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act of Jesus pointed out by the cleansing of the leper will be this, that He takes away the sin which pollutes man's path. Just as the healing of the paralytic symbolized His power to put away the paralyzing burden of guilt by forgiveness, so the miracle before us brings to light His having revealed the open fountain to cleanse all unrighteousness. It is because this fountain is now opened in Him, that those in His kingdom are required to act as in the following passages: 'Lay apart all filthiness,' etc., Jas. i. 21; 'Cleanse your hand, ye sinners,' Jas. iv. 8; 'Laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and evil speakings,' 1 Pet. ii. 1; 'Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit,' 2 Cor. vii. 1.

We may compare the cleansing of the leper with the symbolical deed of washing of feet, which our Lord performed on His disciples at a later period; but the comparison must be made with care. Uncleanness was only attached to the feet of the disciples, otherwise (John xiii. 10, oλa) they were clean; while in the case of the lepers, they were unclean oλo, in the sense in which the Pharisees said to the man that was born blind, 'Thou wast born in sin altogether' (oλos), John ix. 34. The uncleanness on the feet of the disciples was only on the outside, being caused by their walking in this unclean world; while in the case of the lepers, the uncleanness broke out from within.

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Secondly, the disease of leprosy had a result with which no other bodily evil was accompanied. excluded the person possessed with it from intercourse with others. The lepers could only associate with their fellows in affliction; they were bound to make themselves known by their dress, and other tokens ; also, as a rule, they dwelt outside the towns. The ten (Luke vii. 12) therefore came not to Jesus, but stood

afar off, and called out to Him for help from a distance (they lifted up their voices). The strictness in this was so great, that even when the disease was not yet proved, when the symptom observed was perhaps something quite innocent, a mere л, a scab in the skin (Lev. xiii. 7), the suspected person was ordered prophylactically a seclusion for seven days, and under certain circumstances for seven days longer, from the community of the confederate people. The subsequent freeing from the trouble required to be just as much a really indubitable one, before he could be received again, and before the Levitical saying, 'he is pure,' could be pronounced. See Lev. xiv. But even from this view the symbolical meaning is not apparent. For there is this in the consequences of sin, that as far as it occurs in life it partly isolates, and at the same time partly introduces into the com- ' munity itself a disturbing and hindering element. We will unite these two views, and say the cleansing of the leper exhibits the grace of Christ, in that it takes away from men the uncleanness of their lives, and thereby unites them in a common brotherhood; and then see how from this point of view all the details in our narratives are satisfactorily explained. As far as relates to the first of these miracles, we follow, for good reasons, the account of Mark. This evangelist shows (in agreement with St. Luke) more decidedly the urgency with which the sufferer who dared to break through the barriers of the law (he was even 'full of leprosy ') beseeches the help of Jesus. The words in which he asks it are alike in all three accounts: 'If Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean.' The fact that it was the cleansing from the leprosy that was desired, explains that the will is questioned; on the other hand, the power is presumed (in Mark ix. 21 the position is the exact opposite). As our Lord had

shown, by the many miracles which He had already performed (Mark i. 32), Himself as He who can help; the conclusion was easy, that He was also in a position to cleanse even the lepers. But what was doubtful was this, whether He would be inclined to come into any personal relations with such sufferers, as all who had contact with them were rendered levitically unclean. It appears from the conduct of Jesus (ver. 41) that the phrase, if Thou wilt,' was really meant in this sense. He stretches out His hand and touches the suppliant. This must have been done with a special intention; for in the second case in which He meets with lepers (Luke xvii. 14), our Lord bestows His help on the suppliants by means of His simple word. But this intention could not have consisted in a designed opposition to any weakness of faith; for it was no Naaman, with the demand for a fulfilment of a heathen's wish,' who now lay at His feet. But the expression 'touched him' is the real answer of Jesus to the 'if' of the leper; just as His 'I will' (as Bengel says) is the echo of the "Thou wilt' of the suppliant, and His 'Be thou clean' His answer to the 'Thou canst make me clean.' 'If Thou art inclined, that is, not afraid to come in contact with me, Thou canst make me clean.' And the Lord answered, 'I will,' by sign, by word, and by deed. The high significance of this feature in its allegorical application may be touched upon in a few words.

If it is a question of the forgiveness of sin in order to free from guilt, it is still entirely the power of Jesus which is presumed or questioned ('who hath power to forgive sins').. If, on the other hand, it relates to the cleansing from evil habits, the question

1 Compare 2 Kings v. 11, 'Behold, I thought the prophet will surely come out to me, and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leper.'

is just this, as to whether the pure can take part in this matter. (Peter did not consider it right, John xiii. 6.) We saw Jesus justify the power in the history of the sick of the palsy; the inclination is here confirmed by assurance as well as by the result. But certainly a dissimilar and anxious interest is excited by the manner in which our Lord sends away the recipient of the benefit after his complete cleansing. The fact that immediately after the 'being moved with compassion' there follow the words 'straitly charged,' does not surprise us; we have perceived elsewhere a similar change from a state of tender feeling to the function of a judge in Jesus. But at first we do not see the reason why He so severely drives away from His neighbourhood the favoured person, and acts towards Him in the same manner as at a later period He acted to the moneychangers and those selling (egéßaλev, as in Matt. xxi. 12). How are we to understand His stretching out His blessing hand with mild compassion to the unclean, and with the same hand His thrusting him away when he has become clean ?-that He allows the leper to draw near to Him, but will not suffer his presence when he is a leper no more?

Expositors have treated this question in such a way that they make the point of difficulty to lie on the undevì elπns. But the consequence of this view was a total misunderstanding of this last order. For it is an error to suppose that our Lord, by this repeatedly imposed silence on the recipients of His gifts, desired to prevent the running together of the their enthusiastic hopes of the Messiah. which was regularly broken (Mark i. 45, and began to publish it much;' see also Matt. ix. 31); yea, which mostly had just the opposite effect (see Mark vii. 36, 'The more He charged them, so much the

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more a great deal they published it'), would not have been so often repeated by our Lord if He had meant it in this sense. With regard to the question in general, we must consider these instructions as never to be understood absolutely, but as always presuming a mere temporary value. The more particular definition

which we see added in Matt. xvii. 9 ('until the Son of man be risen again') can in some sense be applied here as well as to all similar cases. We must not overlook how, in this view of the εἰς μαρτύριον αὐτοῖς, an absolute prohibition could be justly kept; but the reason of it must in each case be discovered by the context, as it is not everywhere the same (see particularly in Matt. xii. 17). As regards the passage before us, the emphasis evidently is to be placed on the positive motive, on the sending to the priest, which results evidently from the particle ảλλá. Instead of relating to others the benefit received, he should rather go himself (therefore the word σeautóv placed before and emphasized), and show himself to the priest. The reason of the prohibition is thus to be found here in the urgency of the command which was to be first fulfilled, an urgency which must be symbolized not by the ἐμβριμησάμενος, for according to Matt. ix. 30 this may become the simple undevì eiπns, but rather by the ἐξέβαλεν. But wherefore should now the person cleansed without delay hasten above everything to the priest (whether to Jerusalem or to a nearer place does not matter)? The fact that He similarly seemed to tell the cured demoniac (Mark

1 Our opinion is by no means that the negative direction of Jesus should be completely taken away; it remains in its full force. It is only subordinate to the positive, and stands in dependence on the latter; it receives here its motive from it. There are cases where the position of affairs is the opposite. When our Lord says to Mary Magdalene (John xx. 17), 'Touch me not, but go to my brethren,' etc., the point of difficulty without question rests on the prohibition; and nothing would be

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