Episode 22: Two Daughters and the Blind and Mute Men, Matthew 9:18-34

Bible Study: Parody and Subversion in Matthew's Gospel

After having gathered in the lost - the tax/toll collectors and "sinners" - he suddenly gets called to a high status household, but on the way heals a marginalized woman suffering from menstrual bleeding. Chapters 8 and 9 have Jesus entering the worlds and lives of people who are very separate from each other: a leper, gentiles, women and men, social outcasts, low and high status people; in all of these situations, he brings healing, both social and physical. And finally he heals two blind men and casts out the demon from a mute man, punctuating this section of the story with images of liberation from Isaiah.