{ healing and forgiveness, a postscript }

When I wrote the last post, I have to admit I rushed the end. I was so excited and relieved to have finally made some sense of Jesus’ enigmatic question, and so committed to keeping the series to only four posts, that the conclusion ended up, in my opinion, fairly trite. Okay, so the Church is about healing and forgiveness, but we knew this already. And that all this is gift, well, as it stands I fear that doesn’t read much better than a bumper sticker. So if I could have one more go at drawing some conclusions from this passage in Matthew, maybe these lengthy reflections could better be shown worthwhile.

My first complaint with my conclusion in the previous post is that, after all the reflection on the paralytic and the scribes, I rushed to put “us” - the readers - in the place of Jesus. And while I do not think that to be a wholly unwarranted move, I think it might be more helpful and honest to approach Jesus and our participation in Jesus, trough the other characters in the story. For if central to Jesus’ self and life was the attempt to form a community based on the Father’s love, then it would appear that we cannot understand Jesus in isolation, that we have to understand him in his being with others (for isn’t this even what it means to truly understand ourselves?).

This passage in Matthew presents two different ways of approaching Jesus: the way of the paralytic and the way of the scribes. I tried to show what I felt to be at the heart of each of these characters in the previous posts. The paralytic’s approach was characterized by the acknowledgment of brokenness and human vulnerability that is able to hear Jesus’ words and thus to truly be in his presence. The scribes’ “approach” however, wasn’t even an approach, but a skepticism that kept its distance. They displaced their own guilt (however unknowingly) and failed to recognize true author-ity in the midst of asserting their own (illusory) authority.

In view of these characterizations, I think that these parties, in one sense, represent a single, albeit divided, human being (I am not sure there is any other kind). In the confrontation with Jesus, we are asked to bring our self as we truly are - the paralytic. This is the self the Potter can work with. But to allow his hands to work, to shape his story in us, is to acknowledge that all authority on heaven and earth is His. But this is what is so hard. This is when we find ourselves with the scribes, when we do not understand that for Jesus to write our stories is for those stories to be more truly ours.

In this passage, if we read the two groups as a single individual, we have here the struggle of faith: between the self we truly are and are called to acknowledge, which somewhere we know has to be brought to Jesus, but which would require being seen as weak; and the self that we have authored ourselves, that can stand just fine in making judgments of right and wrong, being as learned and devoted as we are. There is the self that we must ask others to carry for us, because we know we are to weak to walk alone, and there is the self that stays among its kind because illusions (especially of strength) are easier held in numbers.

And the differences continue. The point I think needs making though, is that the Christian life is a move from one to the other, from scribe to paralytic. The Christian life takes us from the deep self-delusions, not of modernity or capitalism or communism, but of sin, and asks us to see ourselves as in need, as vulnerable, that is, as we truly are.

That Christian life is partly a “movement” from this one self-understanding to the other, requires a way, and that Way is Jesus. If we are to find ourselves freed of our illusions and vulnerable enough to hear the reality of forgiveness in Jesus, then we have to walk after him on the way to the place where true humanity inevitably ends up in our world, in brokenness, on the cross. That is the way that Jesus is, and as we grow in Christ along his way, we shall be graced by the acknowledgment of our vulnerability, of our fragile, needy humanity, and see ourselves more like the paralytic. That, anyways, is what Matthew calls “faith.”

But we cannot start walking unless we recognize that we are, at the moment, scribes, and that the world we have made ever calls us to take our throne. Jesus’ words of retribution, of calling our righteous judgments “sin,” have to be accepted as truthful if we are to acknowledge that we actually need forgiveness.

But do we stop with the paralytic as our model for humanity? That is to ask, was my move of identifying “us,” the Church, with Jesus a legitimate move? Let me try to answer that question by way of, and in the midst of, another.

Thinking back through the story, and about the comments my friend had written about the similar event in Mark, I thought it interesting who was given voice in the story. As my friend pointed out, the paralytic never says a word. Put this in contrast then with the scribes who do have a voice, and use it to make the accusation of blasphemy.

But why does the paralytic not speak? Why does he not refute the scribes? To experience the forgiveness of God and not rebuke those who would condemn that act as evil? Would not then have been the most justified time to speak?

But he doesn’t. By one reading, he is content with Jesus speaking for him. Maybe to refute the scribes himself would be giving into the desire to be the author of his own words? For if Jesus is speaking on his behalf, what need he say? What could he say? Maybe then, in the forgiven man’s silence, we can read trust.

