{"id":581,"date":"2015-02-23T12:00:48","date_gmt":"2015-02-23T12:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?p=581"},"modified":"2015-02-13T21:33:00","modified_gmt":"2015-02-13T21:33:00","slug":"matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html","title":{"rendered":"Matthew 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Matthew 9:18-26 reports how Jesus raised from death the daughter of a \u201cruler\u201d in Israel. Matthew tells the story in passing, not even bothering to include the ruler\u2019s name. From the corresponding reports in Mark 5:21-43 and Luke 8:40-56, though, we know the man\u2019s name to be Jairus.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s what we know about Jairus:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>His name, \u201cJairus\u201d is from the Greek word, <em>Iairos<\/em>, which means \u201che enlightens,\u201d or in the Hebrew context, \u201cwhom Jehovah enlightens.\u201d Jairus is pronounced, \u201cjay EYE russ.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>He lived somewhere in the region of Galilee, probably within a day\u2019s walk (or less) of Jesus\u2019 home base in Capernaum.<\/li>\n<li>Although he was a leader in the synagogue, he was probably not a rabbi. Most likely he was an \u201celder,\u201d which was \u201ca layman responsible for the administration of the synagogue.\u201d This would have given him significant authority over things like: selecting who could teach, deciding what would occur during worship services, maintaining synagogue buildings, and overseeing community affairs. As such, he would\u2019ve been a very influential man in Galilee, because \u201cJewish culture revolved around the leadership of local elders.\u201d<\/li>\n<li>Some historians have suggested that Jairus was actually the head elder, or \u201cthe head of the local Sanhedrin or court of elders\u201d in his community. In this role he would have carried religious, political, and judicial power.<\/li>\n<li>It\u2019s assumed, by his position as an elder and by the crowd of mourners that gathered outside his house (Matthew 9:23-25), that Jairus was a wealthy man, and well-known in his community.<\/li>\n<li>He clearly loved his daughter very much. Instead of sending a servant to call for Jesus, he came himself, asking for a miracle on behalf of his beloved child.<\/li>\n<li>He was both powerful and humble. As a \u201cruler\u201d in his community, he could have come to Jesus and demanded a miracle (much like Herod did later \u2013 see Luke 23:8-9). Or he could have approached Jesus as an equal, making a formal request. But he didn\u2019t do either of those things. Matthew says he \u201cknelt down\u201d humbly before Jesus; Mark and Luke reveal that in kneeling, he \u201cfell at his feet\u201d\u2014that is, he groveled like a slave before the Christ and begged for a miracle.<\/li>\n<li>He believed in Jesus. His faith drove him to hope in Christ in the first place. When servants told him that his daughter had died, he continued to trust that Jesus could somehow overcome even that final circumstance. His faith was not in vain.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/workscited.html\">Works Cited<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p>[WWA, 182; WWB, 147; SLU 213]<\/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>Matthew 9:18-26 reports how Jesus raised from death the daughter of a \u201cruler\u201d in Israel. Matthew tells the story in passing, not even bothering to include the ruler\u2019s name. From the corresponding reports in Mark 5:21-43 and Luke 8:40-56, though, we know the man\u2019s name to be Jairus. Here\u2019s what we know about Jairus: His&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":571,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12],"tags":[246,245,93],"class_list":["post-581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-matthew","category-personalityandcharacter-studies","tag-daughter","tag-jairus","tag-synagogue"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Matthew 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies) - 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\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Matthew 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies) - For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Matthew 9:18-26 reports how Jesus raised from death the daughter of a \u201cruler\u201d in Israel. Matthew tells the story in passing, not even bothering to include the ruler\u2019s name. From the corresponding reports in Mark 5:21-43 and Luke 8:40-56, though, we know the man\u2019s name to be Jairus. Here\u2019s what we know about Jairus: His&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-02-23T12:00:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-02-13T21:33:00+00:00\" \/>\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 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies) - 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\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Matthew 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies) - For Bible Study Nerds","og_description":"Matthew 9:18-26 reports how Jesus raised from death the daughter of a \u201cruler\u201d in Israel. Matthew tells the story in passing, not even bothering to include the ruler\u2019s name. From the corresponding reports in Mark 5:21-43 and Luke 8:40-56, though, we know the man\u2019s name to be Jairus. Here\u2019s what we know about Jairus: His&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html","og_site_name":"For Bible Study Nerds","article_published_time":"2015-02-23T12:00:48+00:00","article_modified_time":"2015-02-13T21:33:00+00:00","author":"Mike Nappa","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html","name":"Matthew 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies) - For Bible Study Nerds","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-02-23T12:00:48+00:00","dateModified":"2015-02-13T21:33:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/02\/matthew-918-26-a-dead-girl-and-a-sick-woman-personality-and-character-studies.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Matthew 9:18-26; A Dead Girl And A Sick Woman (Personality and Character Studies)"}]},{"@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. Learn more at nappaland.com\/mikenappa.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.biblestudynerds.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/author\/mnappa"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/571"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=581"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":584,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581\/revisions\/584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}