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The woman with the issue of blood

Matt 9:20–22; Mark 5:25–34; Luke 8:43–48 · Later ministry in Galilee

Scripture

Matthew 9:20–22

nd, behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment: 21For she said within herself, If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole. 22But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour.

King James Version · public domain

Mateu 9:20–22

dhe ja një grua që i rrithte gjak nga vetë-heja dy-mbë-dhjetë vjet, uafërua së-prapësmi, edh’ e preku anën’ e rrobës’ s’ati. 21Sepse thosh-te me vetëhen’ e saj, Vetëmë ndë prekça rrobën’ e ati, dotë shëronem. 22Edhe Jisuj kur ukthye, e pa atë, tha, Kij zëmërë, o bijë; besa jote të shpëtoj. Edhe gruaja shpëtoj që mb’atë herë.

Kristoforidhi, Dhiata e Re Toskërisht 1879 · zotërim publik

Summary

Twelve years of suffering end the moment faith touches the hem of His garment. Under the Law a woman with such an issue was unclean, and whatever she touched became unclean with her; here the order is reversed, for faith draws cleansing out of Christ rather than transmitting defilement to Him. She comes from behind and in secret, the Fathers say, less from weakness than from a reverent and humble fear, judging herself unworthy to approach His face.

The Fathers observe that Christ draws her hidden touch into the open, not from ignorance, but for her sake and ours: to make her faith manifest, to confirm and crown it, to free her from her fear, and to guard against any superstition that the cloth healed of itself. They note too that many in the crowd pressed against Him, yet one alone truly touched Him, for it is faith and not the jostling of the body that lays hold of His power.

"Power went out from me" testifies to His divinity: the strength that heals is His own, not borrowed, flowing freely from Him as from its source, so that even His flesh and His garments are made life-giving by the Word who dwells in them. "Your faith has saved you" locates the gift in her trust, that none might think the healing magical or impersonal. The Fathers find here a pattern of every soul that, long worn by the bleeding of sin, presses through the throng of distractions to touch Christ in faith and is made whole.

The Woman with the Issue of Blood (Matthew 9:20–22; Mark 5:25–34; Luke 8:43–48)

Public-Domain Patristic Commentary

As Christ goes toward the house of Jairus and the crowd presses around Him, a woman who has suffered a flow of blood for twelve years, and has spent all she had on physicians without cure, comes up behind Him, saying within herself, "If I may but touch his garment, I shall be whole." She touches the hem of His garment and is healed at once. Christ asks, "Who touched me?" and though the disciples note that the whole crowd is pressing Him, He knows that one touched Him in faith. The woman comes trembling, confesses before all, and He says to her, "Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace." The texts below are quoted verbatim from public-domain translations. Chrysostom's commentary on Matthew is primary; Jerome's commentary on Matthew, together with Augustine and Hilary, is given as preserved in the Catena Aurea on Matthew (St. Thomas Aquinas, trans. J. H. Newman, 1841). (Cyril's commentary on Luke does not treat this miracle in the portions surviving in English.) Nothing is paraphrased.

St. John Chrysostom (c. 347–407)

Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew, Homily 31 (on Matthew 9:18–26) Source: trans. in the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, Vol. 10. Public domain. Full text: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/200131.htm

On the woman's faith, which gave her wings, and outran the ruler:

Do you see the woman superior to the ruler of the synagogue? She detained Him not, she took no hold of Him, but touched Him only with the end of her fingers, and though she came later, she first went away healed. And he indeed was bringing the Physician altogether to his house, but for her a mere touch suffered. For though she was bound by her affliction, yet her faith had given her wings. And mark how He comforts her, saying, Your faith has saved you.

On the several reasons He would not let her go away unobserved:

In the first place He puts an end to the woman's fear, lest being pricked by her conscience, as having stolen the gift, she should abide in agony. In the second place, He sets her right, in respect of her thinking to be hid. Thirdly, He exhibits her faith to all, so as to provoke the rest also to emulation; and His staying of the fountains of her blood was no greater sign than He affords in signifying His knowledge of all things.

St. Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376–444)

Commentary on the Gospel of St. Luke, Sermon XLV (on Luke 8:40–48) Source: trans. R. Payne Smith, 1859. Public domain. Full text: https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/cyril_on_luke_04_sermons_39_46.htm

On the wise plan by which the woman, despairing of human remedies, turned to the Physician from above:

When therefore the unhappy woman had given up all hope from men, and now survived only for utter misery, she conceived in her a wise plan. For she had recourse to the Physician Who is from above, from heaven, as One Who is able readily and without effort to effect those things that are beyond our power, and Whose decrees, whatever it be He would accomplish, nothing can oppose.

On the reasoning that brought her to touch the hem of His garment, arguing from the greater to the lesser:

For she thought perchance within herself, that if He be mightier than death, and the destroyer of corruption, how much more can He also alleviate the malady that afflicts her, staunching by ineffable power the fountains of her issue of blood! She draws near therefore and touches the hem of His garment; but secretly and not openly: for she hoped to be able to escape notice, and. as it were, to steal healing from One Who knew not of it.

On why she sought to remain hidden — the impurity imputed by the Mosaic law:

It was because the law of the all-wise Moses imputed impurity to any woman who was suffering from an issue of blood, and everywhere called her unclean: and whoever was unclean, might neither touch any thing that was holy, nor approach a holy man. For this reason the woman was careful to remain concealed, lest as having transgressed the law, she should have to bear the punishment which it imposed.

