Did the centurion whose slave was paralysed speak to Jesus himself?
Posted on Feb.28, 2009. Filed in Luke, Matthew. Average rating: 6.0 / 10 (Rate It).
Both Matthew and Luke describe an incident where Jesus heals a centurion’s slave. In both accounts, the centurion confidently says that such is Jesus’ authority that he can heal the slave even from a distance, and Jesus is amazed at the centurion’s faith. The two accounts disagree, however, as to whether the centurion speaks to Jesus himself, or, being a Gentile, sends Jewish friends to do so on his behalf.
In Matthew’s account, it is the centurion himself that comes to Jesus:
When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him and saying, ‘Lord, my servant is lying at home paralysed, in terrible distress.’ And he said to him, ‘I will come and cure him.’ The centurion answered, ‘Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed. For I am also a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, “Go”, and he goes, and to another, “Come”, and he comes, and to my slave, “Do this”, and the slave does it.’ When Jesus heard him, he was amazed and said to those who followed him, ‘Truly I tell you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and will eat with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the heirs of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ And to the centurion Jesus said, ‘Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.’ And the servant was healed in that hour. [Matthew 8:5-13 (NRSV)]
Luke, however, has the centurion send first some Jewish elders to speak to Jesus, and then some friends:
After Jesus had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. A centurion there had a slave whom he valued highly, and who was ill and close to death. When he heard about Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders to him, asking him to come and heal his slave. When they came to Jesus, they appealed to him earnestly, saying, ‘He is worthy of having you do this for him, for he loves our people, and it is he who built our synagogue for us.’ And Jesus went with them, but when he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to say to him, ‘Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you. But only speak the word, and let my servant be healed. For I also am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to one, “Go”, and he goes, and to another, “Come”, and he comes, and to my slave, “Do this”, and the slave does it.’ When Jesus heard this he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, he said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’ When those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the slave in good health. [Luke 7:1-10 (NRSV)]
So did the centurion speak to Jesus himself, or did he send others to speak to Jesus on his behalf?
N.B. All posts are written in a style sympathetic to the claim of Biblical error, even in cases where the author ("Errancy") disagrees with the claim. See the About page for the site's philosophy.
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February 27th, 2009 on 11:57 am
There’s a standard answer to this alleged contradiction that all inerrantists seem to use: The centurion’s representatives’ actions can be attributed to the centurion. Luke’s description of the centurion’s representatives speaking to Jesus and Matthew’s description of the centurion speaking to Jesus are therefore perfectly consistent.
I’m not quite convinced by this. I’m open to correction, but here’s my current thinking:
It seems possible to do some things by proxy but not others. I’m happy with the idea of communicating with someone via an intermediary; if I sent a message to someone via a messenger then you could say that I said whatever was in the message, and perhaps even that I spoke to them. I’m also happy with the idea of doing something to someone via an intermediary; if I have someone killed by an assassin then you could say that I killed them. Being somewhere via an intermediary seems more problematic, though; if I sent a representative to a meeting or a class then you couldn’t say that I attended it. You can’t be somewhere by proxy.
Matthew says that the centurion “came to” Jesus. This isn’t a metaphor for the centurion sending representatives; it means that the centurion was physically present with Jesus. To see this, look at Jesus’ final words to the centurion, recorded in Matthew 8:13, “And to the centurion Jesus said, ‘Go; let it be done for you according to your faith.’” “Go” here is the singular, ‘Υπαγε, rather than the plural ‘Υπαγετε, so this instruction is definitely addressed to the centurion as an individual, not to any representatives that might be relaying messages between him and Jesus. If the centurion were still at home with his servant, then where would Jesus send him? The centurion had to be in Jesus’ presence for this command to make sense, and that isn’t something that he could have done by proxy.
March 1st, 2009 on 3:43 am
As an inerrantist, I must admit that I feel the pressure on this one. With that said, the word translated from Greek as “came to” in Matthew, could also be translated as “approached”. It does not seem so odd to say that one individual approached another individual through proxies.
