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THE SECOND YEAR OF HIS MINISTRY
AT THE PASSOVER
Mt xii. 9-21; Mk. iii. 1-6; Lk. vi. 6-n. Jo. r.
It is written that after the rencontre in the cornfield Jesus “migrated thence.” The Passover, which fell that year (27 A.D.) on April 9, was approaching (Mt. xii. 9), and He set out on the journey to Jerusalem. Anxious to escape further annoyance from the exasperated Scribes, He would follow the direct route along the western shore of the Lake; but they observed His departure and pursued Him and His disciples to the first station, probably, as the narrative suggests, Tiberias, Herod Antipas’ new capital, which, if not actually completed, was then nearing completion. It was thus on Friday that He left Capernaum, since Tiberias was only some ten miles southward and it was toward the eve of Sabbath when He arrived.
He remained there over the Sabbath, and after His wont He attended the synagogue and discoursed to the congregation. His vigilant enemies also attended (Cf. Lk. iv. 6); and among the worshippers was a man whose right hand was crippled, evidently by rheumatism—a common malady on the sultry shores of the Lake. Ancient tradition has it that he was a stone-mason, and he thus appealed to Jesus: “I was a mason seeking a livelihood with my hands. I pray you, Jesus, to restore me health that I may not shamefully beg my bread.” Here was a crucial issue.
The Rabbinical law ordained that only where the [ p. 106 ] patient’s life was in danger might a physician apply remedies. The Scribes were all agog. What would Jesus do ?
He called the man to the front.; and then, quoting the phrase which they had employed last Sabbath in the cornfield, He demanded: “Is it ‘ allowable on the Sabbath ’ to do good or harm, to save life or kill ?” (Cf. Lk. xiii. 14) Had He asked whether it was allowable on the Sabbath to heal the man, they would have answered : “No. His life is in no danger. Let him wait till the Sabbath is past, and then come and be healed.’ But the question as Jesus put it admitted of only one answer ; and they kept silence. He swept an indignant glance round the circle of sullen and pitiless faces. “Stretch out your hand” said He; and the man obeyed. His hand was healed.
They had not a word to say; but their public discomfiture infuriated them, and on leaving the synagogue they conferred and resolved to arraign Him. They had two charges against Him—blasphemy and Sabbathbreaking, and both were capital offences. It emboldened them in their design that the Herodians co-operated with them. It was an unnatural and unholy alliance ; for who were the Herodians ? They were Sadducees ; and the Sadducees were the inveterate adversaries of the Pharisees. They were the Romanising party in the Jewish state (Cf. Mt. xvi. 6; Mk. viii. 15). They acknowledged the imperial supremacy, and in requital of their subservience they were rewarded with the lucrative offices of the priesthood. Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee, was a vassal of Rome, and within his dominion they paid him homage, attending his court and supporting his administration. Hence they [ p. 107 ] were styled Herodians, and they were numerous and influential in his capital of Tiberias.
Their alliance with the Scribes meant the leaguing of Church and State against our Lord. At any moment He might be arrested like the Baptist. It was unsafe for Him to remain at Tiberias, and He “retreated thence” and proceeded southward. His departure was observed and an importunate throng pursued after Him (Mt. xii. 15). Delay was perilous, yet He would not refuse their entreaties. He healed them all, enjoining secrecy lest His enemies should be the more provoked; and then He hastened on His way until He reached the frontier of Decapolis and passed beyond Herod’s jurisdiction.
It was an unpleasant situation that confronted Him on His arrival at Jerusalem. Reports of His Galilean ministry had preceded Him thither. He had been delated to the rulers as a heretic, especially as a blasphemer and a Sabbath-breaker; and they eyed Him jealously, ready, should occasion arise, to arraign Him before the Sanhedrin on either of these capital charges.
And occasion soon arose. There was in the city in those days a medicinal pool, popularly known as Bethesda, rc The House of Mercy." Its situation is undetermined, but the oldest tradition identifies it with The Twin Pools close under Fort Antonia which adjoined the Temple precincts on the north-east. And certainly it was near the Temple, since, says St. Jerome, its water had a reddish hue, and this, really due to mineral ingredients in the spring which supplied it, was commonly attributed to infiltration of the blood of the sacrificial victims. It was a peculiarity of the pool that it was subject to periodic disturbance. It [ p. 108 ] was a natural phenomenon occasioned by subterranean volcanic movements ; but popular fancy ascribed it to the intervention of an angel who descended from time to time and stirred the pool; and it was believed that the water then possessed a special efficacy : the first to step into the pool after its ebullition would surely be healed. A colonnade with five porches had been built about it, and these were always thronged with invalids awaiting their opportunity.
