Who, According to Mark, Was Jairus? Studies in Mark, Pt. 12
Traditionally, when one reads Mark's story of Jairus and the healing of his young daughter, they come away with a greater sense of faithfulness, they are inspired by this synagogue ruler's persistence and they admire his seemingly deep respect for Jesus. After all, even when people come from the ruler's home and say to him, “Your daughter is dead, why bother with the Teacher any longer?” Jairus presses on. Indeed, he leads Jesus directly to his home. But I wonder if there may be good reason to question such an ivory tower view of Jairus. In fact, it might well be the case that a closer reading of the story suggests that Jairus was not nearly as interested in Jesus as we would like him to have been. There are two sections of the text prior to the Jairus story (Mk. 5.22-43) that must be borne in mind when reading Mark's account of the Gospel, these two sections are: Mk. 3.1-6 and Mk. 4.1-20. We will look at 4.1-20 first. As I have written in a previous post ( click here f...