40 A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, ‘If you choose, you can make me clean.’ 41Moved with pity Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, ‘I do choose. Be made clean!’ 42Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. 43After sternly warning him he sent him away at once, 44saying to him, ‘See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.’ 45But he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him from every quarter.
Translation: A leper came to him imploring him and kneeling and saying to him, "If you wish, you are able to make me clean." And moved with compassion, extending his hand, he touched and said to him, "I wish. Be made clean." And immediately, the leprosy left him and he was made clean. He (Jesus) spoke harshly to him and immediately threw him out, and he said to him, "See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and bring, according to your cleansing, what Moses arranged, into a witness to them." But he went out and he began to proclaim much and to spread the word so that he (Jesus) was no longer able to go into a town open to sight, but he was outside in deserted places, and they were coming to him from every side.
Background and situation: This brief episode follows upon Jesus' provocative action at the synagogue in Capernaum in which he combined powerful teaching and the exorcism of a demon, followed by his healing of Simon's mother-in-law.
Jesus decides to take his campaign into the komopoleis--the small, mostly clan-based villages of Galilee. The word is only used once in the New Testament. I'm wondering about the relationship of kome--"long-hair"--to the word komopoleis. Is this an indication that the people in these villages were less "kempt" than those in the larger towns?
Their fellow Jews to the south, those of Judea, looked upon the entire region of Galilee as "the sticks." Archaeological evidence confirms that the housing stock of Capernaum, for example, was quite simple and basic, especially when compared to that of Jerusalem. Within "the sticks" of Galilee, the komopoleis would have been "the sticks of the sticks."
Healing of the leper: It is not at all surprising that Jesus might meet a leper there. Indeed, that would be the most likely place to find them. The people of the komopoleis would likely have been the most marginalized people of Galilee, and there would have been a lot of them. 90% of the population was destitute, and this is where they lived.
The first specific geographical location, in Mark, is Galilee--Jesus is both "from" Galilee and "goes into" Galilee. Then Capernaum is named, the home base of the movement, and then the komopoleis. These poor villages are Jesus' first missionary priority. (This is yet another example of Jesus' "preferential option for the poor.")
The word katharizein--to "cleanse"--occurs four times in these five verses. It's where we get our word "catharsis," a psychiatric term which also means "cleansing" or "purging." "Catharsis" is a major category in analytic psychology. It refers to emotional "purging" which, after a fashion, "cleanses" the psyche.
The leper approaches Jesus, and begging on his knees, says an odd thing: "If you want to, you have power to make me clean." Technically speaking, the leper should not be approaching Jesus. That, in itself, was a violation of the purity laws.
Jesus is "moved with compassion." The word is splangxnistheis, which literally means "yearning of the bowels." It indicates strong emotion and "gut-level empathy."
Jesus "stretched his hand," which is reminiscent of the exercise of God's power in the Old Testament, and then--the text is quite clear--"he touched" the leper. Under the current order, the leper's touch of Jesus would render Jesus unclean. Here, however, in the new order of God's kingdom, it is Jesus' touch which renders the leper clean.
The leper is healed, but why is Jesus angry? The word is embrimnsamenos, which NRSV translates as "sternly warning," but which really means "snorting with indignation." Nor did Jesus merely "send him away"--he "immediately threw him out" (exebelen).
Ched Myers argues that, most likely, the leper had already been to the priests and been rejected. (Exebelen could also mean "sent back.") Levitical purity laws specified that it was up to priests to preside over ritual cleansing and certify when and if a person had been healed and could be re-admitted to the community. Jesus' anger, says Myers, originates in the priestly system's continued ostracism of the leper. The leper is ordered back to the priest as a witness to them.
Note the change from the singular "priest" to the plural "them." Myers doesn't say this, but Jesus' instruction that the leper go "to the priest" supports his thesis. The definite article preceding the word "priest" may well mean the same priest who rejected the leper.
That the leper will be a "witness to them" indicates an indictment of the entire purity system, the arrangement that ostracized the leper in the first place.
The episode may well be a kind of midrash (commentary) on the "Malachi" oracle Mark has already cited in his prologue (1:2). That oracle goes on to promise that Yahweh will "cleanse" (LXX, katharizon) the sons of Levi until they "bring their offerings in true justice" (LSS, prosagontes thusian en kidaisune, Mal 3:3). It further promises that Yahweh will appear as a "witness" (LXX martus) against those who use the cultic apparatus to oppress the poor and marginal (Mal 3:5)...(Myers, p. 15)
The now-cleansed leper does not do, however, what Jesus instructed him to do. Instead, he "went out and he began to proclaim much." Jesus' cover, even in the countryside, is blown. He can no longer go into a town openly--literally, "open to sight." He is now limited to "deserted places."
Even then, however, people came to him from everywhere. Even though Jesus is now a "marked man" in the populated areas, including small towns, somehow the poor still can find their way to him.
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