attains her object; she touches the hem of his garment, and all at once strange circumstance! blessed relief! the malady of many years" standing is healed, the issue is staunched, the pain and grief have ceased. But a disquieting circumstance still remains; a matter of some uneasiness has now to be got over. She is cured, it is true, but she is struck with terror at her own temerity; she is filled with alarm when she sees Jesus looking round inquisitively (perieblepeto , imperfect, equivalent to "he kept looking all round"), and hears him earnestly asking those about him, "Who touched me?" She knew that her touch was polluting; she was well aware that it conveyed ceremonial defilement. She had, indeed, only touched the hem the extreme border of his garment, as if in hope that so slight a touch would defile him but little, while it might benefit her so much.

7. Astonishment of the bystanders. The persons next our Lord in the crowd were amazed at the question; some would be disposed to say in reply, "All touched thee," and others, again, would be inclined to think and to say, when they gave expression to their thought, "None touched thee." At length, after all had denied, Peter as usual, acting as spokesman of the disciples, said, Master, the multitude throng thee and press thee sunylibonta , equivalent to "pressing greatly, or pressing upon on every side, and sayest thou, Who touched me?" "Not so," says our Lord; "all the persons in this large crowd do indeed throng and press around me, and yet but one touched me somebody touched me.

8. Surprising graciousness of the Saviour. Our Lord looked round to discover the one individual in all that crowd who had touched him. At last his eye rested on the abashed, affrighted woman; when, lo! instead of a rebuke for her temerity, instead of a sharp reproof for her audacity, instead of a harsh reprimand for her polluting touch, instead of blaming her for her presumption, instead of a single unkind expression of any sort, he commends her faith, confirms her cure, ratifies her desire, and gladdens her heart by these most gracious words, "Daughter, be of good comfort: thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace.

II THE PECULIARITY OF THIS WOMAN"S TOUCH.

1. There must be contact. The first thing we are taught by it is that, in coming to Christ and in seeking cure from him, there must be not merely contiguity but actual contact, and that of a peculiar kind. All the persons in the great crowd that followed our Lord on this occasion were near him comparatively, some were quite close to him; yet only one derived benefit from him. There were, moreover, several, we can scarcely doubt, in that multitude who needed some temporal boon or spiritual blessing; yet only one obtained such a blessing. There were numbers of persons all around and on every side of him; yet virtue proceeded from him only in one direction. Not only so; mere contact itself is not sufficient. Intelligent connection special and spiritual contact is needed. There were many crowding on and crushing our Saviour, yet only one touched him in the true and proper sense. The motives that moved that multitude were various. Some were borne thoughtlessly along with the mass of persons that formed the procession; they went with the crowd. Others, and perhaps the major part, were attracted by curiosity they were desirous of seeing some miracle; or they had itching ears, and hoped to hear some startling statement. Others, again, were, no doubt, drawn into the crowd by feelings of admiration for the Saviour. While various motives thus actuated the individuals that composed that crowd the units that made up that multitude; only one, it would seem, was influenced by the right motive; only one approached the Saviour in the right way; only one at that time was healed.

2. Her feelings and her faith. That one individual felt the misery of her condition, the iron had entered deeply into her soul; that one felt intensely her need of health. That one, besides, had resolved to overcome every obstacle in order to obtain relief. That one, also, was fully persuaded that Christ could confer health and cure. Nay, she felt assured that, as he frequently touched the persons cured by him, a touch of his person, or even of his clothes, or if it were but of the border of his garment or of the fringe of his robe, would make her whole. Now, here was faith true faith, strong faith; and this faith it was that made the difference between her touch and that of the crowd that pressed upon him between the multitude that thronged him and the woman that touched him. Others touched him, but their touch was incidental; hers was intentional. Others touched him, but it was owing to the pressure around; hers was from a deliberate purpose within. Others touched him, not feeling any need of help at his hand, or, if they felt any need, yet not expecting any relief in that way; she touched him, conscious of her malady and convinced of his power to effect her cure. Others touched him, but then it was curiosity, chance as the world calls it, the crowd, the multitude, the pressure that brought them into such close proximity to Christ; she touched him, but it was the result of deliberation on her part, design, earnest purpose, strong desire, anxious hope of cure, and confident expectation of deliverance. There was thus all the difference in the world between the thronging of that multitude and the touching of that invalid. Faith is thus seen to be the means of union with Christ, and union not mechanical and physical, but union rational and spiritual. We may approach him by ceremonies, by profession, by lifeless prayers, by dead works; but in none of these cases do we really touch him: and not coming into living contact with him, we cannot expect to be recognized by him.

