NOTES for Mar 2:1-12

The Gospels often mention "paralyzed people" and their healings. This does not refer to one and the same illness, but to different illnesses that nevertheless had certain symptoms in common. It refers either to certain forms of paralysis or to nervous disorders because of which a person's coordination could be impaired. In any case, in Gospel times people did not know how to treat these illnesses, and such sufferers were doomed to suffer to the end of their days. The chance to be freed from such an illness was certainly bound to draw many people to Jesus, especially since news spread quickly through the small towns of Judea and Galilee. It is no wonder that He is accompanied everywhere by a crowd of people, a great many of whom are waiting to be healed of their illnesses.

That is how it was in the house in the small Galilean town of Capernaum described in today's reading: so many people had crowded in there that many could no longer enter the house or even get near the door (v. 2). It is no wonder that the sick man, who because of his illness could not walk and therefore had to be carried by his friends on a mat (in the Gospel it is called a "bed," v. 4), could not make his way through the crowd to Jesus. One way remained: through the flat roof, which in the East is usually used as an open terrace (v. 4). Such a roof was usually made of packed clay, and making an opening in it large enough to lower a mat with a man lying on it was not easy, but it was possible.

But the words Jesus spoke at the healing caused bewilderment and objections among the "scribes" who were present (vv. 6-7). In the Gospels, "scribes" are people who studied the "Law," that is, the books of Holy Scripture, and taught it to others. Today we would call such people professional theologians. Like professional theologians in the Church today, these people had special authority in the synagogue because of their knowledge; they were respected, and people listened to their opinion. But, as unfortunately happens at times with all theologians in every age, they often approached questions too formally when those questions did not call for such a formal theological approach at all, often quibbling over details and failing to notice the main thing behind them: the Kingdom of God, which Jesus brought into the world.

People often ask: may we pray for the unbaptized, for those who died by suicide? After all, even for the Church, the question of funeral rites for such people is one of the most difficult. But let us think about today's reading. We know that for a miracle to happen, faith is needed. But what should be done if there is no faith? If it was absent to such a degree that a person decided to take his own life? Is this truly inevitable destruction?

And this is what the Gospel tells us today: faith alone is not enough; love is also needed. Where one's own faith is absent, the love of one's neighbors saves. The faith of some and their love for others work a miracle even over those who have no faith, who show no signs of spiritual life, as if they were paralyzed or already dead. Love becomes a conductor of faith from one person to another, and that person receives a saving charge.

We must always remember this and pray without ceasing for those who, for one reason or another, of which there is a great multitude in the world, cannot pray for themselves.

To pay attention to form and fail to see the substance is a characteristic feature of the Pharisees. But this is not a corporate description of ancient Jewish religious figures; it is a type of human consciousness, a type of personality, as a psychologist would say.

In the healing about which Mark the Evangelist tells us today, this personality type appears in all its glory. The scribes who witnessed the healing do not care that Christ raised up the paralytic. What matters is only that, from their point of view, He is blaspheming. That God heard Jesus of Nazareth and gave the paralytic new life is not important. What matters is that the scribes think it is wrong to speak this way. Even the principle that winners are not put on trial is repugnant to them. They condemn Christ all the same.

Choosing between ideas and a living human being, the scribes choose ideas. Alas, they are not the only ones...

One of the hardest things in spiritual life is faith in God's action in our everyday life. The scribes who did not believe that Jesus could forgive sins were not atheists. They believed that God, in principle, could forgive, but how is this reflected in real life? For them God is invisible and inaccessible. His forgiveness has no effect on visible reality. With this approach, God turns into an abstraction. But the Lord Jesus turns their abstract faith in forgiveness into a sign, a sign of God's power acting in this world. He does what the more practical friends of the paralytic hoped for: He grants him not only forgiveness that is "spiritual, somewhere up there in heaven," but real, effective forgiveness that turns his life around.

