Matthew 9:1

IX.

(1) Here, again, the order of the facts narrated varies so much in the three Gospels that the labours of the harmonist are baffled.

ST. MATTHEW.ST. MARK.ST. LUKE.(1.) The Paralytic, Mat_9:1-8.Mar_2:1-12.Luk_5:18-26.(2.) The call of Matthew, &c., Mat_9:9-17.Mar_2:13-22.Luk_5:27-39.(3.) Jairus, and the woman with an issue of blood, Mat_9:18-26.Mar_5:21-43.Luk_8:41-56.(4.) The two blind, Mat_9:27-31.——(5.) The dumb, Mat_9:32-34.—Luk_11:14.It will be seen that (1) and (2) are grouped together in all three, as are the two events in (3), but beyond this we cannot trace any systematic order, and the apparent notes of sequence are so far misleading. In this case. St. Matthew makes the return to Capernaum follow the healing of the Gadarene demoniacs. St. Mark and St. Luke place it after that of the leper, but as if they were uncertain as to its exact position, “after certain days,” or “on one of the days.”

Ship.—Better, boat.

Into his own city.—St. Mark states definitely Capernaum, which had become His “own city” since His departure from Nazareth (Mat_4:13). That city, though the home of His childhood, is never so described.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1. a ship] As ch. Mat_8:23, the boat.

his own city] Capernaum.

Chap. Mat_9:1-8. Cure of a Man afflicted with Paralysis

Mar_2:1-12; Luk_5:18-26

Both St Mark and St Luke notice the crowding of the people to hear Jesus, and narrate the means by which the sufferer was brought into His presence.

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.

Mat_9:1-8

A man sick of the palsy.

The highest cause for joy

I. The miserable condition of a human being.

II. The power and love of Jesus.

III. thy joyous change produced. (American Homiletical Review.)

Sin and its forgiveness

I. Our faith may be effectual in saving others. The faith of the centurion obtained a cure for his servant. Such instances prove that, in all eases, we may help on the salvation of our friends; that in some cases our faith may stand in the place of theirs. Another ones faith may do for an infant, a lunatic, for one who has an insurmountable obstacle m the way of coming to Christ. Apply this to the case of sponsors in infant baptism. We are related to God, and members one of another.

II. The connection between disease and sin. Christ goes deeper than the outward evil, to that which is evil-sin. The consequence of sin often traced in suffering. The consequences of past deeds remain.

III. Christ the restorer of health and the forgiver of sin. We have no right to argue there was no repentance: he felt his need of Christ. Christ spoke to the suffering sinner; giving first that we may return to Him of His own. There may be s crowd of evil thoughts, doubts between you and your Saviour; let none of these hinder you. (C. B. Drake, M. A.)

Helplessness and its Master

There are three views of the outward miracles of our Lord, one as marvels of power, as demonstrations of benevolence, as seeing in them a Divine correspondence between the things of nature and the things of the spirit; between the facts of the outer and inner world. Thus, the multiplied bread a visible image of heavenly nourishment.

I. In the text palsy stands for spiritual prostration and indifference. Action and feeling are smitten; but not gone.

II. The condition of the cure. This patient does hear, does believe, and is ready to obey. Let us never despair of another. They brought him-notice this neighbourly and vicarious kindness. There are instances when the sick man alone lacks force to arise. In the fulfilment of the necessary condition faith and action are joined, and the action expresses the faith. These persons not only believe abstractly in Christs power; they brought their sick neighbour where He was. It was not an experiment with them, but the faith of confident expectation. On our way to cure we have no time for speculation, or curiosity; but to draw near with faith.

III. What he said to the sick of the palsy.

1. A title of endearment and an assurance of hope. Adaptation of Christs treatment; he never administers rebuke to self-abasement.

2. The words reveal a deep insight into the relations of physical and moral evil. Pain, the result of sin; hence He removes disobedience, then discomfort.

IV. The low instincts and preferences of the natural man chafe at this divine friendliness. These scribes represent jealous and selfish human nature. This friendliness is too wise, deep, holy, for their low desires. The scribes watch for the chance of hostile criticism. Self-will demands to be saved after its own manner.

V. Here then, in the cavils of these spectators, the divine physician finds a new disorder more deeply struck than the other. His compassion; His patience. He changes the manner of His mercy, and is willing by any means to convince the people that He is Lord. All miracle is one, the cure of sick bodies and sick hearts.

VI. The multitude glorified God. The intended result was reached. (Bp. Huntingdon.)

Good cheer for sad hearts

I. Sin-its relation to the body. Its sphere of action is in high places; mere matter cannot sin. It lives secretly in the soul, but works terribly in the body. As sin works outward through the body, punishment strikes the body on its way to the seat of sin. Here is one of Gods grandest temples lying in ruins; and God incarnate comes to restore it. He came not to deliver the body from the temporal consequences of sin, but the man from its power here, and its presence hereafter.

II. Sin-its removal by the Lord.

1. It is by a free pardon that sin is removed and its eternal consequences averted. There is no other cure.

2. The Saviour to whom this needy man was brought has power to forgive sins. It is the acquired right of Him who bore the laws curse.

3. Christ has power to forgive on earth. While we are on this earth only.

4. The Son of Man hath power to forgive. The power lies in our brothers hands.

5. Christ the Saviour, in coming to a sinful man desires his safety hereafter, but also his happiness now-Son, be of good cheer. Every man has his own way of seeking good cheer; some by money, lands, politics, war. (W. Armlet.)

The efficacy of grace

1. In awakening the dormant powers of the palsied man.

2. In calming the perturbed soul-Be of good cheer.

3. In healing both soul and body. (A. F. C. Wallroth.)

The cure of the paralytic

I. That sin is great evil.

II. That faith is a great blessing.

III. That Christ is a great saviour.

1. His knowledge. He knew the real need of the paralytic.

2. His authority. It is good to have been afflicted. (D. Rees.)

The paralytic, or sickness improved

Why does our Saviour begin with the pardon of sin?

1. To display His sovereignty.

2. To show that the soul is the principal care.

3. Perhaps the man suffered more from spiritual distress than from bodily pain.

4. It would seem to emit a ray of His glory, and prove a test to try the dispositions of the company.

Here are several things worthy of notice:-

1. This cure was effected by a word.

2. He was ordered to return home. Christ did not seek His own glory.

3. Fix your eye on Jesus, the most prominent figure in the story.

4. How far the case of the paralytic resembles yours.

(1) Are you distressed in mind and body too?

(2) Has Christ healed thy body and not thy soul?

(3) Has he spoken peace to thy conscience, and is thy body still under the influence of disease? (W. Jay.)

The forgiven paralytic

I. The afflicted sufferer brought to the Saviour.

II. The reception given by Christ.

1. Observe what it was that found its way to the heart of Christ. Not his suffering, but faith.

2. Mark the peculiarity of the reception he gave to the paralyzed man-Son, be of good cheer, etc.

III. The contradiction of sinners which Jesus had to endure. This man speaketh blasphemy.

IV. The great truth taught us by this narrative.

1. All men, till they come into saving contact with Christ, are carrying about with them two heavy burdens.

2. Christ has power to meet every case of accumulated guilt and heart-seated depravity.

3. What then is the nature of this blessing? (P. Morrison.)

The mystery of sickness

1. The connection which subsists between the prevalence of sickness and the invasion of sin.

2. Why it is not always the case that when sin is pardoned sickness is healed. Not for want of power on the part of our Lord. Also in the case of the palsied man it was necessary that He should give to the Jewish people a proof that He possessed the power He claimed; this not necessary now. Christ does even now sometimes heal where all human remedy has failed; but not always. Then the discipline of continued affliction is good, impatience is subdued. Also we have given an evidence of the power of the gospel, in the triumph of grace over nature. (S. Robjohns, M. A.)

The paralytic healed

1. The terrible state of the patient.

2. The charity of his friends.

3. The compassion of Jesus, so ready and comprehensive.

4. The opposition of his enemies.

5. The patient, meek forbearance of our Lord.

6. The triumphant display of His Divine power.

7. Its effect upon the multitude, wonder, not repentance. (The Clergymans Magazine.)

The story of a paralytic

One real case of bodily paralysis may help us to picture what above all things we ought to know, the state of our own inner life. I have seen this quoted from the medical records at Paris:-A man was attacked by a creeping paralysis; sight was the first to fail; soon after, hearing went; then, by degrees, taste, smell, touch, and the very power of motion. He could breathe, he could swallow, he could think, and, strange to say, he could speak; that was all; not the very slightest message from without could possibly, it seemed, reach his mind, nothing to tell him what was near, who was still alive; the world was utterly lost to him, and he all but lost to the world. At last, one day, an accident showed that one small place on one cheek had its feeling left. It seemed a revelation from heaven. By tracing letters on that place, his wife and children could speak to him, his dark dungeon-wall was pierced, his tongue had never lost its power, and once more he was a man among men. Strange this, and true; a parable too if we read it aright. The worst kind of paralysis, but, God be thanked, far the rarest of all, is that of the heart and conscience. There never was a man with no affections and no sense of right and wrong. But never must they be pronounced past cure. God alone knows our real state; there is always some tender spot in our nature, some sensitive place on which He can write in characters of love, and it may be some ones privilege to find it-the thought of a mother, of the days of childhood, of a little one who died, or whatever it be, God- can still use that as a means of cure. (H. S. Swithinbank, M. A.)

Forgiveness, the primary Reed of the sinner

Not, Be of good cheer, thy health is given thee, though that he had also; but thy sins are forgiven thee. If a friend should come to a malefactor, on his way to the gallows, put a sweet posy in his hands, and bid him be of good cheer, smell on that; alas! this would bring little joy with it to the poor mans heart, who sees the place of execution before him. But if one came from his prince with a pardon, put it into his hand, and bade him be of good cheer; this, and this only, would cheer the poor mans heart, and fill it with a ravishment of joy. Truly, anything short of pardoning mercy is as inconsiderable towards pacifying a troubled conscience, as that posy in the dying prisoners hand would be. (Gurnall.)

Christ sees the beginning and the ending of the patients ailment

Sin is the well in which it springs, and perdition the sea to which it is flowing. When he looked on disease, he sees its beginning and its ending: his work is to cut short its course, ere it issue in the second death. He looks upward and downward: he will not confine his view to these symptoms which appear in the body, and pertain to time. (W. Arnot.)

Getting the palsied man to Jesus

Many Oriental houses have a court or quadrangle in front; the buildings which form the house occupy one or more of its sides. The internal part of such a house is often screened by a corridor below, having the various household officers behind it, and a gallery above, from which is the entrance to the family apartments. The gallery is roofed over, and its roof is about the same height as the roof of the house. Bearing this in mind we may account for what occurred in this way. The quadrangle was full of people; our Lord instructs them from the gallery: the Pharisees are in the family apartments adjoining the gallery; the friends of the sick man cannot enter the quadrangle from the street; or if this could be done, they cannot reach the corridor, from which there were steps leading to the gallery; they ascend, therefore, the stairs from the back or side of the house leading to the roof, and break open the roof or verandah which covered the gallery. The house-roof was used for a terrace, and was built of strong materials; the gallery-roof was of very slight construction, of the same character as the covered balcony. (Webster and Wilkinson.)

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Mat 9:1. He came into his own city — Namely, Capernaum. And they brought him a man sick of the palsy — The history of this miracle is related Mar 2:1-13, and Luk 5:18-26, with more circumstances than are here mentioned by Matthew, which passages the reader is therefore desired to consult, for the further elucidation of what is here recorded. And Jesus, seeing their faith — Both that of the paralytic, and of them that brought him, viz., their inward persuasion of his divine power, and their confidence in his goodness; said to the sick of the palsy, Son —

A title of tenderness and condescension, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee — By this Jesus intimated, both to the paralytic and to those who brought him, 1st, that sin is the source of all our evils; 2dly, that, sin being forgiven, bodily distempers can do us no real or lasting harm; 3dly, that the primary end of his coming into the world was to save his people from their sins; 4thly, that remission of sins is the never-failing consequence of faith in Christ. Perhaps, however, Christ might speak thus, partly with a view to give the scribes and Pharisees occasion of some discourse.

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CRITICAL NOTES

Mat_9:1. Ship.—Boat (R.V.). His own city.—Capernaum (see Mat_4:13; Mar_2:1).

Mat_9:2. Palsy.—Suffering apparently from a less severe type of paralysis than the centurion’s servant (Mat_8:6). Their faith.—The faith of the sick man and of his friends who brought him (Morison). Son.—A young man apparently. It would scarcely be too strong to translate it thus: “My dear child, be of good cheer; thy sins are forgiven” (Gibson). Thy sins be forgiven thee.—This forgiveness was doubtless the very boon which, above all others, the young man needed and desired. Jesus was reading his heart. Possibly, too, there may have been in this case a peculiar connection between the youth’s sins and his sickness (Morison).

Mat_9:4. Knowing.—Or seeing.

Mat_9:6. Take up thy bed.—The Oriental frequently spreads a mat upon the ground and sleeps in the open air; in the morning he rolls up his mat and carries it away (Carr).

Mat_9:8. Marvelled.—Were afraid (R.V.). Unto men.—This power, which hitherto had been enthroned in the most holy place as the prerogative of Jehovah, now stood embodied before them, as it were, an incarnate Shechinah. Hence their joyous expression, He has given it to the Son of man, and therefore to men (Lange).

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Mat_9:1-8

The pardon of sin.—The miracles of the Saviour had both a temporal and a spiritual side. The multitudes mentioned in Mat_8:18 appear to have thought too much of the former. Therefore it was that He went away to the other side of the lake; and so, as it were, for a season, cut off the supply. Now, it appears, in coming back, that He has the same error in view, but desires to treat it (if we judge Him rightly) in a different way, viz. in the way of rather fixing attention on the spiritual side of His works. The probable evidences of this will be found:

1. In the claim with which He begins.

2. In the proof with which He concludes.

I. The original claim.—This was remarkable, first, in its general scope. It was a tacit claim to a right to speak on the most momentous of topics, viz. on the “forgiveness of sins” (Mat_9:2). No topic reaches so far as this does both towards God and towards men. It affects the Ruler because it affects the equity and so the continuance of His rule. It affects the offender because it affects the continuance of his life. It was doing not a little to undertake to speak at all on such a matter. Remarkable, next, because of its special manner and tone. On this highest of topics He claimed the right to speak in the highest possible way. It is both as a Father and as a King; and as both these in such a way that His word may be trusted to the full, the Saviour speaks in this case. “Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven” (R.V.). In other words—“The cause is over, the question settled; I pronounce thee forgiven.” Equally remarkable was the claim made in regard to the effect it produced. This was of a twofold description. On the one hand it produced in those who stood by and heard it a certain feeling—in all probability partly real and partly also affected—of horror. It seemed to them, and they were men who professed to be both diligent students and special teachers of truth, that there was nothing less than absolute blasphemy in the words they had heard. At the same time it is observable that they do not seem to have dared to put this thought of theirs into words; not, at any rate, to Himself. Only “in themselves”—to their own hearts—do they whisper their thought. Any way, this silence itself may seem to show the more what they thought of His claim, viz., as one involving that which it was hardly befitting to speak of out loud. Finally, the claim is remarkable as being one which we have never heard from Him before. So far as we can judge there had been other occasions for it quite as fitting as this. The case of the leper (Mat_8:1-4); the case of the centurion’s servant, a case of palsy (Mat_8:6); the case of “Peter’s wife’s mother” (Mat_8:14-15) (to say nothing of the unnumbered cases of bodily healing that are referred to, in the mass, without being severally described in Mat_8:16-17)—are all cases in which, if this claim had to be made, it would have been in its place. Why, then, was it deferred until now? Apparently, because the Saviour, as we saw before, had a special object in view, the object, viz., of drawing special attention to the spiritual side of His works. Therefore it was, in this case of healing, that He begins with this claim.

II. The subsequent proof.—Having made such a claim He could hardly leave it unsupported by proof. Having Himself provoked such thoughts, and knowing He had (Mat_9:4), He could hardly leave them alone. At any rate, He did not. On the contrary He proceeds to give good evidence that He could really do as He said; and that, in drawing attention in this way to the spiritual side of His work, He was not only declaring what was transcendantly important but absolutely indisputable as well. The evidence in question was two-fold in character. It proved, on the one hand, that He had the requisite knowledge. He who would pardon sin rightly must be acquainted with “all about” it, of course. What the sinner has done. Why he did it. How much he was tempted. What he thought to do more (Act_8:22). In other words, any one who would be beyond the reach of mistake on this matter must be a judge of the heart. Such accordingly, in this case, by the language He uses, the Saviour proves that He is. He “sees”—so some copies—in the case before Him, the hidden thoughts of the heart; and He proves Himself thereby to be fully competent—if we may so express ourselves—to “try” the question in hand. Why should He not be, indeed, if He is seen, in this way, to have all the requisite “data” on hand? There is evidence also, in the next place, that He has the requisite power. Witness the “order” He gives. Speaking Himself to the man who is sick—who is so sick as to be unable to move of Himself (Mat_9:2), and had been brought there in pity by others—He bids him go back of himself. “Arise, and take up thy bed”—the previous sign of his feebleness to be thus the sign of his recovery—“and go unto thy house.” No challenge could be bolder—no token clearer—no issue more sure. If he can do as I tell him, it is with him as I say. Witness, next, the results of that order. The first result, on the sick man himself. The paralytic does as he is told to do. He took up “that whereon he lay” (Luk_5:25). He did so “before them all” (Mar_2:12). Witness the second result on all that stood by. They see at once what it means. Things are, indeed, as Jesus has said. What He has claimed He possesses. Let God be praised that He does. However marvellous, it is strictly true. The thesis propounded has been proved to the full. “The Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins.”

Besides this most vital of truths, we may learn, from the passage thus analysed, two others of hardly less, if of any less weight.

1. How all important is this question of the forgiveness of sin.—What our Saviour put first from His point of view we may well put first from our own. What the Saviour begins with we should begin with as well. What other advantage, indeed, is worthy of mention along side of this? It is like a ship at sea which has sprung a leak, which, if not “stopped,” will infallibly sink it. What other things are worth striving for—what other things are worth seeking for—what other things are worth thinking of, until this is done?

2. How utterly impossible it is for us to obtain this blessing except in the way presented here.—Who else has the requisite knowledge? Who else has the requisite power? Who else can give the requisite proof? Our Saviour, when challenged, gave proof of His claim. Is it too much to ask as much in all similar claims?

HOMILIES ON THE VERSES

Mat_9:1-8. The great Healer.—

I. The diseased man.—Paralysed. The result of sin. His friends brought him “on a bed,” i.e. on a mat, or cushion, which could easily be thrown over one’s arm (Mat_9:6).

1. There are many who from spiritual disease cannot come to Jesus and have to be brought.

2. Faith is necessary to the overcoming of the great difficulties and obstacles that beset the way.

II. The great Physician.—Jesus saw their “faith” and honoured it. How tender His first word “Son”! Then He proceeded to encourage him, “Be of good cheer. Cheer up!” Then the Saviour exceeds all their wishes, “Thy sins be forgiven thee.” He forgave the sins first and healed his body afterwards to show:

1. His sovereignty.

2. That the taking away of the guilt of the soul was vastly more important.

3. To try the disposition of the company, and to bring out as they were able to bear it, His true character.

III. The cavillers.—The accusation they made was right from one standpoint, and it was wrong from another.

1. They were right in asserting that God alone can forgive sins.

2. It was wrong inasmuch as they counted Jesus a mere man.

IV. The effects.—The cure was:

1. Immediate.

2. In sight of them all.

3. Complete.

4. Perfect.

5. Glorifying to God. So in spiritual healing.—The Study.

The Peace-bringer in the world of conscience.—

I. The apparently irrelevant answer which Christ gives to the unspoken petition of the paralytic and his friends. “Thy sins be forgiven thee.” It was far from their wish, but yet the shortest road to it. Probably the palsy was the result of fast living—“a sin of the flesh, avenged in kind.” Perhaps, too, whatever his friends may have wanted for him, the poor man himself dimly knew that forgiveness was his most pressing want. Christ would not thus abruptly have offered the pearl of pardon to an altogether unprepared heart. The gospel cures sorrow second and sin first.

II. Forgiveness is an exclusively Divine act.—The same deed may be a sin, a vice, and a crime, according as we regard its aspect towards God, towards morals, or towards law. As sin God can forgive it; as a breach of ethical law there is no forgiveness, for ethics cannot pardon; as a breach of the law of the land, the supreme power may remit penalties. God’s pardon often leaves some of the natural consequences, which are the penalties of our sins, in order that we may hate and avoid the evil; but it brings the assurance that there is nothing in God’s heart towards the sinner but pure and perfect love.

III. Jesus Christ claims and exercises this Divine prerogative of pardon.—His claims to Divinity were urged in such a fashion that, if they are denied, it is impossible to save the beauty and lowliness of His character.

IV. Christ brings visible facts into the witness-box, in attestation of His invisible powers.—We may make a more general application of this principle of the visible evidences of invisible powers. Are not the results of every earnest effort to carry the message of forgiveness to men—in homes made Bethels, passions tamed, and lives elevated—witnesses of the reality of Christ’s claim to exercise the Divine prerogative of forgiveness? All the difference between Christendom and heathendom attests Him as the Fountain of the invisible good which has passed into visibility in the secondary results of the gospel, which the blindest can see and the least spiritual can appraise.—A. Maclaren, D.D.

The Gospel of forgiveness.—Many truths are here presented to us, e.g.

1. A strong faith will overcome difficulties.

2. The readiness of our Lord to welcome the needy, and to reward faith.

3. The enmity and opposition of the human heart.

4. The superiority of spiritual to temporal blessings.

5. Testimony given to the Divinity of Christ by His,

(1) forgiving sins;

(2) searching the heart;

(3) healing the body. But the central truth of the passage appears to be the gospel of forgiveness preached to the poor. The gospel of communism sends the weakest to the wall; the gospel of modern science, with its doctrine of natural selection, destroys the feeble. It was the glory of Christ’s mission that He stooped to the poorest and the lowest, and brought the message of life and hope within the reach of all. View this miracle, then, as proclaiming the gospel of forgiveness.

