And having sharply charged him, he straightway sent him away,
Jesus has just touched a leper and made him clean. Now He speaks sharply to the man and sends him off at once — and commentators ask what the sharpness means, why He ordered silence, and where the man had to go in such a hurry.
The Greek verb here is the one usually translated "cast out." One writer notes that translators have rightly chosen a gentler word in places like this, where the Lord has just shown compassion:
For the most part "cast out" is a suitable translation. Still, there are places in our Authorised and Revised Versions where our translators have rightly given a better fitting one, such as Mark 1:43 "sent away," and John 10:4 "puts forth." In this very chapter (verse 43) did our Lord ("moved with compassion," verse 41) at once "drive" away (!) the cleansed leper?
What the word does carry is speed. The man had an errand, and it came before everything else:
The verb (ekballo) used of the Lord sending him on this errand literally means "to drive forth," and it implies urgency and speed. He told the man to carry out his duties to the priesthood before giving himself up to the selfish joy of announcing his cure to his excitable friends and neighbours. God's claims came first.
Writers have guessed at many reasons for the ban on speaking. One ties it to the errand itself, which could not wait:
There has been much guesswork about why Jesus imposed silence on the man. But the account shows that the Lord made the leper's errand to the priests look like one that had to be carried out at once. After the healing, Jesus sent him off straight away. He charged him strictly to say nothing to anyone, but to show himself to the priest. The priest would then have undeniable evidence in front of him that this cure was real.
The errand also put the priest on the spot. He had to face proof he could not deny:
It was important that the priest, at the sight of the cleansed leper, should be forced to admit and witness — to take official notice of — the proof that the hand of God was at work there. God's hand was not now writing judgment on the proud contempt of man. It was working in might, and with the deepest stooping down of grace, to cure a misery and suffering that were hopeless otherwise — the standing picture of a sinner. Besides, grace respects and upholds law, until death and resurrection bring in another glory, greater and lasting.
The same charge also hides the Healer. He works for someone else's reputation, not His own:
Another beautiful trait of the perfect Servant is seen in what follows. He does not seek His own glory, but the glory of the One He serves... Still, he is to tell the priest, and so the law becomes a witness to the presence of God in grace.
Commentators differ on what danger the silence guarded against. One sees the threat not in hostility but in fame:
The command here to tell no one does not seem to come from the opposition. It is more that the crowds, by treating Him as a mere healer, were in danger of hampering His true service. Miracles themselves were only acted parables, and our Lord came from heaven to do more than cure the ills of the body.
The man did the opposite of what he was told, and some have excused him for it. One writer refuses the excuse:
But the healed leper disregarded both the word of his Healer and the express commandments of the law. And there have been those who have sought to justify the act of disobedience, as if grace such as the leper had received freed the person who received it from the duty of obedience. On the contrary, "to obey is better than sacrifice"... Silence is as much a grace as speech, when it agrees with the will of the Lord.
The cost was real. The publicity narrowed the Lord's own movements:
Again we see how our Lord did not chase popular excitement and fame. He told the man to let the testimony to his cure flow in the channel Moses had marked out. But the man, filled with delight, did the very thing he had been told not to do. As a result, the Lord had to avoid the cities for some days and stay in desert places.
- Touched — the compassion of verse 41 still rules verse 43. The sending is urgent, not harsh, and "drove out" goes beyond what the context allows.
- Charged — the sternness protects an errand. The priest came before friends and neighbours, because God's claims came first.
- Sent — the priest is forced to take note of the cure, so the law itself becomes a witness to God at work in grace.
- Hidden — the Servant seeks the glory of the One He serves. He will not be reduced to a public healer, since He came to do more than cure bodies.
- Disobeyed — grace received never cancels obedience owed. Silence can be as much a grace as speech, and ignoring it drove the Lord out into desert places.
and says to him, See thou say nothing to any one, but go, shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing what Moses ordained, for a testimony to them.
Jesus has just healed a man of leprosy. Instead of sending him out to tell the story, He sends him to a priest with an offering. Two orders sit side by side. Say nothing — and keep the old ceremony. Why both?
The law that governed leprosy had no cure in it. It gave a procedure for inspecting and declaring, and nothing more.
The priest's job was to pronounce a man with leprosy unclean. It was also his job to pronounce him clean once he was cured. The law had no power to heal. It only noted whether a man was healed or not. The work of ceremonial restoration began only after some other means had cured the disease.
So the priest was the one man who could feel the full force of what had happened. He knew what human hands could not do.
Showing himself to the priest should have raised a question there. If the priest's lips still guarded knowledge, or his heart looked for it, he would have asked: Who has healed him? It would have drawn out the answer from faith — the Lord is here; the Lord has healed him. No one knew better than the priest that man is powerless here. The law has no provision for healing leprosy. It only gives directions for the ceremony that cleanses a man who is already healed.
Older translations read "for a testimony to them." The man's obedience was itself the message. Jehovah, in the next quote, is the Old Testament name of God.
He hides Himself from human praise. He tells the healed man to go and show himself to the priests, as the law of Moses said. Yet this obedience to the law was itself testimony that He is Jehovah. Under the law, Jehovah alone cleansed the leper, and He did it by His own sovereign will. The priest was only the witness that it had been done.
The rarity of the scene gave it weight.
A striking testimony indeed. As far as Scripture tells us, this was the first Israelite leper cleansed since the instructions of Leviticus 13 and 14, given about 1,500 years earlier. Now a cleansed leper stood at the altar with his two birds in his hands. His presence testified that God had come into the land, and was meeting men's need quite apart from anything priests did or any religious ceremony.
Commentators differ on the reason for the silence. One reading takes it as a matter of sequence and speed — the errand came first, and everything else could wait.
Compare "See that you say nothing to anyone" with the Lord's direction to the seventy, "Greet no one on the road" (Luke 10:4). In matters of urgency it was necessary to avoid these long and elaborate greetings. Elisha gave similar instructions to Gehazi (2 Kings 4:29). The word used for the Lord sending him on this errand means "to drive forth." It points to urgency and speed. The Lord told the man to meet his duties to the priests first. Only then could he give himself to the selfish joy of announcing his cure to his excitable friends and neighbours.
Others read the silence as belonging to the character of the One who gave it. He is working for another's reputation, not His own.
He does not seek His own glory, but the glory of the One He serves. So hear the Lord saying to the healed leper, "See that you say nothing to anyone." Still, he is to tell the priest, and so the law becomes a witness to the presence of God in grace. Under the law, God alone could heal the leper, and the priest could only bear witness to what God had done.
The man ignored the instruction. What followed shows why Jesus gave it.
This would be solid testimony for the priests that the man really was healed, without the excitement that many words might cause. The man, however, did not obey. In the same way today, some put so much emphasis on healing that they hinder the true work of God. Healing the body is a simple thing for the Lord. The deeper work in the soul is far more important, and excitement over visible miracles can smother it.
- Cure — the law could inspect and declare, but never heal; the ceremony began only after the cure.
- Certificate — the priest who had once ruled the man unclean was the one fit to confirm him clean, so Jesus sent him there first.
- Claim — by keeping Moses' command, Jesus let the evidence make the claim for Him: only God cleansed leprosy, and God had done it.
- Concealment — the lips He told to stay silent He also sent to the priest. He wanted the witness, not the fame.
- Cost — the man talked instead of obeying, and excitement over healing can smother the deeper work God wants to do in the soul.