I am no Greek expert, So I must admit here and now that there could be sound reasons not to translate the phrase as “approached” here. No reputable translation that I have consulted translates it as “approached” (A modernization of the Wycliffe Translation–criticized as overly literal–does say “approached to”), but the Greek lexicon suggests “approached” as a possibility nonetheless.
As I noted in another comment, it is a very good translational principle to preserve the ambiguity of the original language. That is probably reason enough to say “came to” rather than “came up to” as some translations and paraphrases do. It might also be a good reason not to use “approached”.
March 1st, 2009 on 7:06 pm
WL: isn’t Matthew 8:13 the more problematic verse? It’s very hard to understand it unless the centurion was physically present.
March 1st, 2009 on 7:52 pm
I did not reply to the “Go” argument in my last comment, but it seems to me that there is also a reply there. Let us first look at what comes right after “Go”. I don’t think that “it shall be done for you as you have believed” is just about the servant. Jesus is calling the centurion to a life of faith in Him. Thus Jesus is saying to the centurion “Go; live a life of faith.” That message can be delivered in person or sent through proxies.
March 2nd, 2009 on 11:49 am
To support the idea that “Go” means “Go home”, here’s the closest parallel to the use of ‘Υπαγε in Matthew 8:13:
‘Then he [Jesus] said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.” So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.’ [Mark 7:29-30]
The situation is very similar, and the word translated “Go” is identical, but here the instructed going seems to be explicitly described as going home.
March 2nd, 2009 on 4:53 pm
There’s no doubt that “upage” often does mean “go” as used in the sentence “You are standing here with me now, go away from me to some other place.” But even in English “go” does not always have that meaning.
I don’t think we can really tell from Matthew’s other uses of the word “upage” what meaning he intended in this case. Any more than you could for the word “go” in English. If the word involved were something metaphysically or morally subtle, like “mind” or “duty”, looking at an author’s other uses could be illuminating. The problem is that “go” is such a basic utility verb. It’s probably not reasonable to expect that an author would freight it with some special content.
It does make sense to look at common Greek usage to determine what the possible range of meanings are. But within those constraints, the best guide to guessing the meaning of the word in this (or any) passage has got to be the context of the passage itself.
For the sake of argument, let us assume that Jesus was talking to the Centurion _in person_. The argument I gave earlier still suggests, that Jesus does not mean to say “Go home” here. He means something more like “Go thy way” (as in the KJV). That is, I think, what the context suggests, and that meaning allows the entire interaction to occur through proxies.
March 2nd, 2009 on 5:19 pm
A somewhat different line of defense could be made by asking the question “Why did Matthew omit (or Luke add) the proxies?”
I’ll be the first to admit that, even if the Matthew passage were translated in the most sympathetic way, if you just read it and weren’t trying to harmonize it with Luke, you would not just assume that there are proxies involved. Quite the opposite in fact.
No doubt Matthew had some rhetorical point in mind. For now, let’s not speculate about what that point might be. Still, One thing I think we can get from Matthew’s omission is that this isn’t a garden variety error.
Matthew was an eyewitness of the events described. Luke was recording the accounts of eyewitnesses. I can see how one eyewitness could flub details of the events in question. But whether the centurion was present at all is not a mere detail. If Matthew omitted the intermediaries from the story, or Luke added them, they didn’t do it by accident, they did it on purpose.
Even if you assume that the authors of Matthew and Luke were later authors who pulled this story from some common Q gospel, why would the author of Matthew omit (or the author of Luke add) the intermediaries? One explanation that does not really make a lot of sense is that this was an error. The omission (or addition) was quite deliberate and done for a purpose.
The only way you can get to ordinary error here is if you assume that at least one of the authors is recording tenth or twelfth hand information that’s gotten garbled along the way. But the agreement of Luke and Matthew on other matters tends to undercut that hypothesis.