I. The need it meets.—The figure presented to us—a paralysed man, helpless, incurable, a mere wreck. Three things combined in him.

1. Disease.—Perhaps the consequence of sinful indulgence; certainly to be traced to sin. The parable of sin.

2. Poverty.—The “bed” a mere couch or mat.

3. Poverty of spirit.—Our Lord’s words imply this.

II. The hope it awakens.—The hope of good.

III. The blessing it bestows.

1. Forgiveness.

2. Manner of bestowment.—

(1) Immediate;

(2) free;

(3) complete;

(4) authoritative;

(5) effectual.

IV. The opposition it excites.—The spirit of opposition to grace always the same—the form differs. Man will be saved, but not on God’s terms.

V. The vindication it receives.—Christ proves His power to forgive, confutes His adversaries, saves the man. The gospel may appeal to results. Application to:—

1. The careless.—Many went away unsaved. “Will ye also go away?”

2. The anxious.—No rest except in Christ. Never rest until you have found Him.

3. The healed.—Go sin no more.

Walk in newness of life—in the power which Christ imparts.—Sir E. Bayley, Bart, B.D.

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.

See Mat_8:28 ff for the passage comments with footnotes.

Mat_9:1-8.—Luke (Luk_5:17) and Mark (Mar_2:3) relate this history immediately after the cure of the leper. But this place belongs rather to the event connected with the centurion at Capernaum. Besides, the circumstance, that the scribes of Galilee now commenced their active opposition, proves that the chronological arrangement in Matthew is correct.

Mat_9:1. Into His own city.—In the Greek: εἰς τὴν ἰδίαν πόλιν. Capernaum had the honor of bearing that name (Mat_4:13).

Mat_9:2. A παραλυτικός. See Com. on Mat_4:24.

Jesus seeing their faith.—This faith appeared more particularly in the bold plan which they adopted for bringing the sufferer into the presence of the Lord, as related by Mark and Luke. But while all shared that faith, the poor sufferer himself appears to have given the special directions. Paralytic, but healthy in soul,—a hero in faith on his sick-bed. Matthew indicates the extraordinary character of the circumstances by the expression: καὶ ἰδού.

Be of good cheer, θάρσε ι, τέκνον.—These two miracles afford an insight into the various methods by which the Lord restores those who are cowardly, and those who, strong in faith, are afflicted. In the one case, He rebukes; in the other, He comforts.—Τέκνον, an affectionate address; Mar_2:5; Mar_10:24; Luk_16:25. Analogous is θύγατερ, Mat_9:22.

Are forgiven thee, ἀφέων ταίσοι.—The perfect tense (Doric). Beza: Emphasis minime negligenda. In this instance the palsy must have been the consequence of the sin of the sufferer, though not in other cases, Joh_9:3. That Christ with His unfailing penetration at once recognized and singled out these instances, showed how vastly different His judgment was from the prejudices of the people (Luk_13:4, and the account of Lazarus). Strauss vainly imagines that there is a contradiction between this and the other accounts about the Lord. Comp. against him the remarks of Meyer (note on p. 189), who, however, should not have denied that in the case before us the forgiveness of sins was both the moral and the psychical condition of restoration. It seems to us strange that de Wette should half concede the statement of Hase (in his Leben Jesu, § 73), who regards this history as an accommodation to popular prejudices.

Mat_9:3. And, behold, certain of the scribes.—Before this, the scribes had not even in their thoughts charged the Lord with blasphemy. We have here a third evidence that Christ read the inmost thoughts of man. He traced the affliction of the palsied man to its secret origin in sin; He read the measures adopted by the palsied man, and by those who bore him, and traced them to faith; and He read the scribes, and descried their secret and blasphemous objections, that He was guilty of blasphemy, since God alone could forgive sins (Luk_5:21). Perhaps these feelings may have appeared in their countenances, as the Jews were wont to express their abhorrence of blasphemy in the strongest manner, even rending their garments and spitting when they deemed the prerogatives of God openly invaded. In the present instance, fear may have restrained such an open expression of what was marked in their faces and gestures. Hence de Wette is wrong in suggesting that the expression ἰσών in Mat_9:4 is “well explained by the reading εἰδώς“ (after B., M.). Mark here correctly adds: τῷπνεύματι. “To read the thoughts and dispositions of others (comp. Joh_2:24-25), was a characteristic of the expected Messiah (see Wetstein ad loc.). In virtue of being the Son of God, Jesus possessed this power, which may be considered analogous to that of working miracles.”—Meyer. But we must not forget the vast difference between the notion of a magical reading of thoughts, which the rabbins entertained, and the Divine-human introspect of Christ, which in every instance was occasioned by some mark overlooked by others, but patent to the Master.

Mat_9:4. Wherefore think ye evil?—Olshausen: Evil, because they failed to understand His Divine character. De Wette: On account of their hasty, malevolent, and light judgment. Comp. Mat_12:31. Their thoughts were evil in themselves, because they regarded the highest life as a blasphemy, and also because they expressed not openly their scruples. Hence ὑμεῖς, in opposition to those who confided in Him. Probably they chiefly objected to this, that Christ seemed to abolish the arrangements of the temple, by which the priest typically forgave sins on offering the sacrifice appointed by the law. It is absurd to interpret the expression used by the Lord as a mere announcement of forgiveness of sins (Kuinoel).

Mat_9:5. Which is easier?—i. e., In truth, both are equally difficult, and presuppose Divine power and authority. But, as the full effect of His absolution could not be patent to the outward senses, He accords a visible confirmation of it by a miracle.1

Mat_9:6. But that ye may know, Arise.—The Evangelist purposely omits to indicate the change of persons addressed,2 in order to make it more pictorial. “That ye may know that power has the Son of Man (power is put first by way of emphasis) on earth (in opposition to heaven) to forgive sins, Arise,” etc. For other details, see the account in Mark and Luke.

Mat_9:8. They were afraid (in the authorized version, marvelled), ἐφοβήθησαν.—Those who witnessed the occurrence experienced a spiritual conflict—the Spirit of Christ contending in their hearts with the unbelief of the scribes. In these circumstances, the miracle of healing proved all the more quickening, that the gracious working of Christ in the face of this opposition implied a greater manifestation of power.

Such power unto men.—Grotius and Kuinoel apply this simply to Jesus, regarding ἀνθρώποις as the plural of category. Baumgarten-Crusius explains it: Such power to men for their salvation through Christ. Meyer and de Wette: A new gift of God to humanity. But the expression referred especially to the ἐξουσία of forgiving sins. This power, which hitherto had been enthroned in the most holy place as the prerogative of Jehovah, now stood embodied before them, as it were an incarnate Shechinah. Hence their joyous expression: He has given it to the Son of Man, and therefore to men. The explanations of Kuinoel and Meyer are not contradictory.3

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. These two miracles have this in common, that they were accomplished under exceedingly difficult circumstances. In the first instance, the coöperation of receptive faith was entirely wanting. The only germ present was that awe with which the demons owned the power and supremacy of Christ; while, on the other hand, the Saviour had to contend not only with the demoniacal spirit, but with the impure and grovelling disposition of the Gadarenes. In the second miracle, the unbelief of the Pharisees and scribes formed a counterpoise to the faith of the palsied man, and of those who brought him forward. Add to this, that the first cure was followed by expulsion from Gadara, and the second by a secretly harbored reproach of blasphemy on the part of the scribes, which was fully expressed on a later occasion (Mat_12:24).

2. The two miracles are still farther connected by the peculiar view of Christ which they present. More than in any other instance in which He healed the possessed, does the Lord here appear as the Mighty One—as conqueror not only of demons, but also of the dark and hostile powers of pagan or semi-pagan countries; while, in the second miracle, we see Him penetrating to the root of evil, to sin, and removing the moral power of consciousness of guilt. His saving grace extends to the lowest psychological and moral abyss of human misery. Combining these two miracles with that of calming the tempest, we behold Christ as the Lord over nature, over the powers of darkness, and over the depths of the human heart.

3. The cure of the demoniacs at Gadara may be regarded as forming the central-point of biblical demonology. It is also an explanation and defence of the legal prohibition of swine-flesh under the Old Covenant. But Lisco and Gerlach go too far in maintaining that the destruction of the herd was intended as a punishment. Jesus only permits it at the request of the demoniacs, who have not yet completely recovered, and hence are not quite under His power. Nor must we forget that, despite their own impurity, the demoniacs commonly possessed in increased measure a clear sense of what was unseemly (comp. Act_19:15). The demons chose to enter into the swine. The demoniacs also chose to bring an ironical punishment on their district, and thus to vent their last paroxysm in a direction more wholesome than formerly.—Lastly, the Lord Himself regarded this judgment as wholly suitable, without, however, having directly sent it.

4. The absolution of the palsied man, and later instances of the same kind, were in some respects an anticipation of the moment when the veil in the temple was rent in twain. Such seems also to have been the unconscious feeling of those who were present at the time. This history forcibly presents to our view the connection between sin and misery, between forgiveness and recovery, and hence also between justification and the resurrection.

[5. The power of forgiving sins is a strictly Divine privilege, as the Jews rightly supposed, and could be claimed by Christ only on the ground of His Divine nature. Hence we may use this claim as an argument for the Divinity of the Saviour (as Athanasius did against the Arians). Yet He claimed and exercised this power as the incarnate Son of God, or as the Son of Man on earth, having brought it with Him from heaven, as the one who is at once like unto us, and above us all as the crown and perfection of humanity. While on earth, He exercised the power directly and personally; after His exaltation He exercises it in His Church as His organ through the means of grace, and the ministry of reconciliation. Hence He conferred this power, commonly called the power of the keys, i.e., the power of discipline in receiving and excluding members, and thus opening and shutting the gates of the kingdom of heaven, upon His apostles (Mat_16:19; Mat_18:18), who in this case speak and act in the name and by the authority of Christ. The Church does the works of heaven on earth (“facit in terris opera cœlorum”), and binds and looses, but only by a committed, not an inherent power, and only as the organ of Christ. Comp. Trench, Notes on Mir., p. 207, and Wordsworth in Mat_9:6 : “Christ forgives sins not only as God, by His omnipotence, but as Son of Man; because He has united man’s nature to His own, and in that nature has fulfilled the law and perfected obedience, and so merited to receive all power on earth (Mat_28:18) in that nature; which power He now exercises as Mediator, and will continue to exercise, till all enemies .. are put under His feet. As Son of Man, He ever exercises this power of forgiving sin on earth, by means of the Word and Sacraments, and by the Ministry of Reconciliation (2Co_5:18-19), and by whatever appertains to what is called ‘the Power of the Keys.’ … Besides, by saying that sins are forgiven ‘upon earth,’ our Lord reminds us that after death there is no more place for repentance and forgiveness, for then the door is shut.” A false inference. The contrast is not between earth and eternity, but between earth and heaven.—P. S.]

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Jesus encounters the contradiction and enmity of the world, not only in His teaching, but also in His works of grace and power.—The glory of Christ’s miracles appears in this, that they are performed in the midst of unbelievers, if He only meet with a grain of faith in those who apply to Him for help.—Jesus must pluck as brands from the burning those whom He redeems from the unbelief of the world.—Christ’s casting out the unclean spirits, as connected with His forgiveness of sins.

The history of the Gadarenes.—Jesus makes a way for His own both by sea and by land.—The insecurity of highways an indication of the state of a country.—Connection between human raving and the spirits of darkness.—Internal contradiction on the part of those who were possessed: 1. They hasten reverently to meet the Lord, and yet complain that He would torment them; 2. they betake themselves to entreaty, and yet display malice; 3. they are themselves cured, and yet become burdensome to others.—The possessed gave a more suitable reception to the Lord than the people of Gadara.—The proximity of the Holy One rendering uneasy and tormenting not only open and wilful sinners, but also those who are deprived of their moral freedom.—It is easier for Christ to heal the raving of maniacs than to remove calculating and yet stupid selfishness.—The Divine judgment accompanying the cure: a trial of the country and people.—The expulsion of the Lord, under the guise of reverence, and in the form of an entreaty, notwithstanding the ceremony of a procession come out to meet Him.

The cure of the Paralytic, Mat_9:1-8.—The Lord reading the secrets of the heart: 1. He descries in the urgent endeavors of felt need, the faith which prompts them, and brings it to maturity; 2. He descries in the misery the guilt which was its cause, and removes not only the misery, but also its root; 3. He descries the secret unbelief of the heart, and obviates its pernicious influences.—The miracle on the conscience and the miracle on the sick life are always combined: 1. The former is the root; the latter, the manifestation. 2. The one or the other may, indeed, be more apparent; but 3. the miracle on the life cannot prove lasting without that on the conscience, while that on the conscience is manifested by that on the life.—This miracle on the palsied man revealing the fullest measure of grace of all the cures accomplished by Christ.—Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be forgiven thee.—The Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins.—Christ will manifest in the bodies of His people what He has done for their souls.—The gospel of free grace confirmed by visible signs before the eyes of His opponents: 1. By the recovery of nations; 2. by the flourishing condition of countries; 3. by the tokens of a coming resurrection all over the earth.—The scribes and priests of the law forgiving sins, and Jesus forgiving sins: 1. The former connected with outward ordinances, sacrifices, and the services of the temple, typical in its nature and arrangements; 2. the latter proceeding from free grace, received by faith, and manifested in a new life.—The outward evidence of secret grace.—The gospel of the forgiveness of sins by Christ, the most glorious gift of God to man.—What God gave to Christ, He gave through Him to men.

Starke:—The devils also believe and tremble, Jam_2:19.—Zeisius:—If the devil cannot have his will, it is a torment to him; so also with his children, the wicked.—Osiander:—They who only seek to do harm are certainly Satan’s children, Joh_8:44.—Hedinger:—Now-a-days, also, the devil enters into the swine.—God sometimes deprives us of cur outward possessions: 1. In compassion; 2. in righteousness. Quesnel.—Hedinger:—What ingratitude to retain the swine and to banish Christ!—It is one of Satan’s devices to represent the gospel as causing loss.—They who banish Christ in His members are worse than the Gadarenes.— Mat_9:1-8. Hedinger:—It is our duty to succor our neighbor in his distress.—When laid on a bed of sickness, we ought to be more anxious for the health of the soul than for that of the body.—True faith receives from the hand of God what it sought.—He who from the heart repents and believes on Christ has forgiveness, Act_10:43.—Jesus reading the thoughts and intents of the heart, Joh_2:25.—It is impossible to be happy or comfortable if we are not assured that we are God’s children.—Each miracle of power or of grace the earnest of another.—Forgiveness of sins comprehends every blessing.—Quesnel:—What is felt a stumbling-block by the worldly-wise, is an occasion to the simple to praise God.—Admiration and praise must go together.

Gerlach:—Those who hate Me love death, Pro_8:36.—Miracles are but the anticipation and earnest of a higher order of things. Hence, as under the Old, so under the New dispensation, Jesus occasionally manifested Himself in His miracles as the future Judge of the world.—But this was not the main object of His miracles, which, in general, were the manifestation of His love, and performed by Him as Redeemer.—Miracles of judgment: this instance (?); the money-changers, and those who bought and sold in the temple (?); the unfruitful fig-tree; terror struck into the company of those who came out to take Him. (Ananias and Sapphira, Elymas.)—In this instance also, blessing and judgment were conjoined: 1. Safety restored to the district; 2. the neighborhood delivered from evil spirits; 3. the possessed cured; 4. the attraction of a prohibited enjoyment removed.— Mat_9:1-8. A special emphasis rests on the name, “Son of Man,” as signifying the Messiah or the Saviour, as man among men.—Jesus has be stowed upon His servants authority to announce to sinners forgiveness of sin in the name of God.

Heubner (on Mat_9:1-8):—Even the faith of others may aid us in obtaining forgiveness of sins.—Christianity has, directly and indirectly, a beneficial influence on bodily ailments.—Consciousness of sin is the sting in all our bodily sufferings.—Forgiveness is the first thing which man requires in his misery.—Christ always addresses to afflicted souls the words, “Be of good cheer,”—The common proverb, that thoughts are free, is essentially untrue.—Common tendency to suspicion.—The deliverance of others should be matter of joy to us.—The healing of the paralytic: 1. How Jesus begins it; 2. how He defends it; 3. how He completes it.—The power of Christ to forgive sins: 1. Wherein it consists; 2. its condition.

Reinhard, 1802.—The forgiveness of sins has the most beneficial influence also upon the consequences of our transgressions.—Harms:—The connection between sin and suffering: 1. Generally patent; 2. sometimes hidden; 3. always certain.—Westermeyer:—The power of Jesus to forgive sins on earth: 1. The contradiction against it; 2. the testimonies for it; 3. its glory; 4. its conditions. Sachse:—Christ the true Physician of the soul. Ranke:—The power of Christ to forgive sins.—C. Beck:—Christ knows how to save truly: 1. He looks to the ground; 2. He heals from the ground.—Höpfner:—Christ at the sick-bed.—Fuchs:—The blessing of sickness.—H. Müller:—I believe in the forgiveness of sins.

Footnotes:

[1][Dr. Trench, Notes on the Miracles of our Lord, 6th ed., Lond., 1838, p. 203 sq., correctly observes: “In our Lord’s argument it must be carefully noted that He does not ask, ‘Which is easiest, to forgive sins, or to raise a sick man?’ for it could not be affirmed that that of forgiving was easier than this of healing; but, ‘Which is easiest, to claim this power or to claim that; to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee, or to say, Arise and walk?’ And He then proceeds: ‘That is easiest, and I will now prove my right to say it, by saying with effect and with an outward consequence setting its seal to my truth, the harder word, ‘Rise up and walk.’ By doing that which is submitted to the eyes of men, I will attest my right and power to do that which, in its very nature, lies out of the region of proof. By these visible tides of God’s grace I will give you to know in what direction the great under-currents of His love are setting, and that those and these are alike obedient to my word. From this which I will now do openly and before you all, you may conclude that it is no ‘robbery’ (Php_2:6) upon my part to claim also the power of forgiving men their sins.’ Thus, to use a familiar illustration of our Lord’s argument, it would be easier for a man, equally ignorant of French and Chinese, to claim to know the last than the first; not that the language itself is easier, but that, in the one case, multitudes could disprove his claim; and in the other, hardly a scholar or two in the land.”—P. S.]

[2][This change is indicated by the parenthetic words of the Evangelist: τότε λέγει τῷ παραλυτικῷ. The regular construction would require either εἰδῶσιν for εἰδῆτε, or λέγω for τότε λέγει.—P. S.]

[3][Alford: “Τοῖς ἀνθρώποις, to mankind. They regarded this wonder-working as something by God granted to men—to mankind; and without supposing that they had before them the full meaning of their words, those words were true in the very highest sense. See Joh_17:8.”—Trench, On Miracles, p. Matt 209: “They felt rightly that what was given to one man, to the Man Christ Jesus, was given for the sake of all, and ultimately to all, that it was indeed given ‘unto men;’ they felt, that He possessed these powers as the true Head and Representative of the race, and therefore that these gifts to Him were a rightful subject of gladness and thanksgiving for every member of that race.”—P. S.]

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 9

1. A Man Sick of the Palsy Healed. (Mat 9:1-8.)

2. The Call of Matthew (Mat 9:9.)

3. With the Publicans and the Sinners. (Mat 9:10-13.)

4. The Question of John’s Disciples. (Mat 9:14-17.)

5. The Ruler’s Request.(Mat 9:18-19.)

6. The Woman Healed of an Issue of Blood. (Mat 9:20-22.)

7. The Maid Raised from the Dead. (Mat 9:23-26.)

8. The Two Blind Men Healed. (Mat 9:27-31.)

9. The Dumb Man with a Demon Healed.(Mat 9:32-33.)

10. The Blaspheming Pharisees and the Compassionate Shepherd of Israel.(Mat 9:34-38.)

After our Lord was requested by the Gergesenes to go away out of their coasts, He passed over the lake and came to His own city, that is, Capernaum . Here the Lord did His greatest miracles, yet they rejected Him there, so that later He said: “And thou, Capernaum, who has been raised up to heaven, shall be brought down even to Hades. For if the works of power which have taken place in thee had taken place in Sodom, it had remained until this day. But I say to you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in judgment day than for thee” (Mat 11:23-24).

One of the mighty miracles He did in Capernaum is related by the Holy Spirit in the beginning of the chapter which we have reached. He is manifested in this miracle like in the others, as Jehovah. A paralytic is brought to Him by loving hands, and when He saw their faith He said to the helpless one, “Be of good courage, child; thy sins are forgiven.” And now for the first time in the Gospel do we read that the scribes said, “This man blasphemes.” They did not speak it out, but He saw their thoughts, for He is the One of whom David says: “Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising; thou understandeth my thoughts from afar off” (Psa 139:2).

He then asks them: “Which is easier: to say, Thy sins are forgiven; or to say, Rise up and walk? But that ye may know that the Son of God has power on earth to forgive sins (then He says to the paralytic), Rise up, take thy bed and go to thy house. And he rose up and went to his house” (Mat 9:2-8).

Divine power is here fully manifested. In Luke the Scribes and Pharisees say, “Who is able to forgive sins but God alone?” (Luk 5:21). Indeed, if He who spoke the word of comfort and gave the paralytic the assurance of forgiveness is not Jehovah, anything less than He, the accusations of the scribes would have been well founded. He then shows that He has the power to forgive sins by healing the body of the paralytic, who rises up and carries away the bed upon which he was brought. The paralytic is a type of the sinner in his helpless condition. In the Old Testament we have a beautiful type of this in Mephibosheth, who was lame on both of his feet and who had to be brought to King David. So this one is brought. But why did they bring him? No question, healing of the body was all which they desired for their helpless friend and what he himself expected. But our Lord goes deeper to that which is the fountain of all disease and pain -- sin. He knew the guilt of sins resting upon the paralytic, and before he could rise and walk, before he could be delivered out of his helpless condition, the sins had first to be forgiven. The conscience, burdened more than the crippled, paralyzed body was by disease, had first to be relieved. The lessons here are clear. It foreshadows that which He, who gave Himself for us and who was raised on account of our justification, gives to every one who believes in Him. He has removed completely the guilt of sin and we have the assurance of the forgiveness of sins: the blessedness of the man “whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered” is ours through and in Christ. He also has given us a new life. He has delivered us from the power of sin and spoken the word “Rise up and walk.” All this is so familiar that we will not enlarge upon it. We should not forget that the spiritual application of “Rise up” is not the first meaning. The paralytic received healing for his body and the miserable body was delivered from the paralysis which held it down. So the body of the believer has been redeemed and there will be a “rising up” from the grave and from the earth, changed in the twinkling of an eye.

