How long does it take for a girl to bend under the weight of her life?
How long does it take for a child, a woman, or a man to become "quite unable to stand up straight"?
What are the names of the spirits that bend us out of our fully human shape?
We know that rules and customs have the power both to weigh down or to lift up. Human touch has the power to bend and bruise or to comfort and heal. Words have the power to destroy or build up.
I once sat in a circle with a group of colleagues, and in the middle of the circle, a young woman sat on a chair. One by one, we named the things that rob human beings of their dignity every day, things that shroud our identity as creatures made in the image of God.
There were baskets with shawls, and every time someone named a reality that diminishes our humanity, they placed a shawl over the young woman’s head.
The shawls were sheer and light as gossamer, but layer upon layer covered her head and shoulders, and soon she began to bend under the weight, unable to see and breathe, her own voice muffled by a pile of fabric. She disappeared, quite literally. She was no longer present as a person, but only as an invisible body, weighed down and bent by crippling spirits.
The woman who entered the synagogue that day had been crippled for eighteen years, and we don’t know how old she was. Did it begin when she was a little child or after she had turned twelve? Or when she got married or didn’t get married?
It doesn’t really matter, does it? For eighteen years she was bent over and quite unable to unbend herself. Eighteen years, bent toward the dust, virtually faceless.
Had she gotten used to looking at people out of the corner of her eye?
Could she even remember any other way of seeing the world?
Had the people around her gotten used to her being bent?
Did they take notice of her or did she always stay below their line of sight?
How long since she last soaked her face in the first sunrays of spring?
How long since she last shared a hug, feeling the warmth of another body against hers?
With her breath trapped in her bent body, how long since she last sang for joy?
Whatever the burden she had born for eighteen long years with its layers of emotional, physical, social and spiritual oppression– she was unable to unbend herself.
Jesus saw her and he called her over.
How big was the room they were in?
How many people were there?
How long did it take her to make her way through the congregation, shuffling all the way from where she was to where Jesus was sitting?
How many times did she say, “Excuse me – I’m sorry – May I?”
Or did the crowd part before her, creating a path to the one who had called her?
And Jesus, did he get up from his chair or did he get down on his knees, turning his head to see her face?
I can’t imagine him standing there and declaring above her bent body, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” Everything I know about Jesus tells me that he looked into her face when he spoke to her. He also laid his hands on her. I imagine him tenderly putting her hands in his, looking into her eyes, saying, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” I see him slowly rising, and her rising with him effortlessly until she stood up straight and laughed and sang, praising God, her face shining like the sun.
Whatever names we give to crippling spirits, to the fears that oppress us, the traditions that imprison us, and the suffocating layers that keep our lives from flourishing – Jesus’ mission is to set us free and to restore life in fullness for all.
You would think that the only thing left to do for the congregation that day in the synagogue was to sing songs of praise with the woman and offer a prayer of thanksgiving. But she alone was praising God; the leader of the synagogue was indignant. His issue was with Jesus, but he addressed the crowd,
“There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.”
In the world of the story, the Sabbath wasn’t just part of the weekend. The seventh day was set aside by God for rest, and work was prohibited; it was a day of rest for men, women, and children, including servants and resident aliens, a day of rest even for farm animals. For one day every week, God’s people were to live not by the work of their hands, but solely by the gifts of God. For one day every week, God’s people were to experience the freedom of complete dependence on God.
That leader took seriously the commandment, “Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy.” It was fine for Jesus to study and teach, but healing was a different matter.
With regard to medical assistance, the common understanding of the sabbath commandment was that emergencies could be attended, but chronic illnesses should not be. If it’s not an emergency, wait one more day. In the leader’s mind, Jesus could have said, “Woman, come and see me tomorrow.” What’s one day after eighteen years?
But Jesus didn’t wait. That doesn’t mean he became an advocate for a more relaxed attitude toward the sabbath and for opening the day of rest for business. He wasn’t in favor of watering down sabbath observance; on the contrary: he broadened it.
Who wouldn’t untie their ox and donkey on the Sabbath in order to lead them away to give them water? Untying farm animals and leading them to the water on the Sabbath was common practice, and it was considered not only permissible but necessary for the animals’ well-being.
Jesus argued from the lesser to the greater: if we can see the need to untie a thirsty animal, how can we not see the need for a human being to be unbound and released? Ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?
At the beginning of his ministry, in his hometown synagogue, Jesus read from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah,
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. [The Lord] has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
And then he said, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:18-21).
Today, he said. His coming marked the beginning of the today of fulfillment. It was time for every child of Abraham to taste the sweetness of sabbath. It was time for every daughter and son of Abraham to be set free from bondage: the loosing of chains doesn’t taint the holiness of the sabbath day – no, it finally brings the sabbath peace to the bound and the bent.
The Sabbath is a day of rest, but also of promise. The Sabbath is a foretaste of that seventh day when humanity is fully at home in God’s creation and at peace. The Sabbath is day of rest for weary bodies, but also a day to immerse ourselves in God’s promise of peace and freedom for all of creation. The Sabbath is a day to stand up and raise our heads and lift up our eyes and lift every voice and sing like those from whose shoulders the yoke of oppression has been lifted – just like the woman did.
And we sing with her, even though our own lives are still weighed down with worries, cares, and fears, and the world we live in still is bent by injustice, lovelessness, and death-serving powers. We sing with her, because Jesus tenderly put her hands in his and rising, raised her to her full stature and dignity as a daughter of Abraham. We sing, because he has put our hands in his, and we trust that he will lift up all who are bent by unbending ways. With her we sing of the One who bends toward us with great tenderness and the power to make whole.
In recent weeks, the difficult conversation about the place of Muslims in the United States has produced more heat than light – there is much fear, but also ignorance, ugly prejudice, and hatred. The fact that this is an election year has only made things worse.
We must remember that words are not just words. Words have the power to tear down or to build up, to ostracize the other or to make honest encounter possible, to oppress or to set free. Words have the power to add layers to what is weighing people down, but they also have the power to remove at least some of those layers.
As followers of Jesus, we must in all things remember the call, the touch, the freeing words of Jesus and learn from him. We do that, and the conversation will change.