This coming Sunday is the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time.  These miracles have to be understood as within the framework of ceremonial cleanliness. What is clear is that both the woman and the girl were not pure/clean in the Levitical sense because of illness/death. In Jewish thought uncleanness was infectious, a human being might incur it by contact with any unclean person or thing (Lev. 5:3); but the law regarded three forms of uncleanness as serious enough to exclude the infected person from society. These were leprosy, uncleanness caused by bodily discharges, and impurity resulting from contact with the dead (Num. 5:2-4). This is not a topic that is just being introduced in Mark 5. Recall the connection with the ending of Mark 4: the exorcism of the unclean spirits from the man living in the (unclean) tombs into the (unclean) pigs. Continue reading →

This coming Sunday is the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Lectionary Cycle B. Last Sunday, in the 12th Sunday’s gospel, Jesus begins teaching the disciples with the first in a series of miracles that demonstrate the extraordinary character of Jesus’ power

• Calming the storm at sea — the disciples still have no faith (Mk 4:34-41)
• Casting a demon from a man and the subsequent desire of the locals that  Jesus leave town even as the healed man becomes a witness (Mk 5:1-20)
• Raising Jairus’ daughter – “don’t be afraid, only believe” (Mk 5:21-24, 35-43)
• Healing the bleeding woman – her faith saved her (Mk 5:25-34)

Continue reading →