{"id":124,"date":"2014-07-18T12:00:33","date_gmt":"2014-07-18T12:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?p=124"},"modified":"2014-05-23T22:01:37","modified_gmt":"2014-05-23T22:01:37","slug":"matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html","title":{"rendered":"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Jesus began his public ministry in Galilee by \u201cteaching in their synagogues\u201d and healing people there (Matthew 4:23).<\/p>\n<p>According to the tradition at the time, a synagogue could form wherever there were 10 adult men, so chances are good that many of these dotted the cities and towns of Galilee. The local synagogue was more than simply a religious place of worship. In that society, it served as a church, a weekday school, and as a local governing council of sorts. Through the synagogue, community elders oversaw their Jewish neighborhoods, exercising authority over both civil and religious affairs\u2014including even the power to scourge (beat and whip) those they considered lawbreakers.<\/p>\n<p>It was the chief elder who ruled each synagogue. As such, he led worship services and chose a man from the community to preach at each meeting. It appears that Jesus was a popular choice for a synagogue speaker in Galilee at this time. That was, no doubt, at least partly due to the fame he was gaining from performing so many miracles in that area.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_311\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-311\" style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/371\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-311\" alt=\"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/371\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg\" width=\"400\" height=\"267\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-311\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Ancient Synagogue at Masada<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/workscited.html\" target=\"_self\">Works Cited<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p>[IB7, 277]<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u2126\u2126\u2126<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"About: Bible Study Nerds\" href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/about-for-bible-study-nerds.html\">About: For Bible Study Nerds\u2122<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a title=\"About: Mike Nappa\" href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/about-mike-nappa.html\">About: Mike Nappa<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Copyright \u00a9 2014 to present by\u00a0<a title=\"Nappaland Communications Inc. official website\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nappaland.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Nappaland Communications Inc<\/a>. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jesus began his public ministry in Galilee by \u201cteaching in their synagogues\u201d and healing people there (Matthew 4:23). According to the tradition at the time, a synagogue could form wherever there were 10 adult men, so chances are good that many of these dotted the cities and towns of Galilee. The local synagogue was more&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":571,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,2],"tags":[53,16,302,93,92],"class_list":["post-124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culturalcommentary","category-matthew","tag-galilee","tag-jesus","tag-matthew","tag-synagogue","tag-teaching"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary) - For Bible Study Nerds<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary) - For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Jesus began his public ministry in Galilee by \u201cteaching in their synagogues\u201d and healing people there (Matthew 4:23). According to the tradition at the time, a synagogue could form wherever there were 10 adult men, so chances are good that many of these dotted the cities and towns of Galilee. The local synagogue was more&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-07-18T12:00:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-05-23T22:01:37+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/files\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mike Nappa\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary) - For Bible Study Nerds","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary) - For Bible Study Nerds","og_description":"Jesus began his public ministry in Galilee by \u201cteaching in their synagogues\u201d and healing people there (Matthew 4:23). According to the tradition at the time, a synagogue could form wherever there were 10 adult men, so chances are good that many of these dotted the cities and towns of Galilee. The local synagogue was more&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html","og_site_name":"For Bible Study Nerds","article_published_time":"2014-07-18T12:00:33+00:00","article_modified_time":"2014-05-23T22:01:37+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/files\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg"}],"author":"Mike Nappa","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html","name":"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary) - For Bible Study Nerds","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/files\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg","datePublished":"2014-07-18T12:00:33+00:00","dateModified":"2014-05-23T22:01:37+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/files\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/files\/2014\/05\/MasadaSynagogue.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2014\/07\/matthew-423-25-jesus-heals-the-sick-cultural-commentary.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Matthew 4:23-25; Jesus Heals the Sick (Cultural Commentary)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/","name":"For Bible Study Nerds","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Mike Nappa","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575","name":"Mike Nappa","description":"Mike Nappa is an entertainment journalist at FamilyFans.com, a bestselling author\u2014and a notorious Bible Study Nerd. He's a former youth pastor who shepherded kids on staff at Chuck Swindoll's church in Southern California\u2014and he's a bestselling and award-winning author with more than a million copies of his books sold worldwide. Plus, he holds a degree in Christian Education with an emphasis in Bible Theology. So, you know, he\u2019s got that going for him. Mike is also a pop culture dork who watches too much TV, reads too many comic books, utters too many bad words, laughs at all the wrong jokes, and often gets in trouble because he says whatever he happens to be thinking at the moment\u2014like quoting an R-rated movie in the middle of a sermon. Yeah, he\u2019s a mess (just like you!), but he kind of likes it that way. Most of all, Mike Nappa loves Jesus, and he figures that covers over a multitude of sins. 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