Healing and the forgiveness of sin are connected things. That is not surprising: illness is a consequence of sinfulness. Of course, it is pointless to look for any specific connections between particular illnesses and particular sins corresponding to them. There are no such connections. There is something else: the incompleteness of life caused by the fall into sin and its consequences.

It is this incompleteness that gives rise to illnesses, in the end making fallen humanity mortal. After all, inevitable death from old age is also a kind of illness, and an absolutely incurable one, at least within the order of things that exists in the fallen world. Jesus, however, brings not mere treatment, but healing.

This is not the restoration of that relative health described by the familiar medical formula "practically healthy," but the return of a person to the fullness of life that was given to him from the beginning. Of course, in itself this does not yet mean that the healed person immediately becomes a resident of the Kingdom. To become one, a person must travel a long road, the road of spiritual and then physical transformation, which is usually completed beyond the limits of earthly life. But everyone healed by the Savior shares in the Kingdom and receives the greatest fullness of life available to him in his present state.

How much of the fullness he has received he can keep is a question for the person himself. The same is true of the question of how well he can preserve the freedom from sin that he receives at the moment of healing. And he surely receives it, because in the Kingdom, in whose life the healed person shares, there is no place for sin. This is a sharing in new life, a new start, a clean slate. What follows depends on the person himself: on his later life, on how truly new it will be.

Four people bring a paralytic to Jesus. This was not easy; they had to dig through the roof of the house and lower the sick man's bed on ropes to Jesus' feet. It is clear that this person is dear to them; such labors are not undertaken for those to whom we are indifferent. It is clear that they want Christ to heal him, and their love for this person and their inability to cure him by their own strength give birth in them to hope in Jesus and trust in Him. And Christ sees their faith.

Here also sit "some of the scribes," who do not trust Him, because everything He does or says calls into question their relationship with God, in which they consider themselves experts. We perhaps cannot even realize what a "bombshell" the words Jesus spoke were. The evangelist Mark tells us of the scribes' perplexity and irritation: they cannot accept the truth of these words, and then this is blasphemy, the arrogation to oneself of divine prerogatives. But the friends of the paralytic also must have been perplexed: after all, this was not why they brought him! What Jesus does after this answers both perplexities: faith is not proved vain, and distrust of the truth is put to shame.

In His ministry Jesus is always unexpected, shockingly unexpected. This unexpectedness overturns people's habitual ideas and makes them able to receive something new and thereby change. Have we lost this sense of His unexpectedness, have we grown used to Him, have we made Jesus understandable and one-dimensional for ourselves, bringing nothing new? If so, then we have closed ourselves off from a real meeting with Him.

Four people bring the paralytic to Jesus; it wasn’t easy, they had to dig the roof of the house and move down on a mat the patient to Jesus’ feet. It is clear that this paralyzed man is dear to them, because we do not make such efforts for somebody who is indifferent to us. It is as well clear that these men want Jesus to heal this patient, their love for this man and their impossibility to heal him on their own strengths generate in them hope and confidence in Jesus Christ. And the Lord Jesus sees their faith.

“Certain scribes” also sit here; they don’t trust Him because all that He makes and says questions their relations with God, relations that they consider their selves professionals. Probably, we cannot even imagine what "bomb" the words pronounced by Jesus were. The Evangelist Marc informs us about the embarrassment and the irritation of the scribes: they cannot accept the truthfulness of these words, and so, it is a blasphemy to appropriate oneself divine privileges. But the friends of the ill one shouldn’t have been perplexed, because they did not bring him to Jesus the Savior for that! What Jesus Christ accomplishes later, answers both embarrassments: faith never turns out fruitless, and disbelieving to the truth turns out humiliation.

Jesus is always unexpected in His ministry, shocking unexpectedness. This unexpectedness overturns people’s usual ideas and makes them able to receive something new, and ipso facto to change. Haven’t we lost the feeling of His unexpectedness, aren’t we used to Him, haven’t we made Jesus Christ incomprehensible and unilinear to us, bringing nothing new into our life? If the answer is yes, then we have been closed from a real meeting with Him - the Lord Jesus Christ.