The Failure of Forgiveness of Sins and the Successful Healing: A Postcolonial Reading of Luke 5:17–26

Introduction

Does Luke 5:17–26, the story of Jesus’ healing of a person with paralysis, simply introduce a supernatural miracle of Jesus treating a sick man? Moreover, is it to explain that Jesus not only heals illness but also forgives sin? This article directly contradicts the current understanding of Luke 5:17–26 that the declaration of Jesus’ forgiveness of sins healed the sick man; instead, it asserts that Jesus intended to inform that the external suffering of the ill man was not due to his inner sin. The intentional failure of physical healing through the declaration of Jesus’ forgiveness of sins followed by his subsequent successful healing is a challenge to the Jewish community’s ideology that the sick are sinners. Furthermore, it is a resistance of Jesus the colonized toward the colonizers trying to entrench their governance within the existing paradigm at the time. This article attempts to read Luke 5:17–26 from a postcolonial perspective in order to capture the challenge and resistance of the colonized toward the colonizers.

Current Understanding of the Text and Objection to It

As for Luke 5:17–26, many scholars have argued that the story presupposes the causal relationship between sin and disease, which had penetrated ancient Mediterranean societies, especially Jewish societies. In other words, within the Palestinian community in the 1st century ce., there was a widespread of social and religious notion that human diseases were caused not merely by external factors such as bacteria and virus penetration, but by internal causes, namely human crimes against God. Thus, physical illness or disability caused by a disease was considered a consequential form of punishment for human sins; therefore, human society believed that only being forgiven for the sins that caused that particular disease could restore the sick to a healthy state again. ¹

Many scholars who interpret the New Testament argue that Luke 5:17–26 should be understood on the premise that sin and disease are related to each other. ² In addition, scholars who interpret the text based on the connection between sin and illness think that the declaration of forgiveness of sin, which Jesus told the sick man, was a prerequisite for the healing. ³ What was the purpose of Jesus’ treatment of the paralyzed man? Should this story also be understood in the context of the social perception that sin and sickness are linked? Scholars explain that Jesus’ cure of the paralyzed man was ultimately to prove that Jesus himself had the ability to forgive sin. ⁴

As for the interpretation of Luke 5:17–26, I challenge the interpretations that scholars have presented so far. The very first question is whether Jesus’ proclamation of the forgiveness of sins toward the sick man has the purpose of healing him. Was the ill man recovered when Jesus proclaimed to forgive sin? Or was the ill man cured after Jesus’ next order to get up and walk? If there was a time gap between the declaration of forgiveness and the command to get up and walk, and if that time gap meant that the healing of the sick man had been delayed, the proclamation of Jesus’ forgiveness of sins may have failed to heal the sick man. This presumption makes us rethink the understanding that Jesus had cured the disease, assuming the causal relationship between sin and illness, which was the social and religious view of the time. Therefore, this article proves that Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness of the sick man’s sins did not cure him and that Jesus’ order to get up and walk healed him. This article also examines Jesus’ intention in the text based on the Postcolonialism theory of Homi K. Bhabha.

The Proclamation of Jesus that Heals no Disease

In Luke 5:18, a paralyzed man is introduced. He is lying down on a mat due to his ‘paralyzed’ (παραλελυμένος) body, and because of the crowd surrounding Jesus, it is impossible for him to approach Jesus in the house (v.18). So the paralyzed man, lying on his mat, is brought before Jesus ‘through the tiles’ (διὰ τῶν κεράμων) by those who carried him (v.19). What is noteworthy here is that the sick man remains silent during the event. He does not approach Jesus himself. The reason may be due to his paralyzed body, but the sick man does not appear as the main subject in the text nor does he directly ask Jesus to cure his illness. Jesus declares that his sins have been forgiven ‘seeing their faith’ (ἰδὼν τὴν πίστιν αὐτῶν) not just his faith (v.20). Furthermore, while Jesus is arguing with Pharisees and teachers of the law, the sick man’s presence becomes unclear as if he had left the story stage.

The silence of the paralyzed man in the text reflects the social perception of the sick at the time. The prevailing worldview of the ancient Palestinian society, especially the Jewish community, was the Deuteronomic theology that those who obey God would be blessed while those who disobey him would be punished. And within the framework of such thinking, the suffering of the sick was not merely to remain in physical pain, but to extend to social and psychological suffering. This is because the condition of the disease was recognized as a condition of causal consequences of sin. ⁵ Therefore, the paralyzed man is not just a man suffering from illness. Rather, because of the social perception that the sick are sinners, his worth is negated, and as a result, he is inevitably presented as a silent existence.