3. An example worth imitation. We may profit by the example of this poor invalided woman as contrasted with that great crowd. We cannot agree with those who disapprove of thronging the Saviour, while they approve of touching him. We approve of both. It is good to be in the throng that crowds round Christ, if only one should be healed at a time, for you yourself may be that one, while all that are far from him shall perish. It is good to be near the pool of Bethesda, for some one is sure to be cured every time the angel troubles the waters, and you yourself may be the happy individual. It is good to wait at the posts of wisdom"s door, for that is the way of duty, and the way of duty is the way of safety. But while it is good to be in the crowd that throngs Christ, it is better far better to touch Christ. There must be real union complete connection with Christ. The electric telegraph, one of the greatest wonders of a marvellous age those wonderful wires that pass over lands and under seas, connecting Ireland with Britain, and Britain with the Continent, and one continent with another; that link the Old World with the New, flashing its messages over more than half the globe, thus facilitating the intercommunion of nations, and expediting the exchange of intelligence from East to West and from West to East; if those electric wires stretched from one place on the earth"s surface to another hundreds of miles remote, and if they reached very near to that other place, just within a yard, or a foot, or an inch, and yet stopped short by that small interval; no communion could be carried on, and no intelligence conveyed. Its hundreds of miles of extent would be unavailing; that yard, or foot, or inch would render the whole useless, and cause all the labour to be lost. It might as well stretch only three-fourths of the way, or one-half the way, or one quarter of the way, or no part of the way at all. Nothing short of a close and complete uniting of the two places, and that without any interval, will do. Alas! how many come close up to Christ, but never close with him. How many are in the throng that never touch him How many there are like the young man in the Gospel that amiable young man whom our Lord loved, who did so much, and went so far, and yet after all came short! They seem to be very close to Christ, and very near his cross; but there is one link wanting thing thou lackest." How many are at the very threshold of the kingdom of Heaven, and ready to say with Agrippa, "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian:" and yet they never cross the threshold, nor enter the kingdom, nor become Christians, in the true and proper sense, at all! How many are on the spot at the very time when Christ is passing by, without ever touching so much as the fringe of his garment! How many frequent the place where his presence is promised and his blessing bestowed; and yet they never feel the one nor enjoy the other! There is nourishment in food, but you must partake of it; or the most wholesome food will do you no good and give you no strength. There is sweetness in music, but you must have an ear for it and give ear to it; else the sweetest music will be but mere noise an empty sound. There is fragrance in the rose, but your olfactory nerves must be sound and sufficiently near the odoriferous flower; or its fragrance will be wasted on desert air! The electric current is a potent agency, as we have seen, but it must needs have the electric wire to pass along; or it loses its practical utility. In view of such facts and considerations, our duty as well as interest is, by grace, to realize union with Christ; we should give no sleep to our eyes, nor slumber to our eyelids, until by grace, through faith, we are united to Christ, and one with him Christ in us and we in Christ, Christ our life, and our life devoted to Christ. For while Christ is able to save, and waiting and willing to save, and while God sent his Son to seek and save that which was lost; yet there must be faith, or we cannot be saved. let us, therefore, seek the aid of God"s Holy Spirit, that he may form the link of faith between our soul and the Saviour; or, if it already exist, that he may strengthen and brighten it

4. How healing virtue is obtainable from Christ. There was healing power in the Saviour inherent in him, in him alone, and in none besides. This poor invalid drew it forth by the touch of faith. The virtue to heal that proceeded from Christ may be compared to the electric current, while the faith of the woman may be likened to the wires along which it passed. Now, if faith be the gift of God, as it is, and the operation of his Spirit as we know from his Word, it may be asked, "Why blame any for the want of it?" We do not and cannot with fairness, blame for want of it; but we may blame persons for not asking it, for not wishing for it, for not seeking it, or for not accepting it. If God gave his Son before you asked him, and without you asking him, "will he not with him also freely give you all things;" in other words, will he not give you faith in him for the asking? If he have given the greater gift, will he withhold or refuse the less? If he has promised his Spirit to them that ask him, and if he invites us and presses us to ask him, do we not tempt God when we refuse to ask him, seeing it is the Spirit that works faith in the heart of man? We are far, very far, from ignoring or overlooking the sovereign grace of God, whereby he takes one out of a city and two out of a family and brings them to Zion: but if we refuse the course that God has prescribed to us; if we reject the conditions on which he offers grace and every mercy; if we neglect the ordinances where he has appointed to meet and bless us, or if, attending them, we forget the object for which we are urged to attend them, or if we use the means without thinking of the great end we should have in view, or if we are not at pains to examine our motives, or if we have no care to meet Christ in his ordinances no longing for his presence, no thirsting for his grace, no hungering for his righteousness, no earnest inquiry, "What must we do to be saved?" and no seeking of the fulfillment of the promises; in all such, or any such cases, are we not thronging Christ instead of touching him? If custom, or curiosity, or the crowd, or habit, or respectability, or worldly advantage, or early training, brings us near to Christ, and if we have no higher object and no holier end in view, are we not thronging Christ, and yet not touching Christ? "Many," we know from the declaration of God"s own Word, "will say, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then," adds the Saviour, "will I profess unto them, I never knew you." What was all this more or better than thronging Christ without touching him?

