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23rd SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (Cycle B)

Readings:
Isaiah 35:4-7a
Psalm 146:7-10
James 2:1-5
Mark 7:31-37

Abbreviations: NABRE (New American Bible Revised Edition), NJB (New Jerusalem Bible), RSVCE (Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition), IBHE (Interlinear Bible Hebrew-English), IBGE (Interlinear Bible Greek-English), or LXX (Greek Septuagint Old Testament translation). CCC designates a citation from the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The words LORD or GOD rendered in all capital letters is, in the Hebrew text, God's Divine Name YHWH (Yahweh).

God reveals His divine plan for humanity in the two Testaments, and that is why we read and relive the events of salvation history in the Old and New Testaments in the Church's Liturgy. The Church's Universal Catechism teaches that our Liturgy reveals the unfolding mystery of God's plan as we read the Old Testament in light of the New and the New Testament in light of the Old (CCC 1094-1095).

The Theme of the Readings: Love in Action
The love of God does not discriminate between rich or poor, the physically whole or the physically impaired, the spiritually strong or the spiritually weak. God's unconditional love is the same kind of unlimited love that Jesus asks of His disciples in every generation.

In our First Reading, the prophet Isaiah writes about God's acts of love to be poured out upon the earth in the era of the promised Messiah. The Messiah's works of love and mercy will be the signs of His divine authority in bringing about the restoration and salvation of God's covenant people.

The Responsorial Psalm is a hymn of thanksgiving. The psalmist praises God, lists His acts of justice, and ends with a declaration of Yahweh's sovereignty for all time and over all generations. God is the eternal sovereign of the world.  He will provide for those who are among the most vulnerable: the oppressed, hungry, prisoners, blind, those who labor under the burden of life, strangers, orphans, and widows. God cares for them with the hands, minds, wills, and compassionate hearts of those who love Him and are faithful to what Jesus identified as the two greatest commandments in demonstrating the love of God and neighbor (Mt 22:37-39). Jesus fulfilled all these acts of godly love listed by the psalmist in His earthly ministry. In addition, Jesus commanded His disciples in every generation to continue His works of mercy and love, acting as His emissaries to our brothers and sisters in the human family.

In the Second Reading, St. James, Bishop of Jerusalem, admonished Christians to show the impartial love of God to their brothers and sisters within the faith community. St. James affirmed that social justice was necessary for those who put their faith in the Resurrected Jesus Christ, just as social justice and demonstrating no partiality within the covenant family was part of the Old Covenant before the advent of the Messiah. St. James's message was, if we demonstrate our love in this way, we will be obedient to Jesus's command to love in the same way as He loves us (Jn 13:34).

In our Gospel Reading, the Jewish crowd witnessed Jesus healing a deaf-mute. They exclaimed in amazement: "He has done all things well.  He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak."  The people connected Jesus's act of mercy for the man He healed and the messianic blessings prophesied by the prophets. They foretold that when the Messiah came, the deaf would hear, the lame would walk, and the dead would arise as God poured His blessings upon His people. As disciples of Jesus Christ, we should be grateful for God's continual acts of love and mercy to a spiritually fallen humanity. God works these acts of love through the deeds of those who are the bearers of Jesus's love within the community of the Church. By their actions, they carry the love of Christ beyond their communities and out into the world. This feeling of gratitude should make us want to cry out, as we do in today's psalms response, "Praise the Lord, my soul!" Jesus Christ is the stream of living water that flows to quench the thirst of our parched souls with the gift of God's salvation!

The First Reading Isaiah 35:4-7a ~ Promises in the Messianic Age
Thus says the LORD: 4 Say to those whose hearts are frightened: Be strong, fear not!  Here is your God, he comes with vindication; with divine recompense, he comes to save you. 5 Then will the eyes of the blind be opened, the ears of the deaf be cleared; 6 then will the lame leap like a stag, then the tongue of the dumb* will sing. Streams will burst forth in the desert, and rivers in the steppe. 7a The burning sands will become pools, and the thirsting ground, springs of water.
* Mogilalon is the word used for "dumb" in the Greek text of Isaiah 35:6. Look for the same Greek word in the Gospel reading.

