CRITICAL NOTES
Luke 13:10. In one of the synagogues.—Time and place are indefinite; probably in Peræa.
Luke 13:11 A spirit of infirmity.—(Cf. Acts 16:6, “a spirit of Python”). I.e., an evil spirit (cf. Luke 5:16)) who had the power of producing bodily weakness.
Luke 13:12. When Jesus saw her.—She does not seem to have asked to be cured; but the language of the ruler of the synagogue implies that she expected or hoped for cure, and therefore she may be credited with a measure of faith. Thou art loosed.—The negative part of the cure—the relief from the evil spirit that had bound her.
Luke 13:13. Laid His hands on her.—The positive part of the cure—the imparting of strength.
Luke 13:14. Said to the multitude.—It is noticeable that he did not address his rebuke to Christ directly, but covertly spoke against Him in his words to the people. Ought to work.—His folly is shown in his implied statement that the bestowal of Divine grace and help is a kind of working by which the Sabbath is profaned.
Luke 13:15. Thou hypocrite.—Rather, “ye hypocrites” (R.V.)—i.e., the ruler and those about him, or those of the Pharisaic sect to which he belonged, and which favoured such criticism. The hypocrisy or insincerity consisted in pretending a zeal for the Sabbath, when the real motive of the speech was to stir up enmity against Jesus. Doth not each one of you?—I.e., they themselves broke their own rule about the Sabbath, in order to show mercy to their cattle. The instance is an apt one: the woman bound down by her infirmity is as helpless as the beast tied to the manger.
Luke 13:16. Ought not this woman?—“Ought”—a repetition of the ruler’s phrase in Luke 13:14. The contrast is very strongly put—it is between a dumb animal and, not merely a human being, but one of the chosen people—“a daughter of Abraham” (by blood and by faith); the few hours of deprivation which a beast might be forced to endure by delay in watering are contrasted with her eighteen years’ servitude.
Luke 13:17. And when He had said.—Rather, “and as He said these things” (R.V.). All His adversaries.—Which implies that a number of them were present. All the people rejoiced.—Though He had abandoned Galilee, and Jerusalem had been hostile to Him, He still seems to have enjoyed a measure of popularity in Peræa (cf. Matthew 19:1-2).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Luke 13:10-17
Work which Hallows the Sabbath.—This incident took place as Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath-day. This reminds us of the comparative prominence and frequency of these Sabbath-day cures. It is quite plain that nothing but the blindest Pharisaism, in its design to misinterpret Jesus and His work, could have led men to suppose that there was anything in these deeds of His inconsistent with the true observance of the day, or with the spirit of the Divine law. It is as obvious, on the other hand, that only a secularism equally blind and a similar misconstruction of His acts, could find in these Sabbath miracles any intention to abolish the day, to take away aught of its sacredness, or loose a jot of its Divine obligation. It was a reward for the faithfulness and diligence of these diseased folks, who, in spite of their ailments, were found in God’s house on the sacred day, that they should there meet with their gracious Deliverer.
I. The miracle.—The sufferer made no application to Jesus for healing. She had come to the synagogue because it was her wont, and because the effort to reach it and share in its blessing was one of the ways in which she fought against the advance of her malady. Jesus saw her and singled her out for a signal instance of His mercy. The expression afterwards used when He turned the attention of the ruler and all the congregation to her case, shows how deeply and tenderly He had looked into it. “Lo!” he said, “see how long she has suffered.” Her bent form and furrowed face were to Him as a book in which He read the story of her eighteen years’ bondage and of her patient struggle to sustain her infirmity. Her faithful attendance on Divine worship, and perhaps other features, to which we have no clue in the narrative, lighted up to Him her genuine, religious, spiritual character. For by the title He gives her hardly anything so commonplace can be meant as merely that she was a Jewess. In all probability it was intended to point her out as one of that inner circle of pious, believing Israelites—the class to which belonged His own mother, the parents of the Baptist, Simeon and Anna—those, namely, “who were looking for the consolation of Israel.” He called her to Him; He spoke the word of liberation; then He laid His hands upon her, and immediately she was cured. There were apparently two elements in the case to be dealt with; one physical—dorsal paralysis; the other nervous or mental—some infirmity which paralysed the will. With His word and touch together the cure was done. The word, majestic and commanding, proclaimed her free from the subtle bond, the root of the mischief, which chained her will. Then His hand laid on her, a sensible act to her faith, gave strength and suppleness to the disused muscles. As the woman rose erect from her long, sad bondage, her grateful piety broke forth in the instant into an irrepressible thanksgiving, a voluntary act of praise before all the people.