Saying all this, what then do we make of a Church that claims to be the body of Christ? And this is made complicated, or better, made more mysterious, by the consideration that the Church is Jesus’ resurrected body. Before his crucifixion and death, we knew how to make sense of Jesus’ body - it was a body just like ours, in all its physicality and materiality. But in the body of the resurrected Jesus we find a deeper mystery, for here we have a body that appears and disappears, a body that is in the Eucharist, a body that is no longer bound by the same restrictions normal bodies are. In the resurrected Jesus, we have a body - a true body, not a metaphorical one - that is, in a deep reality, made up of and shared among several bodies.

This is why it is not so easy to say what “Church” is, for ecclesiology is wrapped up in christology. The mystery of the Church is the mystery of Christ. This does not mean we have to walk away from either, rather, pointing to them as “mystery” is the promise of deeper meanings to be found. So the truth of Church resides in the truth of God. Any theory that is content with stopping short of this will give us a false picture of Church and possibly an idolatrous image of God.

I say all this because I feel a tension in the text between the verbosity of Jesus and the silence of the paralytic in regard to identifying ourselves with one or the other.

For if we are the Church, then we can truly identify with Jesus, for this is what Jesus has promised and what Scripture attests to. And moreover, being Church, we affirm that Jesus’ humanity is the fullness of humanity. So it would seem that we are to identify with Jesus not just as his resurrected body, the Church, but also as living into the fullness of humanity that he is.

So if all this is the case, then it would seem we are to speak. Jesus spoke and still speaks through his body - for this is how all communication takes place; letters, phones, etc. are extensions of bodies. Thus, it would seem that for Jesus to speak today would be for his body, the Church, to speak, keeping in mind the caution that the Church is a mystery that we would be wary of limiting.

But, on the other hand, I feel that we are truly to be like the paralytic, for Jesus says this man has faith, and this is the very thing he asks of us. And Jesus, seeing their faith, forgives him, and this is the very things we need. Thus it would seem that we, like the paralytic, should remain silent, that to offer our own voice and rebuttal would be to revert back to asserting our own author-ity.

So do we speak as Jesus or do we wait in silence as Jesus speaks? Do we really think that if we don’t speak, Jesus will no longer speak in our world? That Jesus “needs” us to speak? But on the other hand, is there not something about the love of God that we participate in through the sharing of the Spirit of Jesus Christ that calls us to speak, to shatter the illusions of sin in the world and confront others with the promise that is forgiveness?

I do not know if we need to choose between these two. For I think there are indeed times when we need to remain silent and allow the Church to speak for and to us, but this is not out of resignation or quieted dissent, but out of a need for forgiveness and feelings of gratitude. I think too that the times wherein we will need to remain silent are also the times when our idea of Church will grow, when we will find the forgiveness of God in places we did not expect it. And I think if we can recognize the mysterious nature of the Church, that it is bound only in the ways that the resurrected body of Jesus is, then we will be better able to be open to that holy forgiveness and presence wherever it may arise.

But if we disregard the model of the paralytic, then I fear the voice we claim and affirm as Church may turn to the voice of the scribes, where we come to denounce these new locations of forgiveness as a threat to the religion we have kept so well guarded. And then Jesus’ words of forgiveness can be but words of rebuke, and we must pray we still have the ears to rightly hear that, less we crucify those who sought but to forgive us.

But there is a time to speak, there is a time to affirm our voice as Church. But note how this voice is spoken in the story. It is one that reveals illusions and offers forgiveness. And this is a voice that we are daily growing in to, learning to speak. We often have a hard time remember the right phrases and our tongues stumble over the more difficult words (I hope it is clear that I say this all by way of analogy, that language is a form of life, that true Christianity is not about simply affirming doctrinal phrases). So as we speak, we need to do so with the humility of those who are still learning the grammar of Christ, looking to and learning from those among us, past and present, who are more fluent that we are.

I will stop here and refrain from attempting to tie all the loose ends together for fear of reducing them to pithy quips. And there is still much more to be gleaned from these verses, and thank God. For it is in hope and thankfulness, not in dismay, that we affirm Scripture is a mystery. Perhaps something else from this verse will strike me later. I can only hope. But for now, I think this is a good place to stop.

{ healing and forgiveness, part IV }

But Jesus perceiving their thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts?” For which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”--he then said to the paralytic--”Stand up, take your bed and go to your home.” And he stood up and went to his home. When the people saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to human beings.

****

The second part of understanding the scribe’s accusation of blasphemy was to consider how their reaction explains and/or moves this act to its completion. I have to admit that this is a particular hermeneutic, that I am reading their presence in the gospel story as having a particular function.