Given that, the question becomes one not of the _accuracy_ of the biblical record, but of the _honesty_ of the record. The issue is not whether the Matthew and Luke accounts are free of _error_, but whether they are free of _deception_. Could the omission of the proxies be made in an honest account? Could the addition of the proxies be made in an honset account?
The main actors are Jesus and the centurion, the Jewish elders and the friends of the centurion are bit players. For that reason, adding them in if they weren’t really involved falsely diminishes the role of the main actors. On the other hand, leaving them out (but carefully using ambiguous language so as not to tell an outright falsehood) removes a distraction from the main focus of the story.
March 2nd, 2009 on 5:46 pm
My guess (based on similar reasoning to that in your last paragraph above) would be that Matthew simplified the story by leaving out the intermediaries because he didn’t think that they were important. In doing so, he introduced some incidental errors into his account. This wasn’t an attempt to deceive, and the errors aren’t significant, but the presence of the errors does suggest that God didn’t inspire the Bible in the way claimed by inerrantists.
March 2nd, 2009 on 6:36 pm
I agree: if Q is real, then the author of Matthew has simply edited it for length. But, I don’t actually think he cares if he’s recording a somewhat incorrect version of events.
March 3rd, 2009 on 1:14 am
I think that Matthew chose to highlight the main actors of the story by leaving out some incidental characters (the proxies). I do not think that this is an error. An error is when you intend to convey a truth about something, but accidentally convey a falsehood. Matthew’s omission was quite deliberate. This is no more an error than it is an error that he didn’t describe the weather during the event. He left it out for narrative purposes.
So I return to my earlier point that the issue is whether he deceived his readers (if even in a small way). I don’t think he did.
2 Questions.
Errancy: What particular tenet of the Inerrantist position (as characterized in the Chicago statement) does Matthew’s omission go against? The denial clause of Article 13 seems, in fact, to allow for just such a case as this.
Amtiskaw: I think the argument I was making holds whether Q exists or not? Am I missing something?
March 3rd, 2009 on 10:10 am
I agree that omitting incidental details doesn’t constitute an error, but I think that Matthew does more than that here: he omits the intermediaries (an incidental detail) and so describes the centurion coming to Jesus himself (an inaccurate addition).
Article XII of the Chicago statement is this: “We affirm that Scripture in its entirety is inerrant, being free from all falsehood, fraud, or deceit.” Matthew 8:5’s “a centurion came to him” appears to me to be a falsehood, as does 8:13’s “And to the centurion Jesus said, ‘Go’”.
March 3rd, 2009 on 10:36 am
If we assume that the story is true in the first place, and that Matthew knew there were intermediates, then he surely knew that his readers were going to be left with a slightly incorrect understanding of events.
It’s not what I’d call “deception” – I just don’t think it’s his intention to give 100% accurate descriptions of events.
March 3rd, 2009 on 12:37 pm
Matthew’s readers would be left with a slightly incorrect understanding of _events_ whether there were intermediaries or not and whether Matthew mentioned them or not. You can’t communicate without leaving something out, and if you leave something out, the objects of your communication are guaranteed to get a slightly incorrect impression.
That does not make Matthew’s account deceptive or even erroneous. The question is whether his readers would they have a slightly incorrect understanding of the _main_ event…the event he was talking about.
I’d like to argue that the truest and fullest understanding of the events does come not from Matthew, but it also doesn’t come from Luke. It comes from reading both. Each story has its emphasis. Each tends to fill in the gaps of the other. Luke tends to fill in the details of the story. Matthew serves to highlight the main point.
Now it is valid to ask whether Matthew positively said that there were no intermediaries. That’s different from not mentioning them. And that brings us back to “came to/approached” and “go away/go thy way”. Errancy has argued that “came to” and “go” constitute not only an omission of the intermediaries, but the active denial that there were any. For reasons I’ve already noted, I think that the language is ambiguous enough to allow the involvement of intermediaries (and is therefore, not the active denial of intermediaries).