5. Confession consequent on cure. She sought Christ privately, but was obliged to confess publicly. So with ourselves; we must confess his name before men, and tell of the gracious Saviour we have found; just as the psalmist says, "Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul." "With the heart men believe unto righteousness, and with the mouth make confession unto salvation.

6. Character of the cure. The cure was immediate; "from that hour." It was complete; the fountain was staunched. It was perpetual; "Be thou whole." This our Lord probably added lest she should think the cure too sudden to continue, too speedy to last, too good news to be true. Not so; it was no transient remedy, no mere temporary relief. All that God does is well done; he does not leave any part of his work unfinished. Having" begun a good work in us, he will perform rather, perfect it till the day of Jesus Christ." The testimony to the Saviour"s work on earth was that "he hath done all things well.

7. Peculiarity of expression. The words eiv eirhnhn are properly "into peace," which refer more to the future than to the present. Peace is not only the present element in which she finds herself, but the future sphere in which her life is to move. Brought into peace by the great Peacemaker, she is ever after to continue therein. The addition of the words isyi ugihv was not superfluous, but most reassuring, in order to ratify the stolen cure and to convince her of its durability and permanence. Further, we may notice the relation of the pistiv of the woman to the dunamiv of the Saviour. The former saved her mediately, or instrumentally, that is, as the connecting link between herself and Christ; the latter was the healing power of Christ, which, working along the line of that faith, saved her as the energetic and efficient cause.

III THE RESTORATION TO LIFE OF JAIRUS"S DAUGHTER.

1. Position of Jairus. The official position of Jairus was highly respectable. He was ruler of the synagogue. Though there is some difference of opinion on the subject, yet the officers of the synagogue appear to have been the following:

(1) The ruler or president of the synagogue, on whom devolved the right ordering and regulation of the service, and with whom were conjoined the elders;

(2) the sheliach tsibbor, the angel or messenger of the congregation, who offered up the public prayers, and who acted as secretary to conduct the correspondence, or to serve as deputy, when required, between one synagogue and another;

(3) the chazzan (uphrethv), or ordinary reader, who read the appointed portions, or who handed the book to an occasional reader; he also had charge of the sacred books;

(4) the diakonov , or, or sexton.

2. The substantial harmony of the narratives. The ruler of the synagogue, according to St. Mark, tells our Lord that his daughter (escatwv ecei) is extremely, ill, "at the point of death in fact, in extremis; according to St. Matthew, that (arti eteleuthsen) she is dead by this time even now dead; "she was so ill when he left that he did not now expect to see her again alive when he returned; according to. St. Luke, that (apeynhsken) she was dying, or "lay a dying; all perfectly consistent.

3. The special tenderness of the parent. Though St. Mark very frequently employs diminutives with little, if any, difference from the simpler form, yet we see good reason for his use of the diminutive yugatrion here. It becomes a term of special endearment and affectionate tenderness in this place, from the circumstance, of which another evangelist, St. Luke, apprises us, namely, that this little girl was an only daughter (yugathr monogenhv), perhaps, indeed most probably, an only child. We can easily imagine the terrible uneasiness of the father, when our Lord had been delayed by the unwelcome incident of the cure of the woman with the bloody issue. Jairus must have looked on this as a most provoking and unpleasant interruption; and now that the messengers bring word that his daughter is dead, and so his worst fears realized, he and they evidently give up all for lost. The great Healer might have restored her to health, however ill, or however far gone she might have been; but how can he restore her to life now that she is dead?

