Sixth Week after Pentecost (Year B): Mark 5:21-43 and Psalm 130

Big Picture:

1) We are almost exactly in the middle of an eight-part portrait of Jesus’ early public ministry, exploring a series of chronologically selected passages from the Gospel of Mark. The outlines of Jesus’ mission are becoming clear: as we saw last week, he’s just calmed a storm at sea, and since then, he’s healed a Gentile man afflicted with an “unclean spirit” (Mark 5:1-20). Both of these events portray the expansive, surprising, barrier-breaking nature of Jesus’ healing, saving work — and this week’s passage continues to develop this theme.

2) Mark frequently composes stories in a “sandwich” form, nesting one episode inside of another. This strategy has at least three primary effects: first, it ratchets up the suspense, as one cliffhanger pauses while we turn to another; second, each story throws light on the other, like a diptych with two images side-by-side; and third, the two stories together create a more-than-the-sum-of-their-parts unity. In fact, Mark’s artistry is such that we should resist thinking in terms of “two episodes”: as we’ll see, there’s really one story here, not two.

3) Mark’s early audiences would have been at least loosely familiar with the purity practices recorded in scripture: menstruating women were allegedly “unclean” (Leviticus 12:1-8; 15:19-30), as were corpses (Numbers 19:11-13), such that anyone and anything they touched also became “unclean.” Jesus overturns these ideas in this story, and bearing them in mind helps highlight the tensions pushing the narrative forward. Did she, an unclean woman, really just touch him, the Holy Teacher? And did he really just touch a stranger’s corpse?

4) Psalm 130 is a classic plea for divine rescue “out of the depths” (Ps 130:1). Its superscription, “A Song of Ascents,” is common to Psalms 120-134 — and it may refer to the “ascent” of pilgrims to the city of Jerusalem, and perhaps to a sanctuary located there. As such, these psalms may have comprised a kind of hymnal of songs sung by pilgrims as they traveled on the way, approaching Jerusalem with every step…

Scripture:

1) Having just underscored the barrier-breaking character of his ministry by healing a Gentile man in Gentile territory, Jesus now crosses back over the Sea of Galilee into Jewish precincts — and now he will dismantle at least two other kinds of barriers: one between “clean” and “unclean,” and the other between life and death.

2) Jairus, a “leader of the synagogue,” falls at Jesus’ feet, pleading that he come to his house and save his daughter, who is “at the point of death” (Mark 5:22-23). Even as he calls “out of the depths” of desperation, Jairus’ plea is a reminder that Jesus’ mixed reception among Jewish leaders sometimes included trust and respect (Ps 130:1).

3) The underlying word Jairus uses here (translated as “be made well” in the NRSV) is the Greek word, sozo, which can also be translated, “save,” “heal,” “preserve,” or “rescue.” The word appears repeatedly in this passage, blurring any sharp distinction between “salvation” and “health,” “saving” and “thriving.”

4) Jesus agrees to go with Jairus to the dying girl, but along the way, the crowds — perhaps emboldened by Jairus’ example — press in around the holy teacher. To get to him, a woman who has been bleeding for twelve years pushes through, in her own way silently calling “out of the depths.” The fact that she’s “endured much under many physicians” suggests she was formerly a woman of some wealth and status — and now has become an outcast, declared “unclean” by holy writ (Leviticus 12:1-8; 15:19-30). Her persistence and audacity is striking: not only does she push through the crowds, she pushes through the words of Leviticus, too, the ancient ideas that not only is she “unclean,” but anything she touches will become “unclean” — including the one whose clothing she seeks to touch!

5) It’s worth pausing here to let this sink in: everything in the story so far suggests that what the woman is doing is wrong, or dishonorable, or both. An “unclean” outcast, she pushes through a crowd, disobeying ancient, scriptural prohibitions. She audaciously touches a holy teacher without his permission, apparently desecrating him in the process. And as it turns out, she thereby delays him on his journey to the home of a local religious leader. And so when Jesus stops, turns, and demands to know, “Who touched me?” — we can imagine a collective gasp from Mark’s early audience. Jesus must be angry! And look, she knows it, too: she’s coming forward “in fear and trembling”… (Mark 5:30-33).