Now Jesus declares the forgiveness of sins toward the paralyzed man: ‘Man, your sins are forgiven you’ (Lk. 5:20b RSV). With regard to understanding Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness of sins, scholars were mainly divided as follows: One view is that Jesus represented God’s forgiveness, ⁶ and the other is that Jesus himself forgave the sick man’s sins. ⁷ However, whether Jesus represented God’s forgiveness or did it himself, their premise is that Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness of sins cured the sick man. In other words, they presuppose a link between sin and disease.

Has Jesus’ proclamation of the forgiveness of sins cured the paralyzed man? The declaration of forgiveness in Luke 5:20b did not heal the paralyzed man. The reasons are as follows. First, there is no response from the sick man after Jesus’ declaration. In other words, there is no indication that the ill man has been cured. He says nothing, does nothing, and the narrator who tells the story is also silent. Second, after Jesus’ proclamation, without mentioning that the sick man has been cured, the story immediately leads to arguments with teachers of the law and Pharisees (v.21–23). Third, at the end of the discussion, Jesus orders the sick man to get up and walk (v.24), and he gets up from his mat and returns home immediately after Jesus commands him (v.25). Therefore, given that the sick man was silent and still lying on a mat and that the debate about forgiveness of sins took place between the declaration of forgiveness and the order to get up and walk, it can be inferred that the paralyzed man had not been cured. In other words, Jesus’ proclamation of forgiveness had no effect on the treatment of the disease.

We must note that the failure of Jesus’ treatment was intentional. Moreover, this deliberate failure is not to assert that Jesus’ ability to forgive sins cannot cure the disease, but rather to signal that the paralyzed man does not need to be forgiven in order to be cured. Luke intentionally changes the tense of the declaration of forgiveness of sins from the present tense (ἀφίενταί) in Mark 2:5, its parallel passage, to the perfect tense (ἀφέωνταί) in Luke 5:20. The statement of the forgiveness of sins in this perfect tense suggests that the forgiveness was a condition achieved earlier and indicates the permanent state of the forgiveness. In other words, Jesus did not forgive his sins as a prerequisite for the cure of the disease, but rather that the sins of the sick man were already forgiven, regardless of the suffering of the illness he was experiencing at the time. Jesus is arguing that the paralyzed man is not currently suffering from a disease caused by sin.

After Jesus declared to forgive the sin of the paralyzed man, Luke 5:21 introduces the opinions of teachers of the law and Pharisees. They argue that Jesus’ proclamation of the forgiveness of sins corresponds to a ‘blasphemy’ (βλασφημία). The interpretations as to why they regarded Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness as blasphemy differ among scholars. Some scholars explain that the claim that Jesus can forgive sin is the cause of the blasphemy charge. ⁸ Another scholar argues that the proclamation of Jesus was blasphemy because it was not related to the offering of the temple. ⁹ Another scholar argues that the Pharisees, who thought the prophecy had ended, considered Jesus’ declaration sacrilege because they accepted it as prophecy. ¹⁰ In any case, all these explanations of scholars share the premise that Jesus’ statement of forgiveness of sins is the cause of the cure for the paralyzed man. In other words, the common premise is that Jesus became a blasphemer because the cause of the sick man’s suffering was his sin and because Jesus forgave it (whether directly or vicariously).

However, as I claimed earlier, Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness of sins did not immediately cure the patient’s paralysis. Rather, the statement of Jesus is a deliberate declaration indicating that the present suffering of the disease is not due to the man’s sin. On the other hand, in the view of the teachers of the law and Pharisees, Jesus committed blasphemy as a man who impersonated God because his proclamation failed to cure the sick man. If the man had been healed immediately after the declaration of Jesus, could they have criticized the proven capacity to forgive sins as blasphemy? Therefore, because the proclamation of Jesus seemed to have failed, his opponents judged him to have committed blasphemy. However, Jesus’ declaration of forgiveness of sins ultimately did not cure the paralyzed man, which means that Jesus is not the one who defamed the divinity and that sin is not the cause of the suffering of the disease.

