Lange Commentary - Mark 7:32 - 7:37

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Lange Commentary - Mark 7:32 - 7:37


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

4. The Healing of the Deaf and Dumb Man. Mar_7:32-37

(Parallel: Mat_15:29-31)

      32And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech 33[a stammerer]; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him. And he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his 34tongue: And, looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that Isaiah , 35 Be opened. And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain. 36And he charged them that they should tell no man: but the more he charged them, so much the more a great deal they published it; 37And were beyond measure astonished, saying, He hath done all things well: he maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

See on Matthew.—The healing of the deaf and dumb man on the east side of the Jordan is a narrative peculiar to Mark. In regard to time it is closely connected with the two foregoing events: occurring at the termination of the Lord’s travels towards Phœnicia and through Decapolis back to the eastern border of the Sea of Galilee (Gaulonitis). Mark shows, in his account of the miracles, a preference for those healings in which the gradual process of the cure, as connected with the instrument and the development of it, is vividly presented. Thus, in his account, the daughter of the Syrophenician woman lies exhausted upon her bed after her deliverance. Thus, he represents Jesus as commanding them to give the daughter of Jairus something to eat. And he alone records the healing of the blind man at Bethsaida—a process which was gradual, and performed in two stages. And here he alone communicates a narrative in which the miraculous act of the Lord is closely connected with the application of the saliva.

Mar_7:32. A deaf man, who could not well speak.—Meyer opposes this translation: “ êùöὸí ìïãéëÜëïí is wrongly translated, a deaf man difficult of speech (see Beza, Maldonatus, De Wette).— ÌïãéëÜëïò , although it seems in its formation to be hard of speech, corresponds in the Septuagint to the Hebrew àִìֵּí , dumb. See Isa_35:5, &c. Hence it is a deaf and dumb man (Vulgate, Luther, Calovius, Ewald), which is also confirmed by ἀëÜëïõò .” Since ìïãéëÜëïò does literally mean one who speaks with difficulty,—and it is said of this one, that after his cure he spoke ὀñèῶò (not simply he spoke),—the meaning of the words is sufficiently established. With deafness there is connected a disturbance of the organs of speech, or a general perversion of speech.

Mar_7:33. Aside from the multitude.—Wherefore? 1. He would make no display (Theophylact); He would not nourish superstition (Reinhard); He would have an undisturbed relation between Himself and the sick man (Meyer). This last is the weakest reason; for we might for the same reason except the same thing elsewhere. Rather we may assume that the district of Decapolis was something like the region of Tyre and Sidon: it was not a purely Jewish land. Here it was necessary, especially in this time of crisis, that He should avoid a publicity which might bring together the Gentiles in crowds, excite superstition as much as faith, and create in the minds of the Jews a prejudice against Him. In an analogous manner the Lord acted in the case of the blind man of eastern Bethsaida: He led him altogether out of the village. In both cases, however, we must remember that it was a susceptibility of faith which was to be gradually awakened. See the Doctrinal Reflections.—And put His fingers.—A similar circumstantial procedure we have in the healing of the blind man, Mark 8. “But we are not to assume that Jesus desired in any sense to conceal the miraculous element in the cures (Lange, Leben Jesu, ii. 1, p. 282), which would amount to untruth.” Meyer. But, upon this principle, the disguise thrown over the evangelical truths of the Gospel through the employment of parables, would amount to untruthfulness.

And He spit.—Spitting, He touched His tongue. Meyer thinks that the touching was the direct spitting upon the tongue. But as the touching ( ἅðôåóèáé ) is elsewhere an application of the hand, it may be assumed that He moistened His finger and touched therewith the man’s tongue. Saliva used in healing: here; Mar_8:23; Joh_9:6. De Wette: Saliva was in antiquity a remedy for the eyes (Plin. H. N. 28, 7; Tacit. Hist. 4, 21; Sueton. Vesp. Cp. 7; Tanchuma, f. 10, 2; Sanhed., f. 101, 1; Hieros. Sotah, f. 16, 4; Vajikra Rabba, f. 175, 2. Comp. Wetstein and Lightfoot, ad Joh. ix. 6). Meyer: “The saliva is, like the oil (Mar_6:13), to be regarded as a conductor of the miraculous power.” Yet it was not applied in the cure of the ear, but only in the healing of the tongue here, as Mark 8 in the healing of the eyes. Wherefore then was this distinction? Probably because the saliva was better suited to be a symbolical medium for the awakening of faith, and it was never wont to be applied to the ear.