Isaiah 35 is a hymn celebrating God's promise to restore Jerusalem in the era of the Messiah.  The Church uses Isaiah 35:1-10 in the Advent liturgy of the 3rd Sunday (Cycle A) to encourage the faithful in the joyous hope that God will come again to complete His mission by bringing eternal salvation to His people.

The miracles that will be the signs of the Messiah's salvation in verses 4-6 were works of Jesus during His ministry. His deeds of healing and raising the dead were signs of His divine authority, as He told the disciples of St. John the Baptist when He said: Go back and tell John what you hear and see; the blind see again, and the lame walk, those suffering from virulent skin-diseases are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised to life, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor (Mt 11:4-5a, NJB). Jesus's declaration on the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles to the faithful assembled in the Temple in John 7:37b-38 was His declaration to the people of the Sinai Covenant that the time of redemption foreseen by the prophets had come. Jesus proclaimed: "Let anyone who thirsts come to me and drink.  Whoever believes in me, as Scripture says: 'rivers of living water will flow from within him'" (an allusion to verses in Is 35:7a; 55:1; Ez 47:1; Zec 14:8 and the promise of Christian baptism).

St. Justin Martyr (martyred c. 165) testified to a Jewish man named Tryphone that the works of Jesus Christ fulfilled the words of the prophets. He wrote: "Christ is the stream of living water that flows from God; he sprang up in the desert wastes of ignorance of God: that is, in the parched earth of all the nations. He, who was born among your people, cured those who were blind from birth, and the deaf and the lame: by his word alone, they leaped and heard and saws once more. He raised the dead and gave them new life, and by all his good works prompted men to see him for who he is.  [...] He did all these things to convince those who were to believe in him, whatever bodily defects they might have, that if they obeyed the teachings that he gave them, he would raise them up again at his Second Coming and make them whole and perfect and immortal as he is" (Dialogus cum Tryphone, 69.6).

Responsorial Psalm 146:7-10 ~ The Lord's Acts of Love
The response is: "Praise the Lord, my soul!" Or: "Alleluia."

7 The God of Jacob keeps faith forever, secures justice for the oppressed, gives food to the hungry.  The LORD sets captives free.
Response:
8 The LORD gives sight to the blind; the LORD raises up those that were bowed down. The LORD loves the just; the LORD protects strangers.
Response:
9 The fatherless and the widow the LORD sustains, but the way of the wicked he thwarts. 10 The LORD shall reign forever; your God, O Zion, through all generations. Alleluia.
Response:

Psalms 146-50 are known as the "Final Hallel" (hallel means "praise God") psalms of the Book of Psalms. Each of the five concluding psalms opens and closes with "Hallel-u-yah" (Hallelujah), which in Hebrew means "praise-God Yahweh" ("Alleluia" in Latin). The first of the "Final Hallel" Psalms is a hymn of thanksgiving in which the psalmist praises God and lists His acts of justice, ending in verse 10 with a declaration of Yahweh's sovereignty for all time over all generations.

God is the eternal sovereign of the world. In His mercy, He cares for the oppressed, hungry, prisoners, blind, those who labor under the burden of life, strangers, orphans, and widows; all those who are among society's most vulnerable. God cares for them with the hands, minds, wills, and compassionate hearts of those men and women who love Him and faithfully demonstrate their love for Him by caring for the suffering and oppressed. Jesus fulfilled all these acts of godly love listed by the psalmist in His earthly ministry. Jesus commands His disciples in every generation to continue His works of mercy and love as His emissaries to our brothers and sisters in the human family.

The Second Reading James 2:1-5 ~ Living the Law of Justice
1 My brothers and sisters, show no partiality as you adhere to the faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ. 2 For if a man with gold rings and fine clothes comes into your assembly, and a poor person in shabby clothes also comes in, 3 and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say, "Sit here, please," while you say to the poor one, "Stand there," or "sit at my feet," 4 have you not made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil designs? 5 Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters. Did not God choose those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that he promised to those who love him? 

In his letter to Christians outside the Holy Land, St. James, the first Christian Bishop of the Church in Jerusalem, admonished the Christian communities not to let class distinction enter into their assemblies when worshipping Jesus Christ, "our glorious Lord." Other possible translations are, "do not let partiality enter into your faith" or "do not let favoritism enter your faith."