The Command of Jesus to Cure a Disease

In Luke 5:22, Jesus notices the intention of the teachers of the law and the Pharisees to charge him with blasphemy. Jesus asks them the following question: ‘Which is easier, to say, “Your sins are forgiven you,” or to say, “Rise and walk”?’ (Lk. 5:23 RSV). Why is Jesus asking this question? Is it to indicate that it is easier to declare forgiveness of sins? Or is it to indicate that it is easier to order to get up and walk?

In response to this riddle-like question of Jesus, scholars think it would have been easier to declare forgiveness of sins and harder to order to get up and walk. The reason is that they judge, almost uniformly, that the declaration of forgiveness of sins cannot prove whether the sin is forgiven, while the result of the order to get up and walk can be confirmed right on the spot. ¹¹ But is the declaration of forgiveness easier because it is impossible to prove? I think it was more challenging to declare forgiveness of sins in the Palestinian Jewish community of the 1^st century ce. The reason is that the validity of saying forgiveness of sins to the sick is verifiable, especially within the worldview that considered sin and disease to have a causal relationship. What happens if someone declares to a sick man that his sins are forgiven, and the ill man is not cured? He will be suspected as a man who pretends to be God and will be condemned as a blasphemer. Jesus was in that very predicament. But what happens if someone orders a sick man to get up and walk, and the ill man is not cured? Although he would have been demeaned, he would not have been condemned as a blasphemer, and death would be spared. Therefore, we cannot conclude that the declaration of forgiveness of sins, because it is unverifiable, was easier than the order to get up and walk.

The enigmatic question of Jesus in Luke 5:23 is not to ask what is easier. The question is intended to shake up the ideology of the time that disease is the result of sin. The reason is that for those who think that sin and sickness are correlated, the declaration of forgiveness of sins and the order to get up and walk are linked together, which makes this a question that cannot be easily answered. Why did Jesus add a declaration of forgiveness of sins, instead of treating the paralyzed man with orders to rise and walk first? Why did Jesus declare forgiveness of sin when it is self-evident that if the declaration of forgiveness of sins fails to cure the sick man, he would be charged with blasphemy? The reason is to prove that the patient’s present suffering is not due to his sin. It is true that if humans disobey God, they will be punished which could include sufferings from a disease; however, not all pain of the illness is the result of disobedience to God. Therefore, by making his declaration of forgiveness ineffective, Jesus is contending that all the sick should not be universally branded as sinners.

After answering the question in Luke 5:23, Jesus says ‘But that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins’ (Lk. 5:24a RSV). The way Jesus proves that he is the Son of Man is by treating the paralyzed man. At the same time, however, the way to confirm that the cause of the sick man’s suffering is not his sin is by curing him with direct healing order not with a declaration of forgiveness of sins. Therefore, in Luke 5:24b, Jesus orders the paralyzed man as follows: “Rise, take up your bed and go home’ (RSV). What is notable here is Jesus’ order to go to ‘your house’ (οἶκος σου). In the preceding passage in Luke 5:12–16, which is considered to be paired with Luke 5:17–26, Jesus treated a leprosy patient and then ordered him to go to the temple to show his treated body to the priest and to offer a gift (v.14). So why did Jesus, unlike the leprosy patient, tell the person with paralysis to go home instead of the temple? It is because of Jesus’ understanding that the suffering of the person with paralysis is not caused by sin. Jesus intentionally made his proclamation of the forgiveness of sins ineffective to reveal that his sin was not the cause of the disease. Furthermore, Jesus gives orders of direct healing to escape the charge of blasphemy and at the same time raises the paralyzed man from his mat. And the meaning of this order to go straight home is Jesus’ final declaration that the cause of the illness is not related to sin.

Luke 5:25 describes the immediate action of the sick man who heard Jesus’ direct order of healing: ‘And immediately he rose before them, and took up that on which he lay, and went home, glorifying God’ (RSV). Luke, in particular, adds the expression ‘immediately’ (παραχρῆμα) not mentioned in Mark, as if to remind again that Jesus’ first word, the declaration of forgiveness of sin, was not able to cure the sick man. The ill man rose immediately by Jesus’ direct order of healing and went home with his mat. Through this, both of Jesus’ intended purposes are achieved. First, by proving that the cause of the present suffering of the sick is not sin, Jesus was able to challenge the worldview, namely the ruling ideology of the leaders of the Jewish community at that time, that the sick are unconditionally sinners. And second, by immediately treating the sick with his direct healing order, Jesus was able to escape from the charge of blasphemy, which he was given because of the failure of treatment due to the proclamation of forgiveness. In other words, he was able to prove his identity as the Son of Man.

