Monday in the Second Week of Advent, December 7, 2020

Luke 5:17-26

One day as Jesus was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law, who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem, were sitting there, and the power of the Lord was with him for healing. And some men brought on a stretcher a man who was paralyzed; they were trying to bring him in and set him in his presence. But not finding a way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and lowered him on the stretcher through the tiles into the middle in front of Jesus. When Jesus saw their faith, he said, “As for you, your sins are forgiven.”  Then the scribes and Pharisees began to ask themselves, “Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who but God alone can forgive sins?” Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them in reply, “What are you thinking in your hearts? Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”– he said to the one who was paralyzed, “I say to you, rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home.”  He stood up immediately before them, picked up what he had been lying on, and went home, glorifying God. Then astonishment seized them all and they glorified God, and, struck with awe, they said, “We have seen incredible things today.”

St. Luke, from whose Gospel the Gospel reading for today’s Mass is taken, states at the beginning of his book that he himself did not see the Lord Jesus, but that he compiled an account about him from the reports of witnesses — “who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word” — with whom he had talked.  Thus, he produced a Gospel with many of the same stories as in the others, but told from points of view, including from his own perspective and experience, and including details not found in, say, that of St. Matthew.  These multiple viewpoints and extra details provide additional validation that the events told in these stories actually happened.  But to the individual Christian, they are important because of what they tell us about the Lord Jesus which would otherwise be unavailable to us. 

Such is the case with today’s Gospel reading, which tells of an event familiar to us through both Matthew 9, 1-8 and Mark 2, 1-12: the cure of the paralytic.  For instance, it is only Luke who tells us that “Pharisees and teachers of the law, who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem, were sitting there.”  In the other Gospels, Pharisees and scribes are merely mentioned as being present on this occasion, but Luke presents them at the head of his account: their presence here is an essential factor in what Jesus does.  Luke says that they were “sitting” (the Greek text also specifies Jesus as sitting).  In ancient times, the teacher sat, the students stood.  Here, we are shown that these men “from every village of Galilee and Judea and Jerusalem” were evaluating the Lord’s teaching.  Although the Lord had mostly confined his preaching to Galilee, he had aroused the attention of the authorities in Jerusalem and they wanted to know what he taught.  The house at Capernaum was full of these people as well as many others from the town itself, wondering at his words and what the “kingdom” of which he spoke might mean for them.

“The power of the Lord was with him for healing.”  This is an odd-sounding phrase in English, and the Greek is strange, too.  Perhaps this is a Hebrew idiom brought over by Luke into the Greek.  One thing is clear, though: the Greek says that the power was “in” him, not “with” him.  This is significant because if power is only “with” someone, it accompanies him in an exterior way and may come or go as it likes, or as the one who gives it likes.  However, the Greek tells us that the power to heal is “in the Lord” — it is not separable from him.  Another reason for the phrase sounding odd is that it seems unnecessary.  Luke has already shown him healing, including a leper shortly before.  Luke is drawing a stark contrast for us between the Pharisees, scribes, and other teachers who come to look the Lord over, and the Lord himself: Luke reminds us that the Lord possessed power as a preacher and as a healer.  He did not simply speak as others did, but did so in an authoritative way, and that his words could command nature so that lepers might be healed, and also the supernatural, so that men and women might be freed from demons.  We see, then, the powerless attempting to  judge the powerful, and the absurdity of it.

“And some men brought on a stretcher a man who was paralyzed.”  Matthew tells us that the man was afflicted by “palsy”, which generally means a paralyzing ailment likely accompanied by shaking and extreme weakness.  “They went up on the roof and lowered him . . . into the middle in front of Jesus.”  Jesus was teaching at this time, not healing crowds of people.  The scene is an academic one, as though Jesus was being considered for official approval to teach.  The lowering of the paralytic in this way appears in this context as an opportunity for a practical example of the matter under discussion.  The paralytic becomes an academic prop, in Luke’s telling.  Given that Luke is known as St. Paul’s “dear physician” (cf. Colossians 4, 15), we might wonder if he is presenting this incident in terms of licensing a medical doctor: a board of established physicians questions an applicant on his learning, and then presents him with actual cases to diagnose and treat.  Jesus proceeds to do this: “Your sins are forgiven.”  The Lord looks directly into the heart of the stricken man and at once identifies the cause of his affliction.  And then he treats him, forgiving his sins.  

“Then the scribes and Pharisees began to ask themselves, ‘Who is this who speaks blasphemies? Who but God alone can forgive sins?’ ”  The Lord now shows himself as the one with power, and power reserved for God alone.  He confronts them so that they must reconsider who they are and who he really is.  Near the beginning of his public life, the Lord forces the authorities to face the question of his identity.  If he can forgive sins, then he is God.  But the forgiveness of sins is an invisible work.  How can anyone know if this man’s sins are forgiven?  With an accompanying miracle that anyone can see.  As a prelude to the man’s walking and proving his forgiveness, the Lord says to the gathered academics, “What are you thinking in your hearts? Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’?”  By this, the Lord means that for him, it is as easy to heal with miracles as to forgive sins — both of which actions are by divine power.  “But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins, etc.”  The Lord wants these teachers to know that he has this “authority” — the Greek can mean “authority” as well as “power” — to forgive sins on earth.  That is to say, they had assembled in his presence in order to consider authorizing him to preach, but his authorization has come from God alone.  He proves it now: “Rise, pick up your stretcher, and go home.”  This is something more than “Rise and walk.”  The Lord commands him to pick up his stretcher and carry it away with him, a sign of the recovered strength of the man: he no longer needs the assistance of his friends, but can take care of himself.  “He stood up immediately before them.”  Such a result never occurred before in a medical demonstration before examiners.  Most of all, the miracle proves the truth of the forgiveness of the man’s sins and the power of the one who forgave them.  Furthermore, the man “went home, glorifying God”, knowing the cause of his cure, and that he had been touched from within by almighty God.

“Then astonishment seized them all and they glorified God.”  “Astonishment” is too soft a word for the Greek.  They were all seized with “bewilderment”.  The world of all who witnessed this had been turned upside down and inside out.  They did not know what to make of what they had seen and heard, but they did glorify God.  “Struck with awe, they said, ‘We have seen incredible things today.’ ”  The Greek has “filled with fear” or “terror”, indicating the strength, almost violence, of the reaction the Lord caused here.  We who regularly go to Mass and hear the priest say, “May Almighty God have mercy on us, forgive us our sins, and bring us to everlasting life” tend to see forgiveness as a regular part of our lives, certainly nothing extraordinary.  But this is not so.  The forgiveness of sins, particularly within the Sacrament of Penance, is always a miracle.  While it does require something on the part of the penitent, primarily sincere contrition and firm purpose of amendment, it is a divine work.  It parts rivers by the stretching forth of a hand, destroys fortress walls with the blast of a trumpet, and raises the dead by a single word.  We ought to be even more staggered by it today than were the Jews long ago.

Despite the earth shattering event and plain revelation of Jesus as the Son of God that night, many of the teachers were able over time to talk themselves out of believing the truth and were among those who cried out for the Lord’s death a few years later.  Despite all the proof an academic could want, they closed their eyes and ears and refused to believe.  Life in Capernaum also resumed to such an extent that the Lord, as though exasperated, reproved them: “And you, Capharnaum, are you exalted unto heaven? You shall be thrust down to hell” (Luke 10, 15).  May we, through the grace of God, ponder his words with humility, and rejoice with faith in the wonders he does for us.