“Now there was room for the blind and crippled to get in. They came to Jesus and he healed them.” Matthew 21:13
When Jesus and his family returned to Nazareth from Egypt, they found a Galilee wracked with political upheaval. Herod the Great had died, but insurrectionist groups were pushing back against Roman oppression. Herod Antipas was petrarch of tiny Galilee – not a huge honour. Antipas decided to build a new capital city named Tiberias after the emperor – on the Sea of Galilee – and commercialise the fishing industry.The city of Magdala, on the western shore, was a huge fishing port and a key piece of the local economy. For the Jews it became a clear moral, ethical and religious issue.
For Jesus, Jewish theology was based in one thing – “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof.” So if the earth belonged to God, the water and everything in it belong to God. It wasn’t a commodity to be bought and sold. The people around the Galilee were not only oppressed by the Romans, but their livelihoods were threatened by their own leaders trying to ingratiate themselves with the emperor.
So at Passover, Pilate the Prefect enters Jerusalem by the West Gate, with armour, horses, lots of soldiers, trumpets blaring, banners waving – a big show to quell any hint of insurrection or resistance. Up from the valley, following the route the Israelites took in their escape from Egypt centuries before, through the east gate – a servants’ entrance – comes Jesus riding a simple donkey – people waving palms and throwing their garments on the road, curiously similar to the parade for the first Jewish martyr Judah Maccabeus. The crowd shouts “Hosanna!!” which means “Save us!!!!”
And Jesus goes straight into the temple, overturns the tables, clears everyone out, so there is room for the blind and diseased to come inside, “and he healed them”. Think about it – he healed those who were barred from the temple, right on the temple property.
I’ve always thought Jesus knew what he was doing – not that he divinely predicted everything – but that he was quite politically astute. The parade, the healing in the temple, would have been the non-violent equivalent of a good poke in the eye with a really sharp stick for the religious leaders. He brought it right home to their doorstep – the living out of the law of God. He held up a mirror to them, by clearing out corruption – and then healing the outcast from society there in the temple.