The Overthrow of the Ideology that the sick are sinners

Where did the worldview come from that external human suffering is due to internal sin? The root of this perception is based on the Deuteronomic theology. It is the theology of reflection, represented by chapter 6 of Deuteronomy. The core content is that if humans obey God well, they will be blessed; on the contrary, if they disobey God’s word, they will be punished. The so-called Deuteronomists interpreted the reasons for Jews losing their country and serving as prisoners in the Babylonian Empire as a result of disobedience to God. And the history of looking back on themselves in the theology of self-reflection is the Deuteronomistic history from Joshua to 1–2 Kings. This self-reflection theology, the Deuteronomic principle, served as the basis for the Jews to maintain their identity through following the colonial rule of various empires.

The Palestinian Jewish community in the 1st century ce. was enjoying autonomy, although it was under the colonial rule of the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire recognized the religious practice of Judaism. It maintained its own identity of the Jews and distinguished them from other people groups on the condition that they stayed within its ruling system without undermining the rule of the Roman emperor. Thus, the Roman Empire, in addition to sending its governors to govern the Jews effectively, kept the Jewish ruling class, a religious force centered on the temple and the law and represented by the priest, the teachers of the law, the Sadducees, and the Pharisees. The Jewish ruling class effectively soothed the Jewish people under the Roman Empire’s control through the Deuteronomic theology, which was the theology of self-reflection. In other words, they instilled that the reason why Jews are now ruled by the Roman Empire was because they were disobedient to God, and thus taught that at times like this, they should become more religious Jews focused on the temple and the law.

In particular, the Jewish community, under the control of the Roman Empire, was suffering from a severe economic gap between the rich and the poor. The patron-client relationship, which was penetrating ancient Mediterranean society at the time, was affecting everyone from the highest patron, the Roman emperor, to the small villages of colonial society. Within this relationship network, the Jewish community also had a fixed social and economic gap. The Jewish ruling class, which was approved by the Roman Empire and ruled the Jewish society, wanted to maintain their socio-economic status. They applied the Deuteronomic principle as an efficient way to achieve their goals. Their logic was as follows: Those in the Jewish ruling class are obedient to God because they themselves enjoy social and economic prosperity while miseries experienced by the economic poor, the lower classes, and even those suffering from a disease in Jewish society prove their disobedience to God. Therefore, they must repent of their sins based on the temple and the law. Using this ideology, the ruling classes of Jewish society maintained their position.

So did Jesus acknowledge and accept this perverted Deuteronomic principle system? I think within Luke 5:17–26, Jesus is criticizing the corrupt view of the Deuteronomic theology and the ruling class who wanted to solidify their position within that system. Jesus deliberately declared forgiveness of sins toward the paralyzed man who had been brought to him. Moreover, by failing in the outcome of the proclamation of forgiveness, and by succeeding with the direct healing order to rise and walk, Jesus declared that the present hardships of the sick were not due to sin. This failure and success of Jesus are not just about the condition of one ill person. Jesus is seeking to overthrow the society by reversing the perverted Deuteronomic theology, or the colonialist-dominant ideology, which was penetrating Jewish community at the time.

False Mimicry Strategy of Jesus the Colonized

The Postcolonialism theory of Homi K. Bhabha focuses on the issue of cultural negotiations and exchanges within the colonial space, in which the colonizers and the colonized clash and conflict with each other, rather than focusing on individual topics of the each group. ¹² He defined the colonial space as an ‘in-between’ space between imperial and colonial cultures and saw mixed encounters between cultures take place in it. ¹³ Bhabha argues that the ‘stereotype’ of colonial rulers who want to fix others as objective objects and dominate within the cultural gap of colonial space is an inconclusive object. ¹⁴ And he explains that in it the subject and the object switch places and lose self-identity. In this way, the meaning action that causes ‘otherness’ that makes the perception of the difference impossible within the binomial confrontational difference is called ‘ambivalence’. ¹⁵ How do the subjects resist within the colonial space characterized by ambivalence? Bhabha argues that those who oppose that power in the way of governing authority are rather bound by the logic of that power, and eventually become entrenched in the existing regime. ¹⁶ Thus, the colonized have a strategy of penetrating the dominant symbolic order and system rather than a traditional form of resistance, such as confrontation with the rulers or rejection of control power, which is what Bhabha calls ‘mimicry’ or ‘sly civility’.