We have also to say that the teaching of remission of sins and what is connected with it is not to be taken from the ninth chapter in Matthew. To teach from this chapter the doctrine of forgiveness, as it has been done so much, would be an error. He shows His authority as Son of Man to forgive sins on earth, and because He has this power and proves it, He manifests Himself by it as God. He is now no longer Son of Man on earth, but He will come again as Son of Man, and then once more will show His authority to forgive sins on earth and speak the Word of Life to those who are helpless. To this the miracle refers us in type.

The paralytic is the type of Israel . We have a number of such types in the Word. In the fifth chapter of the Gospel of John we read of an infirm man who was lying helpless in the five porches (typifying the law) and Jesus came and healed him, telling him, “rise, take up thy couch and walk.” He is the type of Israel . In the third chapter of Acts another helpless one, lame from his mother’s womb, was lying at the beautiful gate of the Temple . He is raised up and leaps and praises God. The name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene had raised him up. He also is a type of Israel . Aeneas in Act 9:32-35, who had been lying for eight years upon a couch, paralyzed, and to whom Peter said, “Jesus the Christ heals thee,” is not different in the typical application from the others.

It is Israel we have to see here represented in type. What He, the Son of Man, when He comes in glory, will do for His earthly people is seen in the healing of the paralytic. First, He will come and turn away ungodliness from Jacob. He will forgive their sins and remember them no more. And His people, the remnant of Israel, will break forth and sing, “Who is a God like unto Thee, that pardoneth iniquity and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of His heritage? He retaineth not His anger forever, because He delighteth in mercy” (Mic 7:18). He will then say to His people, “I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins” (Is. 43:25).

After this He will heal them. His own, poor, blinded, paralyzed and miserable people Israel will be the first of the nations of the earth to receive complete healing for soul and body. They will leap and shout for joy like the lame man in the third chapter of Acts. Therefore it says in Mal 4:1-6, where it speaks of the Son of Righteousness with healing beneath His wings, “Ye shall go forth and leap for joy (correct translation) as calves of the stall.” “And the inhabitant shall not say, I am sick: the people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity” (Is. 33:24). The 103rd Psalm illustrates most beautifully Israel ‘s coming praise. It is not only “who forgiveth all thine iniquities,” but also “who healeth all thy diseases.” The diseases in this psalm are generally spiritualized, but that is incorrect. They are bodily diseases. The healing of the paralytic has been put by the Holy Spirit in a special place to be in harmony with the whole scope of the Gospel of Matthew. What the Son of Man did in humiliation to one paralytic, the Son of Man in exaltation, coming again, will do to the whole nation and others in the earth in that coming age of millennial glory.

The healed one went to his house. “But the crowds seeing it were in fear, and glorified God, who gave such power to men” (Mat 9:8). This was all they saw and did. They did not acknowledge Him as Jehovah, but simply in their formal way glorified God, which was but the service of the lips.

Besides the record of the healing of the paralytic we have nine other events put together once more in a peculiar order, far from being chronological, but in fullest harmony with the scope of this first book. These are: The call of Matthew, Jesus entering the house and sitting down with the publicans and sinners, the question of John’s disciples, the ruler whose daughter had died and the Lord going to raise her up, the woman with an issue of blood who touches Him and is healed, the raising from the dead of the ruler’s daughter, the healing of the two blind men, the healing of the dumb man as well as others and the Lord’s compassion for the multitudes.

The call of Matthew, the same who was chosen by the Holy Spirit as the instrument for the writing of this Gospel, is related in a few words only: “And Jesus passing on thence saw a man sitting at the tax office called Matthew, and says to him, Follow Me. And he rose up and followed Him” (Mat 9:9). Had Matthew written this book by himself and not by inspiration he would have followed the custom of other writers in making himself more prominent. He might have begun the book with an elaborate account of himself, his earthly circumstances and spoken, perhaps, at length of the scene which is but rapidly sketched in one verse. The Holy Spirit, however, guided his pen, and in the right place in the right words he records the story of his own call. The place given to it is significant. After the Lord had shown Himself in His power to be Jehovah He now manifests Himself in His grace to the lost and outcast sinner. What a scene it is which the one little verse puts before us! There he sits gathering in the tax, no thought of Him, no knowledge of Him. As a tax-gatherer he was, with his colleagues, despised by the leaders of the Jews, the Pharisees, the Sadducees and the Scribes, as well as by the mass of the people. Tax-gatherers (Publicans) were known as thieves, who enriched themselves by extortions. Another one said later, after the Lord had entered into his house: “If I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I return him fourfold.” However, this was not the cause why the people hated him. They looked upon them as miserable hirelings of the Roman government, who had put themselves under the control of the Gentile rule and helped in the subduing of the land and the people, their own land and their own brethren. The tax gatherers were, therefore, considered apostates. And such a one is called not alone to follow Jesus, but called and chosen as an instrument to write the kingly Gospel. Marvelous Grace! “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you” (Joh 15:16). This is perfectly illustrated in Matthew’s case as well as in everyone who is saved by Grace. Well may we adoringly cry out: “Oh, the Grace that sought me!” With no thought of Him or for Him, busied in earthly things for the meat that perisheth, Matthew was called to follow Him. Matthew follows. He leaves the table, there is no bargaining on his side, no request to think it over, no desire to go first to do something else, but the first thing done was obedience to the voice which had spoken. Yet there is no claim of merit from his side in doing this. May we who are His own ever be ready in obedience to His call.

And Matthew invites Him to his house and makes Him a feast. It does not say in this Gospel that it was Matthew’s house; in another Gospel the Holy Spirit has made a record of it (Mar 2:14-17). Here a company of tax-gatherers and sinners are come together, and He, the Holy One, the One who had come to seek and to save that which is lost, reclines with them at table and eats with them. Again we say, what a scene of grace! He who created the heavens and the earth in the creature’s place in living touch with those who rebelled against Him! And there they stand, the poor, miserable, self-righteous Pharisees. They would in their religiousness, with their broad phylacteries, keeping the outside clean, not even touch a tax-gatherer, much less speak to him. To sit down and eat with them would have been in their eyes an almost unpardonable crime. And here they find Him whose words of divine authority they had heard, whose deeds of omnipotent power they had seen, who had manifested Himself as Jehovah, and He eats with tax-gatherers and sinners. Not the poor, wicked, self-confessed thieves, the tax-gatherers and harlots appear in this scene and throughout the Gospel as Satan’s masterpiece, but the proud, religious, self-righteous Pharisee. John the Baptist with his divine message came, and the Pharisees were rightly called by him the generation of vipers, but never the tax-gatherers and the harlots, who gladly came and confessed their sins and owned their lost condition. “John came to you in the way of righteousness, and ye believed him not; but the tax-gatherers and harlots believed him; but ye, when ye saw it, repented not yourselves afterwards to believe him” (Mat 21:32). So here we see them, without any faith in Jesus and no knowledge of the God of mercy, wrapped up in the filthy rags, their own righteousness. What else then could they do but speak against the Lord’s gracious way? “Why eateth your Master with tax-gatherers and sinners?” And the self-righteous Pharisees of ritualistic Christendom are not different from these, their forefathers, the Pharisees. No heart for Christ, no understanding of grace and no knowledge of God. In the answer our Lord gives He shows that what He does is in fullest harmony with His having come down into the earth. God would have mercy and He had come to show it. “They that are strong have not need of a physician, but those that are ill. But go and learn what that is -- I will have mercy and not sacrifice; for I have not come to call righteous men, but sinners.”

Then the disciples of John came to Him with a question. “Why do we and the Pharisees often fast, but Thy disciples fast not?” John’s disciples were having a difficulty. Their master had made much of fasting and had enjoined it upon themselves, but the disciples of Jesus were not fasting. Were they not with Him in the tax-gatherer’s house, eating and drinking? It is a straightforward question they bring. They come not as faultfinders or murmurers, like the Pharisees, but as intelligent inquirers, who were seeking light. So the Lord meets them and solves their difficulty by a gracious answer. He is still the same, ever ready to teach and instruct the saint who sits at His feet. The only difficulty is we are often so unlike these disciples of John, though our knowledge and our position is higher than theirs. Instead of taking the straight course in coming to Him first of all, we seek first the solution of our difficulties somewhere else. Perhaps the disciples of John who came here are the same who came and told Jesus, after they buried the headless body of their master.

“Can the sons of the bride chamber mourn so long as the bridegroom is with them? But days will come when the bridegroom will have been taken away from them, and then they will fast.” He Himself is the bridegroom and He had come and while He was with them, mourning could have no place; His rejection was to come and then they would fast. But our Lord not merely answers the question and shows Himself greater than John, who was but the friend of the bridegroom (Joh 3:29), while Jesus is the bridegroom. He adds something which is of great importance. He speaks of a complete change of the order of things. “But no one puts a patch of new cloth on an old garment, or its filling up takes from the garment and a worse rent takes place. Nor do men put new wine into old skins, otherwise the skins burst and the wine is poured out, and the skins will be destroyed; but they put new wine into new skins and both are preserved together.” The old garment is Judaism with its legal righteousness. It is no good and had proven itself as such. No value in it at all, only to be cast aside, utterly put aside. A new garment, a better righteousness was about to be given. He whose name is “Jehovah our righteousness” had come and a change of dispensations was to take place. And now as it has come the old is gone, it is no longer in existence. Yet that which the Lord here but faintly indicates, the impossibility of patching up that which is hopeless and worthless, has been done in Christendom, nay, is the almost universal state of Christendom. It is mixing law and grace together. The rent has become worse. A Judaistic Christianity which, with a profession of Grace and the Gospel, attempts to keep the law and fosters legal righteousness, is a greater abomination in the eyes of God, than professing Israel in the past, worshipping idols.

The new wine is the Gospel of Grace. The old skins [Bottles in the Authorized Version. Skins were used and are being used in the Orient for the preservation of wine. Hence skins is the correct translation.] are the law, the Levitical institutions and all connected with it, New wine belongs into new skins. If the new wine is put into old skins, the skins will burst and then there is no wine left and the skins are also made useless. The two belong no longer together. So Gospel and Judaism, Law and Grace do not belong together. The Gospel of Grace enclosed in ceremonial Judaism will result in the loss of the new wine, and ceremonial Judaism, the old skins, will be gone as well. And such is ritualistic Christendom; it is neither Christian nor Jewish. It has not Judaism and has lost the new wine. “They say, they are Jews and are not” (Rev 3:9). If men hold only the form of godliness and deny the power thereof, it will always mean outward religiousness, legality, self-righteousness and turning away from Grace and the Lord Himself.

The ruler whose daughter had died appears next on the scene. He is unlike the Centurion in the eighth chapter who had the greater faith and wanted the Lord to speak but a word. The ruler of the Jews wants the Lord to come in person to his house and touch the one, without life. His personal presence is demanded to raise the daughter from death to life. That we have here once more dispensational truths before us is seen at the first glance. Israel is often spoken of in the Old Testament Scriptures as a daughter, the daughter of Zion . In the short book of Lamentations alone we find the word, daughter, as meaning Israel, eighteen times. The daughter who has died is then likewise a type of the people. To bring life to Israel can be only through the presence of Him, who is the life. When He came the first time, they would not come to Him that they might have life. But He is coming again to raise up His people, to touch the daughter of Zion .

And while our Lord goes forward to fulfill the request of the ruler, another incident comes in by the way. An unclean woman touches Him and is healed. “And behold a woman who had an issue of blood for twelve years came behind and touched the hem of His garment; for she said within herself, if I should only touch His garment I shall be healed. But Jesus, turning and seeing her, said, ‘Be of good courage, daughter, thy faith hath healed thee.’ And the woman was healed from that hour” (Mat 9:20-23). She represents the Gentiles and the grace which comes to them by faith, while the resurrection of Israel is still unaccomplished, but drawing’ nigh. Faith touches Him now and receives of Him salvation with its precious assistance. But the touching of Him is parenthetical, just as the present age with salvation come to the Gentiles is a parenthesis. Jesus comes to the house of the ruler. It has the meaning of relationship. So will He come to raise up the daughter of Israel . “And when Jesus was come to the house of the ruler, and saw the flute players and the crowd making a tumult, He said, Withdraw, for the damsel is not dead, but sleeps. And they derided Him. But when the crowd had been put out, He went in and took her hand; and the damsel rose up. And the fame of it went out into all that land.” May not the crowd of unbelievers and mockers represent nominal Christendom? Surely the same is in Christendom which we see here. The Lord has declared in His Word, eternally settled in the heavens, His loving purposes concerning Israel . It can well be said of His earthly people, as He said of the ruler’s daughter, “The damsel is not dead, but sleeps.” The Scriptures are full of promises to Israel and the day of their resurrection and restoration, yet Christendom treats all this with unbelief and ridicule. There is no understanding of God’s purposes, the plan of the ages, and hence no heart and no love for the people, who are still beloved for the Father’s sake and whose are the promises. Our Lord said to that crowd, “Withdraw,” and they were put out of the scene, when He came and touched the damsel to raise her up. And may we not see in this also the end of the motley throng in Christendom, which will be put off the scene when He comes to do the miracle of His mercy and His power on Israel?

And when He does this to His people then surely the blind will see and the dumb speak.

In the healing of the two blind men, which comes immediately after the raising of the maid, we see again a dispensational foreshadowing of Israel ‘s present condition and future healing. It is true the miracle of the two blind men who cry to Him is often spiritualized, and we do not at all deny that he has an application in that direction. First of all, however, we must not overlook the original meaning it has in this Jewish Gospel, and as we do this we shall yet more and more grasp the divine scope of the Gospel of Matthew. “Two blind men followed Him crying and saying, Have mercy on us, Son of David.” The two blind men picture Israel ‘s condition as the leper did in the beginning of the eighth chapter. They were blind, when He came and dwelt among them. His own knew Him not and received Him not. But how much greater has their blindness become since they not only have cast Him out, but rejected the offer of His mercy after His resurrection and ascension? Now it is, Let their eyes be darkened. Blindness in part has happened to Israel . When the Apostle to the Gentiles, Paul, had come to Rome, and in his burning love for his brethren, his kinsmen, had sent for them and in disagreement they began to leave, he addressed to them the Word, so true throughout this age: “Well spake the Holy Spirit through Isaiah the prophet to our fathers, saying, Go to this people, and say, Hearing ye shall hear and not understand, and seeing ye shall see and not perceive. For the heart of this people has become fat, and they hear heavily with their ears, and they have closed their eyes; lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted and I should heal them” (Act 28:25-28). But this is not Israel ‘s final condition. Like these two blind men, so Israel will cry out of the deepest darkness, out of the terrible night of Jacob’s trouble, “Have mercy on us, Son of David.” Son of David is His title as He stands in relation to His earthly people, and in this passage we have Him called by this name for the first time in the Gospel. The cry these two men utter is specifically Jewish, and surely no Gentile will cry to Him as Son of David. Later in the Gospel a Gentile woman cried after Him, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is miserably possessed by a demon. But He did not answer her a word” (Mat 15:23). When she called again, she said, “Lord, help me,” and after she had taken her place with the dogs the Lord acknowledged her faith. And when thus Israel cries for mercy and waits for the coming of the Son of Man and the Son of David, He will arise and have mercy upon Zion and “in wrath He will remember mercy.” “He will return again, He will have compassion upon us; He will subdue our iniquities; and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” (Mic 7:19).

He did not pass by the two blind men. “When He was come to the house (which always stands for relationship), the blind men came to Him, and Jesus says to them, Do ye believe that I am able to do this? They say to Him, Yea, Lord. Then He touched their eyes, saying, According to your faith, be it unto you. And their eyes were opened.” So He healed them by coming in touch with them not absent and unseen, but present and touching them. He is absent from the earth now unseen to the eyes of men, yet we believe in Him and through Him on God; we believe, too, that He is able, that all power is given to Him in heaven and on earth and it is also now “according to your faith.” But He who is absent will come back to earth again, back into definite relationship with His earthly people, and then and not before will Israel’s blindness be ended. And what these two healed men did, spreading His name abroad in all that land, believing and seeing Israel will do in that day.

Next comes a dumb man possessed by a demon, and the demon having been cast out, the dumb spake. This, too, refers to Israel still under the control of Satan’s power. Instead of praising their King, Israel was dumb and is dumb now; but the demon will be cast out, and then Israel will speak His praises and sing the new song unto the Lord. What a day it will be, when dumb Israel is at last the people “formed to show forth His praise!” “And the crowds were astonished, saying, It has never been seen thus in Israel .” And in that day when Israel is healed it will be said, “What God has wrought,” and all the nations will know that He is Jehovah. We learn therefore in the three miracles -- the raising of the maid from the dead, the opening of the eyes of the blind and the casting out of the demon from the dumb man -- the blessed story of Israel ‘s coming redemption. Israel raised from the dead will see and behold the King, the Son of David, and speak and praise His name. It is not less the way of divine grace with each sinner who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ. We are dead in trespasses and sins. He said: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, that an hour is coming and now is (and the hour is not yet passed), when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God and they that have heard shall live” (Joh 5:24), and those He raises from the dead to them He gives eternal life, which is He Himself, and gives them the light of life, His Spirit, to enlighten them and guide them. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth will speak to His praise who loveth us and has redeemed us by His blood and delivered us from the power of darkness. Oh, how blessedly rich and full in His Word!

But now the dark side. While the crowds were astonished, the Pharisees said, He casts out the demons through the prince of demons. Here for the first time in the Gospel do we find the awful blasphemy of the religious leaders of the people. The power of Jehovah had been manifested before their very eyes. The leper had been cleansed and gone to the priest, who knew Jehovah’s power had done it; the tempest had been stilled, the demons cast out, the paralytic healed, the dead maid raised up, the blind saw and the dumb spake; but instead of bowing in the august presence of the King and acknowledging the power, which manifested itself in such a manner, as divine, they attributed it to Satan, the prince of demons. They accused the Lord from heaven of being the instrument of Satan! Awful blasphemy! It is here but the first muttering of the coming storm. The storm breaks fully in the twelfth chapter. There they stand in all their Satanic boldness and charge Him with casting out demons by Beelzebub. They committed there and then the sin against the Spirit. We must reserve the closer investigation of this matter till we read the chapter in which our Lord speaks of that sin. Here we notice especially that the rejection of our Lord began with the blind leaders of the people, the religious, self-righteous Pharisees. It is not different in Christendom with the falling away from the faith.

Our Lord continued in His ministry in Galilee . “And Jesus went round all the cities and the villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the glad tidings of the kingdom and healing every disease and every bodily weakness” (Mat 9:35). What an activity this must have been! He walked up and down through Galilee, and certainly not one of the numerous villages was forgotten by Him. Let us notice again that it is the Gospel of the kingdom He preached, therefore Kingdom signs were present. When He, the King, comes again, and the Kingdom of the heavens is established and the heavens rule, then disease and all that offends will be put away.

But what scenes met His eye as He passed thus ministering among the crowds of people? He beheld them as worn out, harassed and cast away as sheep not having a shepherd. His loving heart was moved with compassion for them. In this loving sympathy He reveals Himself as the Shepherd of Israel. Long before His Spirit in the prophets had spoken of the scene we behold here. “Son of Man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel ; prophesy, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God unto the shepherds: Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do not feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flock? ... And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd; and they became meat to all the beasts of the field, where they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill; yea, My flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth and none did search and seek after them” (Eze 34:1-31). In the same chapter we read what Jehovah the Shepherd of Israel says: “I will both search My sheep and find them out. ... I will seek out My sheep. ... I will bring them out from the people and gather them from the countries. ... I will feed them in a good pasture. ... I will feed My flock and I will cause them to lie down. ... I will seek that which was lost. ... I will make with them a covenant of peace,” ... etc. He came thus to His own as the Shepherd, but they did not want Him. As the good Shepherd He laid down His life for the sheep, becoming the great Shepherd in resurrection and the chief Shepherd in glory. But He is also the Shepherd of Israel, and thinks still of His earthly people and loves them. That thirty-fourth chapter of Ezekiel will yet be literally fulfilled through the returning Son of Man, and then His poor flock will know Him and sing in the earth what the believer’s heart sings now: “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want.” “Then saith He to His disciples, The harvest is great and the workmen few; supplicate therefore the Lord of the harvest, that He send forth workmen unto His harvest.” He Himself is the Lord of the harvest. He sends forth the workmen and He equips them for the service. But there is a great difference between the sending forth of the workmen to preach the gospel of the kingdom, and to heal the sick, and the gifts, the Lord in glory, as the Head of His body, has given to the church. The sending forth of the laborers into the harvest will be before us in the next chapter.

Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 9:1-8

Jesus and Man’s deepest Sadness.

I. "Jesus saw their faith." Jesus did not see their faith because there was in them no other commendable quality for Him to see; there was their common attachment to their unfortunate friend. But without their faith their affection for their friend could not have linked him in his suffering and miseries with the Christ in His healing and His peace. It was because they believed in Him that they carried the man to Him. And Jesus saw their faith in Him, and because of their faith He had the opportunity afforded Him of seeing their love of the man.

