Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated) (790 page)
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Authors: George Eliot
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ventured to reproduce.* On this view of the incident it is also impossible to explain what Jesus says to the cured man on a subsequent meeting (v. 14): Behold thou art -made whole ; sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee. Even Paulus is compelled by these words to admit that the man had a real infirmity, though only a trifling one:-in other words he is compelled to admit the inadequacy of the idea on which his explanation of the incident is hased, so that here again we retain a miracle, and that not of the smallest.
In relation to the historical credibility of the narrative, it may certainly be held remarkable that so important a sanative institution as Bethesda is described to be by John, is not mentioned either by Josephus or the rabbins, especially if the popular “belief connected a miraculous cure with this pool-.f but this affords nothing decisive. It is true that in the description of the pool there lies a fabulous popular notion, which appears also to have been received Toy the writer (for even if v. 4 be spurious, something similar is contained in the words Krwjtrtf rov i;<5a.Toc, v. 3, and rapaxOfj, v. 7). But this proves nothing against the truth of the narrative,
since even an eye-witness and a disciple of Jesus may have shared a vulgar error. To make credible, however, such a fact as that a man who had been lame eight-and-thirty years, so that he was unahle to walk, and completely bed-ridden, should have been perfectly cured by a word, the supposition of psychological influence will not suffice, for the man had no knowledge whatever of Jesus, v. 13;
nor will any physical analogy, such as magnetism and the like, serve the purpose : but if such a result really happened,- we must exalt that by which it happened above all the limits of the human and the natural. On the other hand, it ought never to have been thought a difficulty^ that from among the multitude of the infirm waiting in the porches of the pool, Jesus selected one only as the object of his curative power, since the cure of him whose sufferings had been of the longest duration was not only particularly adapted, but also sufficient, to glorify the miraculous power of the Messiah. Nevertheless, it is this very trait which suggests a suspicion that the narrative has a mythical character. On a great theatre of disease, crowded with all kinds of sufferers, Jesus, the exalted and miraculously gifted physician, appears and selects the one who is afflicted with the most obstinate malady, that by his restoration he may present the most brilliant proof of his miraculous power.We have already remarked that the fourth gospel, instead of extending the curative agency of Jesus over large masses and to a great variety of diseases, as the synoptical gospels do, concentrates it on a few cases which proportionately gain in intensity:
thus here, in the narrative of the cure of a man who had been lame thirty-eight years, it has far surpassed all the synoptical accounts of cures per’’“ •• - •’“-»i* S. 298.t Bretschneider, MIRACLES-RESUSCITATIONS OF THE DEAD.formed on persons with diseased limbs, among whom the longest sufferer is described in Luke xiii. 11, only as a woman who had had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years. Without doubt the fourth evangelist had received some intimation (though, as we have gathered from other parts of his history, it was far from precise) of cures of this nature performed by Jesus, especially of that wrought on the paralytic, Matt. ix. 2 ff. parall., for the address to the patient, and the result of the cure are in this narrative in John almost verbally the same as in that case, especially according to Mark’s account.* There is even a vestige in this history of John, of the circumstance that in the synoptical narrative the cure appears in the light of a forgiveness of sins ; for as Jesus in the latter consoles the patient, before the cure, with the assurance, thy sins are forgiven thee, so in the former, he warns him, after the cure, in the words, sin no more, &c. For the rest, this highly embellished history of a miraculous cure was represented as happening on the sabbath, probably because the command to take up the bed which it contained appeared the most suitable occasion for the reproach of violating the sabbath.