A different approach would be to see their presence as more passive, wherein Jesus acts and speaks as he does in order to provoke or challenge the scribes (or Pharisees) in order to provide a teachable moment. But as was my caution against reading the scribes as mere foils, so too do I think such an approach would lessen Jesus’ humanity. His would be a life of actions not done for their own sake or because it was the most human (and therefore, obedient and blessed) thing to do, but of actions performed as mere examples. It would make it such that we could separate Jesus’ teachings from his person, like actors in safety commercials.

I think such a hermeneutic would practically empty Jesus’ life of significance, because such is not what we mean by “living” life at all. And to follow this hermeneutic to it’s logic end, we see that the cross then becomes not the manifestation of love, or the act of utmost obedience to God, or the inevitable end true humanity meets in a world structured by sin; instead, the cross is but the last (even if greatest) “teachable moment.”

So it is my attempt to preserve the humanity of the One who is humanity in its fullest that I interpret the presence of, and conflict presented by, the scribes as the foils with which the gospel writers make evident that humanity in its fullness. And, following my conclusion from the last post, it is my view that the scribes bring Jesus’ humanity into relief not merely as foils, but also through the illuminating juxtaposition of their own (broken) humanity with that of Jesus. The humanity of both sides of the equation must be preserved, that the scribes or Pharisees are “foils” is just another way of saying that conflict moves a plot forward.

Turning now to Jesus’ response, I hope my last post has made it clear why Jesus begins his response with “Why do you think evil in your hearts?” Let me first, though, address Jesus’ seeming telepathy. It is not my view that Jesus had the ability to read minds. I think such a reading of the text is based on two misconceptions: 1) that the ideal form of communication leaves words behind and 2) that Jesus’ knowledge as God was “super-human” knowledge.

We have a funny notion that if we could only read someone’s mind, then we could know what they were really thinking, that we wouldn’t be deceived or confused by their words. And while we can indeed hide our true thoughts from others, it is not our words that cut us off from each other, but what we do with our words. Our world and our minds are formed as we learn language, and they grow together. We learn our world and our language together: what a bike is, what a mistake is, what church is. The myth of telepathy is but another manifestation of the desire for a universal language, which is itself the manifestation of feeling chafed by our own skin.

Second, since Jesus was both fully human and fully God, we can attribute the predicates of both to him without contradiction. So we can say Jesus was tall or short, and we can also say he was divine. And we can also say he has human knowledge and divine knowledge. What we need not do here, however, is think that these compete with each other or that one overrides the other. To think that Jesus’ knowledge as God was “super-human” knowledge is to think of God as merely humanity writ large. Attributing “knowledge” to God is something we have to understand as metaphorical (or analogical), in the same sense that God has anger or that he repents. Whatever it means for God to “know,” it does not mean that he simply knows everything whereas humans only know a little.

So how did Jesus “perceive their thoughts”? Maybe in the same way we perceive each others': we see the eyes that are holding back tears, we see the hands that are shaking in nervousness, we see the shoulders that drop in disbelief. Jesus perceived their thoughts. Do we need science fiction or the supernatural to understand this? Maybe it is simply that Jesus is so fully human, so intimate with the human condition (whereas we live in denial or confusion about it), that the scribes’ actions spoke only too clearly. Jesus “reads their minds/hearts” in reading what is there for everyone to see: their expressions, their body language, their secrecy. And how blind must we be to be so surprised that Jesus called the thoughts “evil” of those not rejoicing at forgiveness?

Jesus saw the scribes huddling together, whispering to each other, he saw the angry expressions that surely coincide with condemnations of blasphemy, he saw the faces of the self-appointed victims, he saw the displacement of guilt. And from all of this he understood that there was “evil” in their hearts. (And we should not take it lightly or as common place that Jesus calls their thoughts “evil.” For it evidences that he knows their charge of blasphemy was not a righteously motivated one, that at its root was not holiness but self-preservation.)

Jesus then puts a question to the scribes: “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’?” I would imagine the scribes are left fairly befuddled by this question, likely thinking to themselves, “Who said anything about healing? And what does it matter which is easier?” Jesus’ response seems to leave the charge of blasphemy behind as irrelevant.

But maybe if we go back to the “evil” the scribes thought in their hearts we can better understand how Jesus’ response makes sense. For perhaps it is the case that for Jesus to respond to the charge of blasphemy would be for Jesus to not go deep enough; it would be simply addressing the surface accusation that, as I tried to show last time, was more of a symptom of the problem than the problem itself.

As I tried to show in the last post, the scribes’ charge can be read as the displacement of guilt and the attempt to preserve their position as author-ities. So Jesus asks them which statement is it “easier to say” or, put differently, “easier to claim authorship of”: “Your sins are forgiven” or “Stand up and walk”?