II. The indignation of the ruler of the synagogue.—The scene had become very offensive to the narrow mind of the presiding elder. The reputation of Jesus for piety and wisdom was by this time so universally acknowledged, that it was no doubt practically impossible for the most prejudiced synagogue ruler to prevent His taking part in the service. Even the president of a Peræan country synagogue had not been able to do so. Jesus was already noted for having set aside Pharisaic opinion as to Sabbath work. This particular Pharisee had probably hoped that no conflict of opinion would arise on the occasion. But that in open congregation, in the place of worship where he ruled, the daring innovator should perform one of His Sabbath-breaking cures was too much for him. It quite overcame any little sense and proper feeling he possessed. He broke out into angry vituperation. Not daring to attack the Lord directly, nor even the thankful woman, in a covert and cowardly manner, he spoke at them both.
III. Christ’s defence of Himself.—The Saviour answered him with a pungent and well-merited rebuke. “You reproach the people, but your quarrel is really with Me. You pretend to be zealous for the law, but you are only jealous of My work. You Pharisees deserve no credit for even conscientiously mistaken views about the sanctity of the seventh day. Your ideas of its observance are quite sane and sensible so soon as a question arises affecting your own material interests. You would have no scruples in relieving the wants of a suffering animal on that day by a certain amount of Sabbath labour. But when I loose from long years of Satanic bondage one of your human sisters, a daughter of the chosen family, and do it with no labour at all, you are filled with horror at the breach of the Sabbatic law.” Such hypocrisy is its own complete self-exposure. But this trenchant reply of Jesus completely shuts the mouths of His adversaries, and brings the admiration of the hearers to a height; for not only the words He had spoken, but the glorious things He had done, filled them with joy. Let us note the spiritual lesson of the woman’s story. She had come to her accustomed place in the synagogue in spite of all weariness and difficulty; and a blessed piece of work it was for her. Had she not gone that day to the place of worship, it is next to certain she had never met with Jesus. In the way of her usual waiting upon God—a troublesome routine it might have seemed to many—she got the blessing; not merely relief from her bodily chain, but, if we have read her character aright, the glorious liberty of those who saw in Christ Jesus the Lord’s salvation. What good cheer is in the story for those who, amid bodily infirmities, mental oppression, or household burdens and afflictions—tempting them to defer their duty to God’s house—find their way statedly thither! Every minister knows that these are often the most blest of all the company that gathers in God’s house. For the Master of the house sees them and calls them to Him To the drooping spirit, to the burdened heart of those who come there just because He bids them, He oft comes, as it were, all unbidden, and makes them glad with an unexpected visitation.—Laidlaw.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON Luke 13:10-17
Luke 13:10-17. The Infirm Woman in the Synagogue.—The third time our Lord, by a miracle of healing, stirred up the wrath of the ecclesiastical rulers at His supposed violation of the Sabbath-day.
I. The danger of falling, all unconsciously, into formalism.
II. Often seeming zealous championship for the truth is really zeal for the promotion of our own theories and ideas.
III. Our Lord’s five actions.—He sees, calls, heals, touches, and lifts up this infirm woman. He does so still with infirm souls.—Dover.