since even an eye-witness and a disciple of Jesus may have shared a vulgar error. To make credible, however, such a fact as that a man who had been lame eight-and-thirty years, so that he was unahle to walk, and completely bed-ridden, should have been perfectly cured by a word, the supposition of psychological influence will not suffice, for the man had no knowledge whatever of Jesus, v. 13;
nor will any physical analogy, such as magnetism and the like, serve the purpose : but if such a result really happened,- we must exalt that by which it happened above all the limits of the human and the natural. On the other hand, it ought never to have been thought a difficulty^ that from among the multitude of the infirm waiting in the porches of the pool, Jesus selected one only as the object of his curative power, since the cure of him whose sufferings had been of the longest duration was not only particularly adapted, but also sufficient, to glorify the miraculous power of the Messiah. Nevertheless, it is this very trait which suggests a suspicion that the narrative has a mythical character. On a great theatre of disease, crowded with all kinds of sufferers, Jesus, the exalted and miraculously gifted physician, appears and selects the one who is afflicted with the most obstinate malady, that by his restoration he may present the most brilliant proof of his miraculous power.We have already remarked that the fourth gospel, instead of extending the curative agency of Jesus over large masses and to a great variety of diseases, as the synoptical gospels do, concentrates it on a few cases which proportionately gain in intensity:
thus here, in the narrative of the cure of a man who had been lame thirty-eight years, it has far surpassed all the synoptical accounts of cures per’’“ •• - •’“-»i* S. 298.t Bretschneider, MIRACLES-RESUSCITATIONS OF THE DEAD.formed on persons with diseased limbs, among whom the longest sufferer is described in Luke xiii. 11, only as a woman who had had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years. Without doubt the fourth evangelist had received some intimation (though, as we have gathered from other parts of his history, it was far from precise) of cures of this nature performed by Jesus, especially of that wrought on the paralytic, Matt. ix. 2 ff. parall., for the address to the patient, and the result of the cure are in this narrative in John almost verbally the same as in that case, especially according to Mark’s account.* There is even a vestige in this history of John, of the circumstance that in the synoptical narrative the cure appears in the light of a forgiveness of sins ; for as Jesus in the latter consoles the patient, before the cure, with the assurance, thy sins are forgiven thee, so in the former, he warns him, after the cure, in the words, sin no more, &c. For the rest, this highly embellished history of a miraculous cure was represented as happening on the sabbath, probably because the command to take up the bed which it contained appeared the most suitable occasion for the reproach of violating the sabbath.
§ 100.
RESUSCITATIONS OF THE DEAD.
RESUSCITATIONS OF THE DEAD.
THE evangelists tell us of three instances in which Jesus recalled the dead to life. One of these is common to the three synoptists, one belongs solely to Luke, and one to John.
The instance which is common to the three first evangelists is the resuscitation of a girl, and is in all the three gospels united with the narrative of the woman who had an issue of blood (Matt. ix. 18 f. 23-26; Mark v. 22 if.; Luke viii. 41 ff.). In the more precise designation of the girl and her father, the synoptical writers vary. Matthew introduces the father generally as dp^av «f a certain ruler, without any name; the two others as a ruler of the synagogue named Jairus: the latter moreover describes the girl as being twelve years old, and Luke states that she was the only child of her father; particulars of which Matthew is ignorant. A more important difference is, that according to Matthew the ruler in the first instance speaks of his daughter to Jesus as being dead, and in treat s him to restore her to life; whereas according to the two other evangelists, he left her while yet living, though on the point ot death, that he might fetch Jesus to avert her actual decease, and first when Jesus was on the way with him, people came out of his house with the information that his daughter had in the mean time F
Mark ii. 9 :(r’l eariv evKC^arepov,
John v. 8 :eysipal, apov Tbv KpaflfiaTOV
Mark ii. 9 :(r’l eariv evKC^arepov,
John v. 8 :eysipal, apov Tbv KpaflfiaTOV
iirotv---------) iyetpai, Kal upov aov rdv KpiiS-ami. nai mpmaTei.
oarov Kai TTfpiTnmi;
11 : - fj’tvpnt, Kal apov rbv Kpafiftarov ami feu vrrai’e elf TOV olxi’jv am. a 12 : ,Kal *iytir&i] evdf-uf, Kal upaf rbv Kfiuj}-
9 : Kal rfujfof eyfvcro vyibs 6 uvdpuirof, ffaruu i-^ArftT ivavriov TTUVTUV.
va/ rinp rnv KnatiftnTnv mirnfi Knl TrFnis.TraTEl.THE LIFE OF JESUS.
9 : Kal rfujfof eyfvcro vyibs 6 uvdpuirof, ffaruu i-^ArftT ivavriov TTUVTUV.
va/ rinp rnv KnatiftnTnv mirnfi Knl TrFnis.TraTEl.THE LIFE OF JESUS.
expired, so that to trouble Jesus farther was in vain. The circumstances of the resuscitation also are differently described, for Matthew knows not that Jesus, as the other evangelists state, took with him only his three most confidential disciples as witnesses. Some theologians, Storr for example, have thought these divergencies so important, that they have supposed two different cases in which, among other similar circumstances, the daughter, in one case of a civil ruler (Matthew), in the other of a ruler of the synagogue named Jairus (Mark and Luke), was raised from the dead by Jesus.*But that, as Storr supposes, and as it is inevitable to suppose on his view, Jesus not only twice resuscitated a girl, but also on both these occasions, healed a woman with an issue immediately before, is a coincidence which docs not at all gain in probability by the vague observation of Storr, that it is quite possible for very similar things to happen at different times. If then it must be admitted that the evangelists narrate only one event, the weak attempt to give perfect agreement to their narratives should be forborne. For neither can the expression of Matthew apri eretevrriae mean,
as Kuinol maintains,!
