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| Significance of Capernaum.
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10. Significance of Capernaum.
Matthew for his part adds,5017
that when the Lord had entered into Capernaum the centurion came to
him, saying, “My boy is lying in my house sick of the palsy,
grievously tormented,” and after telling the Lord some more about
him, received the reply, “Go, and as thou hast believed, so be it
unto thee.” And Matthew then gives us the story of
Peter’s mother-in-law, in close agreement with the other
two. I conceive it to be a creditable piece of work and becoming
to one who is anxious to hear about Christ, to collect from the four
Gospels all that is related about Capernaum, and the discourses spoken,
and the works done there, and how many visits the Lord paid to the
place, and how, at one time, He is said to have gone down to it, and at
another to have entered into it, and where He came from when He did
so. If we compare all these points together, we shall not go
astray in the meaning we ascribe to Capernaum. On the one hand,
the sick are healed, and other works of power are done there, and on
the other, the preaching, Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at
hand, begins there, and this appears to be a sign, as we showed when
entering on this subject, of some more needy place of consolation, made
so perhaps by Jesus, who comforted men by what He taught and by what He
did there, in that place of consolation. For we know that the
names of places agree in their meaning with the things connected with
Jesus; as Gergesa, where the citizens of these parts besought Him to
depart out of their coasts, means, “The dwelling of the
casters-out.” And this, also, we have noticed about
Capernaum, that not only did the preaching, “Repent ye, for the
kingdom of heaven is at hand,” begin there, but that according to
the three Evangelists Jesus performed there His first miracles.
None of the three, however, added to the first wonders which he records
as done in Capernaum, that note attached by John the disciple to the
first work of Jesus, “This beginning of His signs did Jesus in
Cana of Galilee.” For that which was done in Capernaum was
not the beginning of the signs, since the leading sign of the Son of
God was good cheer, and in the light of human experience it is also the
most representative of Him. For the Word of God does not show
forth His own beauty so much in healing the sick, as in His tendering
the temperate draught to make glad those who are in good health and are
able to join in the banquet.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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