Mosaic Law commanded treating every person in the faith community with dignity and justice. Therefore, St. James's teaching in this passage was familiar to Jewish Christians. Mosaic Law contained a system of justice that protected the poor and disadvantaged. According to Leviticus 19:9-18, it was a covenant obligation to protect the poor. Landowners were forbidden to reap their harvested crops to the edges of their fields. They were also not allowed to gather the harvest's gleanings, strip the vineyards, or pick up grapes that had already fallen. Those portions of the crop were for the widows and orphans who gathered them to provide for their needs.

In addition to those laws, every seventh year was a Sabbatical year when the land "rested" by remaining fallow, and mercy extended by forgiving those owing debts. Every fiftieth year saw the sabbatical year mercies repeated along with the freeing of all Israelite slaves and their children and returning the land to its original ancestral owner (Josh 14:1-19:51). God's divine commands made every fiftieth year a time of liberation and mercy when He checked the domination of the wealthy and powerful and where there was a restructuring of society so that the poor were not at the mercy of the rich. The fiftieth year of favor and liberation was the "Jubilee" year. In the days of the Davidic kings of Israel, as God's anointed civil representative to the covenant people, the king could also proclaim a Jubilee year (see Ex 23:10-11; Lev 25:1-55; Dt 15:1-11), as Jesus did when He addressed the Synagogue at Nazareth.

The prophet Isaiah prophesied a divine jubilee with the coming of the Messiah in Isaiah 61:1-2a, The spirit of Lord Yahweh is on me for Yahweh has anointed me.  He has sent me to bring the news to the afflicted, to soothe the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, to release to those in prison, to proclaim a year of favor from Yahweh (NJB). In Jesus' homily, at His hometown synagogue in Nazareth, He quoted Isaiah 61:1-2, proclaiming He had come to fulfill Isaiah's prophecy in the inauguration of a Divine Jubilee of liberation (Lk 4:18-19)!

In his letter, St. James made the point that just as social justice and showing no favoritism to certain members within the covenant family was part of the Old Covenant, it was also necessary for the New Covenant faithful. James's teaching recalls the wisdom of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus) 35:12-14 ~ For he is a God of justice, who knows no favorites. Though not unduly partial toward the weak, yet he hears the cry of the oppressed. He is not deaf to the wail of the orphan, nor to the widow when she pours out her complaint. James may have been thinking of this passage when he identified the mercy shown to widows and orphans as a sign of one's gratitude to God for His mercy by showing concern for the welfare of others (also see Ex 23:10-13; Dt 24:17-22; 26:12-13; and Ruth 2:2).

In verse 2, St. James used the Greek word sunagoge, "synagogue," to identify the assembly of worship of his brothers and sisters in faith. Is he discussing a Jewish-Christian place of community and worship, or is he writing about a Jewish community? Some scholars suggest the words "your synagogue" (translated in our passage as "your assembly") seem to indicate a congregation controlled by Jews who accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior. However, other scholars suggest that James was writing to a mixed assembly of Jews and Jewish Christians. In the early Church, even Jewish Christians used the term "synagogue" for their Christian gatherings. Still, later, the Jews adopted the Greek word sunagoge to identify their assemblies, and Christians adopted the Greek word ekklesia.  When James wrote his letter, there does not seem to be this distinction, which may point to the early dating of his epistle.

In the earliest years of the Church, evidence suggests that the Jerusalem Jewish-Christians were attending the Saturday Sabbath worship at the Temple in Jerusalem or were attending services in the local synagogues in their hometowns. They were studying what we call the Old Testament in the light of the teaching of Jesus's Gospel of salvation. And they were also receiving the New Covenant communion sacred meal of the Eucharist (called the Toda/Todah, "thanksgiving" in Hebrew but Eucharistia, "thanksgiving" in Greek) in their assemblies on Sundays, that they called "the Lord's Day," commemorating the Lord's Resurrection (Acts 20:7; 1 Cor 16:2; Rev 1:10). It may be that James was addressing both Jews and Jewish Christians since in verse 7, he mentions the wealthy men who insult the name of Jesus. A disrespectful attitude toward Jesus certainly wouldn't be the case in a strictly early Christian assembly where most people were poor and devoted to Jesus.