March 4th, 2009 on 6:26 pm
Just to return to one thread in this very interesting discussion that I think got dropped. Errancy mentioned that Matthew’s omission of the proxies may run afoul of Article XII of the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy.
I think that the denial clause of Article XIII sets the boundaries of the debate:
“We deny that it is proper to evaluate Scripture according to standards of truth and error that are alien to its usage or purpose. We further deny that inerrancy is negated by Biblical phenomena such as a lack of modern technical precision…the topical arrangement of material, variant selections of material in parallel accounts, or…”
Does Matthew’s omission of the proxies really amount to even a small deception by _first_ century standards of truth and accuracy? Or are we imposing 21st century standards of precision on this text? Is our translation of the critical phrases “came to/approached” and “go away/go thy way” so certain that we even _could_ apply 21st century standards of accuracy?
March 10th, 2009 on 11:42 pm
I’d like to suggest a third solution. I think this idea may have been missed in this discussion because an indadequate weight is given to the Jewish context of the passage. Wisdomlover discounts the Jewish elders and friends calling them minor “actors” that Matthew omitted from the story in order to highlight the main players- Jesus and the centurion. In fact he calls them “bit players”. They in fact are very important “players” in the story, but for Matthew’s purposes aren’t needed in the account.
On the otherhand, I think Errancy too misses the significance of the interaction between the Gentile believer (centurion) and the Jewish Messiah. He’s too busy worrying about the apparent contradiction between the two accounts to see that both are true.
Consider that this man calls the Jewish rabbi “Lord”- there is no way he could know that Jesus is divine. Even Jesus’ own disciples did not truly comprehend that idea until after the resurrection. Rather, he addresses Jesus this way because he is so deferential to the Jewish people, their religion, and their leaders. Consider that this same man by the account in Luke actually paid for the construction of the synagogue in Capernum (Lu. 7:5), while he himself was apparently not a convert, or proselyte. That fact is no less astonishing than the statement “he loves our nation”- remember the man is a Roman centurion.
I believe what happened is that the Centurion did in fact send the delegations of Jewish elders and friends to first approach Jesus. He himself then came in person to make the final appeal. It is much like the delegations that Jacob sent ahead to meet his brother Esau bearing gifts before he himself approached his brother bowing as he came.
Had Matthew included the preliminary appeal of the delegates, it would have immediately preceded Matt 8:5, had Luke mentioned the arrival of the Centurion, that would likely fall between Lu 7:7-8.
When viewed this way, there is no contradiction, only omission of detail at specific points in the story. This is due to the difference in purpose of the authors. Luke, as a co-minister amongst the Gentiles with Paul, is always concerned in his gospel account that the Good News is good news for the Gentiles. Here he highlights the fact that a Gentile believer- well before the implementation of the Great Commission, is intimately involved with the Jewish people and their religion. He sees that the man is highly regarded in the Jewish community- so much so that Jewish elders are willing to go to Jesus first and appeal to him on his behalf. He loves Israel, and in fact himself paid for the construction of the synagogue in Capernaum. These are amazing facts, and show that at least some Gentiles were already involved with the Jews and their religion prior to the coming of the Messiah, and also highly regarded by the Jews for their piety and generosity. These facts are therefore included for the benefit of a Gentile audience.
Matthew, on the other hand, is writing primarily to a Jewish audience. What he points out is the striking comment that Jesus makes regarding this Gentile’s faith when he says that “many will come from east and west” (i.e. Gentiles, “goyim”) and sit down with the JEWISH patriarchs in the kingdom of heaven (a shocking idea in and of itself), while the “sons of the kingdom” (i.e. Jews) will be excluded. These details are omitted from Luke’s account simply because a Gentile audience wouldn’t be as concerned with the implication of this statement, namely that the Jewish people could not expect to sit down with the Patriarchs solely on the basis of their ethnic/national identity. This is an idea repeated many times in the Gospels, and is here the core idea presented by Matthew. Luke’s core idea is centered on the piety of the Gentile centurion, and his connection to the Jewish people.