This question has the been at the heart of my confusion about the text, because, before rephrasing it this way, I had no idea how to answer it. For which is really easier to say? Well, to belittle the question, the forgiveness option has 6 syllables whereas the healing option has 4. More seriously, some would say it’s easier to proclaim forgiveness because by proclaim healing, it actually has to happen, so you’re putting more on the line. But would that then mean that Jesus takes the easy way out until he happens to see the scribes mumbling over in the corner? Or is it easier to proclaim healing? But that seems counter-intuitive too. It seems that either way you answer this question, you are still left with a problem. From this approach, the question only raises more problems rather than answering the one at hand.

But might it be the case that to even try to answer the question at all would be to miss the point, to miss the rhetorical intent? Might not the question be intended to respond to the scribes in a way that will silence them, that will lead them out of their “evil” ways of thinking into a promise of something, someone, greater?

It is Jesus’ rhetorical device here that is the clue to its interpretation. In Matthew 19:24, Jesus tells his disciples, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” Jesus’ use of “easier” here does not presuppose that either one is possible, but instead highlights the fact that neither are. That it is “easier” for a camel to go through the eye of the needle, itself an impossibility, only serves to highlight that it is all that much more impossible for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of God. The rhetorical device of comparing two things with “easier” is intended to emphasize the impossibility of both.

So if we return to Jesus’ question in Matthew 9:5, we see now that we are meant to hear the question as a rhetorical one: “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’?” should be heard as, “It is just as impossible for you to be the author of forgiveness as it is for you to be the author of physical healing.” The point is that the scribes cannot say, they cannot author, either of these statements. They do not have that author-ity. Jesus’ statement returns their accusation of blasphemy with a question that both confronts them with their own human limitations, as well as the fact that they have overstepped those limits. Jesus' response returns the accusation.

And this is why his next statement is not a non-sequiter, but the logical conclusion. While Jesus’ question pointed to the limitations of humanity; his following words now point to the promise of God: “But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”--he then said to the paralytic--”Stand up, take your bed and go to your home.”

The text could not be more beautiful. Jesus does not merely claim that, unlike the scribes, he possess true author-ity, he makes it manifest in his actions and in the body of the paralytic. While Jesus’ rhetorical question underscored the impossibility of both forgiveness and healing, his actions now demonstrate their possibility and reality in his person. Thus, this teaching concludes the same way as Matthew’s other use of the “easier” device: “When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astounded, and said, ‘Then who can be saved?’ But Jesus looked at them and said, ‘For mortals it is impossible, but for God all things are possible’” (19:25-26).

The Son of God has author-ity on earth because the Son is God, is the Author, and all things are possible for the Author because the Author writes all that is, defines what is, IS all that is. So Jesus brings that reality which is possible in God into existence because it is in him and him alone, as Son of God, that the author-ity to do so exists.

Jesus’ healing of the paralytic is meant to make manifest that author-ity: “But so that you may know....” While it still seems that the healing is only tentatively linked to the forgiveness, I think it might need to remain this way, or, at least, I am still working through what physical disability means in the kingdom of God. I think there may be something to the point I made earlier, about Jesus not doing things to prove a point, but because it is the most human thing to do...

A friend of mine recently shared some of his reflections with me on Mark’s (and Luke’s) version of the story. He writes:

“And Jesus, seeing their faith, said to the man- 'your sins are forgiven'” (Mark 2:5). Not exactly what we expect, is it? Well, it's not what the crowd expected either. It goes on to say that the scribes and “church people” there got really upset. “How can he forgive sins? Who does he think he is?” It's not until Jesus heals him physically that the onlookers are satisfied. In fact, it says “they were full of wonder and gave glory to God!” I wish we could see the world the way Jesus does. See, because the funny thing to me is we never hear any complaints from the cripple. Jesus forgave his sins! I mean, how cool is that? Just think, everything you've ever done wrong, big or small, all of it gone. No more guilt, no more pain. No more aching deep in your soul. You've spent your whole life lying on a bed of shame, and the Creator of the world looked into your eyes and took it all away. He smiled at you, and in that moment – that lifetime of frustration in your heart is replaced with peace. I think in that moment, the cripple realized that Jesus didn't see anything wrong with him. He had faith, and so to Jesus, he was good as new.

I think this is a beautiful insight. It transforms Jesus’ “know” (in “but so that you may know”) to something more than knowledge, at least knowledge as we tend to think of it, because it is a knowledge that itself brings healing in that it brings people into the knowledge of, and thus into participation in, the kingdom of God. The healing of the paraplegic actually does more to heal the people around him than it does for the man himself. He’s already been made whole in the forgiveness and the unconditional acceptance offered and found in the eyes of Jesus.