Mar_7:34. Looking up to heaven, He sighed.—Manifestly the sighing of prayer. How much more easily He seemed to accomplish His healing on other occasions! Or was deafness, in its spiritual significance, much worse than blindness and possession; and did the Lord intend to signify that? We assume, 1. that in this half-heathen district, more imperfect and disturbed forms of faith presented themselves to Him, which made the healing on His part more of a conflict; and 2. that in this half-heathen district, where they generally believed in demigods and magic, He desired to make more definitely prominent His own dependence on God the Father. For the like reason—that is, because the Pharisees had blasphemed the source of His miraculous power—He accomplished the raising of Lazarus before the Jews from Jerusalem in connection with a loud prayer to the Father; and in healing the man born blind, John 9, He joined with Himself in the work the temple-fountain Siloam, the holy spring of the priests. 3. Since the Lord could not influence the deaf man by word, it was necessary that He should influence Him by a strongly speaking sign.—Mark everywhere sets a special mark on the sighing of the Lord, as also upon His manner of looking: comp. Mar_8:12. Meyer remarks, and rightly, that this sigh was at the same time a sigh of painful sympathy.—Ephphatha.—An Aramæan word, in the Imperative: Be thou opened. Related, though not identical, is the Hebrew ôָּúַç , in the Imper. Niphal.

Mar_7:35. And the string of His tongue was loosed.—Thus he did not merely speak with difficulty on account of his being dumb, as Olshausen supposes.

Mar_7:36. But the more He charged them.—The stronger His prohibition was, the more it enkindled a desire to spread the report of the miracle.

Ver: 37. He hath done all things well; that is, in the healing.—Thence they draw the conclusion: As well the deaf, He hath, &c.

DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL

1. Nothing is more instructive and full of significance than the prudence of our Lord in respect to the publication of His miracles, as soon as He had entered the borders of the land where there were closer relations with heathenism, and the people were more infected by heathen views:—the history of the woman of Canaan, the present narrative, and the healing of the blind man in eastern Bethsaida, all illustrate this. The reason was, that Christ would have a monotheistic faith, which traces all up to God the Father as the final source, and that He would not suffer His divine power of healing to be mingled and debased with superstitious and magical notions. This holy prudence will explain many and great restraints upon the full influence of Christianity in the heathen or heathen-Christian world, down to the present day.

2. We may compare the doxology of this people, Mar_7:37, with the doxologies of Mar_1:27; Mar_2:12; Mar_3:11, &c. Matthew explains: They glorified the God of Israel.

3. It must be particularly observed here also, that Jesus could affect this deaf and dumb man only through His glance, His immediate revelation, His signs, and manner of action. So far this instance stands alone; for the youth who was deaf and dumb through possession, Mar_9:25, suffered not through the sealing up of his organs, but through the perversion and violence done to his soul. So also the possessed who was dumb, Mat_9:32; and the demoniac who was blind and dumb, Mat_12:22.

4. Our Christian institutions for the deaf and dumb are an abiding monument of that miraculous healing in the mountains: the natural development of the miraculous act of our Lord. The healing of the deaf and dumb by signs, was a type of the instruction of the deaf and dumb.

5. The Romish rite of baptism relies especially on this miraculous history, because it exhibits the use of several symbolical elements: 1. Separation from the multitude: dedication of Christ in baptism. 2. The baptizing priest touches, with an Ephphatha, the ears of the infant; 3. moistens its nostrils with saliva; 4. lays salt in its mouth. The Christian Church should do all this in a real manner, and not in a symbolical. As the symbol for it, and at the same time the reality of it, Christ instituted simple baptism.

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

Sufferers to be brought to Jesus.—The healing of the deaf and dumb; or, the double disease and the double cure in their reciprocal connection. 1. The connection between deafness and the inability to speak: a. in physical things; b. in spiritual. 2. Right speaking conditioned by right hearing: in natural life, in spiritual things.—He who does not persevere to the end in hearing aright will surely cease by degrees to speak aright.—The true obedience is of eminently quick and sure hearing.—The education of the deaf and dumb man in faith: 1. He must yield himself up to be led by the strange Wonder-worker, who can only speak to him by looks, into the wilderness; 2. he must see His signs, especially the signs of His prayer and His sighing; 3. he must hear his word of power, that he may have his hearing and be able also to speak.—The holy care of the Lord in all His wonderful works, aiming ever at the glory of God’s name.—How the wonder-working majesty of Jesus is concealed in His humility.—Christ, as He went on His way, opposed and avoided with the same decided earnestness the heathenism which deified men and the world, and the Judaism which deified the letter and ceremonial observances.—Christ had to struggle as well with superstition as with unbelief, to exalt both into faith.—All Christ’s miracles were to the honor of God: 1. All His miracles were miracles of prayer, dependence on God, and strict union with His Father; 2. all His miracles were distinguished, not only in their reason and their end, but also in their form and manner, from the magical works of the heathen world.—Christ ever conceals the thousands of His miracles by the disguise of an unpretending medium.—Christ in His whole being full of saving power.—The sighing of Christ and of His Spirit (Rom_8:26) over the sin and the misery of humanity and the creature.—The sympathy of Christ.—Guilt and innocence in the popular proclamation of Christ’s works.—The words of His astonished people: He hath done all things well: 1. In its human limitation; 2. in its higher significance.—Concerning redemption as concerning the creation, the word holds good, The Lord hath done all things well (Gen_1:31): 1. in the whole, 2. in the details.