So the two stories are not in conflict, but merely illustrate the difference in emphasis and intended audience of the two authors, and therefore their respective inclusion or exclusion of certain details. I welcome your comments.
March 11th, 2009 on 9:38 am
Thanks for the suggestion. It’s certainly one worth exploring.
Just to summarise, here’s the proposed timeline: (1) the elders come to Jesus, (2) the friends come to Jesus, (3) the centurion comes to Jesus.
There may be a way to make this work but I think that there are a few problems to deal with (some more difficult to respond to than others):
(i) The centurion says to Jesus, via the friends, “I did not presume to come to you”, making it clear that he didn’t speak to Jesus in person.
(ii) Luke tells us, “When those who had been sent [i.e. the friends] returned to the house, they found the slave in good health.” Why would the centurion set out to ask Jesus to heal his slave when the slave had just been healed?
(iii) The same conversation happens twice: what the friends say to Jesus is the same as what the centurion says to Jesus. Why would the centurion repeat himself? Isn’t it simpler to think that these are two accounts of one conversation?
(iv) The centurion has the friends tell Jesus, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof”. Then when he asks Jesus to heal his slave Jesus says, “I will come and cure him.” Then the centurion says, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof”, and Jesus heals the slave remotely. Why would Jesus respond to this the second time but not the first? Had Jesus forgotten that the friends had said this?
(v) When the friends give the centurion’s “But only speak the word” speech, Jesus is amazed. When the centurion gives the same speech, Jesus is amazed again. Wouldn’t Jesus have been less amazed the second time?
As I said, some of these are more difficult to answer than others, but I’ve included them all because I think that cumulatively they have more force than individually.
What do you think? Are these points problematic for the ‘three meetings theory’?
March 11th, 2009 on 11:25 am
I am more-or-lass happy with my response above. But the fact that the centurion’s first delegation was a group of Jewish elders does seem like it may have more significance than just Luke’s desire to spell out what I called a ‘minor detail’. The idea that there were already Gentiles who were receptive to the promises of Judaism seems important.
With that said, the three meetings timeline that rabbicohen suggests is very interesting. It provides a fresh response to the “Go” argument. I think it can also be refined to address some (all?) of Erancy’s criticisms. Try this:
1) The centurion _approaches_ Jesus through the delegation of Jewish elders.
2) When he learns that that is successful, he sends out the delegation of friends to accompany Jesus.
3) The friends find Jesus as he is on the way to the centurion’s house.
4) The friends have an extended interchange with Jesus as he continues to move toward the centurions house.
5) During this interchange some friends run back and forth to the centurion to report.
6) The centurion, moved by what he has been hearing in the reports, finally comes out himself and joins the delegation of friends.
7) The centurion, now present with Jesus but part of the delegation of friends, finally makes his famous declaration of faith with his own mouth.
8) Jesus praises the centurion’s faith and dismisses him. (So “Go” means “Go home”.)
9) The entire delegation of friends, which now includes the centurion, returns home to find the servant well.
March 11th, 2009 on 1:13 pm
Luke 7:10 makes it obvious that (as far as Luke is converned) the centurion is never present.
March 11th, 2009 on 3:57 pm
As I said, I am content with my original argument (that the whole interchange occurred entirely through proxies and Matthew’s “Go” does not mean “Go home”).
But the time-line suggested by rabbicohen is not overthrown by Luke 7:10 either. All that is required is a slight change to/expansion of 8 and 9:
8′) Jesus praises the centurion’s faith and dismisses him.
9′) The centurion immediately returns but tells his friends to wait.
10′) Upon returning the centurion finds his servant well.
11′) The centurion sends a message to his friends that they can return.
12′) When the friends he had sent out in the first place returned to the house, they found the servant well.