est
morti proximo,,
nor
can
that of Mark, tff^arwf e^et, or of Luke d-nidvriciKe, imply that death had already taken place: no^ to mention that according to both, the fact of the death is subsequently announced to the father as something Tiew.f Our more modern critics have wisely admitted a divergency between the accounts; in doing which they have unanimously given the palm of superior accuracy to the intermediate evangelists.Some are lenient towards Matthew, and only attribute to his mode of narration a brevity which might belong even to the representation of an eye-witness ;§ while others regard this want of particularity as an indication that the first gospel had not an apostolic origin. || Now that Mark and Luke give the name of the applicant, on which Matthew is silent, and also that they determine his rank more precisely than the latter, will just as well bear an unfavourable construction for them, as the usual favourable one ; since the designation of persons by name, as Ave have before remarked, is not seldom an addition of the later legend. For example, the woman with the issue first receives the name of Veronica in the tradition of John Malala j8! the Canaanitish woman that of Justa in the Clementine Homilies ;** and the two thieves crucified with Jesus, the names of Gestas and Demas in the gospel of Nicodemus.ttLuke’s ^ovoyevi^ (one only daughter) only serves to make the scene more touching, MIRACLES-RESUSCITATIONS OF THE DEAD.and the i~&v duSena twelve years of age, he, and after him Mark, mi”‘ht have borrowed from the history of the woman with the issue. The divergency that, according to Matthew, the maiden is spoken of in the first instance as dead, according to the two others as only dying, must have been considered very superficially by those who have thought it possible to turn it in accordance with our own rule to the disadvantage of Matthew, on the ground that his representation serves to aggrandize the miracle.For in both the other gospels the death of the girl is subsequently announced, and its being supposed inMatthew to have occurred a few moments earlier is no aggrandizement of the miracle.Nay, it is the reverse; for the miraculous power of
Jesus
appears greater in the former,
not indeed objectively, but subjectively, because it is heightened by contrast and surprise. There, where Jesus is’ in the first instance intreated to restore the dead to life, he docs no more than what was desired of him ; here, on the contrary, where supplicated only for the cure of a sick person, he actually brings that person to life again, he does more than the interested parties seek or understand.
There, where the power of awaking the dead is presupposed by the father to belong to Jesus, the extraordinary nature of such a power is less marked than here, where the father at first only presupposes the power of Lealino; the sick, and when death has supervened, is diverted from any further hope.
In the description of the arrival and the conduct of Jesus in the house where the corpse lav, Matthew’s brevity is at least clearer than the diffuse accounts of the two other evangelists. Matthew tells us that Jesus, having reached the house, put forth the minstrels already assembled for the funeral, together with the rest of the crowd, on the ground that there would be no funeral there; this is perfectly intelligible. But Mark and Luke tell us besides that he excluded his disciples also, with the exception of three, from the scene about to take place, and for this it is difficult to discover a reason.
That a greater number of spectators would have been physically or psychologically an impediment to the resuscitation, can only be said on the supposition that the event was a natural one. Admitting the miracle, the reason for the exclusion can only be sought in the want of fitness in the excluded parties, whom however, the sight of such a miracle would surely have been the very means to benefit.
But we must not omit to observe that the two later synoptists, in opposition to the concluding statement of Matthew that the fame of this event went abroad in the whole land, represent Jesus as enjoining the strictest silence on the witnesses: so that^ on the whole it rather appears that Mark and Luke regarded the incident as a mystery, to which only the nearest relatives and the most favoured disciples were admitted.