II. He saw something in the man that was a greater evil than the palsy. The friends thought that his being palsied was a sufficient reason why they should carry the man. But Christ forthwith, when He had seen their faith, thought of the man’s sin. He had been called Jesus, for He was to save His people from their sins. This salvation was His ulterior aim in all He said or did. The external was touched for the purpose of awakening and quickening the internal of man. The body was healed in order that the spirit might arise and go to its Father. This man’s affliction seems to have been connected with his sin. Sin and pain have been the sad associates of man’s mortal life. The man was in misery because of his sin, not because of his palsy. He needed cheer of spirit; his heart was broken, and Jesus saw and dealt with that. Having the greater, he could rest without the lesser. Not health, but forgiveness, was to be the basis of his joy.

III. It was when He addressed Himself to the greater thing He saw that Jesus crossed the prejudice of certain of the scribes. Christ suffered at the hands of the scribes and Pharisees because of His morals. It was godliness, according to Christ, that constituted His great offence. It is when Christ touches the conscience, and talks of purity of heart, and says something of hypocrisy that the great quarrel begins. There is no cross for any one who can teach that the kingdom of heaven cometh with observation; and as long as he can say, "Lo, here!" and "Lo, there!" he is safe enough; but He is not who refuses to give a sign from heaven, and who says, "The kingdom of heaven is within you."

J. O. Davies, Sunrise on the Soul, p. 87.

Reference: Mat 9:1-8.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 466.

Mat 9:2

I. Sin—its relation to the body. Sin, we know, is a "spiritual wickedness;" its sphere of action, accordingly, is in high places. Mere matter, whether it lie in an amorphous clod in the valley, or move as an organized living body, cannot sin. In those high places where a finite but immortal spirit comes in contact with the Spirit infinite and eternal lies the only element that is capable of sustaining either spiritual purity or spiritual wickedness; yet though sin draws its life-breath in those heavenly places, its members press the earth, and leave their marks indented deep over all the surface. Though sin lives secretly in the soul, it works terribly in the body. In the man sick with the palsy disease was the forerunner and symptom of the body’s death. So far the man and his friends plainly saw, but Jesus looked through these outer effects to the inner cause. He sees not only the paralysis in the man’s body, but also the sin in the man’s soul. By passing over the obvious disease, and speaking of only the unseen sin, He shows clearly what His mission is not and what it is. His mission is not to perpetuate this life, but to lead all His people through the gate of death into the life eternal. His word, accordingly, is not, "Thy body shall not die," but, "Thy sins are forgiven."

II. Sin—its removal by the Lord. (1) It is by a free pardon that sin is removed, and its eternal consequences averted. (2) The Saviour to whom this needy man was brought had power to forgive sins. (3) Christ has power to forgive on earth. The word limits the position, not of the Forgiver, but of the forgiven. (4) The Son of man hath power to forgive. (5) Christ the Saviour, in coming to a sinful, suffering man, desires not only that he should be saved hereafter, but also happy now. "Son, be of good cheer," was the Great Physician’s first salutation.

W. Arnot, Roots and Fruits of the Christian Life, p. 252.

I. Sickness is the witness to us of wrong that has been done. It is the handwriting on the wall wherewith a man’s hand writes the word that tells us that we have been weighed in the balances and found wanting. And in this sense it is a judgment; it makes known to us the curse of sin. But that is not all. The misery of sickness witnesses not only to the wrong done, but also to the right that has been lost. Sickness is the protest made by nature against the misdirection of her forces.

II. We know so well that the recovery of our sickness depends upon the stoppage of the secret wrong. And yet we find ourselves again and again doing the wrong that we purpose to stop. In discovering the misery of our sin we discover also our powerlessness to cease from sinning. We cannot do the things that we would; and the blood of bulls and goats cannot take away our inherent and ineradicable will to sin. There is but one hope. If only a new fire could be shot into our chilled and flagging heart; if only a fresh jet of force could infuse itself into our jaded and diminished will; if only a spring of living waters could be opened within that naked stone which we once called our heart—that, and that only, can save us, for that, and that only, can cut off the supplies of sin which continually reinforce our habitual disease.

III. And it can be done—it has been done—by that beautiful law, so natural, so rational, so intelligible, of vicarious atonement. By that law, which is already and always at the very root of our human life, it is possible for God, without disturbing or traversing one atom of that natural order which He has Himself sanctioned by creating—possible for Him to intervene, to break off the fearful entail, to shatter the chain that our sins have forged. The spirit of sacrifice is the creator of ethics, and God sanctioned and sealed the entire body of ethical verities by which human society is bonded and fed when He sent His Son, who knew no sin, to be made a curse for us, and to bear on His shoulders the iniquity of the world.

H. Scott Holland, Creed and Character, p. 205.

References: Mat 9:2.—J. Edmunds, Sermons in a Village Church, 2nd series, p. 283; R. Heber, Parish Sermons, vol. ii., pp. 262, 283; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 2nd series, p. 38; J. Keble, Sermons for the Sundays after Trinity, Part II., p. 218. Mat 9:2-8.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. vi., p. 167. Mat 9:6.—J. Vaughan, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament, p. 14; Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 224; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. xiii., p. 145; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. ii., p. 420. Mat 9:9.—R. W. Evans, Parochial Sermons, vol. ii., p. 285; T. Gasquoine, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 164; J. B. Heard, Ibid., vol. xvi., p. 209; R. Heber, Parish Sermons, vol. ii., p. 248; R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons, 2nd series, p. 90; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. i., pp. 143, 154; Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Gospels and Acts, p. 21. Mat 9:9-10.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ii., p. 190. Mat 9:9-13.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 89; A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, p. 20; Parker, Inner Life of Christ, vol. ii., p. 69.

Mat 9:11

I. The religion of the Pharisees had degenerated into a religion of hatred and contempt. There was scarcely a class which did not suffer from their fierce denunciations and supercilious disdain. The world was divided into Jew and Gentile, and on the vast mass of the Gentiles they looked as on a doomed race of no importance, as thorns to crackle in the flame, created apparently as a mere foil to the very great privileges of God’s favourite, the Jew. The race of man was divided into men and women, and on women they looked with insolent disdain; carefully gathering up their robes as they entered the synagogue, lest they should so much as touch them. If this unholy scorn was the normal tone of the Pharisees towards the millions of Gentiles, of women, of Samaritans, may we not imagine the sort of feelings which they must have indulged towards the lowest members of those classes, towards those of whom they would have spoken as the "scum and froth"—"the dregs and outcasts of society"? Now of these classes, two were especially abhorrent to them—sordid renegades who were publicans, fallen women who were harlots. We can imagine the astonishment of angry reprobation which they must have thrown into the question, "Why eateth your Master with publicans and sinners?"

II. With the views and doctrines of the Pharisees contrast the life and words of Christ. While there was one class, and one class only, which Christ denounced, namely the Scribes and the Pharisees, He had for sinners only the call of tenderness; to sinners only was His especial mission; sinners were His especial care; it was the lost sheep over which the Good Shepherd yearned; it was for the wanderers that His heart seemed to burst with tenderness; it was upon the neck of the returning prodigal that the Father wept. He gathered the publicans to His discourses. He sat at their feasts. He chose a publican for His host. He nominated a publican to be His apostle.

III. So thought, so acted, the Saviour of the world. These facts are patent, fortunately, for every one to read. They are the magna charta freely granted to humanity by the great love of God. They show that the Son of God, inflexible in His estimate of sin, was infinitely compassionate in His dealings with sinners. He tried to win men from sin by perfect love; promise, not menace; appeal, not threatening; comprehension, not exclusion; the sweetness of hope, not the denunciation of wrath, that was the secret of Jesus.

F. W. Farrar, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xviii., p 33.

References: Mat 9:10.—J. Keble, Sermons for Saints’ Days, p. 352. Mat 9:10, Mat 9:11.—J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 4th series, p. 92. Mat 9:12.—C. Kingsley, The Water of Life, p. 291; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xi., No. 618; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. x., p. 124. Mat 9:13.—J. P. Gledstone, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 301; H. W. Beecher, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 77; Outline Sermons to Children, p. 117. Mat 9:14-17.—A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, p. 69. Mat 9:14-19.—Parker, Inner Life of Christ, vol. ii., p. 78.

Mat 9:15

Use of Observances.

I. It seems at first sight as if a spiritual religion would dispense with observances altogether. And there is a sense in which this is the case always, and there are occasions on which all observances are dispensed with altogether. For it is undeniable that observances must be secondary, and if they are elevated into the first rank they are out of place. So St. Paul tells the Galatians that he is afraid of them, because they observe days and months, and times and years. And the whole tenour of his teaching corresponds, and perpetually reminds us of his own saying, "Having begun in the spirit, are ye now made perfect in the flesh?" In his day and in his circumstances there was plainly something which made him throw his chief weight into the scale against all observances.

II. Our Lord, however, in answering the question of the Pharisees, why His disciples did not fast, gives us the precise measure of all such observances. If we had the Bridegroom always with us, we should never need them. But the Bridegroom leaves us sometimes, and then we cannot do without them. He has left us, and the Church has found just what He predicted, that much which was needless while He stayed became needful when He was gone. The Church found that she must do what our Lord implied that she would have to do, provide for the needs of human nature in the ordinary fashion, and make rules to keep alive the warmth and power of faith, just as rules are made for the purposes of any ordinary human society. We are tempted to fancy that these observances must be a hindrance, not a help; that what is wanted are power, and life, and passion, not recurring seasons, and reminders of great events, and services in due order. But it is not so. Life and power are wanted; but they are not hindered by the rules of religious life; and meanwhile those very rules often aid them in their weakness. What is true of the Church is true of each one of us. Observances have two uses for every soul. If the Lord be absent, it is by them that we seek Him. If the Lord be present, it is by them that we meet Him.

Bishop Temple, Rugby Sermons, 2nd series, p. 131.

References: Mat 9:15.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. xiv., p. 81. Mat 9:16.—R. Lee, Sermons, p. 268.

Mat 9:17

There is an ever-living freshness in the words of Jesus, as recorded in the Gospels. In reading them we are not with mere antiquarian curiosity studying the history of events wholly unconnected with ourselves, or recalling a state of society which belongs entirely to the buried past; rather we find ourselves presented with prophecies of the ever-recurring future, and with anticipations of the principles which may be applied to the interpretation of the great moral and religious problems of modern society. Securely connected beneath the letter of the original utterances there lies ready for our apprehension the eternal spirit, which may be our unerring guide in practice. Such a vitality of utterance we may surely discern in the parabolic saying of the text.

I. What is the interpretation of these parables of the new patch on the old garment, and of the new wine put into the old bottles, or leathern skins after Eastern fashion? Is it not something of this sort? The old forms of piety amid which John and his disciples still move are not suited to the new religious life emanating from Me. The new life needs new forms.

II. Neither Christ nor His Apostles attempted to put the Gospel as a patch upon the old garment of the Mosaic law, to pour the new wine of the spiritual dispensation into the old bottle of legal rules. They offered the Gospel as a system of principles and laws and motives, not of rules and precepts and observances. They invited men to a rejoicing sense of liberty, as the appropriate temper for that reception of the doctrine of salvation by Christ; they urged men towards the attainment of that perfect love which would cast out fear; they proclaimed that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself; they made the ritual and ceremonial element in religion altogether subordinate to the moral and spiritual. Faith working by love, not ceremonial observance, was the characteristic expression of the Christian life.

III. The Christian Church did not at once rise to the grandeur of the new idea of religion. It constantly exhibited tendencies to fall back upon the old. It was afraid of letting liberty degenerate into license. Men who had become accustomed to all the venerable traditions of the old law did not straightway find pleasure in throwing them off. They represented Christianity as a mere reproduction of Judaism under other names. They made the ministry of the Word and sacraments a priesthood, whose main office was to offer material sacrifice; they violated the whole spirit of the New Testament, and the language of the early Church, by calling the Lord’s day the Sabbath; they tried to limit the very name of religion to the observance of a rule of life which prescribed the most minute precepts for the conduct of every hour; a rigid asceticism was glorified as the fulfilment of counsels of perfection. "New wine must be put into new bottles" embodies a principle which the Church of Christ in all ages forgets at her peril. That principle is, that new wants create new institutions; a new spirit must express itself in other forms, adapted to the new occasion. There must be in all the arrangements of life an elasticity, a power of self-development, an expansiveness, a fertility of invention, an evoking of new energies. New conditions of society demand different methods.

Canon Ince, Oxford Review, Feb. 18th, 1885.

Mat 9:18-19, Mat 9:23-26

The Raising of Jairus’ Daughter.

I. The miracles of raising from the dead, whereof this is the first, have always been regarded as the mightiest outcomings of the power of Christ; and with justice. They are those, also, at which unbelief is readiest to stumble, standing as they do in more direct contrast than any other to all which our experience has known. The line between health and sickness is not definitely fixed; the two conditions melt one into the other, and the transition from this to that is frequent. In like manner storms alternate with calms; the fiercest tumult of the elements allays itself at last; and Christ’s word which stilled the tempest did but anticipate and effect in a moment what the very conditions of nature must have effected in the end. But between being and the negation of being the opposition is not relative, but absolute; between death and life a gulf lies which no fact furnished by our experience can help us even in imagination to bridge over. It is nothing wonderful, therefore, that miracles of this class are signs more spoken against than any other among all the mighty works of the Lord.

II. Note the relation in which the three miracles of this transcendent character stand to one another; for they are not exactly the same miracle repeated three times over, but may be contemplated as in an ever-ascending scale of difficulty, each a more marvellous outcoming of the great power of Christ than the preceding. Science itself has arrived at the conjecture that the last echoes of life ring in the body much longer than is commonly supposed; that for a while it is full of the reminiscences of life. This being so, we shall at once recognize in the quickening of him who had been four days dead a still mightier wonder than in the raising of the young man who was borne out to his burial; and again, in that miracle a mightier outcoming of Christ’s power than in the present, wherein life’s flame, like some newly extinguished taper, was still more easily rekindled, when thus brought in contact with Him who is the fountain-flame of all life. Immeasurably more stupendous than all these will be the wonder of that hour when all the dead of old, who will have lain (some of them for many thousand years) in the dust of death, shall be summoned from, and shall leave, their graves at the same quickening voice.

R. C. Trench, Notes on the Miracles, p. 191.

References: Mat 9:18-26.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 280; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 469. Mat 9:20.—J. Ker, Sermons, p. 186.

Mat 9:21

I. Consider what this sufferer said within herself. (1) As displaying ignorance of the true nature of Christ. (2) As displaying not only ignorance, but error, along with truth. (3) Was her faith, then, a foolish credulity? Not at all. She knew the wonders He had wrought on others, and responded to goodness and truth. His language and demeanour expressed this, and on this convincing evidence she trusted Jesus and was healed.

II. Consider this feeling toward Christ, as finding recognition wider than the Christian Church.

III. Remember that Christ calls us, beyond slight contact, to the closest union with Himself.

Prof. Herbert, Contemporary Pulpit, vol. iv., p. 32.

Jesus Christ was never in a hurry. He had no occasion to be so, because He was conscious of supreme power, and of a capacity to do whatever He in His perfect wisdom deemed right. So that you perceive nowhere throughout the whole of these Gospels the least sign of eager anxiety, the slightest indication of personal uncertainty. He moves on His way, quiet, comparatively undisturbed, with the calmness of conscious strength. This thought is suggested, because the incident before us shows our Lord allowing Himself to be interrupted in a great work which He had undertaken to do, and yet being undisturbed by the interruption. Why should the Son of God be in haste? Can He not do as He wills? Does He not come forth from the bosom of Him of whom it is said, "A thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night"?

Notice:—

I. That the touch of the diseased woman was an expression of conscious need. Necessity, trouble, incurable sorrow bring us to the Great Healer in some way or other.

II. The touch was an expression of superstition and faith. There was surely something of a vague belief that any kind of contact with Christ would bring her blessing. The incident suggests an inquiry as to what kind of faith and how much Faith is necessary to bring us into contact with Christ. That some faith is essential is clear; for had she not asked, the probability is the woman would not have received healing. But the fact of her healing shows how the least faith, the smallest effort of belief, may bring a response from Christ. We may learn that the first and chief thing for our soul’s need is contact with Christ, and that attained, we shall find that from the spiritual touch of the Saviour we gain forgiveness and newness of life. From Him virtue passes into our souls, and faith deepens and strengthens into perfect confidence and rest.

W. Braden, Sermons, p. 183.

I. How many evils sin has brought into the world. The seeds of sin are lying dormant in our souls, and even when brought into God’s family, and made His children by adoption and grace, we still unite in the mortifying confession, "There is no health in us."

II. Another reflection drawn from the history is, that we are too much disposed to seek human help, instead of going directly to God.

III. However deep-seated and desperate the condition of the soul’s health, the Saviour can help us.

IV. Note the secrecy with which the afflicted woman sought help of Jesus. "Nor is her wish for secrecy unbelief, but simply humility—humility, accompanied with such faith in Him that she feels assured that a touch of His raiment will suffice."

J. N. Norton, Golden Truths, p. 475.

Faith’s Approach to Christ.

1. Faith comes with a deep despair of all other help but Christ’s.

2. Faith has a divine power to discover Christ.

3. Faith comes with an implicit trust in Christ.

4. Faith seeks, for its comfort, close contact with Christ.

5. Faith, with all its imperfections, is accepted by Christ.

6. Faith feels a change from the touch of Christ.

J. Ker, Sermons, p. 186.

References: Mat 9:21.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxx., No. 1809; J. E. Vaux, Sermon Notes, 2nd series, p. 48; T. M. Herbert, Sketches of Sermons, p. 40. Mat 9:23, Mat 9:24.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. iii., p. 251; S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year, vol. ii., p. 246. Mat 9:23-25.—F. W. Robertson, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 30. Mat 9:25.—J. M. Neale, Sermons for the Church Year, vol. ii., p. 8. Mat 9:27-30.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxiii., No. 1355; vol. xxvi., No. 560. Mat 9:27-31.—Parker, Inner Life of Christ, vol. ii., p. 97; G. Macdonald, Miracles of Our Lord, p. 101. Mat 9:28.—W. F. Hook, Sermons on the Miracles, vol. i., p. 288. Mat 9:29.—W. Gresley, Practical Sermons, p. 61. Mat 9:30.—Archbishop Benson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii., p. 81. Mat 9:32, Mat 9:35.—Parker, Inner Life of Christ, vol. ii., p. 106. Mat 9:33.—W. F. Hook, Sermons on the Miracles, vol. i., p. 306.

Mat 9:35

Christ the Physician.

In Christ we are allied to the highest and the largest ideal of the most disinterested efforts for the physical and moral welfare of man that our earth has ever seen. Times, indeed, there were in His ministry when it might even have seemed that the human body had a greater claim on His attention than the human soul.

I. Now it would be a great mistake to suppose that this feature of our Saviour’s ministry was accidental or inevitable. Nothing in His work was accident; all was deliberate; all had an object. Nothing in His work was inevitable, except so far as it was freely dictated by His wisdom and His mercy. To suppose that this union of prophet and physician was determined by the necessity of some rude civilization, such as that of certain tribes in Central Africa and elsewhere, or certain periods and places in mediæval Europe, when knowledge was scanty, when it was easy and needful for a single person at each social centre to master all that was known on two or three great subjects—this is to make a supposition which does not apply to Palestine at the time of our Lord’s appearance. The later prophets were prophets and nothing more—neither legislators, nor statesmen, nor physicians. We may infer with reverence and certainty that Christ’s first object was to show Himself as the Deliverer and Restorer of human nature as a whole—not of the reason and conscience merely, without the imagination and the affections—not of the spiritual side of men’s nature, without the bodily; and therefore He was not only Teacher, but also Physician.

II. What is the present function of the human body? We see in it at once a tabernacle and an instrument; it is the tabernacle of the soul and the temple of the Holy Ghost. And thus the human body is, in our idea, itself precious and sacred; it is an object of true reverence, if only by reason of Him whom it is thus permitted to house and to serve.

III. And again, there is the destiny of the body. As we Christians gaze at it we know that there awaits it the humiliation of death and decay; we know also that it has a future beyond; the hour of death is the hour of resurrection. The reconstruction of the decayed body presents to us no greater difficulties than its original construction; and if we ask the question how it will be, we are told, upon what is for us quite sufficient authority, that our Lord Jesus Christ "shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself."

H. P. Liddon, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xx., p. 81.

References: Mat 9:35.—C. Kingsley, The Water of Life, p. 18 Mat 9:35-38.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. viii., p. 354; R. M. McCheyne, Additional Remains, p. 157.

Mat 9:36

I. Our Lord here teaches us how to think of, or to look at, men. (1) Notice how here, as always to Jesus Christ, the outward was nothing, except as a symbol and manifestation of the inward, how the thing that He saw in a man was not the external accidents of circumstances or position; but His true, clear gaze, and His loving, wise heart, went straight to the essence of the thing, and dealt with the man, not according to what he might happen to be in the categories of earth, but to what he was in the categories of heaven. Christian men and women, do you try to do the same thing? (2) Think of the condition of humanity apart from Christ—shepherdless. Unless Jesus Christ be both Guide and Teacher, we have neither guide nor teacher—shepherdless without Him. Do you ever think of the depth of pathetic, tragic meaning that there is in that verse in one of the Psalms, "Such as sit in darkness and in the shadow of death"? There they sit, because there is no hope in rising and moving. They would have to grope if they arose, and so with folded hands they sit, like the Buddha, which one great section of heathenism has taken as being the true emblem and ideal of the noblest life. Absolute passivity lays hold upon them all—torpor, stagnation, no dream of advance or progress; the sheep are dejected, despairing, anarchic, shepherdless, away from the Christ. God give us grace to see the condition of humanity and our own apart from Him.

II. Christ teaches us not only how to think of men, but how that sight should touch us. "He was moved with compassion on them when He saw the multitudes"—with the eye of a God, and the heart of a man. Pity, not aversion; pity, not anger; pity, not curiosity; pity, not indifference. Compassion, and not curiosity, is an especial lesson for the day to the more thoughtful and cultured among our congregations.

III. The text teaches how Christ would have us act after such emotion be built and based on such a vision. I will name three things—(1) personal work; (2) prayer; (3) help.

