Cures Beside the Sea of Galilee
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[7] Jesus withdrew with His disciples to the sea, and a great multitude
from Galilee followed; also from Judea [8] and Jerusalem and Idumea and
from beyond the Jordan and from about Tyre and Sidon, a great
multitude, hearing all that He did, came to Him. [9] And He told His
disciples to have a boat ready for Him; [10] for He had healed many, so
that all who had diseases pressed upon Him to touch Him. [11] And
whenever the unclean spirits beheld Him, they fell down before Him and
cried out, "You are the Son of God." [12] And He strictly ordered them
not to make Him known.
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Commentary:
10. During our Lord's public life people were constantly crowding round
Him to be cured (cf. Luke 6:19; 8:45; etc). As in the case of many
other cures, St. Mark gives us a graphic account of what Jesus did to
these people (cf. Mark 1:31, 41; 7:31-37; 8:22-26; John 9:1-7, 11,
15). By working these cures our Lord shows that He is both God and
man: He cures by virtue of His divine power and using His human
nature. In other words, only in the Word of God become man is the work
of our Redemption effected, and the instrument God used to save us was
the human nature of Jesus--His Body and Soul--in the unity of the
person of the Word (cf. Vatican II, "Sacrosanctum Concilium", 5).
This crowding round Jesus is repeated by Christians of all times: the
holy human nature of our Lord is our only route to salvation; it is the
essential means we must use to unite ourselves to God. Thus, we can
today approach our Lord by means of the sacraments, especially and
pre-eminently the Eucharist. And through the sacraments there flows to
us, from God, through the human nature of the Word, a strength which
cures those who receive the sacraments with faith (cf. St. Thomas
Aquinas, "Summa theologiae", III, q. 62, a. 5).
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Source: "The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries". Biblical text
taken from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries
made by members of the Faculty of Theology of the University of
Navarre, Spain. Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock,
Co. Dublin, Ireland.
Thursday, January 19, 2006 Feria (Week of prayer for Christian unity) |
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