We need not necessarily posit some relationship between forgiveness and physical healing. Jesus even warns against trying to do so in John 9:1-3 and speaks of healing in this same way: “so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” In both John and Matthew, the bodies of these individuals are transformed from signs of brokenness in a world that knows only of impossibility (even if it lives in denial of it) to signs of promise that point to and themselves bespeak the kingdom in revealing the power and sovereignty, the author-ity, of God.

And, for the moment anyways, the people rejoice in the presence of the kingdom: “When the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to human beings” (9:8). They have felt, vicariously through this man’s restored body, the healing touch of God. And they have the right response: wonder and praise, not blame and self-preservation, but awe and the glorification of God. But we hear no more of the scribes. Jesus’ response has appropriately silenced their charges, but we hear nothing of their joining in the glorification of God, and so they slip off-screen and the tension remains, and builds.

And just to cover all the bases, I do not think we need to feel discomfort at the crowds interpretation that God had “given such authority to human beings,” for this is precisely what Jesus is. And, what is more, it is through Jesus that such authority is given to human beings, since those who confess to be his body in being “church,” who share in his blood and body at Eucharist, have been promised (as has all humanity) and have received his Spirit and therefore share in his author-ity.

And so this is the mission of the church, this is the possibility that God has called the church to make a reality: healing and forgiveness. By the power of the Spirit, we participate in that author-ity, and so are given the responsibility, the charge, the great co-mission of authoring the kingdom of God in this world. But let us not ever believe that we have this author-ity of our own accord, that it is anything but gift. And let us bring ourselves as we truly are, in all our brokenness (or willingness to become broken) to Jesus, that He may author the kingdom in our hearts and in our skin.

{ healing and forgiveness, part III }

Then some of the scribes said to themselves, “This man is blaspheming.”

****

I have been avoiding writing these last two reflections. Despite having given this verse a lot of reflection, and having discussed it with a few friends, I have yet to come to a place where this exchange makes any sense. I actually started this series on my blog because I thought by writing it out, by forcing myself to make something tangible of the muddle that was in my head, I could at least come to a place where the story was meaningful, even if I had to acknowledge that meaning as, for the moment, shallow.

Part of the reason this passage has been so difficult is because it seems as if Matthew is cramming so much into this exchange: forgiveness, healing, authority, blasphemy. These topics are manageable enough in their own right, in isolation, but having a text that weaves them together this tightly just seems to confuse things, to confuse categories. For how does healing prove the authority to forgive sins and thus refute an accusation of blasphemy that likely missed the mark in the first place!?

Maybe following the story piece by piece will help to make sense of it, let the story tell itself. Maybe the confusion results from having read the story too quickly too many times, having collapsed it in and over on itself, instead of following after it...

After Jesus’ proclamation that the paralytic’s sins are forgiven, some scribes appear and make the accusation, amongst themselves, of blasphemy. Scribes and pharisees often show up in the gospels as narrative foils; they appear not only to clarify what has just happened, but allow that action to come to fulfillment. This not only functions on a small scale in their side-stage conspiracies and accusations, but also, in a certain sense, on a large scale, moving the whole of the gospels, and thus, the whole of Jesus’ life, towards crucifixion.

But this does not mean they are shallow or empty foils, for they are not exactly strangers or random passersby. These are the religious authorities, the ones well-versed in Scripture, those who have given their lives to understanding Torah and practicing righteousness. Whatever may be said for them (in what they strive for and what they have accomplished), or against them (in their apparent blindness to Jesus as the true end and fulfillment of these), I think it would be safe to say the scribes and pharisees reveal and represent us, especially in our own religiosity.

I timidly include that last “especially” clause, because I think we may lose something vital if we write-off the scribes and pharisees as merely the manifestations of a religion gone shallow and legalistic. These are people. If we read them as mere plot devices then we lose their humanity, and we are no longer reading of our brothers and sisters, but of moral imperatives and generalizations. (Could this be related to the reductionism of language to logic, where the specificities are stripped away to get to the ‘essence’ of the sentence, the “Xa”? Could this be related to how to we talk about issues in the church like homosexuality when we talk about it solely as a doctrinal concept and forget that we are talking about people, and therefore that we must talk to and with those people?)

And so, if we regard the scribes as mere plot devices here, they can no longer be us. They can be “tendencies” or “faults,” sure, but they are no longer strong enough or alive enough to truly confront us with ourselves. We may acknowledge the tendencies or faults they represent in our actions, but those “problems” never radically challenge our person, who we say we are. As mere foils, their blindness or callousness is not tied up with their identity, with their life. And so we do not count their words as ours, for how could we even share a language with such abstractions? (And if we do this to the scribes and the pharisees, is there not also the very real possibility that we do this to Jesus?)

