“And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatick, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them.”
So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought him all the sick, those afflicted with various diseases and pains, those oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and paralytics, and he healed them. The fame of Jesus spreads beyond Galilee into Syria — the Gentile territory to the north — and the crowds that come to him already transcend the borders of Jewish Palestine. The list of conditions he heals is comprehensive: various diseases, pains, demonic oppression, seizures, paralysis. The comprehensiveness communicates that there is no category of human affliction outside the scope of the kingdom's restoration. Psalm 103:3 praises the God who heals all your diseases — Jesus enacts what the psalm celebrates. Syria is also the territory from which the Assyrian oppression came; the healing of Syrians enacts the reversal of judgment into blessing.
Church Fathers on Matthew 4:24
Kings, when about to go to war with their enemies, first gather an army, and so go out to battle; thus the Lord when about to war against the Devil, first collected Apostles, and then began to preach the Gospel.
An example of life for doctors; that they should not be inactive, they are instructed in these words, 'And Jesus went about.'
[ed. note: A passage is here inserted in Nicolai’s edition which is not in the original. It is of no doctrinal importance.] By which too He shewed the Jews that He came not as an enemy of God, or a seducer of souls, but as consenting with his Father.
Read all 24 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS
Publish a reflection on this verse
No reflections on this verse yet. Be the first to write one!