Starke:—Where Jesus goes in and out, there is nought but blessing.—Canstein:—When we look at the deaf and dumb, it should make us reverence all the more the glorious gifts of hearing and speech, and determine to use both prudently to the glory of God.—Zeisius:—Most people can both hear and speak; but how great and how common is spiritual deafness and dumbness!—Luther:—Christ begins His cure with the ears, and acts in accordance with nature; since from hearing speaking comes: ἀêïÞ begets ὑðáêïÞí .—Lange:—Let us seek silence.—A Christian should often sigh over spiritual and bodily misery.—The ears should be open for God, but shut to the devil and the world.—It is a sign that the tongue has been loosened by Christ, when the words become holy, and the new song is sung to His glory out of a new heart.—Quesnel:—The humility of the benefactor, and the thankfulness of him who has received the benefit, may contend without damaging peace in the heart.—Wondering at God’s works is well; but it should never end there.—Nova Bibl. Tub.:—God doeth all things well, not only in healing and binding up, but also in smiting and wounding.—Zeisius:—As Satan damages and ruins everything, so, on the contrary, Christ repairs all things.—Braune:—The Lord guides all His own in various ways, every one in his own; but the goal for all is the great salvation longed for.—Jesus speaks the right language of signs to the deaf and dumb.—Gerlach:—The words, “He hath done all things well,” seem to express an anticipation of the new creation.—Jesus finds His glory in the deaf ears of hardened sinners, and in the speechless or restrained tongues of unthankful, earthly-minded unbelievers. Even from among them He takes many into solitude with Him: His creating hand touches the sealed ear and the idle tongue, His high-priestly intercession groans to the Father for them, and often His Ephphatha opens the ear and looses the bonds of their tongue, so that they may speak plainly.—Lisco:—The turning of the eyes of Jesus towards heaven should teach us to expect our help from thence, and thither to direct our thanksgivings.—Schleiermacher:—That love which could manifest itself so mightily in the Redeemer is among us in our benevolent institutions. But if we ask what has driven men to think upon this, we can say no more than that it is the selfsame Spirit of love who is for ever striving to meet and overcome all the woes and sufferings of humanity.—What a great and wonderful word is this “Be opened,” which the Redeemer was ever speaking throughout His whole manifestation, and the influences of which have never ceased, but will go on until the whole race of mankind have come to the hearing and knowledge of His salvation, and their tongues shall be loosed to the praise of the Most High!—Heubner:—The significance of the healing of the deaf and dumb (in its spiritual application): 1. The person of the wretched one; 2. the leading him to Jesus; 3. the action of our Lord; 4. His looking up to heaven and sighing; 5. His work; 6. His prohibition (the conversion of a sinner should not be boastfully trumpeted to the world; it should exert its influence silently).—Christ the only Physician who can repair the mischiefs in God’s creation.—How much knowledge of God may come through the senses.—Bauer:—How many are still deaf and dumb towards the kingdom of God!

Klefeker:—Even in the sufferings of His creature man, God finds His glory.—Reinhard:—How we, as Christians, should sanctify to our own good the defects, infirmities, and sicknesses of our bodies.—Huffell:—The Christian’s look to heaven.—Reinhard:—The quiet unostentatious zeal with which Christians should do good.—Thiess:—The deaf and dumb man is a type of us.—Couard:—He took him out of the crowd apart.—Bomhard:—The Ephphatha of our Redeemer: 1. A word of omnipotence and grace; 2. great and glorious in its effect; 3. it is uttered to all of us; 4. it is vain for many; 5. it proves its virtue on believers, ever more beautifully and abundantly; 6. it will one day abolish for ever all our fetters.—Rautenberg:—He hath done all things well: 1. Praise of His perfection—wonder; 2. praise of His benevolence—thanksgiving; 3. praise of His glory—adoration.

Footnotes:

[Mar_7:32.—After êùöüí , Lachmann and Tischendorf, after B., D., Ä ., Versions, have êáß .—Ed.]

Mar_7:35.— ÅὐèÝùò is wanting here in B., D., L., Ä ., Versions, Lachmann, Tischendorf. Instead of äéçíïß÷èçóáí , Lachmann and Tischendorf, after B., D., Ä ., read ἠíïßãçóáí .

[Mar_7:36.— Áὐôüò is wanting in A., B., L., Ä ., Vulgate, Laehmann, Tisc hendorf.—Ed.)