Jesus of Nazareth: What He Wanted, Who He Was

It is only against this background that it becomes clear what is going on here. Scribes—that is, theologians—explain that Jesus is not driving out demons with the aid of the God of Israel but with that of a foreign god who himself is nothing but a demon. This officially charges Jesus with apostasy from the faith of Israel. Indeed, as the Markan text correctly interprets, he is charged with being possessed himself. There could be no more effective slander of Jesus in Israel, especially in the eyes of simple, pious people. He was thus branded as an idolater and seducer of the people. But this compromising slander itself makes it clear that Jesus’ opponents could not deny that he drove out demons. All they could do was twist the facts and in doing so demonize Jesus.⁵

So the fact remains: even if the New Testament contained not a single concrete miracle story it would be evident that Jesus healed sick and possessed people. In addition, we have to conclude from the same evidence that healings and other miracles were frequent after Easter, in the early communities. Apparently something began with Jesus that continued seamlessly into the early church.

Miracle Stories

Now, of course, it is true that the gospels not only give indirect evidence of Jesus’ miracles. They describe them as well. In fact, they relate an unusually large number of miracles. Mark’s gospel in particular is positively stuffed with accounts of miracles.

The phenomenon of the numerous miracles in the gospels is quite often downplayed by saying that such things were simply the rule in antiquity. It is said that in that time stories of miracles were constantly being told, belief in miracles had grown greatly, and people told of miracles by many “divine people.” The miraculous was somehow “in the air,” and even in the Judaism of Jesus’ time things were not much different.

But it is not quite so simple.⁶ Obviously in antiquity people, especially simple people, believed in miracles. But there was also a strong skepticism about and a critique of miracles. There were indeed sanctuaries—the most famous being Epidauros, with its cult of Asclepius—to which people went in droves to be instructed by the god during their “temple sleep” as to the nature of their illness and the therapy to be applied. In Epidauros and other sanctuaries there was also a particular “temple medicine” that apparently evinced many successes. But major personalities who not only imparted therapies but actually performed miraculous healings were extremely rare in antiquity, and well-attested “miracles” were even more uncommon.

It is against this background that we have to read the gospels, especially Mark’s, which may ultimately rest on the witness and tradition of Simon Peter. Mark relates the following healings and exorcisms:⁷

The possessed man in the synagogue (1:23-26)

Peter’s mother-in-law (1:30-31)

The leper (1:40-45)

The lame man (2:1-12)

The man with the withered hand (3:1-6)

The possessed man of Gerasa (5:1-20)

The woman with the hemorrhage (5:25-34)

The daughter of the Syrophoenician woman (7:24-30)

The deaf man with the speech impediment (7:31-37)

The blind man at Bethsaida (8:22-26)

The possessed son (9:14-29)

Blind Bartimaeus (10:46-52)

But Mark’s gospel contains other miracles that cannot simply be summarized under “healings and exorcisms”:

The stilling of the storm (4:35-41)

The raising of Jairus’s daughter (5:21-43)

The feeding of the five thousand (6:35-44)

Walking on the lake (6:45-52)

The feeding of the four thousand (8:1-9)

The withered fig tree (11:12-14, 20-25)

Add to these some ten miracle stories in Matthew’s and Luke’s special material, as well as seven miracle narratives in John. Thus Jesus is depicted as definitely a miracle worker, and a great many miracles are attributed to him, something that is unique in antiquity.

Biblical scholarship has long regarded these miracles analytically. As early as the Enlightenment a distinction was made between “healing miracles” and “nature miracles”; the latter included, for example, the stilling of the storm on Lake Gennesareth. Today, a still more careful distinction is made between “healings” and “exorcisms” on the one hand and “raising the dead,” “epiphany miracles” (walking on the lake), “gift miracles” (multiplication of the loaves), “rescue miracles” (stilling of the storm), “normative miracles” (Sabbath healings), and “punishment miracles” (the withered fig tree) on the other.