A. Maclaren, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 305.

I. Christ’s habitual look at men had regard to them as suffering. No other aspect of life seems to have struck Him with equal force, or to have so claimed His thought, that He did not feel its sorrow. The foundation of His work is ethical, but the tone is drawn from His sensibilities rather than from His judicial sentiments; to get rid of the sorrow is the end.

II. The question arises, Is this a true or a false, a healthy or a morbid, view of human life? The question cannot be answered by determining whether there is more happiness or suffering. Suffering is real, and a sympathizing mind will pause upon it rather than look through to the underlying joy, and especially a great pitying nature like Christ’s will pause upon it and see little else. It is not a matter of more or less, but of appealing anguish. Christ was a Man of sorrows, but not His own sorrow; a Man of griefs, but griefs that were His own only as He took them from others into His own heart.

III. It is not a long step from the Christ’s pity to that it evokes in those who believe in Him. There is something beyond a sense of justice and fair dealing, something beyond even goodwill and love. The highest relation of man to man is that of compassion. Hardly separable from love in words, it may be in conception; it is love at its best, love quick, love in its highest gradation; it is the brooding, the yearning feeling, the love that protects while it enfolds. Our sorrows are not our own, to be secretly wept over or soon dispelled. It should be the first question with any one who suffers, as it is nearly always the first impulse, To what service of ministering pity am I called? For the ultimate purpose of God in humanity is to bring it together. The main human instrument is that we are considering; it is the finest and most dominant force lodged in our common nature; it brings men up to the point from which they launch into the universe and live.

T. T. Munger, The Freedom of Faith, p. 131.

Mat 9:36-38

Jesus Seeing the People.

Note:—

I. What Jesus saw. He saw the multitudes. The range of His vision could not be limited, nor His ministry confined, to the immediate requirement of the more palpable of life’s sufferings. He saw the multitude scattered abroad, and as sheep without a shepherd. He commiserates their condition instead of condemning them, and sees that the people had been sinned against quite as much as they had sinned. The people were scattered and distressed. Sin is sure to scatter; untruth always disunites. Man was far from man as Christ saw him; he did not know himself, and because he did not know himself he could not know his fellow, and could never know much of either until he had known God as the Father of both.

II. What Christ felt. "He was moved with compassion on them." The farther we are from sin the more we can be to the sinful. When we are sinful ourselves we avenge, as we have ability, the sins committed against us by others. The day is afar off, but it is coming, when society will seek to save, and will save itself by saving, and not by condemning. Jesus was tempted like as we are, and yet was without sin; and being without sin He is able to succour them that are tempted. He could pity and help because there was no sin in Him.

III. What He said. When Jesus spake He changed His figure, ceased to be the shepherd, and became the husbandman. To Him the world was as a harvest-field, ready to be gathered. Christ calls us all to the harvest. There is work for us all on the field, for His field is the world. If you cannot do you can prepare to do by cultivating definiteness of purpose and consecration of heart. The labourers who labour must not be discouraged because the labourers are few; the Master knows how few you are and how great is the field.

J. O. Davies, Sunrise on the Soul, p. 119.

References: Mat 9:36.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. vi., p. 18; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. x., p. 121; Expositor, 1st series, vol. iv., p. 30; W. H. Murray, The Fruits of the Spirit, p. 290; Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Gospels and Acts, p. 24. Mat 9:36, Mat 9:37.—E. W. Benson, Contemporary Pulpit, vol. iii., p. 177. Mat 9:36-38.—Homiletic, Magazine, vol. ix., p. 141; Parker, Inner Life of Christ, vol. ii., p. 116. Mat 9:37, Mat 9:38.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xix., No. 1127. Mat 9:38.—C. Girdlestone, Twenty Parochial Sermons, 3rd series, p. 1; R. Heber, Sermons Preached in England, p. 232.

The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

THE DEMONIZED GADERENE

Mat 8:28-34; Mat 9:1; Mar 5:1-21; and Mar 5:26-40. We visited this country of the Gadarenes, which comes down to the northeast coast of this sea; Gergesa, their capital, situated on a beautiful, rich plain, enjoying a handsome view of this beautiful water, as well as the majestic mountains and fertile valleys of the surrounding countries. Matthew says they came to Gergesa, Mark and Luke say they came to the country of Gadara. This is in perfect harmony, as Gergesa was the city and Gadara the country. You must remember that when our Savior bade the temple adieu, the day before He was arrested, He said, “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.” Within forty years from the utterance the Roman armies signally verified it. Hence the desolation has been on that country ever since. However, Gadara was a Gentile country; but it was the subject of a terrible Divine retribution, as we will see in this narrative, for rejecting the ministry of Jesus. “And they came to the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes, and a man with an unclean spirit, from the tombs, met Him immediately having come out of the ship, who had his habitation among the tombs; and no one was able to bind him with chains, because frequently he had been bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been slipped off by him and the fetters torn to pieces, and no one was able to subdue him.” Matthew says there were two demoniacs, exceedingly fierce, so no one could pass that way. Mark and Luke speak of but one. Luke says that he wore no clothing. It is a notable fact that raging maniacs have an aversion to wearing clothing, and if possible will tear it off. Mark: “And he was all the time, night and day, among the tombs and in the mountains; was crying, and cutting himself with stones. Seeing Jesus a great way off, he ran and fell down before Him, and crying, with a great voice, said, What is there to me and to Thee, O Jesus, the Son of the Most High God? I adjure Thee, in the name of God, that you torment me not; for He said to him, Unclean spirit, come out from the man.” Luke says: “For a long time he had possessed him, and he was kept bound with fetters and chains; and smashing his fetters, he was driven by the demon into the wilderness. And Jesus asked him, saying, What is thy name? and he said, Legion, because many demons had entered into him. And he continued to exhort Him that He may not command them to depart into the abyss;” i.e., the bottomless pit.

God never created the devil, a sinner, nor a snake. The snake originated from the transformation of the Nahash, an intelligent biped, one of the intermediate links between man and the lower animals, and unfortunately used by Satan in the abduction of humanity. Satan is a fallen archangel:

“How thou art fallen, O Lucifer, the morning star!” (Isa 14:12.)

The term “devil” is the ordinary cognomen of Satan, demon being the regular epithet applied to those innumerable evil spirits, swarming up out of the bottomless pit and thronging the atmosphere, their highest aspiration being a habitation in some human spirit, as in the case of this Gadarene, into whom a whole legion — i.e., ten thousand — had crowded together. Nothing is so terrible to these demons as the gloomy dungeons of the bottomless pit. Consequently they importuned Jesus not to send them thither. Originally the intelligences inhabiting the innumerable worlds, constituting the celestial empire, were presumptively all on probation. In the fatal revolt of Lucifer, an immense host, perhaps one-third (Revelation 12), followed the apostate archangel. As this apostasy, in all probability, infected many celestial worlds, we find innumerable hosts of fallen demons roaming round this world, hunting a habitation in some human heart. (Ephesians 6) We have no right to conclude that this Gadarene is the only legionaire in all the earth. It is pertinent to remember how all the demons, with whom Jesus comes in contact, recognize Him. We have no record at what epoch in bygone eternity the angels were created; evidently long before Divinity spoke this world into existence. As Jesus is co-eternal with God Himself, identical with the uncreated Jehovah, the recognition of these demons is doubtless a vivid reminiscence of the bright celestial ages which glided away before the dark period of rebellion and ruin supervened. It is here specified that the legionaire tore his clothing from his person, smashing all the fetters and escaping from all the chains with which they could bind him. The muscular power of these Oriental red men is vastly superior to that of Europeans and Americans. In all probability, he was a natural giant, as were most of the aborigines in that country in the days of Joshua; for you must remember he was not a Hebrew, but a Gentile. It is generally believed that physical strength is located in the muscles. This is a mistake. The muscles are the mere instruments used by the nerves, which are the custodians of physical power. A crowbar is a most potent instrument in the hands of a stalwart man; but left alone, utterly impotent.

I thought the muscles were the custodians of physical strength till, in 1884, a stroke of partial paralysis demonstrated the utter impotency of the muscles without nervous stimuli. From a human standpoint, the exegesis of Samson’s paradoxical strength was the induement of the Holy Ghost, who operated through his nerves, thus imparting miraculous physical dynamics. Now remember, this Gadarene had ten thousand demons, ready in a moment to electrify his nerves, thus imparting an incredible muscular power. I have seen epileptics whom it took a half-dozen strong men to manage. You have all witnessed the extraordinary feats of strength and activity performed by maniacs, lunatics, and epileptics. This man was doubtless a combination of them all, so many demons, ready at any moment to turn loose the very galvanic batteries of the pandemonium on their poor victim, thus making them instrumental in the most paradoxical feats of agility and power. Why did he dwell among the tombs? Satan is king of death and hell. He sways his leaden scepter over every graveyard, holding fast every human body in the dark sepulcher, as their souls in the regions of woe. Hence these demons found congeniality among the tombs.

Mar 5:11. “And there was at the mountain a great herd of swine, feeding. And all the demons entreated him saying, Send us into the swine, that we may go into them. And Jesus immediately permitted them. And the unclean spirits, having come out, went into the swine, and the herd rushed down a steep place into the sea, and there were about two thousand, and they perished in the sea.” These heathen Gentiles set great store on the hog, a notoriously unclean animal, which God’s people were forbidden to raise, heavy interdictions being laid on the eating of the same. When I visited that country last November, our dragoman showed us the mountain traditionally recognized as the pasture of the swine, and the cliff down which the whole herd stampeded into the sea; thus transmitting to us a most monitory lesson against demoniacal possession, which is so common in all ages, the present day being no exception to the rule. Here we see these hogs unhesitatingly choosing suicide rather than demoniacal possession. This verdict of the swine should put millions to the blush this day, who go over the earth, full of demons, and claiming a place among the bon tons of society. “And those herding them fled, and proclaimed in the city and in the country; and they came out to see what is that which has been done. And they come to Jesus, and see the demonized man sitting down, clothed, and in his right mind, him who was called Legion; and they were afraid. And those seeing, explained to them how it occurred to the demonized man, and concerning the swine. And they began to entreat Him to depart from their coasts.” Luk 8:36 : “And those seeing, explained to them how the demonized man was saved; and the whole multitude of the surrounding country of the Gadarenes entreated Him to depart from them, because they were possessed with great fear.” Here we have the united testimony of Matthew, Mark, and Luke to the unanimous and importunate verdict of all the Gadarenes, requesting Jesus to leave their country. That this awful and hopeless demoniac had been wonderfully saved, all admitted. But there was another phase to the matter — they had lost their swine. Now a pertinent question looks them all in the face. Will they have Jesus or bacon? If they keep Jesus, they can have all of the sick healed, all the devils cast out, all the people saved, soul and body, and turn their country into a little heaven, so they can live on angels’ food instead of “hog and hominy.” The popular verdict comes quickly, and without a dissenting voice: they all decide to let Jesus go, and save their bacon to eat and sell for the money.

DOOM OF GADARA

“And embarking into the ship, He returned;” i.e., went back to Capernaum, the center of His evangelistic work in the North, thus throwing a dark shadow over all of that country of the Gadarenes, which has wrapped it in gloom and withered it with desolation these eighteen hundred years. When I visited that country, with its beautiful, fertile plains, bordering on the sea; majestic, rich mountains, with innumerable valleys and coves — all, at the time of our Savior’s visit, flourishing as the gardens of the Lord, cultivated by a thriving and enterprising people, whose temporal needs a gracious Providence had most abundantly supplied. So they needed nothing but the Savior, whom, in loving, Fatherly affection, He so kindly sent them. O what a grand introductory He made among them in saving the worst man they had! How all hell rallied to hold their grip tight on Gadara! Jesus comes to all people, even uninvited, thus pitying their blindness and ignorance, and giving all a chance for salvation. But when He turns the light on them, if, instead of rejoicing in it, they prefer darkness, and, like these besotted Gadarenes, even have the impudence to ask Him to leave, He always goes, leaving them to their choice, with the devil and hell, world without end. Jesus saves none against their will; neither does He stay where He is not wanted. When I stood upon the old walls of Gergesa, the capital of Gadara, to which Jesus went, and looked around upon the ruins of the city, without an inhabitant except the wandering Arabs, then on the spot, grazing their herds and flocks, and saw their country, which has lain desolate eighteen hundred years, I saw in panorama, as I look out over the sea, Jesus embarking on the ship, which sails away, appearing smaller and smaller, till she passes out of sight, thus leaving poor Gadara doomed and ruined. How signally has this been verified in the dismal fate of that country! The Gadarenes have literally faded from the face of the earth, not one to be found; their capital desolate, their cities and villages depopulated and destroyed; their country in the hands of the nomadic Bedonins, the wild sons of Ishmael, in reference to whom God said, “His hand shall be against every man’s hand, and every man’s hand against him.” They are born robbers. If you would visit the land of Gadara this day, you would need an armed escort to save you from robbery and murder. What a warning to the people who request Jesus to depart from them!

William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [LVI. Jesus Heals Two Demoniacs].

LVI. JESUS HEALS TWO GERGESENE DEMONIACS. (Gergesa, now called Khersa.) aMATT. VIII. 28-34; IX. 1; bMARK V. 1-21; cLUKE VIII. 26-40.

b1 And they came to the other side of the sea [They left in the "even," an elastic expression. If they left in the middle of the afternoon and were driven forward by the storm, they would have reached the far shore several hours before dark], c26 And they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is over against Galilee. a28 And when he was come into the country of the Gadarenes. c27 And when he was come forth bout of the boat, cupon the land [Midway between the north and south ends of the lake, and directly east across the lake from Magdala, was the little city of Gergesa. In front and somewhat to the south of this city Jesus landed. Some sixteen miles away and to the southeast, and seven miles back from the lake, was the well-known city of Gadara. Further on to the southeast, on the borders of Arabia, and at least fifty miles from Gergesa, was the city of Gerasa. The name Gerasenes is, therefore, probably an error of the transcribers for Gergesenes, as Origen suggested. The region is properly called "country of the Gadarenes," for Gadara was an important city, and the stamp of a ship on its coins suggests that its territory extended to the Lake of Galilee], bstraightway there met him out of the tombs ca certain man out of the city [Gergesa], bwith an unclean spirit, cwho had demons; b3 who had his dwelling in the tombs: cand abode not in any house, but in the tombs. [The sides of the mountain near the ruins of Gergesa are studded with natural and artificial caves which were used as tombs.] band no man could any more bind him, no, not with a chain; 4 because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been rent asunder by him, and the [344] fetters broken in pieces: and no man had strength to tame him. 5 And always, night and day, in the tombs and in the mountains, he was crying out, and cutting himself with stones. [The natural spirit of the man seeking to throw off the dominion of the demons would cry out in agony, and the demons themselves, in their own misery, would use him as a vehicle to express their own grief. It would be hard to imagine a more horrible state] cand for a long time he had worn no clothes, b6 and when he saw Jesus from afar, che cried out, bhe ran cand fell down before him, band worshipped him; 7 and crying out with a loud voice, he saith, csaid, What have I to do with thee [on this phrase, see Rom_10:7, Rev_9:1, Rev_9:2, Rev_9:11, Rev_11:7, Rev_17:8, Rev_20:1, Rev_20:3. How these demons escaped from the abyss is one of the unsolved mysteries of the spirit world; but we have a parallel in the releasing of Satan-- Rev_20:1-3.] a28b And there met him two possessed with demons, coming forth out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man could pass by that way. [Matthew tells of two, while Mark and Luke describe only one. They tell of the principal one--the one who was the fiercer. In order to tell of two, Matthew had to omit the name "legion," which belonged to one; and conversely, Mark and Luke, to give the conversation with one, did not confuse us by telling of two.] 29 And, behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time? [The judgment-day, the time of punishment and torment-- Mat_25:41, 2Pe_2:4, Jud_1:6.] b11 Now there was there aafar off from them bon the mountain side a great herd aof many swine feeding. 31 And the demons besought him, cand they entreated him that he would give them leave to enter into them. asaying, If thou cast us out, send us away into the herd of swine. bthat we may enter into them. 13 And he gave them leave. a32 And he said unto them, Go. And they bthe unclean spirits cthe demons came out of the man, and entered aand went into the swine: and behold, the whole herd rushed down the steep into the sea, cthe lake, bin number about two thousand; and they were drowned in the sea. aand perished in the waters. [About a mile south of Khersa a spur of the mountain thrusts itself out toward the lake so that its foot is within forty feet of the water line. This is the only spot on that side of the lake where the mountains come near the water. The slope is so steep and the ledge at its foot so narrow that a herd rushing down could not check itself before tumbling into the water. [346] Skeptics have censured Jesus for permitting this loss of property. God may recognize our property rights as against each other, but he nowhere recognizes them in the realm of nature. What was done to the swine was done by the demons, and the owners had no more right to complain than they would have had if the herd had been carried off by murrain, by flood, or by any other natural cause. All animals have a right to die, either singly or in numbers. The demons evidently did not intend to destroy the swine. Their desire to have live bodies to dwell in shows that they did not. But the presence of the demons in their bodies made the hogs crazy, as it had the demoniac, and they ran the way their noses were pointed at the moment. For discussion of demoniacal possession, see Mar_7:31-37.] cand he went his way, publishing throughout the whole city [Gergesa] how great things Jesus had done for him. band began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him [for the cities which constituted Decapolis, see page 173]: and all men marvelled. 21 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. c40 And as Jesus returned, the multitude welcomed him; for they were all waiting for him. [They could see the sail of his boat as he started back.] a1 And he came into his own city. [Capernaum.] [348]

[FFG 344-348]

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

9:1-17 Controversy ensued among Jesus’ opponents, the teachers of religious law and Pharisees (9:1-13), and among the disciples of John the Baptist (9:14-17).

9:1 His own town was Capernaum (Mark 2:1), where he apparently relocated from Nazareth after being rejected there (Matt 4:13; Luke 4:16-31).

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

Mat 9:1. Διεπέρασε, He crossed over) Being asked to do so by the Gergesenes. The Lord does not force His blessings on the unwilling.[390]—ἰδίαν, His own) sc. Capernaum, exalted by this inhabitant.

[390] And by that very fact He excited in men the more ardent desires after Him, inasmuch as He did not make too long delays in the one place.—Harm., 1. c.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat_9:1 ff. Mar_2:1 ff., Luk_5:17 ff., introduce the account somewhat earlier. Matthew reports, briefly and simply, only the essential points, following, it may be, an older form of the tradition.

Τὴν ἰδίαν πόλιν] Kapernaum; ἣ μὲν γὰρ ἤνεγκεν αὐτὸν ἡ Βηθλέεμ· ἣ δὲ ἔθρεψεν ἡ Ναζαρέτ· ἣ δὲ εἶχεν οἰκοῦντα Καπερναούμ, Chrysostom. See Mat_4:13.

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.

Mat 9:1-8 . The palsied man (Mar 2:1-12 ; Luk 5:17-26 ).

Mat 9:1 . ἐμβὰς : Jesus complied with the request of the men of Gerasa, who had intimated so plainly that they did not want any more of His company. Whatever His purpose in crossing over to the eastern shore may have been, it was frustrated by an event which in some respects was an unexpected disaster. Was it rest only or a new sphere of work He was seeking there? vide notes on Mark. εἰς τ . ἰδίαν π .: entering the boat which had been moored to the shore, Jesus returned with His disciples to His own city, to distinguish it from Gerasa, the city that shut its gates against Him; so named here only. When precisely the following incident happened cannot be ascertained. Luke’s indication of time is the vaguest possible; “on one of the days”. Matthew and Mark give it in different sequence, but their narratives have this in common, that they make the incident occur on arrival in Capernaum after an excursion; in either case the first mentioned, though not the same in both. Vide notes on Mark.

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

9:1.] Certainly this verse should be the sequel of the history in the last chapter. It is not connected with the miracle following;—which is placed by St. Luke at a different time, but with the indefinite introduction of ἐγένετο ἐν μιᾷ τῶν ἡμερῶν.

[τὸ] πλοῖον, not the ship, as applying to any particular ship previously used, or kept by our Lord and the disciples,—but simply generic,—and expressed idiomatically in English by a ship, as E. V. τὰ πλοῖα, ‘ships,’ are the whole genus, in which embarkation might have been made: τὸ πλοῖον, the individual of that genus, in which embarkation actually was made: but no further defined by the article, than as being one of that genus, not as being any one previously mentioned ship, or one hired for that purpose. This import of the article has been denied by Middleton, and the generic rendering in this commentary consequently impugned by his followers. In reply, I may observe (1) that of the occurrence of the generic sense, there is no doubt, even on Middleton’s own shewing. In ch. 10:36, ἐχθροὶ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, οἱ οἰκιακοὶ αὐτοῦ, he recognizes in substance the generic sense, by rendering τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, ‘every man,’ or ‘men generally,’ though he calls the use ‘hypothetic.’ Compare also ἐξῆλθεν ὁ σπείοων τοῦ σπείρειν, ch. 13:3, where ὁ σπ. is merely in the singular what οἱ σπείροντες would be in the plural, viz. ‘he that soweth,’ ‘a sower,’ generic. See also ch. 15:11: Luk 11:24; ch. 19:10: 1Co 7:3; ch. 25:32 (where in English also we might say, ‘as the shepherd divideth the sheep from the goats’); also ch. 10:12, 27. (2) We may say, if we please, that some πλοῖον is implied in ἐμβάς, and that the article refers to such implication. But this is in fact amounts to the generic sense. If I say, without any previous mention of a particular ship, ‘When he had embarked in the ship;’ I imply by the word ‘embarked,’ connexion with a genus, ships: by adding, ‘in the ship,’ I signify elliptically, ‘in the ship in which he did embark;’ but I no further identify the ship, than as belonging to the genus before implied. (3) The use of the English article in the expression, ‘in the house’ (= indoors), ‘in the field,’ &c., is a case in point: the articles here also being generic.

τὴν ἰδ. πόλ.] Capernaum, where our Lord now dwelt: cf. ch. 4:13.