Lastly, the difference on which Sehulz insists as favourable to the second and third evangelist, namely, that while Matthew makes Jesus
simply take the ninidcn by the hand, they have preserved to us the words which he at the s.nnip fin™
as Kuinol maintains,!
est
morti proximo,,
nor
can
that of Mark, tff^arwf e^et, or of Luke d-nidvriciKe, imply that death had already taken place: no^ to mention that according to both, the fact of the death is subsequently announced to the father as something Tiew.f Our more modern critics have wisely admitted a divergency between the accounts; in doing which they have unanimously given the palm of superior accuracy to the intermediate evangelists.Some are lenient towards Matthew, and only attribute to his mode of narration a brevity which might belong even to the representation of an eye-witness ;§ while others regard this want of particularity as an indication that the first gospel had not an apostolic origin. || Now that Mark and Luke give the name of the applicant, on which Matthew is silent, and also that they determine his rank more precisely than the latter, will just as well bear an unfavourable construction for them, as the usual favourable one ; since the designation of persons by name, as Ave have before remarked, is not seldom an addition of the later legend. For example, the woman with the issue first receives the name of Veronica in the tradition of John Malala j8! the Canaanitish woman that of Justa in the Clementine Homilies ;** and the two thieves crucified with Jesus, the names of Gestas and Demas in the gospel of Nicodemus.ttLuke’s ^ovoyevi^ (one only daughter) only serves to make the scene more touching, MIRACLES-RESUSCITATIONS OF THE DEAD.and the i~&v duSena twelve years of age, he, and after him Mark, mi”‘ht have borrowed from the history of the woman with the issue. The divergency that, according to Matthew, the maiden is spoken of in the first instance as dead, according to the two others as only dying, must have been considered very superficially by those who have thought it possible to turn it in accordance with our own rule to the disadvantage of Matthew, on the ground that his representation serves to aggrandize the miracle.For in both the other gospels the death of the girl is subsequently announced, and its being supposed inMatthew to have occurred a few moments earlier is no aggrandizement of the miracle.Nay, it is the reverse; for the miraculous power of
Jesus
appears greater in the former,
not indeed objectively, but subjectively, because it is heightened by contrast and surprise. There, where Jesus is’ in the first instance intreated to restore the dead to life, he docs no more than what was desired of him ; here, on the contrary, where supplicated only for the cure of a sick person, he actually brings that person to life again, he does more than the interested parties seek or understand.
There, where the power of awaking the dead is presupposed by the father to belong to Jesus, the extraordinary nature of such a power is less marked than here, where the father at first only presupposes the power of Lealino; the sick, and when death has supervened, is diverted from any further hope.
In the description of the arrival and the conduct of Jesus in the house where the corpse lav, Matthew’s brevity is at least clearer than the diffuse accounts of the two other evangelists. Matthew tells us that Jesus, having reached the house, put forth the minstrels already assembled for the funeral, together with the rest of the crowd, on the ground that there would be no funeral there; this is perfectly intelligible. But Mark and Luke tell us besides that he excluded his disciples also, with the exception of three, from the scene about to take place, and for this it is difficult to discover a reason.
That a greater number of spectators would have been physically or psychologically an impediment to the resuscitation, can only be said on the supposition that the event was a natural one. Admitting the miracle, the reason for the exclusion can only be sought in the want of fitness in the excluded parties, whom however, the sight of such a miracle would surely have been the very means to benefit.
But we must not omit to observe that the two later synoptists, in opposition to the concluding statement of Matthew that the fame of this event went abroad in the whole land, represent Jesus as enjoining the strictest silence on the witnesses: so that^ on the whole it rather appears that Mark and Luke regarded the incident as a mystery, to which only the nearest relatives and the most favoured disciples were admitted.
Lastly, the difference on which Sehulz insists as favourable to the second and third evangelist, namely, that while Matthew makes Jesus
simply take the ninidcn by the hand, they have preserved to us the words which he at the s.nnip fin™
,,H-r>..nr\
+!,,>AvTHE LIFE OF JESUS.
+!,,>AvTHE LIFE OF JESUS.
can either have no weight at all, or it must fall into the opposite scale. For that Jesus, if he said anything when recalling a girl to life, made use of some such words as i\ ~ai(; kyelpov, maiden, I say unto t/iee, arise, the most remote narrator might imagine, and to regard the ra/UGd KOVJU of Mark as an indication, that this evangelist drew from a peculiarly original source, is to forget the more simple supposition that he translated these words from the Greek of his informant for the sake of presenting the life-giving word in its original foreign garb, and thus enhancing its mysteriousness, as we have before observed with reference to the trjx}>aOd in the cure of the deaf man.
