The Secret Codes in Matthew: Examining Israel’s Messiah, Part 7: Matthew 8 – 11:5, by Kevin M. Williams
Behold, there came a synagogue official, and bowed down before Him, saying, “My daughter has just died; but come and lay Your hand on her, and she will live.” And when Jesus came into the official’s house, and saw the flute-players, and the crowd in noisy disorder, He began to say, “Depart; for the girl has not died, but is asleep.” And they began laughing at Him. But when the crowd had been put out, He entered and took her by the hand; and the girl arose. And this news went out into all that land (Matthew 9:18, 24-26).
Yeshua once again should have known better. Touching a corpse is forbidden (Numbers 9:11)! The High Priest of Israel especially should not touch a dead body. Yet from the p’shat to the remetz, the evidence was gone. There was no dead body. There was no breaking of God’s sacred Torah. And the witnesses?—they took the news “out into all that land.”
Our check list is getting smaller.
And as Jesus passed on from there, two blind men followed Him, crying out, and saying, “Have mercy on us, Son of David!” And after He had come into the house, the blind men came up to Him, and Jesus said to them, “Do you believe that I am able to do this?” They said to Him, “Yes, Lord.” Then He touched their eyes, saying, “Be it done to you according to your faith.” And their eyes were opened. And Jesus sternly warned them, saying, “See here, let no one know about this!” But they went out, and spread the news about Him in all that land. (Matthew 9:28-31).
The only item left on our list is deafness. Matthew’s gospel does not confirm this for us as you might expect. However we do read, “And Jesus was going about all the cities and the villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness” (Matthew 9:35), which may well have included deafness.
Regardless, Mark’s gospel specifically fills in the missing piece:
And they brought to Him one who was deaf and spoke with difficulty, and they entreated Him to lay His hand upon him. And He took him aside from the multitude by himself, and put His fingers into his ears, and after spitting, He touched his tongue with the saliva; and looking up to heaven with a deep sigh, He said to him, “Ephphatha!” that is, “Be opened!” And his ears were opened, and the impediment of his tongue was removed, and he began speaking plainly. And He gave them orders not to tell anyone; but the more He ordered them, the more widely they continued to proclaim it. And they were utterly astonished, saying, “He has done all things well; He makes even the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak” (Mark 7:32-37).
“The blind receive sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, the poor have the gospel preached to them” (Luke 7:22). We have not only checked off our list, we have found Yeshua doing much more, exceeding expectations.
This may be a difficult statement to agree with, but these miracles in and of themselves were not all that remarkable. The Old Testament is littered with such examples: of sicknesses being healed, of the dead being raised to life, of people’s hearts being turned toward God. While we can say what Yeshua did was exemplary—supernatural even—and clear proof of his messiahship, Israel’s history was filled with supernatural events and exemplary men and women. None of them were the Messiah.
Category: Biblical Studies, Fall 2002, Pneuma Review
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