March 11th, 2009 on 4:45 pm
I took the “some” in (5) “During this interchange some friends run back and forth to the centurion to report” to be a clever way of getting information to the centurion so that he’d come to speak to Jesus without triggering the healing that occurs when those who had been sent (which presumably means more than just “some” of them) returned to the house.
It seems to me that as long as the centurion leaves his house before his friends return and trigger the healing, problem (ii), which is the Luke 7:10 problem, has been solved. This is the case on the original (1) to (9) timeline, so why is the expansion suggested above necessary?
March 12th, 2009 on 5:11 pm
“..why is the expansion suggested above necessary?”
Luke wraps up the account by saying “And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the servant well.”
Amtiskaw argued that this shows that the centurion was never there. That goes too far, but it _may_ show that the centurion was not in that final returning group. The timeline I originally suggested had the centurion in that final group. So, assuming that this reading of Luke 7:10 is correct, that would be ruled out.
By revising and expanding 8 and 9 into 8′-12′ you address Amtiskaw’s argument. The centurion returns ahead of the final group. The final group consists only of the friends who had been sent, and they return to find the servant well.
March 12th, 2009 on 5:27 pm
Okay. I’m not convinced that this is necessary, but I at least understand the motivation now.
March 13th, 2009 on 11:51 pm
I’d like to respond to Errancy and problems with my suggestion that the centurion visits Jesus following the two preliminary delegations. But, first I’d like follow up my point that Matthew and Luke had very different intended audiences and purposes in their writing.
Mathew on the one hand had a Jewish audience in mind. For example the earliest church fathers are in agreement that the text was originally in Hebrew and subsequently translated into Greek (though no proof exists in the form of a Heb. manuscript). Mathew never explains Jewish customs and rituals, as he assumes the reader (being Jewish) would already understand them. Jesus’ geneology is traced to his ultimate Jewish ancestor, Abraham. When Jesus is born, the wise men seek “he who is born king of the Jews” (Matt 2:2).
Luke, on the other hand, always seeks to present the universal aspect of faith in Jesus even though he is the Jewish Messiah. When Jesus is born it is good news to “all the people” (Lu 2:10). When Luke quotes the Tenach (O.T.) he almost always selects texts that show God had been concerned about the Gentiles from ancient times, as in his quote of Is. 40 (Lu 3:4-6). Luke’s genealogy traces Jesus’ ancestors well past the Jewish people, all the way to Adam. And, knowing his audience would not understand, he almost always explains Jewish customs and rituals, such as explaining that the feast of unleavened bread is actually the Jewish Passover observance.
This has significant bearing on the passage in question. In the passage, I would say Matthew’s core idea is not focused so much on the faith of the Gentile centurion, as it is on the irony that Gentiles will sit down with the Patriarchs in the kingdom of heaven, while Jews (i.e. those without faith) would be thrown out (Matt 8:11-12). The shock value of that statement was meant to have an impact on a Jewish audience. The dialogue between Jesus and the centurion and/or his delegates is minimized because it is of minimal relevance to Matthew’s main point.
Luke on the other hand omits the entire statement from his narrative, and focuses instead on the centurion and his actions. This I believe supports his core idea, that at least some Gentiles were deeply connected to the Jewish world and the God of Israel, well before the coming of Messiah. But why would the centurion send not one but two delegations ahead of him? This is easy to understand in context. Jews did not associate with Gentiles, especially religious leaders. They risked ritual defilement. The purpose of Peter’s vision in Acts was to show him that he would not be defiled by having contact with Gentiles (Acts 10:28). So it is completely understandable that this man, not being Jewish, yet passionately deferential to the Jewish people, would be reluctant to just march right up to Jesus to make his request. Instead, he first sends Jewish elders, and then his trusted friends. Lastly, he comes in person to make his plea. Jesus’ response is a resounding affirmation of the man’s faith. Again, this serves Luke’s purpose in the narrative.
I think the remaining “difficulties” can be mostly be resolved.
(i) The centurion says to Jesus, via the friends, “I did not presume to come to you”, making it clear that he didn’t speak to Jesus in person.
