Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Matthew 9:18-34, A ruler's daughter, a bleeding woman, the blind and the mute
A synagogue ruler asks Jesus to raise his daughter; on the way a woman touches the fringe of his cloak. Then two blind men call him Son of David, and a mute man speaks.
Matthew 9:18-34, in every translation this tool compares.
A leader comes to say his daughter has just died. On the way a woman who has bled for twelve years touches the edge of Jesus' cloak and is healed. At the house he sends out the flute players and the noisy crowd and takes the girl by the hand. Two blind men call out Son of David and receive their sight, a man who cannot speak is freed from a demon, and the Pharisees say he drives out demons by the prince of demons.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/synagogue\/","n":"The synagogue","s":"The local gathering place where Jews met on the Sabbath to pray and study Scripture. It was also a community center, run by people of standing.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/unclean-by-touch\/","n":"Unclean by touch","s":"Under the law, skin disease, bleeding, corpses, tombs and certain animals made a person ritually unclean, and touch could pass it on.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/burial-and-mourning\/","n":"Burial and mourning","s":"Mourners came at once, the dead were buried the same day, wrapped in linen in rock tombs, and family carried the duty of burial. Pagan mourning, with little hope beyond a shadowy underworld, could be bleak.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/messiah\/","n":"The Messiah, son of David","s":"The anointed king most Jews expected from David's line, who would free Israel from its enemies. Nobody expected him to be killed.","r":""}
The edge of the cloak was probably one of the tassels on the four corners of the outer garment that the law required, with blue and white cords (Numbers 15:38-41; Keener and the ESV Study Bible). Flute players led the mourning, and Keener notes that even the poorest family had to hire women to wail at a funeral. Son of David was a royal title, and most expected a warrior king, not a healer. Sorcery was a capital charge, and Keener notes that critics in the second century still granted the miracles but called them sorcery. The rule Keener has in view is Rabbi Judah's: even the poorest man was to hire "not less than two flutes and one wailing woman" (Wilkins). The word for the woman's bleeding is the one the Greek Leviticus uses for menstruation (15:33), so Wilkins reads a prolonged menstrual flow.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Matthew 9:18-19, 9:20-21, 9:23-24, 9:25-26, 9:27-31 and 12:24
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Matthew 9:18, 9:20, 9:23, 9:25, 9:27 and 9:34
- ESV Study Bible, study notes on Matthew 9:20 and 14:35-36
- Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Matthew 9:20 and 9:23