4. Jesus" power over death. He had heard, or, if we read a compound of the same word, though slightly supported parakousav he had overheard the conversation between the messengers and Jairus; he had heard them dissuade the ruler from fatiguing with the length of the journey, or in any other way worrying the Physician (skulleiv , root skulon , spoils, means "to spoil, despoil, flay, trouble, harass, or worry"), as it was only bootless labour quite useless work for the child was dead. Our Lord tried to revive the father"s hopes, encourage his fainting heart, and strengthen his weak faith, saying, "Do not be afraid, only believe." The mourners, especially the hired mourners, who were making so much ado, and beating themselves (ekoptonto), in grief more seeming than sincere, began to deride our Lord, or laugh him down (kategelwn). In fact., they did not wish her restored, lest perhaps their occupation would be gone. Taking the maiden by the hand, he addressed her, in the vernacular Aramaic of the district, saying," Talitha cumi, Maid, arise." Straightway she arose and walked; her motion proved strength, and strength and motion belong to life; and so death, after all, is a sleep, from which the Saviour brings awakening. His power over every stage of death appears by the restoration of one just departed as this maiden; of one being carried out to burial, as the son of the widow of Nain; of one already in the grave four days, as lazarus.

5. Practical character of our Lord. When Simon"s mother-in-law was cured, she turned to her domestic duties; when this young girl of twelve years of age was restored, she walked about (periepatei) how natural When others wondered, Jesus thought of the keen appetite of the young girl, and ordered her food. J.J.G.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Luke viii, 40.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

Raising of the Daughter of Jairus.

The prayer of Jairus:

v. 21. And when Jesus was passed over again by ship unto the other side, much people gathered unto Him; and He was nigh unto the sea.

v. 22. And, behold, there cometh one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name; and when he saw Him, he fell at His feet,

v. 23. and besought Him greatly, saying, My little daughter lieth at the point of death; I pray Thee, come and lay Thy hands on her that she may be healed, and she shall live.

v. 24. And Jesus went with him; and much people followed Him and thronged Him.

Mark relates this story at greater length, with closer attention to detail than the other evangelists, Mat 9:18; Luk 8:41, except in the matter of symptoms of the sickness, in which Luke, the physician, is more exact. Upon leaving the country of the Gerasenes, Jesus sailed directly across the sea, back to the region which He had left only the day before. Most of the people had undoubtedly not yet thought of returning home, and they could therefore soon assemble once more and come to Him, as He was by the Sea. They gladly received Him, for they were all waiting for Him, Luk 8:41. But before He had had an opportunity of performing the work of His ministry, as was His custom, one of the chief men, of the rulers of the local synagogue, whose name was Jairus, came, looking for Jesus. As soon as he saw the Lord, the distraught father fell down at His feet and begged and urged Him most earnestly, with many words. The words pour forth from his mouth in the anxiety of his pleading: My daughter is about breathing her last; she may even now be dead. Come at once and quickly; lay Thy hands upon her that she may be healed and live. Jesus, after His usual manner of kind sympathy and willingness to help, did not tarry by the seaside, but turned at once to go after the pleading father. It was, as usual, the faith implied and expressed in his words that impressed the Lord. Jairus was sure he was possessed of unshakable faith that Jesus could perform this miracle, this cure. He sees the fulfillment of his wish, if Christ would but consent to come. But he must first pass through a test of his patience. Mark notes especially that the people pressed around the Lord from all sides; He jostled and pushed with the crowd.

Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Observe here, 1. The person who came to Christ on behalf of his sick daughter, described by his name Jairus; by his office, a ruler of the synagogue; by his gesture, he fell down at Jesus’s feet and worshipped him. This gesture of his was not only a sign of tender affection in him towards his daughter, but also an evidence of his faith in our blessed Saviour; yet his confining Christ’s power to his bodily presence, and to the touch of his hand, was a token of the weakness of his faith: Come, says he, and lay thine hand upon her, and she shall live. As if Christ could not have cured her without either coming to her, or laying his hand upon her.

Note, All that come to Christ are not alike strong in faith. Yet our blessed Redeemer refuses none who come to him with a sincere faith, though in much weakness of faith.

Observe, 2. How readily our Saviour complies with Jairus’s request; Jesus went with him. Although his faith was but weak, yet our Saviour doth not reject him, or deny his suit, but readily goes with him.

Learn hence, How ready we should by to go to Christ in all our distresses, afflictions, and necessities, who is so ready to hear and so forward to help us, if we seek him in sincerity, though our faith be feeble.