It would seem then that we could look at the scribe’s reaction with two ends in mind: 1) to find ourselves in them, that is, in their words, and 2) to understand how their reaction explains and/or moves this act to its completion. And while I would love to skip ahead to the latter (mostly because I do not understand their reaction), I’m not sure an answer would be full - or human - enough without the former. Nor do I think Jesus’ response would cut deep enough if we leave him confronting mere plot devices and “tendencies” rather than human beings. So I will focus on the first end in this post, and close out this series with the latter in the next.

So why call blasphemy?

The initial and common response, that Jesus is blaspheming because he is forgiving sins, is complicated by the fact that he does not expressly identify himself in the act of forgiveness. At first read, it even seems difficult to call it an “act” of forgiveness at all, because Jesus does not say “I forgive you,” but rather, “your sins are forgiven.” Their is no subject acting, no one doing the forgiving, there is the object (“your sins”) and a description (“are forgiven”).

Now we could grant the scribes the conclusions reached in the previous post, that in his pronouncement, Jesus is claiming for himself that divine presence which makes manifest the reality of the Kingdom, and thus, the reality of forgiveness; that Jesus’ pronouncement of forgiveness is the claim to be the God in whose presence forgiveness is found. And while this claim to divinity, if false, would surely be grounds for an accusation of blasphemy, I do not think this is what is going on.

If we are trying to find our feet with the scribes, trying to understand how their words could be found in our mouths as well, then if we grant them this insight as grounds for their reaction we must grant ourselves that same insight and then move from there to see how or why we would respond with that same accusation of blasphemy. The admittedly vague and lofty theological insight would have to be the starting point.

This seems failed from the beginning, not only because I am not quite sure of the validity or of my own conclusion, but because coming to this text as Christians, we approach the text already confessing that Jesus’ claim to divinity is not blasphemy but truth. And anyways, it is from a common humanity and way of life that we hope to understand the scribe’s accusation, not from a common theological claim (though we do, obviously, share a theology with them that is grounds for our way of life).

While I said before that I thought to claim the scribe’s charge of blasphemy in reaction to Jesus’ act of forgiveness was problematic, I did not say it was wrong. And while I also said that I just needed to follow the story as it is told to understand it, I do not know how to make sense of the scribes' charge without the insights provided by Jesus’ response. I don’t think this move is all too problematic, seeing that we affirm that Jesus’ words help us to better know ourselves, since Jesus is closer to us than we are to ourselves. So why not allow Jesus’ response to the scribes to provide that same act of exhuming and illuminating the selves from which these words come?

The point of Jesus response that I want to focus on here, in order to understand the scribes' charge of blasphemy, is the phrase, “But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins...” (v.6a). In conjunction with this phrase, it may help to remind ourselves of the crowd’s reaction to the sermon on the mount: “the crowds were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes” (Mat. 7:28b-29).

So, what is Matthew doing here by twice bringing Jesus’ “authority” into conflict with the scribes? A little Greek might help. In both these passages from Matthew, the word for authority is “exousia,” which is made up of “ex” (out of) and “ousia” (essence or being). So exousia means doing something out of, or from, one’s being. The verb often gets translated “authority,” but to better see its meaning in English, it may help to write it, “author-ity.” Jesus authors his own words, his words and acts come from himself, his being, which is the self he has been given by, and which is of, the Father.

It is no coincidence then that both times Matthew speaks of Jesus’ author-ity, he brings this into contrast with the scribes, who were only to explain and expound on what had already been authored in scripture. In Matthew 7, it is not said that Jesus taught with a different authority, but simply with authority, which is not how the scribes taught. The point is not that Jesus’ presentation is so self-assured and dogmatic in contrast to the teaching of the scribes, if anything the case was likely the other way around, the probability of which should guard us against such a reading.

The point is that Jesus authors his own words (which, in his being God incarnate, are the same words of the God of the Hebrew scriptures). Jesus need not cite the holy books to declare the reality of forgiveness because he is the embodiment and fulfillment of that book as the Word of God. Jesus is both the Author and that which is eternally authored.

And the scribes, as through a mirror darkly, see some flickering of that claim in Jesus’ words. They catch some glimpse that Jesus’ pronouncement of forgiveness bespeaks a deeper authority. But in their (and our) assumption that we fully understand ourselves and go through life attempting to understand the mysterious other, they displace the problem.

It is my suspicion then, that the scribe’s accusation of blasphemy results from hearing Jesus’ words as the usurpation of the authority that they themselves have wrongly assumed. It is not that Jesus is expressly claiming authority, it is that he is implicitly re-claiming that authority.