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

9:1-8. The healing of a paralytic, from Mar 2:1-12.

(M) 1. And He embarked into a boat, and crossed over, and came to His own city.] Mar 5:21a has: “And when Jesus had crossed over in the boat again to the other side.” The editor now wishes to return to Mar 2:1, which begins: “And He entered again into Capharnaum after some days, and it was reported that He is at home. And there were gathered together many, so that there was no longer room for them; no, not even about the door (R.V.): and He was speaking to them the Word.” The editor omits, as usual, the thronging of the multitude, cf. Introduction, p. xviii, and substitutes for εἰς Καφαρναούμ the words εἰς τὴν ἰδίαν πόλιν. He has already (4:13) made it clear that Christ’s headquarters were at Capharnaum. For the omission of Mk.’s ἐν οἴκῳ, see on 15:15. He now inserts Mar 2:3-12, and thus completes his second series of miracles over forces natural (8:23-27), supernatural (8:28-34), and spiritual (forgiveness of sin, 9:1-8). He then adds Mar 2:13-22 simply because it is closely connected in Mk. with the preceding section, and in spite of the fact that it interrupts his series of illustrations of Christ’s healings.

1-8. There are several small points of agreement between Mt. and Lk. against Mk. Both have a different introductory verse to that given by Mk. Mat 9:1 is due to his alteration of Mk.’s order, and his omission of Mar 2:2 is in harmony with his omissions elsewhere, e.g. of Mar 1:33, Mar 1:45, Mar 1:2:13, Mar 1:3:9, Mar 1:20, Mar 1:32. He does not, like Mk., emphasise the pressure of the multitudes. But there seems no reason why Lk. should omit Mk.’s reference to Capharnaum and introduce the incident in such ambiguous terms. Both have καὶ ἰδού and κλίνη or κλινίδιον, Luk 5:19, Luk 5:24 for κράβαττος. Both omit τῷ παραλυτικῷ and καὶ ἆρον τὸν κράβαττόν σου from Mar_9. Both insert ἀπῆλθεν εἰς τὸν οἶκον αὐτοῦ in Mar_12. Both have an expression of “fear” in the parallels to Mar_12. Lk. also has several details peculiar to himself.

Many commentators, therefore, think it necessary to suppose that Mt. and Lk. had before them a second documentary source which would account for these agreements, and in particular for Lk 17a. But it is questionable whether the facts are sufficient to warrant the conclusion. κλίνη, e.g., and the omissions from Mar_9 may well be independent alterations. ἀπῆλθεν εἰς τὸν οἶκον αὐτοῦ may be due to independent inference from Mar_11 ὔπαγε εἰς τὸν οἶκόν σου, whilst the insertion of “fear” at the end, and all these agreements, may be due to reminiscence of Mt. by Lk. It seems better to leave them unexplained than to build upon them the theory of a second source, which, whilst it affords an explanation of these details, introduces other difficulties.

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

Into Capernaum, for as Theophylact saith, Bethlehem brought him forth, Nazareth brought him up, and Capernaum was his dwelling place.

Sins are the causes of our afflictions, and Christ only forgiveth them if we believe.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

The first words of this chapter oblige us to look back to the close of that which precedes it, where we find the Gadarenes so resenting the loss of their swine, that they were disgusted with Christ's company, and besought him to depart out of their coasts. Now here it follows, He entered into a ship, and passed over. They bid him begone, and he took them at their word, and we never read that he came into their coasts again. Now here observe, 1. His justice - that he left them. Note, Christ will not tarry long where he is not welcome. In righteous judgment, he forsakes those places and persons that are weary of him, but abides with those that covet and court his stay. If the unbeliever will depart from Christ, let him depart; it is at his peril, Co1 7:15. 2. His patience - that he did not leave some destroying judgment behind him, to punish them, as they deserved, for their contempt and contumacy. How easily, how justly, might he have sent them after their swine, who were already so much under the devil's power. The provocation, indeed, was very great: but he put it up, and passed it by; and, without any angry resentments or upbraidings, he entered into a ship, and passed over. This was the day of his patience; he came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them; not to kill, but to cure. Spiritual judgments agree more with the constitution of gospel times; yet some observe, that in those bloody wars which the Romans made upon the Jews, which began not many years after this, they first besieged the town of Gadara, where these Gadarenes dwelt. Note, Those that drive Christ from them, draw all miseries upon them. Woe unto us, if God depart from us.

He came into his own city, Capernaum, the principal place of his residence at present (Mar 2:1), and therefore called his own city. He had himself testified, that a prophet it least honoured in his own country and city, yet thither he came; for he sought not his own honour; but, being in a state of humiliation, he was content to be despised of the people. At Capernaum all the circumstances recorded in this chapter happened, and are, therefore, put together here, though, in the harmony of the evangelists, other events intervened. When the Gadarenes desired Christ to depart, they of Capernaum received him. If Christ be affronted by some, there are others in whom he will be glorious; if one will not, another will.

Now the first occurrence, after Christ's return to Capernaum, as recorded in these verses, was the cure of the man sick of the palsy. In which we may observe,

I. The faith of his friends in bringing him to Christ. His distemper was such, that he could not come to Christ himself, but as he was carried. Note, Even the halt and the lame may be brought to Christ, and they shall not be rejected by him. If we do as well as we can, he will accept of us. Christ had an eye to their faith. Little children cannot go to Christ themselves, but he will have an eye to the faith of those that bring them, and it shall not be in vain. Jesus saw their faith, the faith of the paralytic himself, as well as of them that brought him; Jesus saw the habit of faith, though his distemper, perhaps, impaired his intellect, and obstructed the actings of it. Now their faith was, 1. A strong faith; they firmly believed that Jesus Christ both could and would heal him; else they would not have brought the sick man to him so publicly, and through so much difficulty. 2. A humble faith; though the sick man was unable to stir a step, they would not ask Christ to make him a visit, but brought him to attend on Christ. It is fitter than we should wait on Christ, than he on us. 3. An active faith: in the belief of Christ's power and goodness, they brought the sick man to him, lying on a bed, which could not be done without a deal of pains. Note, A strong faith regards no obstacles in pressing after Christ.

II. The favour of Christ, in what he said to him; Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee. This was a sovereign cordial to a sick man, and was enough to make all his bed in his sickness; and to make it easy to him. We read not of any thing said to Christ; probably the poor sick man could not speak for himself, and they that brought him chose rather to speak by actions than words; they set him before Christ; that was enough. Note, It is not in vain to present ourselves and our friends to Christ, as the objects of his pity. Misery cries as well as sin, and mercy is no less quick of hearing than justice. Here is, in what Christ said, 1. A kind compellation; Son. Note, Exhortations and consolations to the afflicted speak to them as to sons, for afflictions are fatherly discipline, Heb 12:5. 2. A gracious encouragement; "Be of good cheer. Have a good heart on it; cheer up thy spirits." Probably the poor man, when let down among them all in his bed, was put out of countenance, was afraid of a rebuke for being brought in so rudely: but Christ does not stand upon ceremony; he bids him be of good cheer; all would be well, he should not be laid before Christ in vain. Christ bids him be of good cheer; and then cures him. He would have those to whom he deals his gifts, to be cheerful in seeking him, and in trusting in him; to be of good courage. 3. A good reason for that encouragement; Thy sins are forgiven thee. Now this may be considered, (1.) as an introduction to the cure of his bodily distemper; "Thy sins are pardoned, and therefore thou shalt be healed." Note, As sin is the cause of sickness, so the remission of sin is the comfort of recovery from sickness; not but that sin may be pardoned, and yet the sickness not removed; not but that the sickness may be removed, and yet the sin not pardoned: but if we have the comfort of our reconciliation to God, with the comfort of our recovery from sickness, this makes it a mercy indeed to us, as to Hezekiah, Isa 38:17. Or, (2.) As a reason of the command to be of good cheer, whether he were cured of his disease or not; "Though I should not heal thee, wilt thou not say thou hast not sought in vain, if I assure thee that thy sins are pardoned; and wilt thou not look upon that as a sufficient ground of comfort, though thou shouldst continue sick of the palsy?" Note, They who, through grace, have some evidence of the forgiveness of their sins, have reasons to be of good cheer, whatever outward troubles or afflictions they are under; see Isa 33:24.

III. The cavil of the scribes at that which Christ said (Mat 9:3); They said within themselves, in their hearts, among themselves, in their secret whisperings, This man blasphemeth. See how the greatest instance of heaven's power and grace is branded with the blackest note of hell's enmity; Christ's pardoning sin is termed blasphemy; nor had it been less, if he had not had commission from God for it. They, therefore, are guilty of blasphemy, that have no such commission, and yet pretend to pardon sin.

IV. The conviction which Christ gave them of the unreasonableness of this cavil, before he proceeded.

1. He charged them with it. Though they did but say it within themselves, he knew their thoughts. Note, Our Lord Jesus has the perfect knowledge of all that we say within ourselves. Thoughts are secret and sudden, yet naked and open before Christ, the eternal Word (Heb 4:12, Heb 4:13), and he understands them afar off, Psa 139:2. He could say to them (which no mere man could), Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts? Note, There is a great deal of evil in sinful thoughts, which is very offensive to the Lord Jesus. He being the Sovereign of the heart, sinful thoughts invade his right, and disturb his possession; therefore he takes notice of them, and is much displeased with them. In them lies the root of bitterness, Gen 6:5. The sins that begin and end in the heart, and go no further, are as dangerous as any other.

2. He argued them out of it, Mat 9:5, Mat 9:6. Where observe,

(1.) How he asserts his authority in the kingdom of grace. He undertakes to make out, that the Son of man, the Mediator, has power on earth to forgive sins; for therefore the Father has committed all judgment to the Son, and has given him this authority, because he is the Son of man, Joh 5:22, Joh 5:27. If he has power to give eternal life, as he certainly has (Joh 17:2), he must have power to forgive sin; for guilt is a bar that must be removed, or we can never get to heaven. What an encouragement is this to poor sinners to repent, that the power of pardoning sin is put into the hands of the Son of man, who is bone of our bone! And if he had this power on earth, much more now that he is exalted to the Father's right hand, to give repentance and remission of sins, and so to be both a Prince and a Saviour, Act 5:31.

(2.) How he proves it, by his power in the kingdom of nature; his power to cure diseases. Is it not as easy to say, Thy sins are forgiven thee, as to say, Arise and walk? He that can cure the disease, whether declaratively as a Prophet, or authoritatively as God, can, in like manner, forgive the sin. Now, [1.] This is a general argument to prove that Christ had a divine mission. His miracles, especially his miraculous cures, confirm what he said of himself, that he was the Son of God; the power that appeared in his cures proved him sent of God; and the pity that appeared in them proved him sent of God to heal and save. The God of truth would not set his seal to a lie. [2.] It had a particular cogency in this case. The palsy was but a symptom of the disease of sin; now he made it to appear, that he could effectually cure the original disease, by the immediate removal of that symptom; so close a connection was there between the sin and the sickness. He that had power to remove the punishment, no doubt, had power to remit the sin. The scribes stood much upon a legal righteousness, and placed their confidence in that, and made no great matter of the forgiveness of sin, the doctrine upon which Christ hereby designed to put honour, and to show that his great errand to the world was to save his people from their sins.

V. The immediate cure of the sick man. Christ turned from disputing with them, and spake healing to him. The most necessary arguings must not divert us from doing the good that our hand finds to do. He saith to the sick of the palsy, Arise, take up thy bed, and go to thine house; and a healing, quickening, strengthening power accompanied this word (Mat 9:7): he arose and departed to his house. Now, 1. Christ bid him take up his bed, to show that he was perfectly cured, and that not only he had no more occasion to be carried upon his bed, but that he had strength to carry it. 2. He sent him to his house, to be a blessing to his family, where he had been so long a burden; and did not take him along with him for a show, which those would do in such a case who seek the honour that comes from men.

VI. The impression which this made upon the multitude (Mat 9:8); they marvelled, and glorified God. Note, All our wonder should help to enlarge our hearts in glorifying God, who alone does marvellous things. They glorified God for what he had done for this poor man. Note, Others' mercies should be our praises, and we should give him thanks for them, for we are members one of another. Though few of this multitude were so convinced, as to be brought to believe in Christ, and to follow him, yet they admired him, not as God, or the Son of God, but as a man to whom God had given such power. Note, God must be glorified in all the power that is given to men to do good. For all power is originally his; it is in him, as the Fountain, in men, as the cisterns.

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

CHAPTER IX.

Christ heals a paralytic person at Capernaum, 1-8.

Calls Matthew, 9-10.

Eats with publicans and sinners, at which the Pharisees are

offended, and he vindicates his conduct, 11, 12.

The disciples of John come to him and inquire about fasting,

14-17.

A ruler requests him to heal his daughter, 18, 19.

On his road to the ruler's house, he heals a diseased woman,

20-22.

Arriving at the ruler's house, he restores the young woman to

life, 23-26.

Heals two blind men, 27-31.

Casts out a dumb demon, 32-34.

Preaches and works miracles in all the cities and villages, 35.

Is greatly affected at the desolate and dark state of the Jewish

people, 36.

Exhorts his disciples to pray to God to send them proper

instructers, 37, 38.

NOTES ON CHAP. IX.

Verse 1. He came into his own city] Viz. Capernaum, where he seems to have had his common residence at the house of Peter. See Mt 4:13, and Mt 8:14. This verse properly belongs to the preceding chapter.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

1 And he entered into a ship, and passed over, and came into his own city.

Ver. 1. And he entered into a ship] He called not for fire from heaven upon those brutish Gadarenes that were so glad to be rid of him. Some wicked ones Christ punisheth here, lest his providence, but not all, lest his patience and promise of coming again to judgment, should be called into question, saith Augustine.

Came into his own city] Capernaum, a colony of the Romans, where our Saviour hired a house, and wore a stole or long garment, as a citizen. Happy town in such an inhabitant, and in this respect lifted up to heaven, Mat 11:23. Indeed, heaven came down to Capernaum; for the Lord so delighteth in his servants (how much more, then, in his Son) that their walls are ever in his sight, and he loveth to look upon the houses where they dwell, Isa 49:16.

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.

And he entered into a ship ... - Jesus acceded to the request of the people of Gadara Mat 8:34, recrossed the Lake of Gennesareth, and returned to his own city. By “his own city” is meant Capernaum Mar 2:1, the city which was at that time his home, or where he had his dwelling. See the notes at Mat 4:13. This same account, with some additional circumstances, is contained in Mar 2:3-12, and Luk 5:18-26.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The cure of the paralytic (ver. 2), is generally supposed to have been anterior in point of time, to the cure of two possessed persons, chap. viii. Carrieres supposes the contrary. (Bible de Vence) --- Into his own city. Not of Bethlehem, where he was born, nor of Nazareth, where he was brought up, but of Capharnaum, says St. John Chrysostom, where he is said to have dwelt since he began to preach. See Matthew iv. 13. (Witham) --- St. Jerome understands this city to be Nazareth, which was Christ’s own, because he was conceived there. St. Augustine, St. John Chrysostom, Euthymius, Theophylactus, think it was Capharnaum, because this miracle was performed at the last mentioned place, according to St. Mark’s relation; and St. Matthew calls it Christ’s own city, because after leaving Nazareth, he chose Capharnaum for the chief place of his abode. If St. Jerome’s interpretation be admitted, we must suppose that St. Matthew having told us that Christ came to his own city, Nazareth, and omitting to relate what happened there, passed immediately to the history of the cure of the paralytic, which took place at Capharnaum. Such omissions and change of place without the reader’s being informed of the transition, are not unfrequent in the evangelists. We must likewise observe that they frequently invert the order of facts, as to the time of their happening. (Jansenius) --- Christ may be said to have had three cities: Bethlehem, in which he was born; Nazareth, in which he was educated; and Capharnaum, in which he most frequently resided, during his sacred ministry. It is most probable, and most generally understood, that in this place of the Scripture Capharnaum is meant; though several understand it of Nazareth, and some few with Sedulius, lib. 3. carn. Intravit natale solum, quo corpore nasci

Se voluit, patriamque sibi pater ipse dicavit.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Whether the same ship he came in or no it is not material: he

passed over the lake of Gennesaret,

and came into his own city; not Bethlehem, in which he was born, but either Nazareth, where he was brought up, or (which most judge) Capernaum, whither, leaving Nazareth, he went formerly to dwell, Mat 4:13, whither he is said to have entered, Mar 2:1; this was upon the seacoast of Zebulun and Naphtali, Mat 4:13.

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

The Sick of the Palsy. Call of Matthew. Raising of Jairus' Daughter

1-8. The paralytic healed and his sins forgiven (Mar_2:1; Luk_5:17). The peculiarity of this miracle is that it was worked to prove a doctrine, and that in the face of opposition. There were present certain scribes and Pharisees, some of whom had doubtless come from Jerusalem expressly to oppose Jesus. Jesus at once threw them a challenge by saying to the man, 'Son, thy sins be forgiven thee.' The scribes understood this to mean that He claimed to forgive sins as God only can do. Instead of repudiating this suggestion, as a mere man would have done, Jesus accepted it, and proceeded to prove His claim by a miracle. 'Whether is easier,' said He, 'to say, Thy sins are forgiven; or to say, Arise, and walk?' The former, of course, is easier. Any impostor can say, 'Thy sins are forgiven,' because it is impossible for men to know whether the words have taken effect or not. But not gvery one can say, 'Arise, and walk,' because if such words are spoken without authority, the speaker is at once convicted of imposture.

This miracle, like the resurrection, maybe regarded as a vindication by God Himself of the character of Jesus. No man could make the claims that Jesus did, without rendering himself liable to the most serious imputations upon his character. Either He was the Son of God, or, as the scribes rightly said from their point of view, a blasphemer. Hence in this miracle Jesus deliberately appealed to the judgment of God, and God by working the miracle vindicated the character of Jesus.

1. His own city] i.e. Capernaum.

2. They brought to him] According to the fuller accounts in St. Mark and St. Luke the bed of the paralytic was carried by four men, who, unable to approach Jesus for the crowd, ascended to the roof of the house by the outside stairs with which most Eastern houses are furnished, and making a hole in the flat roof ('the tiling,' Luke), let down the bed by cords in front of Jesus, who was addressing a great multitude. Where was Jesus at the time? Some say in the upper chamber of the house, but this would hardly have held so many. More satisfactory is the suggestion of Edersheim that Jesus was preaching in the covered gallery or verandah of the house, and that the hole was made, not in the roof of the house, but in the roof of the verandah. The house was probably Peter's, and one of considerable size, as befitted a man of some means. It was built, as the better class of Eastern houses generally are, like an English college. A single gate or door opened into a large square courtyard, planted with trees. Round it were the various apartments of the house, opening directly into the courtyard. There was also a roofed verandah running round the court. Jesus was sitting in the verandah, addressing the crowds that filled the courtyard and the doorway and the street beyond, when the men unroofed the verandah from above and let the sick man down.

2. Son, be of good cheer] Words of encouragement and comfort to the man, who, we may conclude, knew that his disease was the result of past sin, and was therefore ashamed of himself. Not only drunkenness, but various other sins of self-indulgence produce paralysis. Jesus, who knew at a glance the whole history of the case (cp. Joh_5:14), first removed the sick man's spiritual trouble, and then healed him. The absolution was given for the man's own sake, but it was also a challenge to the Pharisees, who were present as enemies. Their hostility had been roused not only by the cleansing of the leper (Mat_8:1), but by the very similar miracle worked shortly before at Jerusalem (Joh_5:2), in connexion with which also Jesus had incurred the charge of blasphemy ('He called God His own father, making Himself equal with God,' Joh_5:18).

6. The Son of man] i.e. the Son of God in the humiliation of His life on earth. Hath power (RM 'authority') on earth to forgive sins] What is the force of on earth? Bengel rightly says, 'This speech hints at His celestial origin.' Christ's design is to prove that His Incarnation has not emptied Him of His divine prerogatives. Though humbled on earth, the divine power of pardon was still His. By becoming man He had not ceased to be God.

8. Which had given such power (RM 'authority') unto men] The saying is a striking one. Although one man alone had exercised the power, the people rightly perceived that there had been established the principle that the divine forgiveness can be committed to man. Christ afterwards gave such power unto men when He committed to His Church the power to forgive sins (Joh_20:23). A strong distinction must, however, be drawn between Christ's own power to forgive, which is original and absolute, and the ministerial power of absolution which is delegated and conditional: see on Joh_20:23.

9-13. Call of Matthew (Mar_2:14; Luk_5:27 : see Intro.). The call of a publican was another challenge to the Pharisaic party. Considering the low estimation in which publicans were held (see on Mat_5:46), it was an act of extraordinary boldness, and, if human success was aimed at, a most unwise one. But Jesus had a mission to the despised and outcast, whom He regarded as in many respects nearer the kingdom of God than the respectable Pharisees. The most obvious way to win their confidence and to acquire influence over them, was to call one of their number to the apostolate. He did so, and followed up the step by holding a great feast, at which He and His disciples publicly ate and drank with publicans and sinners. The incident has a double significance. (1) It is a protest by Jesus against the practice of social ostracism. If publicans are treated as if they were thieves, they are likely to become so. If actors are regarded as disreputable people, disreputable they will be. But if men are treated with respect, they are thereby taught to respect themselves, and to try to deserve the good opinion of others. (2) It is an intimation that the Church has a mission to the poor, the outcast, and the criminal, as well as to the respectable classes. Many signs show that this duty is now much more appreciated than it was. Parochial missions to the poor, street preaching, the police-court missionaries, the missions in prisons, are all imitations of our Lord's feast to publicans and sinners.

9. Matthew] The other Gospels call him 'Levi.' Matthew ('gift of Jehovah') was the name by which he was known among Christians. He may have adopted it at his call.

