Disabling the Church from the Center for Disability and Ministry

Reimagining Healing: A Biblical Perspective on Disability and Wholeness

• Center for Disability and Ministry at Western Theological Seminary • Season 1 • Episode 7

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This episode probes into health, healing, and disability from a fresh biblical perspective, emphasizing an integrated understanding of personhood. It features narratives from scripture that redefine health as relational wholeness rather than mere physical restoration, inviting listeners to reconsider their views on healing.

• Exploring the biblical notion of the person as a cohesive whole 
• Unpacking the trilectic understanding of body, spirit, and community 
• Analyzing the significance of physiognomy in biblical narratives 
• The story of the woman with the issue of blood as a lesson in holistic healing 
• Understanding dual miracles in the story of the man lowered down through the roof 
• Insights into Celedonius, the man born blind, and the challenges to societal beliefs around health 
• The role of community and relational dynamics in achieving true healing 
• Setting the stage for future discussions on shalom and disability

Speaker 1:

Disabling the Church is a production of the Center for Disability and Ministry at Western Theological Seminary. This series amplifies the voices, giftedness and perspectives of disabled people to enrich the ministry and witness of the Church and perspectives of disabled people to enrich the ministry and witness of the church.

Speaker 2:

Hello all and welcome to Disabling the Church podcast. I am your host, dr LS Carlos. It is an honor to be with you today. Thank you so much for sharing of your time and listening in. I pray that you are well and today, in the midst of our conversation, I hope that we can reflect a bit on the topics of health and healing.

Speaker 2:

In the conversation around disability, the topic of what it means to be healthy and healed is often on the table, but this is often discussed in relation to the assumption that one's body, if you live with a disability, is not ideal and therefore must be healed, and so the assumption is that one's need for healing is intimately connected to the fact that one's body is disabled. It's as simple and as complicated as that. But when we look at the biblical narrative and healing in scripture, jesus' healing ministry there is so much more nuance and depth to how the person is understood, how health is framed and therefore how ideal and non-ideal are understood non-ideal are understood. When Jesus enters our world and offers something through and in his healing ministry, it begs the question what he is beckoning us toward. And so today, over the course of our conversation, I hope that we can reflect on and then learn a couple of things. One, what's the biblical notion of the person? When we understand what a person is and what scripture means when we talk about person, then we can move to understanding what it means to be a healthy person, right, and then from there we also have a better framework for understanding what it means to be unhealthy or in need of healing. So let's begin first by unpacking the biblical concept of the person.

Speaker 2:

So in our world, in 21st century Western context, the person is usually understood in terms of mind, body, soul or spirit right For the Jewish mind, the person as a living person is one cohesive whole. And then what happens when you die is what can be debated in terms of what happens to these entities. But as a living person you are one cohesive whole. And the body is better understood in terms of the living person and three bodily realities. So a fleshly body, the stuff that makes up the physical stuff, you see, if you are conventionally cited and then the eternal, spiritual, mental, emotional body. And the communal body, one's relational interconnectedness and locality. These three bodies make up one unified whole that then can be articulated as the living person. So in my research and writing I call this the trilectic understanding of the person. Understanding of the person, now the living person. Then, in scripture we see that concept in Genesis 2, verse 7, for example, right In the Torah, the person upon God breathing into Adam the first human, this creature becomes nefesh hay or living creature.

Speaker 2:

In the Septuagint, or the Greek translation of the Old Testament, it's sekendosan, these words in Hebrew and Greek. They translate to this cohesive creature that is living, called the person. It's not divided up. Living, called the person. It's not divided up, right. And if we have that understanding of the person in mind, then we can move to understanding how the nature of what the body looks like relates to convictions around what the person is like. Okay, so this leads to a clear relationship between the state of what you see, someone's physical body, pointing to the reality of their internal spiritual state. This is called physiognomy of your internal spiritual state. Okay, so in Jesus's world, physiognomy is an umbrella that sort of runs over everything. And this makes sense. Then, right, if you stop and think about the ostracization, the exclusion and the purity laws and things like that that are present in scripture. And so, even though the word disability isn't anywhere in scripture, it's Things like bodily ideals, or a person being clean or unclean, or touchable or untouchable. That's well entrenched in the biblical tradition and it has a lot to do with this concept of physiognomy. So now let's turn back to scripture.

