reflection
BLIND, AT THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
Martà Colom
The three synoptic Gospels tell the story
of the healing of a blind man in the vicinity of Jericho. The stories have
important differences between them, as they respond to the particular literary
project of each evangelist. In Mark, for instance (10:46b-52) the blind man has
a name (Bartimaeus), while the blind in Matthew (20:29-34) and Luke (18:35-43)
are anonymous. On the other hand, in Matthew there are two blind people who ask
Jesus to heal them –not just one as in Mark and Luke. At the same time, there
are some fundamental features of the episode that are repeated in the three Gospel
accounts. Here our purpose is not to make a comparative study of the
differences but to focus on the fact that the three passages describe, at the
start of the section, the blind person (or people in the case of Matthew)
sitting by the roadside; and at the end, after talking with Jesus and having
their eyesight restored, they decide to follow Jesus. Mark specifies “on the
road” (10:52).
Without going into a detailed analysis of
all the nuances and levels of significance of the episode, we want to
concentrate on this simple point: initially seated by the road, when the blind man
has regained his sight he follows Jesus on the road. It seems important to us
to understand that for the blind man being on the edge of the road was the
cause of blindness, not its consequence. In other words, the blind man was not at the edge of the road because he was blind; he
was blind because he was on the edge of the road.
