(Matt. 9:9-17; Mark 2:13-22; Luke 5:27-39).

This is narrated by Matthew himself, as well as by the other two Evangelists, Mark and Luke, and only Matthew calls himself by this name, and the others Levi. Leaving the house after His miracle of healing the paralytic, the Lord saw a man sitting on the toll-box, that is, at the collection of tolls, or taxes, named Matthew, or Levi, and said to him: "Follow Me." And he immediately stood up and followed Jesus. It should be added that the tax collectors, or tax collectors, among whom Matthew belonged, were considered by the Jews to be the most sinful and contemptible people, since they exacted taxes from the people in favor of the Roman government. In addition, they took the right to this collection of taxes at the mercy of the Roman government, and in their excessive thirst for profit they exacted from the people more than they ought to, and therefore they deserved a general hatred towards themselves.

Such is the power of the word of the Lord, that the publican, a prosperous and greedy man, abandoned everything and followed Him, who had nowhere to lay his head. But this also proves that sinners who are aware of their sin and are ready to sincerely repent are closer to the Kingdom of Heaven than the Pharisees, who are proud of their imaginary righteousness. Rejoicing at the call of the Lord, Matthew invited Jesus and His disciples to his house and gave them a treat. According to the Eastern custom, those invited to lunch or dinner did not sit at the table, but reclined around a low table on special side benches or sofas, leaning on a pillow with their left hand. Apparently, Matthew's fellow tax collectors, other tax collectors and sinners, according to the Pharisees, also came there and sat down with Jesus and His disciples at the same table. This was the reason for the Pharisees to condemn the Lord for such a rapprochement with sinners. "Why does your Master eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?" they asked Jesus' disciples. St. St. Chrysostom explains these words thus: "They slander the Teacher before the disciples with evil intention, wishing to distract the disciples from the Teacher," since they cast a shadow on the Lord as on the seeker of bad society. "It is not the healthy who have need of a physician, but the sick," Jesus replied to these calumnies. The meaning of these words is that the so-called righteous like the Pharisees do not feel the need for a Saviour, but sinners feel this need. The place of the physician is at the bedside of the sick, as the Lord says, My place is with those who are sick with the consciousness of their spiritual infirmities, and I am with them, with publicans and sinners, as a physician with the sick. The Pharisees believe that righteousness consists in offering the sacrifices established by the law, but at the same time they forget the words of God spoken by the prophet Hosea: "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings" (Hosea 6:6). The Lord means that sacrifices and all formal piety without love for one's neighbor, without a work of mercy, are worth nothing in the eyes of God. "I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance," or, in other words, the Lord came for sinners to repent and reform, He came to call to repentance not those who consider themselves righteous and imagine that they have nothing to repent of, but those who humbly recognize themselves as sinners and ask God for mercy. True, the Lord came to save everyone, including the so-called righteous, but until they give up dreams of their righteousness and do not recognize themselves as sinners, their calling will be fruitless, and salvation is impossible for them.

Having failed in this, the Pharisees transferred their accusations to the disciples of the Lord, and in this they were joined by the disciples of John the Baptist, who, as we have already said, considered their teacher superior to Jesus and were jealous of His ever-increasing glory. St. John the Baptist was a strict faster, and, of course, he accustomed his disciples to the same strict fasts. Probably at this time he was already in prison, and his disciples strengthened their fast on this occasion. The Pharisees drew their attention to the fact that Christ's disciples did not observe such strictly established fasts, and so they asked the Lord: "Why do we and the Pharisees fast much, and Your disciples do not fast?" But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast." This means: for your teacher has called Me the Bridegroom, and himself the friend of the Bridegroom, who should rejoice; therefore, My disciples, as sons of the bridal chamber, rejoice as long as I am with them, and with this joy too strict fasting is incompatible, as an expression of sorrow and sorrow. When other days come for this, and they remain alone in the world, then they will fast. In memory of these words of the Lord, our holy Church established the fast of Passion Week, which adjoined the fast of the Holy Forty Days, and the fast on Wednesdays and Fridays, precisely on those days when the Bridegroom was taken away from us – the days of betrayal, His sufferings and death on the cross. Saying that the time has not yet come for His disciples to fast, the Lord develops this idea further with the words: "No one puts patches of unbleached cloth to old clothes; for the newly sewn will tear off the old, and the hole will be even worse. Nor do they pour new wine into old skins; otherwise the skins burst, and the wine flows out, and the skins are lost; but the new wine is poured into new wineskins, and both are saved."