On the Sabbath of the sacred week Jesus visited Bethesda and found crouching on a mat in one of the porches an old man who had been helpless for threeand-thirty years. It was a pitiful case; for he was a moral wreck, suffering in his friendless age the penalty of youthful excess. “Do you want,” said Jesus, “to get your health ?” and the poor creature told Him his story. He was just able to crawl daily to the pool and lie beside it watching for the troubling of the water; but he had no one to help him, and always ere he could struggle to his feet another stepped in before him and he had lost his chance. “Rise,” said Jesus, " take up your mat and walk.” He obeyed and found himself healed.
Ere he recovered from his astonishment Jesus had slipped away; and, unable to thank his Benefactor, he took his way to the Temple to thank God. As he passed briskly through the gate and entered the sacred court, he was challenged by some Pharisees. He was carrying his mat, and the Law prohibited the carrying of a burden on the Day of Rest, with ridiculous scrupulosity forbidding a tailor to take his needle or a scribe his pen abroad with him toward sunset on Friday evening, lest ere his return home the sun [ p. 109 ] should set and the Sabbath begin and find him carrying his burden. It was thus a violation of the Sabbath that the man should be carrying his mat, and they sternly took him to task. He explained that he had been healed, and his Healer had bidden him “take up his mat and walk.” It was news to them that he had been healed, but for this they cared nothing. The breach of their law was their sole concern. " Who,” they demanded, “is the fellow that said to you ‘ Take it up and walk * ?” He did not know, and they let him pass with the reprimand.
Jesus had slipped away from Bethesda to avoid the plaudits of the bystanders, but He was not done with the man. He was on the outlook for him, and He found him in the Temple-court. " See,” said He, “you have got your health : sin no more, lest something worse befall you.” The man was a simple-minded creature, and he went straight to the Pharisees and innocently informed them that it was Jesus that had healed him. Here was the opportunity which they desired, and they hastened after Jesus and, overtaking Him ere He had quitted the court, they angrily assailed Him. He had healed the man on the Sabbath Day; and this was work, and their law forbade working on the Day of Rest.
He met them with a lofty argument. Did not God work on the Sabbath ? Ever since the creation of the world He had continued His beneficent operations, making the sun rise and sending the dew and the rain and satisfying the desire of every living thing on the Sabbath even as on other days. “My Father has been working to this hour, and I work too.”
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It seems an innocent argument, yet it shocked the Pharisees and furnished them with another and still graver charge against Him. He had called God His Father, and this they construed as blasphemy. How did they so make it out ? God is the Heavenly Father, and in calling Him “My Father” was He claiming more than the relationship which belongs to all the children of men ? In truth He claimed much more, as the Pharisees perceived in the light of His fuller discourse. His offence was that “He termed God ‘ His own Father’—‘His proper Father,’ ‘His Father in a peculiar sense’—making Himself equal to God.” It was a claim to deity, and in their judgment this was blasphemy.
They had thus two capital charges on which they might arraign Him before the Sanhedrin, and they would forthwith have arrested Him but for the risk of exciting a tumult. He was the popular hero, and they must proceed warily. He faced them fearlessly and, in the hearing of the curious crowd which had thronged about them, argued with them of His high claims. He affirmed His union with God. That was the explanation of His miracles: they were the Father’s works wrought through the Son. What wonder that a man should be healed by the Father, the Creator, the Life-giver, who would one day by the voice of the Son summon the dead from their graves ? Well for them if on that day they believed in Him and acknowledged His claims. And how could they refuse these, attested as they were not merely by His own affirmation but by a threefold testimony ? First there was the testimony which John the Baptist had borne Him little over a year ago and which had so [ p. 111 ] impressed them at the time. This they had indeed rejected, but there remained the indubitable testimony of the miracles which they were witnessing and which demonstrated His divine commission. And finally there was the testimony of the Scriptures, those sacred writings which the Pharisees so venerated and which their Scribes studied so diligently. They “searched the Scriptures,” but they searched them blindly. They had a controversy with the sceptical Sadducees on the question of immortality (Cf. Ac. xxiii. 8), and they searched the Scriptures for proofs of their doctrine; but they missed their testimony to the Coming Saviour who would give eternal life to every one that believed on Him. “You search the Scriptures because you fancy that in them you have eternal life ; and those Scriptures it is that testify of Me, and you will not come to Me that you may have life.” And thus their Law was their condemnation. Moses had testified of Him, and had they believed Moses, they would have believed Him.(Cf. Lk. xxiv. 27)