Luke.13:10-17 - Life Affirming God

Luke.13:10-17 - Life Affirming God

When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment” (V.12)

For the last time in the Gospel, Jesus enters a synagogue and restores a woman’s life and challenges the life negating structures. The woman’s condition is attributed to “a spirit of weakness”. For 18 years she had been bent over, unable to stand up straight. The term translated “weakness can simply mean illness”. Several features of the story suggest that the woman’s condition may be seen as indicative of her diminished status as a woman

Breaking the stereotyped religiosity The description of the woman as daughter of Abraham is unusual. It is placed first in the Greek sentence (v. 16), a position of emphasis. This description will be matched in 19:9 by Jesus' insistence that Zacchaeus is "a son of Abraham," a point that Jesus makes against the crowd, which rejects Zacchaeus as a "sinner." Similarly, it is probable that Jesus insists the woman is a daughter of Abraham because she has been robbed of her rights as a member of the covenant people, since she is identified as the bearer of an unclean spirit. Her physical position -- bent over -- can be taken as symbolic of her social position, just as Zacchaeus's short statute can represent his vulnerability before the crowd. Jesus goes beyond the stereotyped spirituality and its attributes.

Restoring life and dignity of the bent over Woman. Jesus releases the woman from her ailment by a pronouncement and the laying as of hands. The physical act again suggests a further significance. The laying as of hands was normally accompanied by prayer and served as an act of blessing. Jesus laid hands as the sick, but the laying on of hands was also used as a conferral of blessing. In the end, Jesus confers as the woman a status of dignity; She is a “daughter of Abraham” Jesus is the process of releasing the captive, freeing the oppressed, and raising up children to Abraham. As in the other scenes in Luke in which Jesus responds to the needs of a woman, this scene points to a new status for women in the Kingdom of God.

This is in fact paradigmatic of Jesus’ mediation of the Kingdom to the women who are demeaned, denied their proper status, and oppressed by religious and social restrictions. Because of her physical condition, the woman carried shame, but by the end of the story she has been released from her shame and Jesus’ opponents have been shamed. The leader of the synagogue wants to make the issue Jesus’ violation of the Sabbath, but Jesus returns the focus to the needs and dignity of the woman. Leader construes his role as maintaining proper observance of the Sabbath rather than celebrating the release of the woman from her “weakness”. The story of the stooped women is, in fact, the story of many women today.

Prayer – God of marginalized, helps us to see the unseen, hear the unheard cries, and stretch out our hand when all goes away. Amen

Thought for the Day- Restoring the stooped down womanhood is one of the challenges of today.