Healing the sick

[Blood_Angel]

When Jesus is meant to have made cripples walk again, or people with illnesses well.

Can this be taken as a metaphor for healing the people down on their luck, lost in life, dealing with depression, mental illnesses and anti-social behaviours? It’s just a theory.

 

[Earnest_Bunbury]

It can be taken in all the ways of the senses of Scripture, literal and spiritual. The spiritual senses include: the allegorical (or “typological” sense), the moral (or “tropological” sense), and the anagogical (or “heavenly”) sense. source

Jesus heals body and soul as He wills and many today been known to receive miraculous healing, either soul or body or both. It happens today as it happened then spiritually and literally.

As to the spiritual sense, we are healed every time we receive grace but only to our disposition to receive it. In that the Church produces saints by God working through Sacramental Grace, we are made anew into creatures perfected for heaven. Forgiveness of sins gives us peace if we keep from turning from God by further sin.

“Down on their luck” would appear to be antithetical to God’s Providence and would need further defining to clarify, as would “lost in life”. The rest may be crosses or may be for God to manifest His power by the miracle of grace. We have no insight into another one’s life or soul, only our own and even that is difficult to surmise.

 

[Nita]

When Jesus is meant to have made cripples walk again, or people with illnesses well.

Can this be taken as a metaphor for healing the people down on their luck, lost in life, dealing with depression, mental illnesses and anti-social behaviours? It’s just a theory.

They are records of real events – not metaphors for healings other than the ones specified. But that doesn’t mean we can’t use those true physical healings and compare them to spiritual healings. For example, when Jesus heals leprosy (a deadly physical disease) we can see a comparison to the spiritual healing we experience when our mortal (deadly spiritual “disease”) sins are forgive in Confession.

Some of the physical healings Jesus performed came about because He cared about the emotional suffering of someone involved. Eg. the Canaanite woman in anguish for her daughter (Mt. 15:21-27); a father mourning for his only daughter who had died (Luke 8:40-42, 49-55)

 

[Sherry_G]

Jesus performed many miracles which are recorded in the Gospels and other letters of the Bible, just as God the Fathers miracles are recorded in the Old Testament. These are historical events. However, don’t ever forget that Jesus walked on the earth as a true man and true God for over 30 years. When his mother, Mary told him about the problem with the wedding hosts running out of wine, she knew that Jesus would change water into wine, so even though Jesus said it was not His time; she just told the waiter “Do whatever He tells you”. Jesus can and does perform miracles for us in our everyday lives. He takes away the blot of our sins from our very souls, just because we ask him for mercy and forgiveness in the Sacrament of Penance. He can cure disease, including mental illness as He wills it. Sometimes He does not will our recovery, but uses our suffering to show us the way home to Him in heaven for eternity. Rejoice and be glad, despite whatever trials we face, for ours is the kingdom of God.

 

[Ignatius]

When Jesus is meant to have made cripples walk again, or people with illnesses well.

Can this be taken as a metaphor for healing the people down on their luck, lost in life, dealing with depression, mental illnesses and anti-social behaviours? .

No, it means that Jesus actually, miraculously healed them literally, just as people today are miracously healed at Lourds.

 

[pablope]

No, it means that Jesus actually, miraculously healed them literally, just as people today are miracously healed at Lourds.

And in addition, those 70,000 or so witnesses at Fatima…where those believers and had repented were cured during the miracle of the sun.

 

[rcjones]

It can be taken in all the ways of the senses of Scripture, literal and spiritual. The spiritual senses include: the allegorical (or “typological” sense), the moral (or “tropological” sense), and the anagogical (or “heavenly”) sense. source

Good answer. They were real healings and they had a spiritual significance.

We have three basic ways of knowing God. We instinctively know he is God, though we don’t understand all the details. You read the Word, or experience something and know God was there. This is hearing. Like sheep hearing the shepherd’s voice but not understanding the words. Jesus healed the deaf.

We know God intellectually by using the faculties of the mind and reading his word. This is seeing. Jesus healed the blind.

We live with Christ within. This is walking. Jesus healed the lame.

Leprosy represents sin. Jesus fulfills the law of the leper. He became a leper by being made to be sin. He ‘shaved his head’ when the Father departed from him and he lost his authority. He covered his lip when he prayed ‘remove this cup’ and didn’t get an answer. When he was totally covered with our sin he was declared clean in the resurrection. As the leper would then go through a ceremony like the ordination of a priest, Jesus became our high priest.

The dead represent those who are dead in trespass and sin, given a new life in Christ.

The poor represent those with nothing to offer God, recognizing their own sinfulness, and receiving the good news.

Mt 11:5 The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them.

Lu 7:22 Then Jesus answering said unto them, Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard; how that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached.

The metaphorical issues which are mentioned in the OP, I don’t think are interpretation, but application. When you have the things that Jesus healed taken care of, the rest falls into place.