The receipt of custom] RV 'the place of toll.' Custom, or toll (Gk. telos), was a tax levied on goods imported or exported from one district to another, as distinguished from tribute (Gk. censos, or phoros), an annual tax on houses, lands, and persons. As customs generally went to the native government, Matthew was probably in the employ of Herod Antipas, not of the Romans. J. Lightfoot thinks that the toll was levied on vessels plying on the lake. More probably it was levied on the caravans trading between Egypt and Damascus, most of which passed through Capernaum. Follow me] St. Luke says that St. Matthew 'left all' and followed Jesus. Probably he had been a disciple for some time and expected the call.

10. As Jesus sat at meat (lit. 'reclined') in the house] From St. Matthew and St. Mark it might be supposed that the meal took place in the house of Jesus, i.e. of Peter; but it is clear from St. Luke that it was in the house of Matthew, who made a great feast for his Master. This feast is not to be regarded as a mere farewell banquet given by him to his old associates, but as part of a definite design on the part of Jesus to reach the despised and outcast classes. There being so great a multitude of guests, it is probable that the feast was held not in the upper-room, but in the great courtyard of the house. For the attitude of sitting (reclining) at meat, see on Luk_7:38; Joh_13:23.

11. When the Pharisees saw it] The Pharisees were not invited, but they walked in to see what was happening. In the East a banquet is a public affair, and any casual wayfarer may enter as a spectator. Why eateth your master with publicans and sinners?] The Pharisees spoke to the disciples to seduce them from their allegiance to their Master. Publicans were social outcasts, and religiously halfexcommunicate. It was said, 'A religious man who becomes a publican, is to be driven out of the society of religion.' 'It is not lawful to use the riches of such men, of whom it is presumed that all their wealth was gotten by rapine, and that all their business was the business of extortioners, such as publicans and robbers are.' Publicans were forbidden to be judges or to give evidence: see on Mat_5:46. Some think that 'sinners' is a mere Pharisaic term of abuse for publicans.

12. They that be whole, i.e. the Pharisees, have no need of a physician, i.e. of Christ, but they that are sick, i.e. the publicans and sinners. The saying is spoken in irony, for the Pharisees, wanting charity, wanted a physician even more than the publicans.

13. I will have mercy, and not sacrifice] i.e. I would rather see love and charity towards fellowmen than ritual observances. Ritual without love is an abomination. Quoted from Hos_6:6, and again in Mat_12:7. The righteous] i.e. those who think themselves such, viz. the Pharisees. Ironically spoken. Of course Christ did come to call the Pharisees, but they refused to be called.

14-17. Controversy with the disciples of John and with the Pharisees on fasting (Mar_2:18; Luk_5:33). Matthew's feast probably took place on a Monday or a Thursday, days which were observed by the Pharisees and John's disciples as fasts: see Mk, 'The disciples of John and the Pharisees were fasting.' The jealousy of the disciples of John had showed itself even before John had been cast into prison (Joh_3:26). Now that John was in prison, they readily became the tools of the Pharisees, who instigated them to come forward and say, 'Why do we and the Pharisees fast oft, but thy disciples fast not?' The question had two purposes. (1) It was intended to hold up to public odium the laxity of the religious practices of Jesus as compared with the strictness of those of the Pharisees and of John. (2) It was intended to produce a breach between John and Jesus. The reputation of Jesus had been established very largely by the witness which John had borne to His Messiahship. If Jesus could be induced to condemn John (and it seemed impossible that He could defend His own disciples without doing so), John would perhaps disown Jesus, whose reputation would thereby be seriously diminished.

Jesus disappointed them by an answer at least as diplomatic as the famous one about the tribute-money. Addressing the disciples of John, He reminded them that their own master had called Him the Bridegroom, and added that at a wedding not even the Pharisees would desire the guests to fast. When the weddingfeast was over, or rather when the bridegroom was taken from them by a violent death, they would mourn and fast. Then in three parables (the last of which is in St. Luke only) He showed that the disciples of John were as right from their point of view as His own disciples were from theirs. In the first parable He compared the religious practices of John to an old garment, and His own to a new garment. John, He said, was not so foolish as to tear a piece of cloth from the new garment of Christianity in order to patch with it his own Jewish garment. He could not, for instance, consistently borrow from Christ the dispensation from fasting, and teach it to his disciples, without making a complete breach in his system. Let the disciples of John continue to fast until they came to Jesus, when they would adopt different practices altogether.

Having defended John, Jesus, in a second parable, defended Himself. John's wine was old, and was contained in bottles which suited it. His own was new, and required new bottles. In other words, the two different types of piety required different outward methods of expression. John's preparatory ministry of repentance was rightly accompanied by fasting and mourning, but now the fulness of joy was come, the time of feasting and rejoicing had begun.

In a third parable, given only by St. Luke, Jesus again defends the disciples of John. 'No one,' He says, 'having drunk old wine, desires new, for he says, The old is good enough.' In other words, the disciples of John, having tasted John's wine and found it to be good, are not to be blamed if they are not over anxious to taste new wine, i.e. to adopt the new and to them untried practices of Christ's disciples (Luk_5:39).

14. Fast oft] Some ancient authorities omit 'oft.'

15. The children (RV 'sons') of the bridechamber] i.e. the friends of the bridegroom, who, amid singing and playing of instruments, conducted the bride, accompanied by her companions, to the house of the bridegroom and to the bridechamber, and remained to take part in the wedding-feast, which usually lasted seven days. Here the 'sons of the bridechamber' are the disciples of Christ. Christ was first called the Bridegroom by the Baptist himself (Joh_3:29). Shall be taken from them] The first prediction in St. Matthew of the Passion. And then shall they fast] The first reference is to the sorrow of Christ's disciples after His death. The words, however, may be taken to suggest for fasting a permanent place in the Christian system of devotion, but a less prominent one than in the austere system of John and the formal self-righteous one of Pharisaic Judaism: see on Mat_6:16.

16. A piece of new cloth] lit. 'undressed cloth.' According to St. Luke the piece of new cloth is taken from the new garment of Christianity. It signifies the bright and joyous character of the religion of Christ, which cannot be successfully grafted upon the austere and joyless system of the Baptist.

Taketh from the garment] i.e. parts, or separates itself from the garment. And the rent is made worse] RV 'a worse rent is made.'

17. Old bottles] The most usual Eastern bottles are simply goat-skins drawn off the animal entire. The neck of the animal forms the neck of the bottle. Those used for wine are tanned with oak-bark and seasoned in smoke, which gives a flavour to the wine that is much appreciated. New wine is liable to a certain amount of after-fermentation, so that it cannot safely be stored in old bottles. Our Lord's saying about the old and the new bottles applies properly to the Baptist's teaching, but it may also be applied to Judaism in general. So taken, it means that the forms of Judaism are inadequate to express the spirit of Christianity, and that those who, like the Judaising Christians in the Acts, try to combine the Law with the Gospel and to enforce the Mosaic ritual, are trying to put new wine into old bottles.

18-26. The raising of Jairus' daughter, and the healing of the woman with an issue of blood (Mar_5:21; Luk_8:40). The most important point in the raising of Jairus' daughter is the reality of the death. This has been denied on account of our Lord's words, 'The maid is not dead, but sleepeth.' It is perfectly true that the mourners understood them in this sense, 'for they laughed him to scorn, knowing that she was dead' (Lk), but inasmuch as the narrative comes from Peter himself, who was present, and is told as a miracle, it must be held that she was really dead, and that Jesus spoke of her as sleeping, because He was about to wake her. He used the same words of Lazarus, and on that occasion explained them (Joh_11:11).

Some who are able to credit the miracles of healing, find difficulties in crediting the miracles of resurrection. There is, however, no more real difficulty in believing the resurrection of Jairus' daughter than in believing that of Jesus Himself. The former illustrates the latter, and is rendered probable by it. It should be observed in this connexion, (1) That miracles of healing, important as they are as proofs of God's benevolence, are entirely inadequate to illustrate the cardinal doctrine of a future life (2) That Jesus Himself regarded raising the dead as part of His ordinary ministerial work (Mat_11:5; Luk_7:22), and, according to St. Matthew, delegated the power to the Apostles (Mat_10:8), in accordance with which St. Peter afterwards raised Tabitha (Act_9:40).

Christ's three miracles of resurrection form a graduated series. In the case of Jairus' daughter the spirit had hardly fled. The widow's son (Luk_7:12) had been dead longer, but not more than twenty-four hours. Lazarus (John 11) had been dead four days, and decomposition had probably begun. Yet we are not to suppose that one miracle was more difficult than another to Him who is the Resurrection and the Life.

The healing of the woman with the issue is an example of the way in which Jesus accepted imperfect faith in order to render it perfect. The woman was superstitious. She thought that a kind of magical virtue resided in our Lord's body, ready to flow out to heal without any act of will on His part, or any act of faith on hers. All that she had to do was to touch, and in doing so she was careful to touch (Mat_9:20) that portion of His garment which to a Jew was holiest, viz. the tassel, which, in accordance with Num_15:37, every Jew was required to wear on the four corners of his cloak to remind him of Jehovah's commands. But since there was real faith mingled with her superstition, Jesus allowed her to be healed, only calling her back afterwards to make her faith perfect. By saying 'Who touched me?' and insisting on a full confession, He made it clear to the woman and to others that He had healed her by His own deliberate act, and was fully aware of all the circumstances of the case. By saying 'Thy faith hath saved thee,' He reproved her superstition. Not the touch, nor the holy tassel, nor the supposed magic virtue had. healed her, but her faith.

18. While he spake] According to this Gospel the ruler came to Jesus as He was sitting at meat with Matthew the publican. The other Gospels record the incident immediately after the return from the country of the Gadarenes (Gerasenes).

Is even now dead] According to the fuller narrative of St. Mark and St. Luke, Jairus says that his daughter is at the point of death. Afterwards a messenger arrives announcing that she is dead.

20. A woman] Eusebius (Church Historian, Bishop of Cæsarea in the 4th cent. a.d.) says that she was a heathen, residing at Paneas (Cæsarea Philippi), near the sources of the Jordan. Her house is shown in the city, and the wonderful monuments of our Saviour's benefit to her are still remaining. At the gates of her house, on an elevated stone, stands a brazen statue of a woman on her bended knee, with her hands stretched out before her like one entreating. Opposite to this is another statue of a man, erect, of the same materials, decently clad in a mantle, and stretching out his hand to the woman. This statue they said was a likeness of Jesus Christ.' It may, however, have been a statue of Æsculapius, the god of healing, who was in great favour at the beginning of the Christian era. Touched the hem (RV 'border,' or, rather, 'tassel') of His garment] see prefatory remarks on Mat_9:18-26.

23. According to St. Mark and St. Luke only Peter, James, and John, and the parents witnessed the miracle. The minstrels] RV 'the flute-players.' The rabbis said, 'Even the poorest among the Israelites (his wife being dead) will afford her two flutes (i.e. two male flute-players to play at the funeral procession), and one woman to make lamentation.' The multitude of hired mourners marks the wealth and position of Jairus.

25. St. Mark gives our Lord's actual Aramaic words, Talitha cumi, i.e. 'Maid, arise.'

26. St. Mark and St. Luke add that our Lord commanded the parents to be silent about the miracle. Some think that this was only a warning against religious gossip. More probably, since the house was surrounded by an excited crowd, His design was to prevent a tumult.

27-31. Healing of two blind men in the house (peculiar to St. Matthew). Blindness, chiefly as the result of ophthalmia, is exceedingly common in the East, and several miracles of restoring sight to the blind are recorded in the Gospels: Mat_12:22; Mat_20:30; Mat_21:14; John 9. In this case Christ elicited a definite act of faith from the men before healing them. The act of touching their eyes was probably intended to aid their faith. Their addressing Him as Son of David need not imply that they believed Him to be the Messiah.

30. Straitly charged] i.e. sternly (see RV) charged them, because He foresaw that they would disobey: cp. Mat_12:16, etc.

32-34. Healing of a dumb man (Luk_11:14). This miracle is given by St. Luke in another connexion, and is there followed by a reply by Jesus to the criticisms of the Pharisees.

32. A dumb man] The Gk. word may either mean deaf or dumb, or both.

33. It was never so seen] Their wonder was excited not merely by this miracle, but by a long series of miracles worked in succession, of which this was the last.

34. The prince of the devils] St. Luke 'by Beelzebub': see on Mat_12:24.

35-38. Tours of Jesus in Galilee (peculiar to St. Matthew, but cp. Mar_6:6, Mar_6:34; Luk_10:2). The early tours of Jesus in Galilee enabled Him to gain a comprehensive view of the actual spiritual condition of the people. It was a very unfavourable one, yet He was not moved to anger, but to pity, for the fault was not in them, but in their guides. 'They were distressed and scattered as sheep not having a shepherd.' True they had the scribes and Pharisees, but these were no true shepherds, but blind leaders of the blind. Yet the situation was hopeful. The people had received Him gladly, and were eager to be taught. 'The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few.' What was wanted was more missionaries to assist Him in His work. Hence the mission of the Twelve.

36. Cp. Mar_6:34.

37, 38. St. Luke introduces this saying in connexion with the mission of the Seventy (Luk_10:2).

J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1. To his own city — His own by residence, Capernaum. See note on Mat_4:13.

This verse properly closes the narrative of our Lord’s excursion across Gennesaret and his return. What follows occurred at Capernaum some time previous, and before his Sermon on the Mount.

§ 30. — SIXTH MIRACLE — THE PALSY CURED, Mat_9:2-8.

The main points in this miracle are these: 1. Such is the true faith of the man himself, beheld by our Lord’s discerning spirit, that he pardons his sins before he heals his palsy. It is first soul, and then body. So when the wreck made by sin in our entire nature is repaired, man will become physically perfect. 2. Our Lord is a perfect logician. He places here the miracle as proof, in close succession after his claim of forgiving power as the thing to be proved. No geometrician could ever bring preposition and demonstration into closer contact. “Thy sins be forgiven thee,” is, first, the proposition, and then the miracle is the proof. His miracles demonstrate that he is connected and clothed with the divine power by which he forgives the penitent. Miracles are therefore intended to be a demonstration of divine authority. 3. Our Lord reads the conscious thoughts of men. He gave the blaspheming scribes a proof to their inward consciousness that he knew their hearts. See note on Mat_5:4.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Vers. 1-8. The paralytic forgiven and healed. Parallel passages: Mar_2:1-12 Luk_5:17-26. (For connexion of thought, cf. Mat_8:18, note) In the parallel passages this narrative follows our Mat_8:1-4. Matthew"s account is shorter, as usual.

And he entered into a ship; boat (Revised Version). So completely did he grant the request of the Gadarenes. Observe that this expression is not an original phrase of the writer of the First Gospel, but is a reminiscence of the source that he has just used. (cf. Mar_5:18; with Luk_8:37; in both of which it now forms part of the preceding narrative) And passed over; crossed over (Revised Version); dieperasen , also in the source. (cf. Mar_5:21) And came into his own city; i.e. Capernaum, where Mark says that the following miracle took place. The thought is that of Joh_1:11. Yet observe the contrast Mat_8:34. There "all the city" rejected him; here some of the leaders reject him, but the multitudes fear and glorify God (ver. 8).

Vers. 1-8. The cure of the paralytic.

I THE SICK MAN BROUGHT TO CHRIST.

1. His own city. It had been Nazareth; now it was Capernaum. The Nazarenes had rejected him. He did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief; he marvelled at their want of faith. Now he was in Capernaum; he was well known there, but not as he had been known at Nazareth. The Nazarenes had known him from childhood all through those thirty years of quiet, humble holiness; he had lived among them like one of themselves, distinguished only by his goodness; he wrought no miracles then. But that quiet life was in one sense the greatest of miracles; it was stranger that the Son of God should live like ordinary men than that his path on earth should be surrounded with glory, marked by startling wonders. In Capernaum he was known as the great Preacher, the Wonderworker, the loving, the compassionate Healer. All there believed in his power, not all had yielded their hearts to his love, It was now his own city, blessed with his presence, the highest of all conceivable privileges.

2. The sick man. He was paralyzed, quite helpless; apparently he had lost the power of speech. He could not come to Christ himself; he had to be carried. Four men brought him as he lay helpless on his bed. Probably he was still young: "child," the Lord calls him. It was a pitiable case, and he seems to have brought it upon himself; it was, we gather from Christ"s words, the punishment of sin. How often sin brings chastisement now! We suffer justly; we receive the due reward of our deeds. Happy they whom suffering brings to Christ!

3. The bearers. The poor man had kind friends; they brought him. They had great difficulties; they could not come nigh to Christ for the press. They drew the sick man up to the roof; they uncovered it; they let him down into the midst before Jesus. It is a blessed task to tend the sick and suffering; it is a holy, Christ-like work. It is more blessed still to bring sinful souls to Jesus Christ, the great Physician. The Lord saw their faith. They must believe in Christ themselves who would bring others to him; we cannot help penitent sinners unless we ourselves have learned to hate sin, to overcome it by the power of faith, to live in the holy presence of Christ, breathing the atmosphere of his love. The Lord listens to intercessory prayer. Faith brings blessings not only on the believer, but on those for whom he prays. The centurion"s faith brought healing to his servant; the faith of friends to the paralytic. But he too, it seems, believed. He could not come; he was willing, desirous, to be brought; he would not have been healed had he been brought by force. Jesus saw their faith the faith of all, the sick man and his friends. Christians may help others; they may influence them by word, by holy example; but he that would be saved must himself believe. Each soul must know Christ itself: each soul must be brought into spiritual contact with the Saviour; each individual soul mast have access unto God through him.

4. The Saviour. The Lord read the hearts of the bearers; he saw their faith. He read the heart of the paralytic; he saw his trembling fearfulness, his consciousness of sin.

(1) Child," he said, "be of good cheer." The poor man sadly needed encouragement; the Lord gave it at once; he had come to heal the brokenhearted. The poor man was humbled to the very dust; the Lord looked on him with a great pity. So he pities us in our sufferings now with the same quick, tender compassion; his sympathy comforts, helps, encourages, the trembling penitent.

(2) But there was behind the physical sickness its moral cause. The man had greatly sinned. The punishment had done its work; it had softened his heart; it had brought him to the feet of Jesus. The Lord knew the truth of his repentance. He waited not for the confession of the lips; perhaps the poor man could not speak. He pronounced at once the most blessed absolution, "Thy sins be forgiven thee." He is the same gracious Saviour now; he came to save his people from their sins. "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

II THE SCRIBES.

1. Their silent accusations. There were many Pharisees and doctors of the Law sitting there; they had been drawn by the fame of Jesus not only from Galilee, but even from Judaea and Jerusalem. They were watching our Lord, listening to him. He had spoken a great and awful word. They dared not condemn him openly; they saw his power, they feared the people; but they reproached him in their thoughts. He was guilty of blasphemy, they murmured in their hearts; he had dared to pronounce the forgiveness of the paralytic; he had assumed to himself the prerogative of God. Certainly God, and God alone, could forgive sins.

2. The Lords answer. There were no spoken words, but he knew their thoughts. "He saw their thoughts," some ancient manuscripts read; their thoughts lay open to his all-seeing eye; he read them. He reads our thoughts now; he sees all the low, carnal, uncharitable thoughts which defile our souls, as he saw their thoughts then. They were thinking evil things in their hearts, accusing him of blasphemy, when they ought to have seen in the power of his works, in the perfect holiness of his life, the proof of his Divine origin; they were thinking in their unworthy jealousy, "It is easy to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee;" none can tell whether those great words truly convey forgiveness. Let him prove his authority; let him heal the paralytic.

III THE MIRACLE.

1. The word of power. "Forgive us our trespasses," we say to our Father which is in heaven. "The Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins." "Coelestem ortum hic sermo sapit," says Bengel very beautifully. He had power on earth to forgive sins, because he came from heaven; the Son of man could forgive, because he was in truth the Son of God. None could test that power; only the forgiven penitent could know in the depth of his heart the reality of his forgiveness; he could tell, and he only, in his inmost experience the blessed sweetness of that holy absolution. But the Lord would deign to reply to the unworthy questionings of the scribes; he would illustrate his spiritual authority by his power over outward things. He saith unto the man, "Arise!" It was a bold word, a strange thing to say to a helpless paralytic. But he had faith to be healed; his will exerted itself in obedience to the Lord"s command. The muscles, so long useless, obeyed the mandate of the will. He arose before them all; he took up his bed, and departed to his house. So it is now in the history of conversions. Many souls have lost all spiritual energy; they are without spiritual force, spiritual activity; they have a vague wish for holiness, but it is only a weak, irresolute desire; an emotion rather than a resolve. But they feel at last the danger of sloth; Christian friends help them; they come, they are brought to Christ. He saith the word, "Arise!" A new strength flows in upon their weakened will the strength which he giveth. In that strength they arise; they need no longer the help of others; they obey the Lord"s life-giving command; they go forth, glorifying God.

2. The wonder of the multitude. They might well wonder; they had seen strange things that day. Their wonder, or their fear (according to the more ancient manuscripts), led them to glorify God. We see strange things now sinners saved, souls drawn by the power of the cross to the Saviour"s love. The miracles of grace are more wonderful than the miracles of power; they should lead us to glorify God, to glorify him in our praises, to glorify him in our lives.

LESSONS.

1. It was sin that brought suffering into the world. Suffering should show us the guilt of sin, and should lead us to Christ.

2. Christ is our Hope, our only Hope. We must come to him ourselves; we must help others to come.

3. Christ is full of compassion. He pities our sorrows; he forgives the sins of the penitent.

4. Praise him for his mercies; glorify God.

HOMILIES BY P.C. BARKER Vers. 1-8. The (Mar_2:1-12 Luk_5:17-26) Lord of both lives.

Notice in introduction one of the simplest instances of the way in which the three very various accounts of our Lord"s life and works supply one another, add greatly to our information, and form a network of evidence of the authenticity of the narrative which it would seem impossible to gainsay. Observe

I THE GRACIOUS ACTION TAKEN BY THE SAVIOUR SO PROMPTLY ON THE FIRST SIGHT OF FAITH. Notice the fact that the forgiveness of the sins of the paralytic took precedence of the healing of his disease. Was this due to the specialty of the occasion, the large attendance of doctors of the Law and Pharisees? Was it due exclusively to something that the eye of Jesus saw in the spiritual condition of the paralytic in that his heart"s deepest desire was for forgiveness; or that there was special fitness in him to stand as an example, to all time herein, of one blessed to take the supreme good first, and find "all" the rest "added to him;" or to the sovereign and unerring will inscrutable?