In verse 4, St. James says the attitude of preferring one person over another based on wealth sets a corrupt standard. There is no spiritual value in worldly wealth. Its worth is only in what material good the wealth can provide. The rich man may not find himself valued for who or what he is morally and spiritually but simply for what he has obtained materially. Others may judge the poor man of less worth as a person just because of his poverty. There is corruption in the man or woman judging a person's value this way because their motives are corrupt. Such a person either covets the wealth of the rich and desires to use it to their advantage or dismisses the value of the poor man or woman based only on outward appearances and not considering the richness of that person's soul.

Jewish Christians would be familiar with James's teaching. Compare James's statement of non-partiality in James 2:1-4 with the teachings of Old Covenant Law and the wisdom provided in the books of Job and Proverbs:

The Sinai Covenant's concept of social justice is illuminated and perfected in the law of the Gospel of salvation. Like God's justice, human righteousness and justice from which we derive our understanding of justice must exceed the perceived value of civic or social conduct. Perfect justice calls for complete conformity to the will of God and total non-partiality concerning the individual.

5 Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters.  Did not God choose those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that he promised to those who love him?
James writes that God chooses for those materially poor to be rich in faith. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus blesses the "poor in spirit," who are not self-sufficient but recognize that they need God. James's statement also recalls Jesus's discourse in which He blessed the poor in Luke chapter 6:20-23, known as The Sermon on the Plain. Material wealth, which provides a sense of self-sufficiency, poses a danger when it distracts the wealthy from the blessings of spiritual wealth, while the poor fully embrace the richness of faith because they have nothing else to support them in their struggles. The poor fully understand their limitations; they know that they need God in their lives. The simple truth is that spiritual poverty is far more deadly than material poverty. The Old Testament prophet Zephaniah warned the poor, Seek Yahweh all you humble of the earth who obey his commands.  Seek uprightness, seek humility: you may perhaps find shelter on the Day of Yahweh's anger (NJB).

The poor and afflicted are called the anawim in Hebrew. There was a sacrifice set aside for them among the five animals acceptable for blood sacrifice; turtle doves and pigeons are the sacrifices of the anawim (Lev 5:7; 12:8). We know that Joseph and Mary were from a humble station in life because this was the sacrifice they brought to the Temple for Mary's purification and Jesus's dedication to Yahweh forty days after His birth in Luke 2:22-24.

The question of justice on behalf of the poor was a continual concern in sacred Scripture. However, the wisdom literature of the Old Testament distinguished between poverty as a result of idleness (i.e., Prov 10:4) and poverty that exists in an unjust and unmerciful society. The prophets expressed Yakweh's knowledge that the poor were also those oppressed by society, and they demanded justice for the weak and poverty-stricken in Isaiah 10:2; Amos 2:6ff; Job 34:28ff; and Ecclesiasticus 4:1ff.  St. James demanded the same justice for the poor and defined it as the ethical practice of religion, repeating Jesus's teaching in His summary of the Law in Matthew 22:40 as love in action through the love of God and neighbor, defining "neighbor" as members of the human family.

The Gospel of Mark 7:31-37 ~ Jesus Heals a Deaf Man
31 Again, he left the district of Tyre and went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee into the district of the Decapolis. 32 And people brought to him a deaf man who had a speech impediment [mogilalon] and begged him to lay his hands on him. 33 He took him off by himself away from the crowd. He put his finger into the man's ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; 34 then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him, "Ephphatha!" (that is "Be opened!"). 35 And immediately the man's ears were opened, his speech impediment [mogilalon] was removed, and he spoke plainly. 36 He ordered them not to tell anyone. But the more he ordered them not to, the more they proclaimed it. 37 They were exceedingly astonished, and they said, "He has done all things well. He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak."

This story only appears in St. Mark's Gospel. Jesus traveled into Gentile territory a third time, journeying east and returning to the region of the ten Greek culture cities called the Decapolis (see Mk 5:1; 8:24). People brought a man who was deaf and incapable of intelligible speech and begged Jesus to heal him. There are seven stages associated with the man's healing:

  1. Jesus took the man aside by himself and away from the crowd.
  2. Jesus put His finger into the man's ears.
  3. Jesus used His spit to touch the man's tongue.
  4. Jesus looked to heaven.
  5. Jesus groaned.
  6. Jesus commanded, "Be opened!"
  7. Jesus ordered the man and his friends not to tell anyone.

