NOTES for Mar 1:35-45
It seems that Jesus did not always want the fame of the healings He performed to spread throughout Palestine. Sometimes He works a miracle in such a way that the healing itself becomes a testimony to everyone who saw it, but at other times Jesus heals almost unnoticed, insofar as this is possible.
Moreover, He insists on strict observance of the prescriptions of the Torah, which requires anyone healed of leprosy to go to the priests so that they may attest that the disease has truly gone. This might seem an obviously excessive precaution: Jesus, after all, knows perfectly well whom He has healed, just as He knows that the disease has indeed disappeared. The man who has been healed is also certain of it. He certainly needs no other testimony; he trusts Jesus completely. He trusts Him so much that he is ready to go and tell everyone about Him, about the One who healed him. Jesus, on the contrary, stops him and directs this zeal for preaching into more traditional and restrained religious channels. What for? Why?
The simplest answer might be the one usually given: Jesus does not want to be regarded as the Messiah; He does not seek the fame that miracles and healings inevitably brought Him. In fact, throughout His earthly ministry Jesus never wanted to be a public figure, and if He nevertheless became one, it was only in those places and at those times when there was no possible alternative.
The proclamation had to be public, but every possible association that might arise in the popular religious consciousness had to be avoided as far as possible. This was not only because such associations were false, but also because they were by no means spiritually beneficial to the people themselves, nor to the man who had been healed and was ready to run and bear witness. In reality, he had not yet had any opportunity to come to know Jesus at all; he had not yet understood what this Man had brought into the world. For the moment he had nothing to testify to except one healing.
What can such a person tell? About a new miracle-worker, famous for healing every disease with a single movement of His hand? This is true, but such testimony can hardly be considered adequate to the mission entrusted to Jesus by His Father. Ordinary restraint within traditional bounds is better than such testimony. At least it leaves time to become aware of what has happened and to reflect on it, which certainly cannot be said of a turbulent, emotional but superficial proclamation.