[Rabbicohen] On the contrary, this is just typical Oriental deference. It is foreign to us, because our social practices are different.
(ii) Luke tells us, “When those who had been sent [i.e. the friends] returned to the house, they found the slave in good health.” Why would the centurion set out to ask Jesus to heal his slave when the slave had just been healed?
[Rabbicohen] Well, good point. But we just are not given all the chronological details, so it’s difficult to tell who is where at any given time.
(iii) The same conversation happens twice: what the friends say to Jesus is the same as what the centurion says to Jesus. Why would the centurion repeat himself? Isn’t it simpler to think that these are two accounts of one conversation?
[Rabbicohen] Maybe I’m missing something. The friends are essentially conveying what the centurion would say if he were there in person, so that when he is there in person the plea is essentially the same.
(iv) The centurion has the friends tell Jesus, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof”. Then when he asks Jesus to heal his slave Jesus says, “I will come and cure him.” Then the centurion says, “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof”, and Jesus heals the slave remotely. Why would Jesus respond to this the second time but not the first? Had Jesus forgotten that the friends had said this?
[Rabbicohen] That presumes Jesus did not respond to the friends- which he may have. Or he was simply waiting for the centurion to come in order to answer him directly.
(v) When the friends give the centurion’s “But only speak the word” speech, Jesus is amazed. When the centurion gives the same speech, Jesus is amazed again. Wouldn’t Jesus have been less amazed the second time?
[Rabbicohen] Ok, another good point. I do think his “amazement” was more for the benefit of the crowd, though, and his comment as recorded in Matthew would seem to address a wider concern than the faithfulness of one centurion.
What do you think? Are these points problematic for the ‘three meetings theory’?
[Rabbicohen] Yes, they’re somewhat problematic, but only at the detail level. The Oriental practice of deference in conjunction with the centurion’s “outsider” standing would explain the centurion’s actions and motivation, in my view.
March 14th, 2009 on 12:45 am
I’m happy enough with your responses to (i)-(iii), but not so satisfied by your responses to (iv) and (v).
With regard to (iv), the problem is that on the three meeting theory Jesus had already been given the reason not to go under the centurion’s roof. If this was a good reason, then he wouldn’t have said to the centurion “I will come and cure him”. If it wasn’t a good reason, then he would have actually gone under the centurion’s roof.
With regard to (v), as I understand it you’re saying that Jesus wasn’t really amazed the second time but acted as if he were to put on a bit of a show. I’m not quite comfortable with this. The text says that Jesus was amazed, describing his internal response, rather than that he gasped and said “Wow!” (or whatever), describing his external response, so I think that you’re departing from the text here.
For what it’s worth, here’s what I think is the most promising response to these problems (it’s the same in each case): there’s a difference between saying something via a messenger and saying it oneself.
Saying “I am not worthy to have you come under my roof” once via a messenger was one thing, but reiterating it in person was something else, and that was what changed Jesus’ mind.
The “But only speak the word” speech was amazing coming from the messengers, but to see the centurion deliver it himself was something else, and that was what amazed Jesus the second time.
Now I’m not quite convinced by these either–I think that it makes much more sense to say that Matthew edited the messengers out of the story for brevity introducing some (ableit trivial) falsehoods as he did so–but the availability of this kind of response makes me think that the three meeting theory is just about tenable, at a push, if you’re feeling charitable.
March 16th, 2009 on 6:24 pm
Well, as I said those particular points were good objections, which I suppose is why my response to them is weak. Great discussion, and I appreciate the collegial atmosphere in the discussion, even though some of us may at least be starting from opposite poles. Unfortunately I have to bow out of the discussion as I have to attend to my father’s sudden passing, though he did live to a ripe old age of 92. Shalom all.
March 16th, 2009 on 11:27 pm
I’m sorry to hear about your father; my sincere condolances.
Your contributions here were very welcome, and well worth careful consideration. I hope that in due course you’ll be back to participate again.
All the best.