According to the interpretation of St. Chrysostom, a new patch and new wine are a strict fast, strict requirements in general, and old clothes and old skins are the infirmity, the weakness of the disciples, who are not yet prepared to carry out great feats. The Lord means the following: I find it untimely to impose on My disciples, who are still weak, until they are renewed, regenerated by the grace of the Holy Spirit, the burden of a strict life and heavy commandments. Here the Lord protects His disciples from reproach with true fatherly love and condescension towards them.

Second Easter

The Healing of the Paralytic at the Sheep's Font

(John 5:1-16).

This event is narrated only by St. John, who reports in his Gospel about each of the Lord's coming to Jerusalem on feast days. In this case, it is not entirely clear on which feast Jesus came to Jerusalem, but it is more likely that it was either Passover or Pentecost. Only in this case does it turn out that the Lord's public ministry lasted three and a half years, as the Holy Church accepted it from ancient times, guided precisely by the chronology of the Fourth Gospel. Thus, about six months passed from the Baptism of the Lord to the first Pascha, described in the 2nd chapter, then a year to the second Pascha, mentioned in the 5th chapter, another year to the third Pascha, which is spoken of in the 6th chapter, and another, third, to the fourth Pascha, the one before which the Lord suffered.

At the Sheep Gate, so called because sacrificial cattle were driven to the temple through it, or because there was a market near it where these animals were sold, on the northeast side of the city wall, on the way through the Cedar Stream to Gethsemane and the Mount of Olives, there was a pool called in Hebrew – Bethesda, which means "house of mercy" or the mercy of God: the water in this pool was collected from a healing spring. According to Eusebius, as early as the fifth century after the birth of Christ, five porticoes of this bath were shown. The healing spring attracted many sick people of all kinds. However, this was not an ordinary healing spring: it manifested its healing power only at times when the Angel of the Lord descended into it, disturbing the waters, and then only the one who was the first, immediately after the water was disturbed, could be healed; Apparently, water only showed a healing property for a short time, and then immediately lost it.

Here, at the pool, there was a paralytic, who had been suffering for 38 years and had almost lost hope of ever being healed. Moreover, as he explained to the Lord, not having a helper with him, he was not able to use the power of the miraculous spring, not having the strength to move on his own quickly enough to immerse himself in the font as soon as the water began to stir. Having been merciful, the Lord instantly heals the unfortunate with His one word: "Get up, take up your bed and walk." In this way He showed the superiority of His saving grace over the means of the Old Testament.

But since it was the Sabbath, the Jews, by which name St. John usually means the Pharisees, Sadducees and Jewish elders, who were hostile to the Lord Jesus Christ, instead of rejoicing for the unfortunate man who had suffered for so long, or being amazed at the miracle, were indignant that the former sick man dared to violate the commandment of Sabbath rest by carrying his bed and made a remark to him. The healed man, however, not without some audacity, began to justify himself that he was only carrying out the command of Him who had healed him, and Who, in his eyes, had sufficient authority to exempt him from the observance of too petty Sabbath ordinances. With a tinge of contempt, the Jews ask the former patient, "Who is the Man who dared to allow him to violate the general rules?"

Blazh. Theophylact: "This is the meaning of malice! They do not ask Who healed him, but Who commanded him to carry his bed. They are not interested in what leads to surprise, but in what is condemned." Although they did not know for sure, they could well guess that the Healer was none other than the hated Jesus of Nazareth, and therefore did not even want to talk about the miracle. But the healed man could not give them an answer, for he did not know Jesus.

Probably, the healed man soon went to the temple to offer gratitude to God for his healing. Then Jesus met him with the significant words: "Behold, you are healed; sin no more, lest something worse happen to you." From these words it is especially clear that illness befalls a person as a punishment for his sins, and the Lord warns the healed against repeating his sins, so that an even greater punishment does not befall him. Recognizing his Healer, the former sick man went and announced Him to the Jews; not with evil intent, of course, but to raise the authority of Jesus Christ. This caused a new attack of anger among the Jews, and they "sought to kill Him because He did such things on the Sabbath."