Once Again

“and looking up to heaven with a deep sigh, He said to him, “Ephphatha!” that is, “Be opened!” Mark 7:34 NASB

Ephphatha – Yeshua heals a deaf boy. He does it in a very unusual way (you can read the whole story if you wish). We recognize this miracle and praise God. There is, of course, a second miracle that might not be so obvious. The next verse tells us that at the same time this boy’s speech impediment was completely removed. If you have ever encountered people who are deaf from birth, you know that their speech is affected. Not being able to hear others or even our own voice means that how we form words, inflect them and vocalize them is also a condition of being deaf. So Yeshua’s miracle is not simply that this boy can hear. The bigger miracle is that he instantly could speak as if he were able to hear all of his life. It’s one thing to unstop ears. It’s quite another to repair a lifelong difficulty speaking.

Now that we recognize the temporal extension of this miracle, we should also notice how Mark chooses to recount it. Mark uses a particularly poignant Greek term to express Yeshua’s emotional reaction. The verb is stenazo. It means “to groan, to sigh.” Yeshua’s distress over this boy’s condition causes a deep emotional reaction. He feels this boy’s suffering and that produces an outward expression. He groans toward heaven. Here is a completely human reaction to unjust affliction. “Looking up to heaven” Yeshua in essence says, “Lord, You know all about this. You know the heartache and pain. You know life’s injustice. Now do something.” I am sure that these same ideas have crossed your path. You too have groaned toward heaven, perhaps vocalizing your distress about life’s oppression. You and Yeshua stand in the same place. “Do something,” you plead. And in this case, YHVH responded, not simply by returning the boy’s hearing, but also by instantly undoing years of struggle and suffering. That’s restoration. That’s what we want. Not just fix the current situation, fix the history of the situation. That’s why real restoration, real forgiveness, is still eschatological. We wait for all of it to be finished.

The last thing we notice about this verse is the Aramaic expression ephphatha. Yeshua speaks one of the languages common to first century Israel. Perhaps he does so because this was the language of the boy. We will never know for sure. But one thing we do know. Mark translated this word into the Greek dianoichtehti, an imperative (“Be opened!”) from the Greek verb dianoigo. This implies that the reading audience did not know Aramaic. If they did, there would be no reason to translate. This last little fact helps us understand Mark’s agenda. He isn’t writing to first century Jews. They wouldn’t need translation. Mark has another audience in mind. In order to truly understand why Mark chooses the material he does, and why he recounts it as he does, we need to know who his intended audience is. And this helps. There’s a lot packed into this little verse, isn’t there?

Topical Index: ephphatha, be opened, groan, stenazo, deaf, Mark 7:34