Tuesday in the Fourth Week of Ordinary Time, January 31, 2023

Mark 5, 21-43

When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around him, and he stayed close to the sea. One of the synagogue officials, named Jairus, came forward. Seeing him he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him, saying, “My daughter is at the point of death. Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live.” He went off with him and a large crowd followed him. There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years. She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors and had spent all that she had. Yet she was not helped but only grew worse. She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak. She said, “If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured.” Immediately her flow of blood dried up. She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction. Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him, turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who has touched my clothes?” But his disciples said to him, “You see how the crowd is pressing upon you, and yet you ask, Who touched me?” And he looked around to see who had done it. The woman, realizing what had happened to her, approached in fear and trembling. She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be cured of your affliction.” While he was still speaking, people from the synagogue official’s house arrived and said, “Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?” Disregarding the message that was reported, Jesus said to the synagogue official, “Do not be afraid; just have faith.” He did not allow anyone to accompany him inside except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official, he caught sight of a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. So he went in and said to them, “Why this commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep.” And they ridiculed him. Then he put them all out. He took along the child’s father and mother and those who were with him and entered the room where the child was. He took the child by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise!” The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around. At that they were utterly astounded. He gave strict orders that no one should know this and said that she should be given something to eat.

St. Mark has shown through his account of the Lord’s calming of the ferocious storm at sea how he has power over the natural world, and how he, the Son of God, restores all things from the chaos wrought by our sins to how they were meant to be (cf. Ephesians 1, 10); how he has power over the supernatural world, overcoming the devil and bringing peace to men (cf. John 16, 33); and now, how he conquers death, touching it with his Body and bidding it be gone.  In this same Gospel reading, we see too how he makes all things clean: “All things are clean to the clean” (Titus 1, 15).  Having accomplished all this signs, the Lord truly shows himself to be the Son of God, and that he can be none else.

“Seeing him he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him.”  The synagogue official shows obeisance reserved for eastern kings, who regarded themselves as gods.  We note here how in each of the three miracles stories that are linked together here, those needing help rush to him.  The possessed man as well as the synagogue official even throw themselves at the Lord’s feet.  Mark is careful to have us see this.  People who know him, who know him not at all, and who know him by reputation all come to him in this way.  “Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live.”  We see the man’s faith laid out before the Lord.

“She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak.”  This woman knew of Jesus by reputation as well.  Since he has returned to Capernaum, either she has remained indoors because of her condition and so has not seen him, or she has come from another town, her hopes of a cure buoyed by what she has heard of this wonder worker.  Like Jairus, she too has faith.  But whereas Jairus wants the Lord to touch his daughter, this woman will be happy if she can just touch the hem of his cloak.  “She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction.”  we can only imagine what this must have felt like.  A surge of spiritual power flowing through her, a sudden cessation of the suffering she had endured?  Perhaps she felt as so many feel upon leaving the confessional, exulting in a feeling of freshness and newness.  “Who has touched my clothes?”  Many people have touched his clothes, but only one was open to receiving his healing.  Many people receive Holy Communion at Mass, but how many truly know what they are doing, desire with their whole heart to do it, receive devoutly, and give thanks to God afterwards?  The Lord offers his grace to us, but so often we do not take it from him.  It is so odd.  It is as though the Lord were a beggar on the street, but instead of begging us to give him something, he is begging us to let him enrich us, and we walk by, even pretending not to see him.  But this woman desires his grace with all her heart, and he dispels her uncleanness completely and for all time.

“Your daughter has died.”  This verse should be translated as “Your daughter died”, for the tense is aorist, not perfect.  That is, it happened and it is done.  “Has died” gives the sense of something that has recently happened.  That does not seem to be the case here.  This leaves open the possibility that she died a little time before, possibly while Jesus was still at sea, and that, as per the custom, the body lay in its deathbed while the flute players and mourners were assembled.  She would not have died the day before, though, since the Jews bury their dead before sundown.  If Jairus were aware of her death before he came to Jesus, it would reveal his terrible desperation.  He would think that since no one can raise the dead, as long as Jesus does not know she is dead, there is a chance she might still be healed.  Or, possibly, he did believe the Lord could raise the dead (though he had not yet done so), but feared to ask him to do this, lest he be rejected.  The people from his house who say so plainly, “She died”, do not seem to be breaking devastating news to him.  There are no tears, condolences, or embraces.  Instead, a barely concealed annoyance with Jairus: “Why trouble the teacher any longer?”  As if to say, Let us get on with the mourning and bury your daughter.

“The child is not dead but asleep.”  The Lord says this with deference to what the father has told him and to comfort the family; but also because one who sleeps in death can be awakened.  The just “sleep” in death while the wicked “taste” death in all its bitterness.  They “die the death”, as was said to Adam (cf. Genesis 2, 17, literally from the Hebrew and as found in the Douay Rheims).  Talitha koum.  Mark preserved the Hebrew spoken by the Lord, which helps us know which language he spoke with among the people, but which also may be a sign that these words were used in Mark’s time, during St. Peter’s lifetime, as part of the baptismal ritual, when a girl or woman was baptized in the river and rose again out of it.

“He gave strict orders that no one should know this and said that she should be given something to eat.”  This was not a sign for all, but particularly for his most fervent and devoted Apostles, the ones most likely to understand what it meant.  

By meditating closely on these works of Jesus Christ we may come to know his earnest desire for our salvation and his abundant power to cause it.