JOURNEY WITH JESSICA

Raging With Compassion

(Adaption of a sermon on Mark 1:40-45)

It is forbidden that “any person, who is diseased, maimed, mutilated or deformed in any way, so as to be an unsightly or disgusting object, to expose himself or herself to public view.”

This ordinance, put into law in San Francisco in 1867, was intended to deal with the problem of poverty—or specifically, the disabled beggars flocking to the city, making the upstanding Christian citizens feel uncomfortable and guilty. The educated opinion of the time was that it was more charitable to give council, withholding physical assistance in case one is to encourage the sin of sloth, or as William Sloacher writes: “Pauperism is a disease upon the community, a sore upon the body politic, and being a disease, it must be, as far as possible, removed, and the curative purpose must be behind all our thought and effort.”

Over the next several decades, cities throughout America adopted this law as their own. Today this collection of ordinances is colloquially called “ugly laws.”

When Jesus walked in Galilee, similar ordinances were termed “purity laws.” The Jewish versions originated in Leviticus though Gentiles had their own purity codes. These laws named who and what is ‘clean’ versus who and what is ‘unclean.’ Of those, skin conditions grouped as leprosy were the most ‘unclean’ of all— banned from the Temple, they were meant to live outside the camps, away from all their family and friends, doomed never to experience physical touch again. The fear wasn’t as much a communicable disease, but communicable uncleanliness, a punishment for sin. “Ritual purity laws reflect the belief that God might withdraw from the Temple if the Temple were to become polluted by unclean people or things.” Only a Priest could declare a person ‘clean.’

By the time of Jesus, people with leprosy were gathering in and around the populated regions in hopes of collecting alms. Having no employment, no place to live, and the ability to defile not only the sacred life of the community but its daily functioning as well, persons with leprosy lived in isolation and poverty.

This is the world in which we find Jesus as he starts out in his ministry. A God-fearing Jew, Jesus has to balance his allegiance to the Law and his overwhelming compassionate love for God’s people, leading to a perplexing expression of anger in this text. In verse 41 the NRSV translates it: “Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him” The word translated ‘pity’ is the Greek word “splagchnizesthai” meaning “to be moved with compassion.” Other ancient texts don’t use that word at all, instead “oristheis” which means “was angered” leading the NIV to translate it: “Jesus was indignant.” Either way, there is some form of powerful emotion as the text moves to verse 43 which reads, “After sternly warning him he sent him away at once.” In Greek the word “embrimaomai” is used which means to “to snort with anger.”

But why would Jesus be angry? Yes, the man approached him, but he did not touch him. He didn’t make a demand but instead kneeled on the ground, begging “if you choose, you can make me clean.” The man gave Jesus a choice, knowing Jesus was not a priest and so according to ritual purity laws, Jesus could not make him clean. But in the core of himself, the man KNEW Jesus could meet his need. Weighing the dichotomy of law and love, I propose Jesus was compassionate AND angry.

He was raging with compassion.

Jewish Disability Theologian Julia Watts Besler speaks of her own compassionate rage of Leviticus Purity codes: “[To me this is a] powerful and disturbing text: one that makes visible the dynamics by which certain bodies are marked as inferior. I take these biblical words as a visceral reminder of the brutal power of ableism. I hold them as a witness to the deep disdain for disabled people that runs through so much of our histories, our cultures, our sacred narratives.”

Besler rejects the notion that these verses embody God’s desire. Instead, she sees them as “a powerful testament to the way that humans have imagined God in our own image, the way we have endowed God with our own prejudices.” Considering them “a cautionary tale, a warning about how easy it is for humans to press our assumptions on the divine.”

In his compassionate rage, Jesus touches the man and declares him clean. By this action of Jesus, God Incarnate reaches out a hand, making what was ‘unclean’, ‘clean’. And in that moment, God was not defiled as feared. Yes, Jesus being a good Jew knows the law and retreats to the countryside. People would have known that his action of touch marked him as unclean. However, some “from every quarter” were attracted to Jesus regardless of purity codes, following him into the wilderness, reaching out and touching him. There was something MORE— something that transcends the human concept of ‘clean’ and ‘unclean’, overriding the ritual codes.

Through Jesus, God moves from hidden within the walls of the inner sanctuary of the temple to out in the world among those the world considers unclean. Declaring “YES In My Back Yard.” Today’s Jesus might not touch someone with Hansen’s Disease, instead bandaging a wound of a man with AIDS or administering Narcan for a fentanyl overdose. Fearless and raging with compassion, no place and no one is forbidden to God.

Every time I council an individual turned away from the church because of their disability, I rage with compassion. Let us rage with compassion because the Ritual Purity Laws God came to earth to abolish still remain. Let us rage with compassion through our work with disabled and other marginalized peoples. Let us rage with compassion because in our actions, God reaches out a hand, making what was “unclean” “clean”, what was “defiled” “holy.”

References:

Belser, Julia Watts. Loving Our Own Bones: Disability Wisdom and the Spiritual Subversiveness of Knowing Ourselves Whole: Disability Wisdom and the Spiritual Subversiveness of Knowing Ourselves Whole. Beacon Press, 2023. 

Black, Kathy. A Healing Homiletic: Preaching and Disability. Abingdon Press, 1996. 

Schweik, Susan M. The Ugly Laws: Disability in Public. New York University Press, 2010. 

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