Mark 5:38 — Community Reflections

MARK 5:38 — KING JAMES VERSION 0

“And he cometh to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and seeth the tumult, and them that wept and wailed greatly.”

When they came to the home of the synagogue leader, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly — the professional mourners and neighbors have already arrived — the Jewish mourning tradition began immediately at death. The commotion communicates the genuine community grief that accompanies the death of a child. The crying and wailing loudly (alalazontas) is the public expression of mourning that was both culturally expected and genuinely felt. The scene of communal mourning that Jesus encounters is the opposite of the intimate healing space he is about to create.

Church Fathers on Mark 5:38

Those who were about the ruler of the synagogue, thought that Christ was one of the prophets, and for this reason they thought that they should beg of Him to come and pray over the damsel. But because she had already expired, they thought that He ought not to be asked to do so.
Theophylact · 11th century

It is not said that he assented to his friends who brought the tidings and wished to prevent the Master from coming, so that our Lord’s saying, 'Fear not, only believe,' is not a rebuke for his want of faith, but was intended to strengthen the belief which he had already. But if the Evangelist had related, that the ruler of the synagogue joined the friends who came from his house, in saying that Jesus should not be troubled, the words which Matthew relates him to have said,…
Augustine · 4th century

It was told the ruler of the synagogue, Thy daughter is dead. But Jesus said to him, She is not dead, but sleepeth. Bother are true, for the meaning is, She is dead to you, but to Me she is asleep.
Pseudo-Jerome · 5th century

Read all 10 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain

COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS

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