A Scene in the Sanctuary.—
I. An exemplary worshipper.
II. An unlooked-for reward.
III. Pretended zeal for the Sabbath.
IV. Unanswerable rebuke.—W. Taylor.
Christ’s Treatment of Women.—There is great beauty in the behaviour of Christ to women, whether it be the woman of Samaria, whose deep wound He probes so faithfully, yet with so light a touch; or the child of Jairus, to whom He speaks in her own dialect, holding her hand; or the widow of Nain, whom He bids not to weep; or she whose many sins were forgiven her, loving much; or Mary, for whose lavish gift He found so pathetic an apology—“She hath done it unto My burial.” This woman He would not heal from a distance, as though an alms was being flung to her; but neither was it for Him to attend upon her needlessly—such efforts that she can yet put forth must be made, and so He calls her to Him, lays His hand upon her, speaks kind words that name not the humiliating cause of her complaint; and even when the adverse criticism of the ruler requires Him to say all, His only thought of her is sympathetic—to Him she is honourable, as one of the holy race, and pitiful, as, to its owner, a helpless creature that needs drink on the Sabbath day. He will not refuse release and refreshment to His own. Satan had bound one who belonged by formal covenant to another, and Jesus dwelt with lingering pity on the long period of her thirst, whom He had led away to the watering.—Chadwick.
Luke 13:11. A Noble Character.—The noble character of this woman is plainly indicated by a number of particulars stated concerning her:—
I. Her faith—for she is a daughter of Abraham—i.e., not merely a Jewess, like the other women in the synagogue, but one of kindred spirit with her great ancestor.
II. Her steadfast resistance to the encroachments of her malady.
III. Her zeal in attending upon Divine worship.
IV. Her devout thankfulness, openly expressed, on being healed.
“Spirit of infirmity.”—Her sickness, having its first place in her spirit, had brought her into a moody, melancholic state, of which the outward contraction of the muscles of her body, the inability to lift herself, was but the sign and the consequence.—Trench.
“Bowed together.”—Probably she did not perceive that Jesus was present; but Jesus saw her.
Luke 13:12. “Loosed.”—This expresses the setting free of her muscles from the power which bowed them down, and then (Luke 13:13) the laying on of the Divine hands confers upon her strength to rise and stand upright. It would be, in such a case, one thing to be loosed from the stiffening of years, and another to have strength at once conferred to stand upright.—Alford.
Luke 13:13. “He laid his hands on her.”—The miracle is
(1) a representation of the gracious work of Christ on the soul.
2. It is an illustration of the kindness of the Saviour to afflicted, weak, and contrite disciples.
Five Kindly Actions.—In the healing of this woman our Lord did five things: He compassionately saw her; He called her; He healed her; He touched her; and He lifted her up. Thus does He also perfectly cure a sinful soul. He sees it, in His compassion; He calls it, by His internal inspiration; He heals it, by remitting its sin; He touches it, by the afflictive chastenings of His hand. He raises it up to things above, in the warmth of Divine love.—Ludolphus.
Luke 13:14. “Answered with indignation.”—The ruler of the synagogue is restrained, by some measure of awe, from openly attacking Jesus; He abstains also from directly rebuking the woman who had been healed, but most ridiculously reproves the innocent multitude. It is very significant that he admits the fact of healing.
Luke 13:15. “Loose his ox or his ass.”—Our Lord varied, from time to time, the arguments with which He abolished the fanatical formalism of the Pharisees respecting the Sabbath. Sometimes He appealed to His own inherent authority (John 5:17-19); sometimes to Scriptural precedents (chap. Luke 6:3-5), or to common-sense and eternal principles (ibid., Luke 6:9). Here, as in chap. Luke 14:5, He uses an argumentum ad hominem: they allowed men to loose and water their cattle on the Sabbath, to abridge a few hours’ thirst; was, then, this suffering woman not to be touched, not to be spoken to, to end eighteen years of suffering?—Farrar.
Luke 13:16. “Ought not.”—To the “ought” of ceremonial obligation (Luke 13:14) Christ opposes the “ought” of moral obligation—the Divine necessity of love.
There is here a Threefold Contrast:—
I. “Ox or ass” and “daughter of Abraham.”
II. Fastened to the stall, and “bound by Satan.”
III. A few hours of thirst and eighteen years of suffering.