Observe, 3. The great humility of our blessed Saviour in suffering himself to be thronged by poor people: Much people followed him, and thronged him. O humble and lowly Saviour! How free was thy conversation from pride and haughtiness: how willing to converse with the meanest of the people for their advantage! Our Lord did not only suffer them to come near him, but even to throng him. What an example is here for the greatest persons upon earth to imitate and follow, not to despise the persons, nor disdain the presence of the meanest and poorest of the people; but to look upon some with an eye of favour, upon others with an eye of pity, upon none with an eye of contempt.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21. When Jesus was passed … to the other side. Sailed back across the sea to Capernaum.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Connecting Statement:

After healing the demon-possessed man in region of the Gerasenes, Jesus and his disciples return across the lake to Capernaum where the one of the rulers of the synagogue asks Jesus to heal his daughter.

the other side

It may be helpful to add information to this phrase. AT: "the other side of the sea" (See: Ellipsis)

beside the sea

"on the seashore" or "on the shore"

the sea

This is the Sea of Galilee.

Jairus

This is the name of a man. (See: How to Translate Names)

So he went with him

"So Jesus went with Jairus." Jesus' disciples also went with him. AT: "So Jesus and the disciples went with Jairus" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

lay your hands

"Laying on hands" refers to a prophet or teacher placing his hand on someone and imparting either healing or a blessing. In this case, Jarius is asking Jesus to heal his daughter.

that she may be made well and live

This can be stated in active form. AT: "and heal her and make her live" (See: Active or Passive)

pressed close around him

This means they crowded around Jesus and pressed themselves together to be closer to Jesus.

translationWords

Jesus

Sea of Galilee

synagogue

die

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

21–34. THE PETITION OF JAIRUS AND THE HEALING OF THE WOMAN WITH THE ISSUE

Mat 9:18-22. Luk 8:40-48

21. διαπεράσαντος. The usual word for crossing water; see on Mar 4:35. He crosses from the [1078] to the W. shore of the Lake, from those who had begged Him to leave them, to those who at once gather together and throng Him. Lk. using his special verb says that they welcomed Him, ἀπεδέξατο αὐτὸν ὁ ὄχλος, Mk that a great multitude were crowded together upon Him.

[1078] Codex Basiliensis. 8th cent. At Basle.

ἐπʼ αὐτόν. This kind of constr. is freq. in Mk after a gen. abs. Cf. Mar 5:2, Mar 9:28, Mar 10:17, Mar 11:27, Mar 13:1; Mar 13:3. Winer, p. 259.

ἦν παρὰ τὴν θάλασσαν. He was by the sea; probably no motion to the sea is suggested; παρά c. acc. in late Greek is freq. after verbs of rest; Mar 4:1; Act 10:6; see on Mar 10:46. Winer, 503. The remark here is quite in place. Finding a large audience awaiting the arrival of the boat, Jesus remained on the shore and addressed them. In Mat 9:18, Jesus is in a house when Jairus comes.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21-43.] Raising of Jaeirus’s daughter, and healing of a woman with an issue of blood. Mat 9:18-26. Luk 8:41-56. The same remarks apply to these three accounts as to the last. Matt. is even more concise than there, but more like an eye-witness in his narration (see notes on Matt. and Luke);—Mark the fullest of the three.

21.] συνήχθ … = ἀπεδέξατο αὐτ. ὁ ὄχλ. Luke.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21-43. Jesus, repelled by the people of Decapolis, returns to the western shore of the lake, and there raises the daughter of a synagogue ruler by the name of Jairus. On his way to the house of Jairus, he is approached in the crowd by a woman with an issue of blood, who is healed at the touch of his garment.

21. εἰς τὸ πέραν πάλιν συνήχθη—having crossed over to the other side, again there was gathered.

εἰς τὸ πέραν πάλιν, instead of πάλιν εἰς τὸ πέραν, Tisch. א D mss. of Lat. Vet. Syrr. It is more in Mk.’s manner to connect πάλιν with συνήχθη.

καὶ ἦν παρὰ τὴν θάλασσαν—And he was by the sea. According to Mt., Jairus came to Jesus while he was in the house. He places the events after the crossing of the lake in the following order: first, the healing of the paralytic, and the dispute about forgiveness of sins; then, the call of Matthew; then, the question of John’s disciples about fasting; and then, while he was saying these things, the coming of Jairus. And these events are connected all the way through by marks of time, fixing the chronological connection. Mat 9:1-18.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.