Mark 5: 21-43
Dear Friends, Today’s two stories of the woman and Jarius’ daughter are part of a string of four stories that deal with Jesus’ conflict with the demonic. The other two are the calming of the storm at sea (Mk 4:35-41) and the healing of the Gerasene demoniac (Mk 5: 1-20).
The people at the time of Jesus had a much different idea of the presence and the power of the demons than the Hollywood version so popular today in movies like “The Exorcist”. In the time of Jesus, people had a basic vision of good and evil. Evil was seen in all dimensions of human experience that limited human freedom. Evil was involved in all things and experiences that controlled people in a way that seriously limited their freedom.
These four stories present Jesus as the Strong One who reveals his power over the controlling demons. These expressions of evil came in nature’s violence such as the storm, in the maladies of personal addiction and psychological pathology as displayed in the Gerasene story, the consequences of personal sickness in the story of the suffering woman and in death as shown in the young daughter.
All these episodes reveal Jesus as the victor in the battle of good and evil. Jesus invites his followers to see in his presence the power of a gracious God setting the woman free from the curse of twelve years. In the young daughter, Jesus reveals a message of hope in the ultimate expression of good over evil in the conquest of death. This story mirrors his own ultimate victory in the Resurrection.
The stories also show another dimension of freedom. The laws of cleanliness in the practice of the Jews often had very bad unintended consequences. In the life of the bleeding woman, not only did she have the burden of her personal sickness, she was totally isolated socially from the community because of her impurity of bleeding. She was, for all practical purposes, as isolated as a leper. When she touched Jesus, it was a gross violation of the laws of purity and even more, an incredibly daring gesture for a woman in her times.
In the case of the woman, Jesus transformed the violation into an act of freedom and love. When he touched the dead body of the young daughter he was also in grave disobedience of the purity laws. He turned it into a great act of love and freedom.
The interaction of the woman with Jesus is a particularly powerful expression of human desperation encountering a God of tender mercy and compassion. The woman had come up empty on all fronts. In total abandonment and weakness, she reached out to touch Jesus. She walked away not only healed, but transformed in the depth of her being. She now was saved, now at peace and most of all, now a very special daughter of God.
The message for us is clear. We need to bring our burdens and anxieties to Jesus. We need to know and trust that Jesus wants to heal us and to set us free as much as the two beautiful females in today’s story.
We need to stay in the struggle for the dignity of all in both the Church and society. After all these centuries, we must continue to seek the power of the strong One over the evil that still diminishes woman’s role in the Church; still is weak in hearing the cry of the poor especially in the immigrants. We still are in need of the healing touch in families wracked by the addiction of a member and of families being destroyed by pathological divisions of one sort or another. Likewise, we are in need of the hunger for justice that flowed from the heart of the bleeding woman and the grieving father. They took the first step on the road to freedom and justice. We are called to do the same as vessels of Jesus’ love and healing power for our brothers and sisters.