Speaker 2:

In Matthew 9, mark 5, and Luke 8, there's a common, known story of the woman with the issue of blood, who had been bleeding for 12 years. In this story, what you see is this woman is deemed to be spiritually unclean because she is bleeding, is bleeding Now. Under normal circumstances this is seen to be, at least within the biblical narrative, within the boundary of a menstrual flow. But if you read the text in Levitical law, the person is unclean for as long as they are bleeding and therefore anyone who touches them is ceremonially unclean and must wash and abide by a certain period of purification before they are no longer considered unclean and can re-enter spiritual life and social engagement and the temple. And so we understand that she is physically bleeding and therefore socially unclean, untouchable and spiritually unclean and therefore ostracized, isolated, pushed to the margins, et cetera, et cetera. And so the entire nature of her person is fractured to varying degrees at various levels, is fractured to varying degrees at various levels, and when she encounters Jesus she desires to be wholly restored.

Speaker 2:

When we talk about healing and health, what we're talking about here is the restoration of the whole person, and scripture encapsulates that in the word and the concept of Shalom. When we read the healing narratives, we begin to see beginning with even like. The woman with the issue of blood she desires to be, the Greek word used in this passage is invited into, essentially sorzo. Sorzo is a word that means wholly restored and translates intimately related to this concept of shalom. But when she touches the hem of Jesus's robe, she is physically restored, her disease ceases. She doesn't receive holistic restoration like she hopes for.

Speaker 2:

Then Jesus calls forth someone to explain what happened to him. Remember the narrative Power has gone out from me. Someone touched me and the text says the woman went before him in fear and trembling and told Jesus the whole truth. And upon hearing her, jesus says to her daughter be restored, go in peace and be healed of your disease. These words of life that Jesus speaks over her all can be translated back to the word shalom. But when Jesus speaks to her and says be restored, the word he uses there is soto Receive the holistic restoration that you sought in the beginning. But that holistic restoration is given to her through the relational interaction between her and the personification of the Holy of Holies, the one who brings shalom, the peace of God with flesh on in the presence of a community that now sees that she is clean, pure, restored spiritually and in every other way. So the interesting thing here to pay attention to, among other things, of course, is that she came to Jesus desiring holistic restoration. She did not receive that initially by touching the hem of Jesus's robe Read Matthew 9, mark 5, luke 8. What she receives is simply the physical restoration of her body and deliverance from the disease.

Speaker 2:

It's not simple proximity with Jesus that changes people and brings the health and healing that the gospels say is promised to us. Remember the narrative says that people were bumping up against Jesus in a crowd constantly. That's not the restorative moment. The Shalomic, holistic restorative moment is encountering Jesus, not just proximity with Jesus, but encountering Jesus as God. And that's a relational reality that Christ is the driver of when he reaches toward the woman and says daughter, be well, be restored. Daughter, be well, be restored, be freed of your disease and go in peace. That relational dynamic where Jesus recognizes and reaches toward a person and that person is encountering God in Christ. That's the Holy of Holies with flesh on. That's shalom in a person. That relational exchange is shalom, lived out. That's the kind of healing that then brings us to a state of, in the biblical framework, health.

Speaker 2:

The state of her body mattered for the sake of the engagement with Christ, the one who loves her and the one who made her mattered for the sake of the engagement with Christ, the one who loves her and the one who made her. But it is so not the divisive deficit driven point. Let's think about this a little bit more with a subsequent narrative the man lowered down to the roof by who we often assume culturally they're his friends we don't actually know that for certain but by people who are carrying him on a mat in Luke 5. Okay, we know the narrative, but he's lowered down to the mat and Jesus, seeing the faith of the ones who were with him, takes pity on him and says Son, your sins are forgiven. And those present, the religious leaders, they're wondering in their hearts and they're mumbling and they're accusing Jesus to blasphemy. Jesus, perceiving this in his spirit, says what is easier to say your sins are forgiven or to say pick up your mat and walk and go home, but that you would know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins. Pick up your mat and go home. Let's walk through that narrative a bit.

