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2. Many Healings (15:29–31)
² Jesus moved on from there and went along by¹ the Lake of Galilee; then he
went up into the hills and sat down there. ³ Great crowds came to him, bringing
with them people who were lame, blind, crippled,² dumb³ and many others; they
put⁴ them down at Jesus’ feet, and he healed them, ³¹so that the crowd were
amazed when they saw the dumb speaking, the crippled made healthy,⁵ the lame
walking and the blind seeing. And they gave glory to the God of Israel.
At this point Mark mentions a single healing, but Matthew gives a second
general summary of healings which recalls that given quite recently in 14:34–36.
This repetition is the more striking when it is also observed that this summary is
immediately followed by a second feeding miracle closely similar to that which
preceded the previous one. A clue to Matthew’s purpose in thus apparently
repeating himself is perhaps found in the unusual comment in v. 31 that the
crowds “gave glory to the God of Israel.” This is never said about the Galilean
crowds, and the terminology suggests that the crowd are Gentiles, recognizing
the special power of the Jewish Messiah. We shall note in the next pericope the
likelihood that the second feeding miracle is to be interpreted as a Gentile
counterpart to the Jewish feeding in 14:13–21. And the immediately preceding
pericope has been explcitly concerned not only with Jesus’ ministry in a Gentile
context but also more specifically with the issue of the role of the Jewish
Messiah with regard to the non-Jewish world. It seems therefore that the whole
of 15:21–38 is presented as Jesus’ ministry outside Israel, with the many
healings and the feeding miracle deliberately balancing those already granted to
the Jewish crowds, a point which is reinforced when it is noted that the healings
listed in v. 31 parallel those performed in a Jewish context according to 11:5 (see
below).⁷
If that is Matthew’s intention, his description of Jesus’ itinerary in v. 29, while
not as explicit as one might wish, is consistent with such a non-Jewish location.
When Jesus has been by the Lake of Galilee in earlier chapters he has normally
been in Jewish territory. But there was also the largely Gentile area of Decapolis
on the east side of the lake, which Jesus has already visited in 8:28–34, and the
fact that he needed a boat to return from the scene of the second feeding to the
Jewish area of Magadan (see on v. 39) suggests that it is in the hills on the east
side of the lake that vv. 29–38 have been set; Mark’s parallel specifically
mentions Decapolis (Mark 7:31). To reach Decapolis from “the region of Tyre
and Sidon” would involve a journey around the north side of the lake, which
would naturally bring Jesus back to its shore as v. 29 indicates, though
presumably not in the area around Capernaum where he was well known. The
“hills” into which he climbed (v. 29) would then be on the Golan (eastern) side
of the lake rather than in the more familiar Galilean area. But Matthew’s
geographical indications are not very specific, and the Gentile setting of these
verses is indicated as much by the content of the narrative as by what Mattthew
says about their location. The statement that he “went up into the hills and sat
down there” may be intended to recall Jesus’ previous involvement with a
Jewish crowd in the hills (5:1), though this time we are not told that he did so in
order to teach.⁸
The summary of Jesus’ healings in this Gentile area is as comprehensive as
among the Jews in 14:34–36, but this time it is expressed in terms of specific
complaints rather than in purely general terms, though with a generalizing
“many others” at the end of the list. The complaints mentioned recall Isa 35:5–6,
the blessings promised as part of God’s redemption of his people, a passage
which was also echoed in Jesus’ depiction of the “deeds of the Messiah” in 11:5;
but now those messianic blessings are being experienced also outside the
covenant people. The surprisingly vivid verb “threw them down” does not seem
to connote either violence or impatience, but perhaps conveys something of the
pressure Jesus was put under by this expectant Gentile crowd, who clearly had
heard (like those from Decapolis in 4:25 and like the woman of 15:22) about the
Jewish Messiah’s healing powers, and expected him to treat them in the same
way. We hear nothing now of reluctance on Jesus’ part: the principle accepted in
15:27–28 does not need to be argued again. That they “gave glory” not to Jesus
himself but to “the God of Israel” shows a good understanding of the source
from which Israel’s Messiah must draw his authority.
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