II A REMARKABLE AND REMARKABLY SIMPLE INSTANCE AND ILLUSTRATION OF FAITH WITH WORKS AND OF FAITH SHOWN BY WORKS. These works of themselves spoke for the faith that was behind them, as also for the intense desire that gave such definite outline to it. "Their" faith, no doubt, designates that betokened by the conduct of all concerned the paralytic himself, and those who were hands, arms, and feet to him. The "works" of themselves asked help of the mighty Helper. And they showed the undoubting persuasion on the part of those who put forth their strength, and on the part of him, of whose suggestion perhaps it all came, where, and where alone, that help was to be had.

III THE UNDOUBTED BLASPHEMY HEARD ON THIS OCCASION, BUT LAID ON THE WRONG PERSONAGE. The enemies of Christ, as they stood around, understood aright what he had done, what he had said, and to what the deep implication of these amounted. But they took up the position that he bad not done what he said, and could not do it, and that therefore he committed blasphemy in uttering it. Their hostility was a foregone conclusion, and had it not been so, there would have been reason on their side; and the language of Christ, and his action immediately following, allow this, within certain limits, for he remarks on the exact position, and offers and gives a proof. But their unbelief and disbelief were already deep-rooted in their heart that "thinking evil in the heart," which he so distinctly saw, so pronouncedly marked.

IV CHRIST"S CONDESCENDING AND MOST COMPLETE VINDICATION OF HIS LANGUAGE AND HIMSELF. The practical test he challenges, with dignity surpassing that of Elijah on Carmel! He does not volunteer it, but bids them "stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord." And they do see it! Whether they will even now believe is another thing. Certain as it is that they have not made their own the beatitude, "Blessed are they who have not seen, and vet have believed," have they even entitled themselves to hear it said, "Because thou hast seen, thou hast believed"?

V THE ATTITUDE AND DOCILITY OF THE PEOPLE, AS THESE RISE UP IN JUDGMENT AGAINST THE DOCTORS OF THE LAW AND PHARISEES. They "marvel;" they "glorify God;" and this not as the only Object of adoring praise and worship, but also as "the Giver of such power to men;" and they are "filled with fear." And they make confession, unstinted, undisguised, of the impression they have received: "We never saw it on this fashion;" "We have seen strange things to-day. B.

HOMILIES BY MARCUS DODS Vers. 1-17. At Capernaum.

The choice of Capernaum as suitable centre justified by results. Rapid spread of our Lord"s fame. Eager crowds gathering from far and near. Picture scene: Here, father carrying drooping child; there, little girl with blind father; camel bearing woman bowed with infirmity; sick of all kinds brought by friends; crowd ever increasing; silence broken only by occasional yell of a possessed one or moans of sufferers. Crowds waiting before daylight, but Jesus not there gone to a desert place to pray. His approach suddenly announced by one on the edge of the crowd; wonder and awe as he passes to the house, stretching out hands of effectual blessing. Two results of this crowding of multitudes:

1. Jesus obliged to seek a more retired place.

2. Incident of text. Four friends, believing that he whom they have carried far will be able to walk back if they can lay him before Jesus. Overcome obstacles, removing a few large, uncemented tiles of roof a liberty pleasing to our Lord as a tribute to him and proof of their faith. Common experience to ask one thing and receive another. Perhaps this man had an inward conviction that spiritual gifts were the greater. Scribes cavil at "Thy sins be," etc.; begin to suspect evasion; therefore Jesus does work that can be tested by their senses. Two points unusual: Our Lord accepted test tacitly proposed, and the miracle convinced the witnesses. Miracles evidences of revelation because themselves parts of it, not mere signs. God could not reveal himself except by miracle. Historical fact that nature has never done so. Revelation not so much accompanied by as consisting of miracles. Such a revelation authenticates itself, proves itself such because giving higher and worthier idea of God.

I CALLING OF MATTHEW. His office odious to Jews, both as representing foreign government and from oppressive system of farming taxes. Evil effects of such system seen now in Egypt and elsewhere. No loss to government by Matthew thus suddenly throwing up office, he having already paid the sum. Possible, but rare, for good man to be in such a calling. Our Lord does not defend his calling of Matthew on that ground. He chose his followers among the unsophisticated, or those who had not yet found their good. Probably some previous acquaintance with Matthew. Matthew perhaps gradually dissatisfied with himself. Among such the Lord is found. His unanswerable reply to Pharisees, They that be whole," etc. To those sick in body, in heart, in spirit, he offers himself; to the heavy-laden, disappointed, broken, sinful, one unfailing Friend, bent on bringing them into his own peace and holiness and joy. Are there none here who will at length listen to his call, "Follow me"? Follow by keeping him always in view, thinking of him, doing his will.

II MATTHEW"S FEAST. In the joy of his heart inclined to be lavish. From being despised, hated, suddenly chosen as friend and companion by greatest and worthiest. Cherished money-bags contemptible in presence of Christ and his love. Pharisees not in sympathy. It might be a fast-day; much might be involved. It was thin end of wedge a party forming, not fettered by mechanical rules, but allowing the spirit naturally to express itself. Suitable, therefore, that this, our Lord"s first recorded teaching to a mixed multitude, should deal with this new thing. He lays down the principle that underlies all outward observance, viz. that the state of mind gives it appropriateness and virtue. Further explained in two parables. In every generation can be seen this Pharisaic spirit deep-seated hatred and fear of change. Men who have never gone deep enough to distinguish between essential and accidental, saying, "If there is new life, let it be kept in the old forms." To do so were to destroy both. These parables fit a most important principle. Had Matthew fasted at this time, his new love and energy would have been wasted instead of utilized, and fasting (the old bottle) become for ever distasteful to him. As it was, he would fast again when he felt it suitable. New ways sometimes preferred by new converts. If love to Christ and sound moral conduct go with the changes, no need to fear them. But our Lord bad also a word of apology for conservatism of Pharisees: "No man, having drunk old wine," etc. Natural to prefer the old. So with many of the best of men. For few attain to the complete magnanimity and truth of the Lord. "Oh that patrons of old ways understood Christ"s wisdom, and that patrons of new ways sympathized with his charity!... When will young men and old men, liberals and conservatives, broad Christians and narrow, learn to bear with one another; yea, to recognize each in the other the necessary complement of his own one-sidedness?" (Bruce). D.

HOMILIES BY J.A. MACDONALD Vers. 1-8. Soul-searching.

At the request of the Gadarenes Jesus crossed over. He does not obtrude his blessings on the unwilling. We do not read that he ever after visited them. Coming to his own city, Capernaum, where residence gave him citizenship, (Mat_4:13 Mat_8:14 Mar_2:1) "they brought to him," etc. (vers. 2-8).

I JESUS SEES THE FAITH OF THE CONTRITE HEART.

1. He saw the faith of those who carried the paralytic.

(1) This was obvious in the simple fact of their seeking his healing power. Faith is seen in works. (Jam_2:17-22)

(2) It was obvious, moreover, in their earnestness. For, obstructed by the crowd, they broke up the roof and let down the bed whereon the sick of the palsy lay. (see Mar_2:4 Luk_5:19)

(3) They brought him because he could not come of himself; and Jesus honoured their faith. So does he honour the faith of those who bring their children to him in baptism or in prayer.

(4) The faith which secured healing, however, was not of necessity that which brought forgiveness (see e.g. Luk_17:12, etc.).

2. In the paralytic Jesus discerned a deeper faith.

(1) Disease is the general effect of general corruption, not always the particular effect of particular sin. (cf. Exo_15:26 Deu_28:21)

(2) Oftentimes it is this also. Disease is often the natural consequence of sin. And God has often visited individuals with disease as a temporal judgment upon sin. (cf. Num_11:33 Num_12:10 1Ki_13:4 2Ki_5:27 Luk_1:20 Act_13:11 1Co_5:5 1Co_11:30 1Ti_1:20)

(3) Hence the Jews commonly connected suffering with sin. (cf. Joh_5:14 Joh_9:2, Joh_9:34) This man evidently took his sin to heart, and his affliction may have deepened this oppressive sense. No man is fit for forgiveness who does not with the heart believe himself to be a sinner. Heart-faith in sin is repentance. Spiritual disease is invariably the result of spiritual evil. Diseased action is the result of corrupt motive.

(4) This man, moreover, discerned in Jesus not only the Healer, viz. of the body, but also the Healer, viz. of the soul. No man is fit for forgiveness who does not with the heart accept Jesus as the Christ. (see Rom_10:9, Rom_10:10)

(5) All this heart-faith Jesus saw when he proceeded to say, "Son, be of good cheer; thy sins are forgiven." The pardoning voice of Jesus in the believing heart brings "good cheer" evermore.

II JESUS SEARCHES THE THOUGHTS OF THE EVIL HEART.

1. He read the evil thoughts of the scribes.

(1) He saw that they "said within themselves, This man blasphemeth." Blasphemy consists in:

(a) Attributing unworthy things to God.

(b) Denying worthy things of God.

(c) Attributing to others or arrogating the attributes of God.

(2) If Jesus were not Divine it would be blasphemy in him to affect to forgive sins. The offended only can forgive the sins of the offender. (cf. 2Sa_12:13 1Ki_8:39 Isa_63:2-5 Jer_17:10 Mar_2:7)

(3) The sin in the thoughts of the scribes was that they did not apprehend the Divinity of Christ. His miracles, together with the prophecies concerning Messiah, should have convinced them of this.

2. He proved to them his Divinity.

(1) By discovering their secret thoughts. In those passages which challenge to God alone the prerogative to forgive sins, the reason urged is that God alone can search the heart. (2Ch_6:30; see places referred to above)

(2) This knowledge is a mark of Messiah. (cf. Joh_2:15 Joh_16:19, 30 Rev_2:23) Therefore the rabbins by this test confuted the claims of Barchochebas. "Bar Cozeba," says the Talmud, "reigned two years and a half. He said to the rabbins, "I am the Messiah." They replied, "It is written of Messiah that he is of quick understanding, and judges (Isa_11:3); let us see whether this man can tell whether one is wicked or not, without any external proof." And when they saw that he could not judge in this manner, they slew him.

(3) He proved his Divinity by reasoning upon his miracle-working. "For whether is easier, to say, Thy sins are forgiven; or to say, Arise?" If you concede the power of healing with a word, you must concede the Divinity of the Worker, and therefore should concede also that the Son of man has power on earth to forgive sins.

(4) He confirmed his reasoning by miracle. "But that ye may know that the Son of man," etc. Here was a Divine work to confirm a Divine claim. An impostor might say, "Thy sins are forgiven," for the result is not so obvious; but were he to say, "Arise!" he must have power, else he will be instantly rejected.

III THE PRESENCE OF THE HEART-SEARCHER IS FEARINSPIRING.

1. The fear of the forgiven is reverential.

(1) The sense of sins forgiven brings Christ very near. It brings him near in his Godhead. For who can read the heart but God! (1Co_2:10, 1Co_2:11)

(2) It intensifies sincerity. In the near presence of the essential truth there is ever-discouragement to falsehood. Divine good can only dwell in Divine truth.

(3) Gratitude is kindled in the presence of love. The forgiveness of sins does not consist in pronouncing them pardoned, but in removing the sinful inclination from the heart, and replacing it with the passion for goodness. As between sin and suffering there is an intimate connection, so is there an important relation between the pardon of sin and the healing of diseases. (cf. Psa_41:3, 4 103:3 Jer_33:24 Jer_38:17 Mat_8:16, Mat_8:17)

2. The fear of the sinner is awful.

(1) The awe is salutary to the thoughtful. "When the multitudes saw it, they were afraid, and glorified God, which had given such power to men." "Power on earth to forgive sins," viz. "because he is the Son of man". (cf. Joh_5:22, Joh_5:27) The union of the Divine and human in the Person of the Lord is the source of his saving power. "Power on earth." Here sin is committed. Here sin is forgiven. Christ, who has all power in heaven, has therefore all power also on earth.

(2) To the gainsayer the awe is confounding. The scribes were silenced. The day of judgment in the presence of the Heart-searcher came into their very soul. How senseless is the sinner who thinks he sins securely when unseen by men! J.A.M.

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

His own city - Capernaum, chap. iv, 13; Mark v, 18; Luke viii, 37.

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

The Healing of the Palsied Man.

v. 1. And He entered into a ship, and passed over, and came into His own city.

Jesus complied with the request of the Gerasenes to depart out of their neighborhood. Entering into the boat in which He had come over with His disciples. He crossed back to the western side of the Sea of Gennesaret, to the city of Capernaum, where He made His headquarters during His Galilean ministry. No sooner had He arrived there than the fact became known, and multitudes of people began to gather in the house and on the street. It was a day of grace for the whole city: Jesus was teaching, and His power went out to heal the sick, Luk 5:17. An important incident:

v. 2. And, behold, they brought to Him a man sick of the palsy, lying on a bed; and Jesus, seeing their faith, said unto the sick of the palsy, Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee.

Matthew implies that there was a long process connected with the bringing of the sick man, which is told in detail by the other evangelists: The four friends bearing their burden, the impossibility of making headway through the crowds, the ascent to the flat roof, the uncovering of the tiles. Finally, the paralytic, bedridden and helpless as he was, was deposited in a cleared space before Jesus. A notable point: the Lord looks, above all, for faith. In this case He found their faith, that of the paralytic as well as that of his friends, by virtue of His omniscience. So satisfied was He with the result of His scrutiny that He addresses words of comfort to the sick man. The Savior’s intuition read in his eye the need of an assurance involving more than mere bodily recovery. The consolation of the soul was what he aspired for; the despondence, due probably to a bad conscience, must be removed. An infinite tenderness in Christ’s words: Take courage, cheer up, son! There is no reason to fear that the heavenly Father and I, His Representative, will condemn. He deals first with the disease of the soul, announcing, with absolute authority, the fact of the forgiveness of sins, applying it to this individual man. As sin is the greatest evil on earth and draws after it all the other evils that flesh is heir to, so forgiveness, pardon, is the greatest good that God can give to man, Psa 103:3. "This is the voice of the Gospel: Be of, good cheer, live, be preserved. The entire rhetoric of the Gospel is connected with this word: Son, be of good cheer. For it indicates that the heart must be driven to confidence with all arguments and examples that praise God’s mercy, against all arguments and examples that tell of God’s wrath... That is the kingdom of Christ; who has it thus has it right. There is no work, but only the acknowledgment of all our misfortune and acceptance of all the gifts of God; there is nothing but just consolation; there these words go without ceasing: Be glad, do not be terrified in thy conscience on account of thy sins, that thou hast not done much good; I will forgive all that. Therefore there is no merit, but all pure donation. That is the Gospel: That demands faith, wherewith thou receive and hold these words, that it be not said in vain. For we have no other defiance with which He bids us boast than that God says: Be in high spirits, be cheerful, for I forgive the sin; boast of My forgiving, of that make a show. Then hast thou cause to boast and to glory, not on account of thy works."

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

In the last verse of the foregoing chapter, the Gadarenes with one consent desire Christ to depart out of their coasts; here we find our Saviour, according tho their desire, departing from them into his own city, which was Capernaum; for Bethlehem brought him forth, Nazareth brought him up, and Capernaum was his dwelling-place.

From their desire of Christ’s departure, and from Christ’s departing accordingly to their desire, we learn, That the blessed Jesus will not long trouble that people with his presence who are weary of his company and desirous of his departure.

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

Matthew Chapter 9

In the following chapter (9), while acting in the character and according to the power of Jehovah (as we read in Psa 103:1-22), “Who forgiveth all thine iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases”; it is the actual grace in itself towards and for them, in which He came, which is presented. It gives the character of His ministry, as the previous one gives the dignity of His Person and the bearing of what He was. He presents Himself to Israel as their true Redeemer and Deliverer; and, to prove His title (which unbelief already opposed) to be this blessing to Israel, and to pardon all their iniquities which raised a barrier between them and their God, He accomplishes the second part of the verse, and heals the disease. Beautiful and precious testimony of kindness to Israel, and at the same time, the demonstration of His glory who stood in the midst of His people! In the same spirit, as He had forgiven, and healed, He calls the publican and goes to his house-come not to call the righteous, but sinners.

But now we enter on another portion of the instruction in this Gospel-the development of the opposition of unbelievers, of the learned men and the religionists in particular; and that of the rejection of the work and Person of the Lord.

The idea, the picture of that which took place, has been already set before us in the case of the Gergesene demoniac-the power of God present for the entire deliverance of His people, of the world, if they received Him-power which the devils confessed to be that which should hereafter judge and cast them out, which displayed itself in blessing to all the people of the place, but which was rejected, because they did not desire such power to dwell among them. They would not have the presence of God.

The narration of the details and the character of this rejection now commences. Observe that Mat 8:1-27 gives the manifestation of the Lord’s power-this power being truly that of Jehovah on the earth. From Mat 8:28 the reception this power met with in the world, and the influence which governed the world, are set forth, whether as power, or morally in the hearts of men.

We come here to the historical development of the rejection of this intervention of God upon the earth.

The multitude glorify God who had given such power to a man. Jesus accepts this place. He was man: the multitude saw Him to be man, and acknowledged the power of God, but did not know how to combine the two ideas in His Person.

The grace which contemns the pretensions of man to righteousness is now set forth.

Matthew, the publican, is called; for God looks at the heart, and grace calls the elect vessels.

The Lord declares the mind of God on this subject, and His own mission. He came to call sinners; He would have mercy. It was God in grace, and not man with his pretended righteousness counting on his merits.

He assigns two reasons which make it impossible to reconcile His course with the demands of the Pharisees. How should the disciples fast when the Bridegroom was there? When the Messiah was gone, they might well do so. Moreover it is impossible to introduce the new principles and the new power of His mission into the old Pharisaic forms.

Thus we have grace to sinners, but (grace rejected) now comes at once a higher proof that Messiah-Jehovah was there, from her bed of death, He obeys the call. As He goes, a poor woman, who had already employed every means of cure without success, is instantaneously healed by touching in faith the hem of His garment.

This history supplies us with the two great divisions of the grace that was manifested in Jesus. Christ came to awaken dead Israel; He will do this hereafter in the full sense of the word. Meanwhile, whosoever laid hold of Him by faith, in the midst of the multitude that accompanied Him, was healed, let the case be ever so hopeless. This, which took place in Israel when Jesus was there, is true in principle of us also. Grace in Jesus is a power which raises from the dead, and which heals. Thus He opened the eyes of those in Israel who owned Him to be the Son of David, and who believed in His power to meet their need. He cast out devils also, and gave speech to the dumb. But having performed these acts of power in Israel, so that the people, as to the fact, owned them with admiration, the Pharisees, the most religious part of the nation, ascribe this power to the prince of the devils. Such is the effect of the Lord’s presence on the leaders of the people, jealous of His glory thus manifested among them over whom they exercised their influence. But this in no way interrupts Jesus in His career of beneficence. He can still bear testimony among the people. In spite of the Pharisees His patient kindness still finds place. He continues to preach and to heal. He has compassion on the people, who were like sheep without a shepherd, given up, morally, to their own guidance. He still sees that the harvest is plenteous and the labourers few. That is to say, He still sees every door open to address the people and He passes over the wickedness of the Pharisees.

Let us sum up what we find in the chapter, the grace developed in Israel. First, grace healing and forgiving as in Psa 103:1-22. Then grace come to call sinners, not the righteous; the bridegroom was there, nor could grace in power be put in Jewish and Pharisaic vessels; it was new even in respect of John Baptist. He comes in reality to give life to the dead, not to heal, but whoever then touched Him by faith-for there were such-were healed in the way. He opens eyes to see, as Son of David, and opens the dumb mouth of him whom the devil possessed. All is rejected with blasphemy by the self-righteous Pharisees. But grace sees the multitude as yet as having no shepherd; and while the porter holds the door open, He ceases not to seek and minister to the sheep.

John Nelson Darby — Synopsis of the Books of the Bible: the New Testament (c. 1857–1862) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1. He entered into a ship. The last chapter left the Savior in the country of the Gadarenes on the eastern side of the lake. He now returns to Capernaum. Came into his own city. Capernaum, so called because, after leaving Nazareth, he made Capernaum his Galilean home.

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:

Matthew returns to the theme, which he began in Matthew 8:1, of Jesus healing people. This begins an account of Jesus healing a paralyzed man.

Jesus entered a boat

It is implied that the disciples were with Jesus. (See: Active or Passive)

a boat

This is probably the same boat as in Matthew 8:23. You only need to specify this if needed to avoid confusion.

into his own city

"to the town where he lived." This refers to Capernaum.

Behold

This marks the beginning of another event in the larger story. It may involve different people than the previous events. Your language may have a way of showing this.

they brought

"some men from the city"

their faith

This refers to the faith of the men and may also include the faith of the paralyzed man.

Son

The man was not Jesus' real son. Jesus was speaking to him politely. If this is confusing, it can also be translated "My friend" or "Young man" or even omitted.

Your sins have been forgiven

This can be stated in active form. AT: "I have forgiven your sins" (See: Active or Passive)

translationWords

Jesus

faith

son

sin

forgive

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

1–8. CURE OF A MAN AFFLICTED WITH PARALYSIS

Mar 2:1-12; Luk 5:18-26.

Both St Mark and St Luke notice the crowding of the people to hear Jesus, and narrate the means by which the sufferer was brought into His presence.

1. εἰς πλοῖον. In such adverbial expressions the article is often absent, as εἰς οἶκον. Cp. English ‘to take ship,’ ‘to go home.’

τὴν ἰδίαν πόλιν. Capernaum, the city where He dwelt, thus designated here only: cp. ἕκαστος εἰς τὴν ἑαυτοῦ πόλιν (Luk 2:3), his ancestral city.

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.