The ear that hears Jesus’ pronouncement of forgiveness as “blasphemy” is the keen and distorting ear of those who, in the back of their minds, know they sit not rightly on the throne. Or it is the sensitive and frustrated ear of those who, sleepy and comfortable in their day dreams of respectability and prestige, wish to quiet the reality that speaks differently.

So the scribes call “blasphemy,” quietly and amongst themselves, because Jesus’ (implicit and rightful) claim to author-ity reminds them of their own. This is why the scribe’s have a particular insight into what is going on here, for they see their own claiming of authority in Jesus. And thus, they see their own guilt in Jesus. This is the displacement: they see their history playing itself out before them and the indictment which they cannot levy against themselves because it is too heavy, too heinous, is now directed outward, against the one who rightly claims the throne, against the true Author-ity.

Why do they make this accusation quietly, amongst themselves? Could it be otherwise? Could they really verbalize the claim that, in its voicing, might show them guilty as well? Maybe this is to their credit, for maybe it shows that at some level they know that a public accusation would only reveal themselves, that it would be to cry murder with blood on one’s own hands. Or maybe it is just cowardice. Maybe it is just easier to condemn the sinner in private without fear of correction. Jesus has only begun his ministry, and the scribes (and the Pharisees) have not yet built up the indignation and brazenness it takes to hide oneself (from the eyes of others, and even, and especially, from one’s own eyes).

Perhaps this is where we can find ourselves with the scribes. Perhaps here, in the need to protect the selves we have aggrandized, and in the need to displace the guilt of our usurpation, of claiming author-ity, we can understand their whispered accusation.

How we hear Jesus’ words, as forgiveness or as accusation, may depend on the kind of person we bring to Jesus: one broken and vulnerable, dependent on others, or one that claims the author-ity to write our own story, and even the stories of others. Perhaps it is always an admixture. Perhaps we need to be told we are "thinking evil" by Jesus in order to acknowledge the brokenness that allows Jesus' words of forgiveness to work their miracles, to be open to the authoring hand of God.

So then...how does the story end?

{ healing and forgiveness, part II }

When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.”

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So this is where I start to lose the story; as soon as Jesus acts, as soon as he but speaks, the narrative thread starts to unravel. For these words do not seem to fit, if we are honest. This is not the expected turn of phrase. To come all this way, to carry a paralyzed man on a mat all the way to the shore! or, rather, to have one’s broken body paraded through town, with curious eyes, all-too-perceptive eyes seeing more than your body, but seeing the inability which shames and defeats you daily, just to arrive and to then receive what? Forgiveness? But what of healing!?

Jesus has directed his attention (or at least his words) to the paralytic alone, and the action focuses in on this exchange for just half a verse. It is as though Matthew did not think these strange words needed explaining, or maybe the explaining is yet to come by way of the scribes...

But as the story stands at this moment, I think what is most shocking is that what is offered by Jesus, what is proclaimed on that shore, is not this man’s physical healing, but the forgiveness of his sins. And therein lies another point of confusion:

Is Jesus actually forgiving him or is he stating what is merely already the case?

In the Greek (and in the vast majority of translations), Jesus is not saying “I forgive you.” Jesus does not technically put himself anywhere in the equation, he seems to be merely stating a fact. But is this to imply his words are any less effective, that by merely stating a proposition - something that philosophers of a certain tradition could reduce to symbolic logic (Xa) - Jesus has stopped short of actually doing anything effective?

But I think it is we who stop short, not Jesus, if we take his words as merely designative or assertive. That one could stick Jesus’ words into a formula might not make them less true, but it would make them meaningless (and what is truth without meaning?). This is because we find meaning between us, in that common space that we occupy but do not and never could fill. It is because meaning exists here and is shared between us that we do not own or determine the meaning of our words.

My words are not packages in which I must wrap my meaning in order to give that meaning to you. We inherited our words (and their meaning) when we inherited our world (of meaning); we can no more determine the meaning of a word on our own than we could lay claim to our own private world (which is not to say these are not done, but that they are illusions). So to put Jesus’ expression (and most, if not all, of our ordinary expressions for that matter) into a formula is to remove that expression from the space between people, to say that the true essence, the true meaning of the expression, does not depend on that space or those people.

So returning to Jesus’ words to the paralytic, what seems to be happening is neither Jesus’ offering of his forgiveness, nor a banal assertion of facts. For how can one “take heart” in an equation? Rather, the paralytic is to take heart because Jesus is declaring an ultimate reality that, in that very declaration, alters the experienced reality.