 Notice that Jesus took the man aside to heal him away from the crowd. Perhaps this was because of the man's deafness. When he suddenly hears for the first time, the noise of the people's voices might have been unsettling, and Jesus was making the first experience of hearing enjoyable. The other unusual occurrence is that Jesus groans as He prays for the man. The Gospel of John records that Jesus groaned twice before raising Lazarus from the dead, using the word embarimaomai, meaning "to sign or groan" (Jn 11:33, 38). But Mark used the Greek word stenazo, which also means "to sign or groan."  St. Paul used the same word when he wrote that we long to be free of our earthly bodies and instead be in glory in our resurrected bodies (Rom 8:22-23; 1 Cor 5:2-4). Perhaps this was the reason Jesus groaned. See these examples from St. Paul's letters (underlining added):

Also, notice for the first time in St. Mark's Gospel that Jesus used matter (spit) to heal the man (also see Jn 9:6-7). This action prefigures Jesus's gift of the Sacraments in which matter (physical substance) will play a role:

  1. Eucharist: the bread and wine
  2. Baptism: water and anointing with sacred chrism (oil that represents the gift of the Holy Spirit)
  3. Confirmation: anointing with sacred chrism that represents consecration by the Holy Spirit
  4. Matrimony: the woman and man
  5. Anointing the sick: oil of anointing and laying on of hands
  6. Reconciliation: laying on of hands
  7. Holy Orders: oil of consecration and laying on of hands

St. Mark used the Aramaic word "Ephphatha!" and explains its meaning, "Be opened!" for non-Aramaic speaking Gentile-Christians in the congregations reading or hearing his Gospel. Jesus told the man and his friends not to talk about his healing experience. Jesus needed more time for His ministry to continue to call the "lost sheep of the House of Israel" (Mt 15:24) before the animosity of the religious authorities evolved into the hatred that climaxed in His Passion. But again, in the enthusiasm for the healing, the word of His miracle spread.

37 They were exceedingly astonished, and they said, "He has done all things well.  He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak."
The people connected Jesus's act of mercy for the man He healed and the messianic blessings prophesied by the prophets. Those prophecies foretold, when the Messiah came, the deaf would hear, the lame walk and the dead arise as God poured out His blessings upon His people like life-giving streams in a desert (Is 26:19; 29:18-19 and 35:4-6 from our First Reading). In the Greek text of Isaiah 35 from our First Reading, the Lord God promised His people: "Say to those whose hearts are frightened: Be strong, fear not! Here is your God; he comes with vindication; with divine recompense, he comes to save you. Then will the eyes of the blind be opened, the ears of the deaf be cleared; then will the lame leap like a stag, then the tongue of the dumb [mogilalon] will sing.  Streams will burst forth in the desert and rivers in the steppe. 7a The burning sands will become pools, and the thirsting ground, springs of water" (Is 35:4-7a). Mark even uses the Greek term mogilalon (speech impediment) that appears in only one other place in Scripture, in the Greek translation of Isaiah 35:6 where the prophet describes the "dumb" singing. A crucial line in the Gospel reading is the phrase "He has done all things well," voiced by the crowd referring to Jesus's works. It echoes the Greek translation of Genesis 1:31 when God saw His works in the Creation event and judged them "good."

During His earthly ministry, Jesus fulfilled all the works of love and mercy prophesied by the prophets as signs of His divine authority as the promised Messiah. As a demonstration of our love for Him, faith in Him, and gratitude for His gift of eternal salvation, Jesus asks His disciples in every generation to continue His acts of love and mercy. Jesus asks us to continue His earthly mission by caring for our needy brothers and sisters in the human family as we wait for His return in glory.

Catechism references for this lesson (* indicates Scripture quoted or paraphrased in the citation):
Isaiah 35:4-7a (CCC 549*)

Mark 7:32-36 (CCC 1504*); 7:33-35 (CCC 1151*)

God's transcendence (CCC 273*, 300*, 314*)

Knowledge of God according to the Church (CCC 36*, 37-40, 41*, 42-43)

Prefer Christ to all else (CCC 2544*)

Following Christ in a consecrated life (CCC 914-919, 931-932)

Michal E Hunt, Copyright © 2015; revised 2021 Agape Bible Study. Permissions All Rights Reserved.