Yeshua Explored
25th December 2023
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Jesus returns home
MATTHEW 4:13-17, MARK 1:14-15, LUKE 4:16-32, JOHN 4:43-54
After a short stay in Cana, we follow Jesus to Nazareth, the city of his childhood. It has only been a few months since he left there, but much had happened since! he would hear the familiar double blast of the trumpet from the roof of the synagogue minister’s house, proclaiming the advent of the holy day. Once more it sounded through the still summer air, to tell all that work must be laid aside. Then a third time it was heard, to mark the beginning of the Sabbath. Jesus returned to that place where, as a child, a youth, a man. He had so often worshipped in humility, sitting not up there among the elders and the honoured, but far back with the hoi-polloi.
Familiar faces were around him, familiar words fell on his ear. And now he was again among them, suddenly a stranger among his own countrymen; this time, to be looked at, listened to, tested, tried, used or cast aside, as the case may be. It was the first time, so far as we know, that he taught in this synagogue, and this was his boyhood synagogue in Nazareth.
Synagogues became the cradle of the Church. They originated during the Babylonian captivity, when it was realised that, deprived of the Temple, there needed to be places and opportunities for common worship on Sabbaths and feast days. After the return to the Land, such ‘meeting houses’ continued and thrived. Here those who were ignorant even of the language of the Old Testament would have the Scriptures read and explained to them, as well as a common place for prayer. Thus, the regular synagogue service developed, first on Sabbaths and on the feast, or fast days, then on ordinary days, at the same hours as the worship in the Jerusalem Temple. The services on Mondays and Thursdays were special, these being the ordinary market days when the country people came into the towns and would be able to bring any case that might require legal decision before the local Sanhedrin, which met in the synagogue.
They were scattered over the whole country and in Jerusalem and some other large cities there were not only several synagogues but these were arranged according to nationalities and even crafts. Contrary to common thought, synagogues did not face the east, this was condemned on the grounds of the false worship mentioned in Ezekiel 8:16. The prevailing direction was towards the west, as in the Temple. In general, however, it was considered that since the Shekhinah was everywhere, the direction was not of paramount importance.
We are now in the Nazareth synagogue. The officials are all assembled. There is the Chazzan, or minister, who must be not only irreproachable, but his family too would be beyond reproach. Humility, modesty, knowledge of the Scriptures, distinctness and correctness in pronunciation, simplicity and neatness in dress are expected qualities, reminiscent of those insisted on by Paul in the choice of deacons and elders.
Let us now follow the worship on that Sabbath in Nazareth. On his entrance into the synagogue, the chief ruler would request Jesus to act for that Sabbath as the Sheliach Tsibbur, the leader of the service. For according to the Mishnah, the person who read the portion from the Prophets in the synagogue was also expected to conduct the devotions, at least in greater part. If this rule was enforced at that time, then Jesus would ascend the Bima (podium) and standing at the lectern, begin the service in prayer.
After this followed the Shema, from the word ‘shema’ or ‘hear,’ with which it begins. It consisted of three passages from the Torah, followed by this prayer: ‘True it is that You are Yahweh, our God, and the God of our fathers, our King, and the King of our fathers, our Saviour, and the Saviour of our fathers, our Creator, the Rock of our Salvation, our Help and our Deliverer. Your Name is from everlasting, and there is no God beside You. A new song did they that were delivered sing to Your Name by the seashore; together did all praise and own You King, and say, Yahweh shall reign, world without end! Blessed be the God who saves Israel.’
This prayer finished, there followed certain eulogies or benedictions. There were eighteen of them, later nineteen. Then we get to the primary object of the synagogue service. The Chazzan, or minister, approached the Ark and brought out a roll of the Law. It was taken from its case and unwound. The time had now come for the reading of portions from the Law and the Prophets. On the Sabbath, at least seven people were called upon successively to read portions from the Law, none of them consisting of less than three verses. The Methurgeman, or interpreter, stood by the side of the reader and translated into Aramaic, the common tongue. Yet he was not allowed to read out this translation, as it might popularly be regarded as authoritative Scripture, which it wasn’t!
The visit to Nazareth was in many respects decisive. His townsfolk had no doubt heard of his exploits in Cana and Capernaum, so there would have been a high degree of expectancy.
Jesus commenced the first part of the service and then read out those eulogies which were appropriate. And now, one by one, priest, Levite, and, in succession, five Israelites, had read from the Law. There is no reason to disturb the almost traditional idea that Jesus himself read the concluding portion from the Prophets, the Haphtarah. The whole narrative seems to imply this. Similarly, it is most likely that the Haphtarah for that day was taken from the prophecies of Isaiah and that it included the passage quoted in the Gospel account.
When unrolling, and holding the scroll, much more than the sixty-first chapter of Isaiah must have been within range of his eyes. On the other hand, it is quite certain that the verses quoted by Luke could not have formed the whole Haphtarah. According to the traditional rule, the Haphtarah ordinarily consisted of not less than twenty-one verses, though, if the passage was to be ‘explained,’ or a sermon to follow, that number might be shortened to seven, five, or even three verses.
Now the passage quoted by Luke consists really of only one verse (Isaiah 61:1), together with a clause from Isaiah 58:6 and the first clause of Isaiah 61:2. This could scarcely have formed the whole Haphtarah, just a small part of it. Jesus would have read the Haphtarah and the text of his sermon in Hebrew and then translated it into Aramaic, the common tongue.
It was, indeed, Divine wisdom, the Spirit of the Lord upon him, which directed Jesus in the choice of such a text for his first Messianic Sermon. It struck the keynote for the whole of his Galilean ministry. Isaiah 61:1-2 was regarded as one of the three passages in which mention of the Holy Spirit is connected to the promised redemption.
What followed was the Pethichah, the introductory text to his sermon. This was totally unexpected for the assembly. This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears. The focus was this; Scripture is about to be fulfilled by the One who was now addressing them, in the Gospel which he bears to the poor, the release which he announces to the captives, the healing which he offers to those whom sin had blinded, and the freedom he brings to them who were bruised. These were bold statements to make; bold … but true!
A new age had just been heralded. This was so unspeakably in contrast to any preaching from Rabbis that had been heard in that synagogue. Edersheim observes:
‘Indeed, one can scarcely conceive the impression which the Words of Christ must have produced, when promise and fulfilment, hope and reality, mingled and wants of the heart, hitherto unrealised, were awakened, only to be more than satisfied. There was a breathless silence. On one point all were agreed: that they were marvellous words of grace, which had proceeded out of his mouth.’
But then the penny dropped. This was the Son of Joseph, their village carpenter! The atmosphere turned, from admiration and expectation to something very different. It prompted a response from him, ‘No prophet is accepted in his own country’. They could not bear his presence any longer, not even on that holy Sabbath. They thrust him out from the synagogue and the city itself, not before trying to topple him over the nearby cliff. He came to his own, and his own received him not. Cast out of his own city, Jesus pursued his solitary way towards Capernaum.
Capernaum would be his new home. Here he would preach in the synagogue, built by his first Gentile convert, a Centurion. Here also was the home of his earliest and closest disciples, the brothers Simon and Andrew and of James and John, the sons of Zebedee. Here he spent the summer, mostly alone, as he built up his ministry in Galilee.
This is an extract from the book, Jesus : Life and Times, available for £14.99 at https://www.sppublishing.com/jesus-life-and-times-a-clash-of-kingdomsand-the-triumph-of-mercy-376-p.asp (Finalist for Academic Book of the year at 2023 CRT awards)