‘Mimicry’ refers to the process of the colonized people assimilating into the dominant culture as they embrace the culture of the colonizers. ¹⁷ If ‘stereotype’ is a strategy in which colonial power subjugates people, ‘mimicry’, on the contrary, is the process in which the subjects become conformal subjects that resemble colonizers. ¹⁸ Here, Bhabha argues that the results of the ‘mimicry’ are entirely different from the original intentions of the colonizer. According to him, ‘colonial mimicry is the desire for a reformed, recognizable Other, as a subject of a difference that is almost the same, but not quite’. ¹⁹ The colonizers demand that people ‘be like them’ to facilitate their rule. But at the same time, they make contradictory demands that people ‘should not be the same as them’ in order to maintain the colonial system. In response to these ambivalent demands mixed with allowances and prohibitions, the colonized people have an ambivalent reaction that follows and violate discipline at the same time. In other words, ‘mimicry’ is a subversion tactic that seems to convey faithful following of the example of the ruler, but at the same time mocks the ruler. ²⁰ As a result, the colonized people get a way of dismantling existing colonial rule, which is their ‘sly civility’. ²¹

I think that the words and actions of Jesus in Luke 5:17–26 can be understood within Bhabha’s theory of Postcolonialism, especially within the strategy of ‘mimicry’. In commenting on the text earlier, we could see that Jesus had deliberately disabled the first declaration of forgiveness, arguing that the suffering of the sick was not due to sin. And we could see that Jesus proved the patient’s innocence and his divine ability at the same time by his effective second order. This is the mimicry strategy of Jesus. Jesus brings the Deuteronomic principle, one of the ruling ideologies of Jewish society, to the teachers of the law and Pharisees, who are sympathetic forces of the ruling class and propagators of the ideology. The principle was a ruling ideology, in which obedience to God would result in blessings while disobedience would result in punishment. It was a degenerated ideology that those who suffered, such as those with diseases, were punished because they disobeyed God, and that they should be taught by those who enjoy wealth and high social status, that is, those who are blessed because they obeyed God.

Jesus begins to imitate the Deuteronomic principle of the ruling class. At first, he seems to accept the ruling class ideology that the sick are sinners. The reason is that Jesus declares forgiveness not healing order for the sick man who has been brought to him. This declaration is in line with the ideology of the Deuteronomic theology of the Jewish ruling. However, the imitation of Jesus turns out to be a mimicry action because the proclamation of forgiveness fails. Of course, such failure was initially expected by the ruling class. Therefore, they wanted to rule Jesus as a blasphemer to block the influence of Jesus and solidify their dominion. Nevertheless, Jesus destroys those ruling classes’ hopes through a second direct healing order. In other words, Jesus seems to accept the existing ruling ideology that the sick are sinners, but on the contrary, he overthrows the premise. Furthermore, Jesus exposes the despicable power of the current ruling class by simultaneously proving his divine ability and the innocence of the sick man.

In sum, by first declaring forgiveness of sins, Jesus seems to accept the existing ruling ideology that the cause of the external illness is internal sin. It was an act of imitation by the colonized, which the colonizers wanted to inject into the natives. However, Jesus’ proclamation of the forgiveness of sins fails. The failure served to expose that the colonial ruling ideology was not something that the subjects should accept and resemble. Furthermore, the exposure turns out to be right with the success of the second healing order. The failure of Jesus’ first declaration of forgiveness and the success of his second order of healing are part of the mimicry strategy of Jesus the colonized mocking the colonizer’s ruling ideology.

Conclusion

This article has so far attempted a new understanding of Luke 5:17–26. It goes beyond the current understanding that Jesus in the text treated the sick man by forgiving his sins. The worldview that dominated Jewish society in the time of Jesus was the Deuteronomic principle. This principle has been transformed into the ruling ideology of the establishment in the Jewish community. Jesus challenged the ruling ideology that the establishment has used. First of all, the non-correlation of forgiveness and healing is proved by the fact that Jesus failed to cure the sick man with his declaration of forgiveness. When Jesus was unable to heal the sick man, sympathizers of the ruling forces criticized him as a blasphemer. According to them, because the sick man had not been cured, Jesus had no power to forgive sins. However, Jesus declared himself the Son of Man with divine authority and treated the sick man with his second order to get up and walk. Jesus in Luke 5:17–26 proves that the paralyzed man is not ill because he is guilty. Furthermore, Jesus the colonized expresses his resistance to the ruling ideology that the sick are sinners.