After what we have
seen we shall willingly abstain from finding out whether the individual who originally furnished the narrative in
Luke were
one of the three
confidential
disciples, and whether the one who originally related it, also put it into writing: a task to which only the acumen of Schleiermacher is equal.*
After what we have
seen we shall willingly abstain from finding out whether the individual who originally furnished the narrative in
Luke were
one of the three
confidential
disciples, and whether the one who originally related it, also put it into writing: a task to which only the acumen of Schleiermacher is equal.*
In relation to the facts of the ease, the natural interpretation speaks with more than its usual confidence, under the persuasion that it has on its side the assurance of Jesus himself, that the maiden was not really dead, but merely in a sleep-like swoon; and not only rationalists, like Paulus, and seniirationalists, like Schleiermacher, but also decided
supranaturalists, like Olshauscu, believe, on the strength of that declaration of Jesus, that this was no resuscitation of the dead.f The last-named commentator attaches especial importance to the antithesis in the speech of Jesus, and because the words OVK d-XKOave, is not dead, are followed by a/.Aa KaOKvdd, but sieejjeth, is of opinion that the former expression cannot be interpreted to mean merely, she is not dead, since I have resolved to restore her to life, strange criticism,-for it is precisely this addition which shows that she was only not dead, in so far as it was in the power of Jesus to recall her to life. Reference is also made to the declaration of Jesus concerning Lazarus, John xi. 14, Aa^apo^ drtiOave, Lazarus is dead, which is directly the reverse of the passage in question, OVK d-nsOave. TO Kopdoiov the damsel is not dead. But Jesus had before said of Lazarus, aurrj •/; daQivua OVK Hart, -rrpof Oavarov, this sickness is not unto death (v. 4.), and ^d^apot; v <£iAof TJJMV Keiwi-[irjTai, our friend Lazarus sleepet/i (v. 11). Thus in the case of Lazarus also, who was really dead, we have just as direct a denial of death, and affirmation of mere sleep, as in the narrative before us. Hence Fritzsclie is undoubtedly right when he paraphrases the words of Jesus in our passage as follows ;j)ucllam nc p>\> i/iortua habetote, sed dor mire, existiinatote, quippe in vitam i/iox reditiiram. Moreover. Matthew, subsequently (xi. 5) makes Jesus say, veicpoi ry«-povrai, the dead are raised up; and as he mentions no other instance * Ut sup. S. 12!). f Paulus, cxcg. llandb. 1. B. S. 520, 31 f,; Schleiermarhcr, »t Blip. S. 1 •>‘.> ; Olshausen, lt S. ;>j?7. Even Neamler does not express himself >!<•’ i’ledly against this interpretation of the \vorils of Jesus; while ^vith regard to the p;ir’: ‘.• > .’ ron”•-II1l’!•!...
-..HI
supranaturalists, like Olshauscu, believe, on the strength of that declaration of Jesus, that this was no resuscitation of the dead.f The last-named commentator attaches especial importance to the antithesis in the speech of Jesus, and because the words OVK d-XKOave, is not dead, are followed by a/.Aa KaOKvdd, but sieejjeth, is of opinion that the former expression cannot be interpreted to mean merely, she is not dead, since I have resolved to restore her to life, strange criticism,-for it is precisely this addition which shows that she was only not dead, in so far as it was in the power of Jesus to recall her to life. Reference is also made to the declaration of Jesus concerning Lazarus, John xi. 14, Aa^apo^ drtiOave, Lazarus is dead, which is directly the reverse of the passage in question, OVK d-nsOave. TO Kopdoiov the damsel is not dead. But Jesus had before said of Lazarus, aurrj •/; daQivua OVK Hart, -rrpof Oavarov, this sickness is not unto death (v. 4.), and ^d^apot; v <£iAof TJJMV Keiwi-[irjTai, our friend Lazarus sleepet/i (v. 11). Thus in the case of Lazarus also, who was really dead, we have just as direct a denial of death, and affirmation of mere sleep, as in the narrative before us. Hence Fritzsclie is undoubtedly right when he paraphrases the words of Jesus in our passage as follows ;j)ucllam nc p>\> i/iortua habetote, sed dor mire, existiinatote, quippe in vitam i/iox reditiiram. Moreover. Matthew, subsequently (xi. 5) makes Jesus say, veicpoi ry«-povrai, the dead are raised up; and as he mentions no other instance * Ut sup. S. 12!). f Paulus, cxcg. llandb. 1. B. S. 520, 31 f,; Schleiermarhcr, »t Blip. S. 1 •>‘.> ; Olshausen, lt S. ;>j?7. Even Neamler does not express himself >!<•’ i’ledly against this interpretation of the \vorils of Jesus; while ^vith regard to the p;ir’: ‘.• > .’ ron”•-II1l’!•!...
-..HI
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