6) And now the story pivots in a stunning, scandalous direction. Jesus is not angry. On the contrary, with the crowds and Jairus looking on, Jesus praises the woman for her audacity, her daring, her persistence, her “faith”: “Daughter, your faith has made you well” (again, the word is sozo) — a remark that is yet another surprise, since the story to this point seems to suggest that Jesus’ “power” is the source of her healing (Mark 5:30). But Jesus strikingly draws attention not to his power, but to hers.

7) And at that very moment, Jairus receives news that tempts him to despair: Your daughter is dead. You’re too late. You’ve taken too long. But Jesus, overhearing the news, says to Jairus: “Do not fear, only believe” (Mark 5:36). Because of what’s just happened, the choreography is clear. It’s as if Jesus says to Jairus: Look — this woman has just shown you what genuine faith looks like: audacious, daring, persistent trust in God. No barrier can constrain God’s graceful mercy. Even the barrier between life and death, in the end, can and will be overcome.

8) And so even this last barrier will be broken. At Jairus’ house, Jesus sends away everyone but the family and the disciples Peter, James, and John — the same trio invited to the mountaintop at the Transfiguration (Mark 9:2), a sign that the events in Jairus’ house have a similarly iconic, revelatory status. Taking the dead girl’s hand in his and calling her to rise (Talitha cum! Little one, get up!), Jesus breaks two barriers at once: the barrier between “clean” and “unclean” (Numbers 19:11-13), and the barrier between life and death. In both senses, the story foreshadows Jesus’ resurrection, as well as the broader promised resurrection to follow.

Takeaways:

1) As Mark arranges them, these two episodes form a single story: a vivid picture of Jesus’ expansive, barrier-breaking, healing, saving, life-giving ministry. Is Jesus more interested in “eternal life” or “life here and now”? This story helps clarify that this is a false choice; sozo carries both connotations at once. Likewise, just as Jesus breaks ethnic and sociopolitical barriers between Jews and Gentiles, he also breaks barriers within religious life that contemptuously demean and separate. For Christians today, the task is most definitely not to criticize Jewish practices (thereby falling into the contempt trap all over again!), but rather to identify and root out Christian practices that implicitly or explicitly create walls between “outsiders” and “insiders.”

2) This story is also a glimpse of how Jesus thinks about scripture. He engages it not with uncritical obeisance, as if every word in Leviticus (or any other book) is to be taken at face value, but rather with wise rabbinical judgment, carefully weighing which passages are most important, which passages help throw light on other passages — and then applying the results at the right time, in the right place, and in the right way (remember, “love your neighbor as yourself” is from Leviticus, too! (Leviticus 19:18)).

3) “Faith” is cast here as a form of barrier-breaking courage, daring, and persistence — and the woman is cast as an exemplar, all the more surprising because of the presence of a religious leader, Jairus, who effectively becomes her student. An outcast is thus brought center stage. A consummate insider is encouraged to learn from her. And the very act of reaching out to God in bold tenacity, even and especially “out of the depths,” is spotlighted as a pivotal power possessed by each and every human being: “your faith has made you well [sozo]…”

4) Finally, the fact that sozo has such a wide range of meanings in this story — from salvation to health to resurrection to thriving to restoration to community — should stand as a guardrail against concluding that, in our own lives, the absence of a “cure” means afflicted people are to blame for their “lack of faith.” Healing comes in many different forms, physical, emotional, social, and otherwise, and we can trust that our most daring, faithful efforts will be met with God’s merciful healing touch. For that, after all, is Jesus’ message of encouragement here, the good news of the Gospel in this story: Even “out of the depths,” my children, take heart, reach out, push through, and dare to touch God’s garments — for God is already reaching out to you, and will yet take your hand, both today and in the end, to say, “Talitha cum! Little one, get up!”