Curing a Woman with a Non-Stop Period
Psalm 5, 6 • Psalm 10, 11
Jonah 1:1-17a • Acts 26:24-27:8 • Luke 8:40-56
Here are the elements (but not necessarily the facts) of the account.
A woman had spent all her money on doctors who could not cure her persistent menstrual bleeding.
She went to be cured by Jesus but He was already mobbed by crowds seeking cures, and the apostles were vigorously pushing supplicants out of the way.
The woman nonetheless managed surreptitiously to touch the hem of the robe of Jesus.
Jesus felt a loss of miraculous power and tells the lady that her faith, as demonstrated by the desperate grab, had been the source of her instantaneous healing.
Biblical commentators describe this episode within Luke’s gospel as “intercalative,” meaning that it seems to have been a later add-on to scripture. This insertion inevitably required some backfilling to make the story edifying and without a hint of scandal to the readers of the time.
The tugging at the hem of the robe of Jesus followed by His sensing of a drop in His internal miracle voltage meter provides a socially safe nonverbal plot device, revealing how Jesus became aware of the woman’s dilemma and unconsciously effected a cure.
At the time of the gospel’s compilation (and for centuries thereafter) it was shameful for a woman to discuss menstruation with any male who was not her husband or a doctor. In fact, women who were menstruating were thought of as being “unclean” for as long as their period lasted and were not supposed even to be out in public. They were expected to “self-quarantine.”
My stripped down interpretation eliminates the need for snide remarks about doctors, for a boisterous crowd, for apostles acting as Secret Service agents, for the spontaneous hem tugging, and finally for the voltage alarm going off to alert Jesus that He had unconsciously performed a miracle peculiarly tailored to the woman’s needs without even knowing her or anything about her menstrual problems in advance.
In my reading, the woman decided she could count on Jesus to hear out her gynecological problem without either of them being embarrassed. Jesus admires her courage and intelligence (i.e. “faith”) and cures her.
Of course, this brings up the even more shocking idea that women were that smart in those days. But by 2020, at least some men, could belatedly come to realize that women had been brighter than men were throughout all history.
Before this reflection closes out for today, it should be acknowledged that a much higher exegetical authority than myself, “Etsy,“ the online sales service for handicrafts, offers a rendering in pencil by artist Diana Downing of Overcomer’s Art called “Hem of His Garment: An Act of Desperate Faith,” that buyers unanimously give 5 stars, with some saying “The picture speaks to your soul!” So maybe this “intercalation” still inspires as intended.
Written by Tony Stankus
Tony Stankus is the first U of A librarian ever promoted at the rank of Distinguished Professor. Now 69, he formally committed to the Episcopalian middle way at age 66, because he could no longer resist the transcendent joy of St. Paul’s liturgies or the warmth of its priests and people.