By way of analogy (but beautifully more than!) Jesus saying “your sins are forgiven” is like the abolitionist who says to the newly-freed-slave, “you are free.” The abolitionist’s words did not loose the physical chains, they did not affect the rights of ownership, but in making this new reality real-ized, are those words not truly effectual? Are those words, repeated a thousand times to blinking, tearing eyes, not liberating? For isn’t it having those words now exist outside one’s own head, having those words now enter that space between where reality and meaning truly exist, to find those words in the mouth of another, to have that which was almost rejected because it sounded so ridiculous, dreamt, be confirmed and acknowledged by another, is not this what we need in order to believe? Is not this what we need for meaning to take root, for truth to be not known, but acknowledged?

Jesus radically changes this man’s reality, for Jesus’ pronouncement is the breaking-in of a new Kingdom. And so Jesus’ words are a declaration of freedom, offered to one who had offered himself, in all his brokenness and vulnerability, to the possibility and reality that Jesus was and is. The mystery of Jesus is that he is not merely the one who declares the reality of forgiveness, but is the one through and by whom that forgiveness comes. Jesus simply is that forgiveness. In his physical person, in the reality of God’s human existence, Jesus is forgiveness. To be in the presence of Jesus is to be forgiven.

This is a truth to be acknowledged, a meaning to be found in the presence of Jesus. So would not Jesus’ saying, “your sins are forgiven” be as for him to say, “I am here, you are with me”? Would not all of us need to “take heart” in such a presence? And what is more, for Jesus to say “your sins are forgiven” is to say who that “I” is which is there present, for it is to collapse into a singularity presence and forgiveness.

And perhaps it is that faith which Jesus saw, the acknowledgment of brokenness and human vulnerability, which gave Jesus hope that his words, that forgiveness, could be acknowledged, shared. Which is to say, hope that he would be acknowledged, shared. And hope that in this broken man the Kingdom, in a small but incomprehensible way, may be realized, between people, the only way it can be.

I do not think I have yet sufficiently answered my own discomfort at why there is not a physical healing. But I think this is a start, in that there is something profound about Jesus’ words here that this reflection has hopefully served to bring a flickering candle to. Hopefully there will be more to come...

{ healing and forgiveness, part I }

And after getting into a boat he crossed the sea and came to his own town. And just then some people were carrying a paralyzed man lying on a bed. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.” Then some of the scribes said to themselves, “This man is blaspheming.” But Jesus, perceiving their thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”--he then said to the paralytic--”Stand up, take your bed and go to your home.” And he stood up and went to his home. When the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to human beings. - Matthew 9:1-8

****

So I have been struggling with these verses on and off for about six months now. What follows is a series of sketches where I’ve tried to make sense of this from a few different perspectives, and to arrange those sketches in a way that might help me, or any one else who stumbles across this sketchbook, to be able to see the landscape more clearly. I have a feeling my vision is still too limited to be able to take in this landscape, but here it is for what it’s worth.

I do not know why the NRSV opts for “carrying” when the Greek seems clearly to be more intentional, more closely connected in meaning with “to offer” or “to bring” than “to haul.” The Greek even follows the verb with the prepositional phrase “to him.” The act is purposeful and it is directed at Jesus. Now Jesus’ healing ministry has only just begun (the leper, the centurion’s servant, Peter’s mother-in-law and “many” who showed up thereafter, and the Garadene demoniacs), but apparently the news is spreading. So here we have a small act, a lone act - though not carried out alone - in Jesus’ home town. There are no crowds waiting like they had been outside of Peter’s mother-in-law’s house. Had they heard of the pigs running off the cliff and chose to keep their distance?

We are left with one of two (if not both) baffling questions: “Why are these people alone?” or” Why is there no one else beside them?”

Is it with either of these two questions that we are directed then (by the text) to see as Jesus? For though the text does not call much attention to it, it is there, wedged between Jesus and forgiveness: faith. “When Jesus saw their faith...” This is the second time that faith has been viewed communally in Matthew, though the first time was negative (“Ye of little faith”) and directed against the disciples during the storm at sea (Mat. 8:23). (One might even see the first mention of faith as directed negatively against all of Israel in Mat. 8:10, such that "the disciples" would be synechdochal for all Israel).

So we find faith here when we lacked it just a moment before at sea. We find faith walking with a body that must depend, that must trust; and a body that reminds us of our own fragility - and even mortality - in its brokenness and dependence, for it is a body that if left alone would perish. And we find this faith right after it had been absent on the seas, consumed or lost in fear of our fragility, our mortality. On the sea we cried out from this fear of mortality, pleading for the Miraculous One to make it go away, to shield us from it. But here, here the vulnerability is not hidden, it is lifted up, carried on a mat through city streets, and there is no crowd to block our view or distract us.

So between Jesus and forgiveness, there is the acceptance of human vulnerability and the bringing, the offering of that humanity to Jesus. And Jesus saw their faith...