On the proof, from His sending forth power of His own nature, that the Emmanuel is very God:

"For, I know, He said, that power has gone forth from Me." But it transcends our degree, or probably that even of the angels, to send forth any power, and that of their own nature, as something that is of themselves. Such an act is an attribute appropriate solely to the Nature That is above all, and supreme. For every created being whatsoever that is endued with power, whether of healing, or the like, possesses it not of itself, but as a thing given it by God.

St. Jerome (c. 347–420)

Commentary on Matthew (on Matthew 9:20–22) As preserved in the Catena Aurea, trans. J. H. Newman, 1841. Public domain. Full text: https://www.ccel.org/ccel/aquinas/catena1.ii.ix.html

On the perfect tense of "hath made thee whole":

He said not, Thy faith shall make thee whole, but, "hath made thee whole;" for in that thou hast believed, thou art already made whole.

On the woman, excluded by the Law, healed not in house or town but on the way:

This woman that had the flux came to the Lord not in the house, nor in the town, for she was excluded from them by the Law, but by the way as He walked; thus as He goes to heal one woman, another is cured.

On the spiritual meaning of touching the hem, and the healing of the Gentiles:

She touches not the garment, but the hem thereof; because she saw not the Lord in the flesh, but received the word of the incarnation through the Apostles. Blessed is he that touches but the uttermost part of the word by faith. She is healed while the Lord is not in the city, but while He is yet on the way; as the Apostles cried, "Because ye judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles." And from the time of the Lord's coming the Gentiles began to be healed.

Blessed Augustine (354–430)

From his Harmony of the Gospels, as preserved in the Catena Aurea on Matthew. Public domain.

On why Matthew, unlike Mark and Luke, has the father say at once that his daughter is dead:

He looks not at the words of the father respecting his daughter, but rather his mind. For he had so far despaired of her life, that he made his request rather for her to be called in life again, thinking it impossible that she, whom he had left dying, should be found yet alive.

On the rule that we must attend to a man's meaning rather than his exact words:

Hence we learn a thing of the highest necessity, that we should look at nothing in any man's words, but his meaning to which his words ought to be subservient; and no man gives a false account when he repeats a man's meaning in words other than those actually used.

St. Hilary of Poitiers (c. 310–367)

As preserved in the Catena Aurea on Matthew. Public domain.

On the power that dwelt in Christ's body, uncontained by the flesh it assumed:

Herein is to be observed the marvellous virtue of the Lord, that the power that dwelt in His body should give healing to things perishable, and the heavenly energy extended even through the hems of His garments; for God is not comprehensible that He should be shut in by a body. For His taking a body unto Him did not confine His power, but His power took upon it a frail body for our redemption.

On the ruler read figuratively as the Law:

Figuratively, this ruler is to be understood as the Law, which prays the Lord that He would restore life to the dead multitude which it had brought up for Christ, preaching that His coming was to be looked for.

Note on sources and other Fathers

The Fathers read the same touch from several angles. Chrysostom dwells on the contrast running through the whole chapter: the woman is "superior to the ruler of the synagogue," for where he brought the Physician all the way to his house, "for her a mere touch suffered," since "her faith had given her wings," and Christ crowns it with "thy faith hath saved thee." Chrysostom then explains why Christ would not let her slip away healed but unseen, listing the reasons: to free her from the fear of having stolen the gift, to correct her notion that she could be hidden, to set her faith before everyone for imitation, and to show that He knows all things. Jerome, given here as the Catena Aurea preserves his Matthew commentary, presses the exact words ("not 'shall make thee whole,' but 'hath made thee whole'") and notes that the woman, shut out by the Law's rules on uncleanness, is healed not in the house or town but "by the way," so that as Christ goes to raise one (Jairus's daughter) another is cured along the road. His spiritual reading became famous: she touches not the garment but the hem, "because she saw not the Lord in the flesh, but received the word of the incarnation through the Apostles," and is healed while He is still on the road, an image of the Gentiles who "began to be healed" once the gospel turned to them.

Augustine, harmonizing the three accounts, observes that Matthew "looks not at the words of the father respecting his daughter, but rather his mind," drawing from it a rule of the highest necessity, that "we should look at nothing in any man's words, but his meaning." Hilary draws out the Christology of the scene: the healing power "extended even through the hems of His garments," for "God is not comprehensible that He should be shut in by a body," and "His taking a body unto Him did not confine His power, but His power took upon it a frail body for our redemption"; he then reads the ruler as a figure of the Law, which begged that life be restored to the dead multitude it had reared for Christ.

St. Ambrose, in his exposition of Luke, also dwells on her faith and her trembling confession, and a widespread reading (found in the Gloss, in Rabanus, and the Latin Fathers) sees the woman as a figure of the Church gathered from the nations, healed by faith in the incarnate Word. The Gloss notes that she was already made whole at the moment of the touch, not when Christ turned to her, as the other evangelists confirm. These survive in English mainly in modern copyrighted translations. For verbatim public-domain English, the works above are the principal sources, Chrysostom in his own homily and Jerome, Augustine, and Hilary as the Catena preserves them.

Patristic sources