Speaker 2:

There are two miracles that occur. Remember physiognomy, assuming that the state of your body is a manifestation of your internal spiritual state. The spiritual leaders hear Jesus's words when he says, son, your sins are forgiven. Leaders hear Jesus's words when he says, son, your sins are forgiven. Your sins are forgiven. That's miracle one. And Jesus seems to be challenging physiognomy here and saying you are spiritually restored, you are given the opportunity to enter into right relationship with the God who made you, in the presence of a community who has rejected you. And that community, or at least the spiritual leaders therein, question the validity of that because his body still remains in the same state. And Jesus says then, second miracle, pick up your mat and go home, so that others would know that indeed, your sins have been forgiven and I am God in the flesh. Be restored spiritually and spiritually, physically, socially, emotionally, be restored, be made whole and go home. We see all the layers of the person coming together and the fracture being restored. What it means to be healthy is better described as being whole in the multifaceted reality. That is the biblical understanding of the person, disability and the state of our bodies, not the central point. Encountering Jesus as God, the one who does the impossible, not just making the impossible probable but actually doing it, and then inviting us into relationships, that's health, that's healing.

Speaker 2:

Now, last, we're going to think about the man born blind in John 9. The man born blind in John 9, church tradition tells us, is Celedonius. In the text he's not given a name, but the writing and commentaries of Irenaeus tells us that this man's name is Celedonius. Then history tells us Celedonius goes on to be one of the greatest missionaries of the early church in France.

Speaker 2:

So in John 9, remember, the apostles are walking with Jesus and they pass a man and they say that he's born blind. And so they asked this question was this man born blind because of his sin or the sins of his parents? And Jesus says neither, but that the works of God would be shown in him. Okay, now remember, physiognomy is the first layer here, right? Is this man blind because he sinned or because his parents sinned? They're not trying to be jerks or insensitive, they're trying to be good Jews.

Speaker 2:

There is a conviction that says people can actually sin in the womb, and so when they say, did this man sin, even though he's born blind, they're poking at that rabbinic tradition. And Jesus says neither but that the works of God would be shown in him. And Irenaeus tells us there is a way to read this that is faithful to the larger biblical witness and the witness of the church and the ministry of Christ. He says from the time of this being recorded in the biblical witness, people have debated what that phrase means. The works of God. Irenaeus says interpret these words as the works of God, pointing us back to the works of God that created humanity from the clay, the mud and the clay in Genesis. Remember back to the beginning of our conversation today, when we talked about Nefesh Hayah and from the dust God forms a Hadam and then breathes life into this creature and this creature becomes a living soul or a person. That is the narrative that, according to Irenaeus' reading of this text, jesus is referring back to when he says works of God.

Speaker 2:

Reading of this text Jesus is referring back to when he says works of God. And if that's not clear, then Jesus reaches into the dirt, spits, makes clay from the dirt or mud and then puts it on Celedonius' eyes and then says go and wash in the pool called Siloam or scent. Irenaeus says it's better to read this passage not as Celadonius the one born blind, but instead the one born without eyes. So when Jesus forms from the dust, mud and clay, he's placing eyes into Celedonius' face, as if to say as God, as I formed you from the dust of the earth. So I am asking now, do you see me as God working in your midst, the holy of Holies with flesh on?

Speaker 2:

If you read it that way, then from the beginning of time, way back in Genesis, when God is forming of a blind man named Celedonius, that is so persuasive when we are thinking about what it means to be whole and healthy, if we whittle it down to, being healthy means fitting into social, cultural ideas and ideals around what the body ought to be, and we think that that is what God is restoring us to when we think about healing and health.

Speaker 2:

We have missed it by a mile and a half. The greatest thing that comes to the fore for us when we lean into this rich way of engaging the biblical witness and Christ's healing example is that we see the importance of relational depth and true connection with the God who made us and the community that he's placed us in as communal creatures, that, indeed, for whom it is not good to be alone. And so, friends, as we pick up next week, we'll talk more about shalom in particular and what that is, and we will think more about kind of the erroneous nature of thinking about disability as related to sin. Some of what we've discussed this week will be revisited then through the lens of talking about the relationship between disability and sin and Shalom. It has been good to be with you. May God bless you, may God keep you. May God cause his face to shine upon you and ever give you peace, amen.

Speaker 1:

This has been a Center for Disability and Ministry production. Join us next time for another insightful episode.