Healing of the Centurion’s servant.

(Mat. 8:5-13)

Following this, the Lord went to Capernaum where, once again, He performed the miracle of healing the Centurion’s servant “in absentia” ie. without being there. Evidently, the Centurion commanded the local garrison of 100 Roman soldiers.

Some of the cities in Palestine, under the authority of the Roman Empire, had military garrisons stationed there for their protection. Although the Centurion was a heathen, he was disposed toward the Jewish faith, the synagogue built by him serving as witness to this. According to Saint Matthew, the servant suffered greatly from his infirmity, while Saint Luke — who relates in more detail - states that he was even close to death.

Initially, the Centurion sent Jewish elders with a request to come and heal his servant. Thereupon, he sent his friends and finally — as Saint Matthew writes — he himself left to meet the Lord, Who was approaching his house. His words: “Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy that You should enter under my roof. Therefore I did not even think myself worthy to come to You. But say the word, and my servant will be healed” (Luke 1:6-7), sound so unusual for a heathen in terms of faith and humility, that the Lord — as both the Evangelists relate — “marvelled.” He considered it necessary to emphasise before those that were present, that He did not find such faith even among God’s chosen people — the Israelites. Further on, as Saint Matthew alone relates, the Lord refutes the Jew’s opinion that only they can be members of the Messiah’s Kingdom. He also foretells that many of the heathens “from the east and west” — together with their Old Testament forefathers — will be found worthy to inherit this Kingdom. While at the same time, for their disbelief in the arrived Messiah, the “sons of the Kingdom” ie. the Jews, will be cast down into the hellish darkness, where “there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Mat. 8:12). As in many of the Lord’s sayings and sermons, the Kingdom of Heaven is presented as a supper or feast, at which (in the East) people did not sit but reclined. A guest who has transgressed in any way, was led out of the banquet room into the outside (hellish) darkness, into the cold — juxtapositioned to the warm and glowing room — where they gnashed their teeth from cold and sorrow; this image, understood by everyone, was taken to give a more visual presentation of the eternal torment of sinners in hell. The faith and humility of the Centurion was rewarded instantly - as soon as the Lord pronounced: “Go your way; and as you have believed, so let it be done for you” (Mat. 8:13).