All: The life of Jesus

The life of Jesus

Healing the Woman with the Issue of Blood

MiracleMiracles

In short

Galilean ministry, interleaved with Jairus's daughter; a woman bleeding twelve years touches Jesus' garment-fringe and is healed: 'Daughter, your faith has made you well'

Citations: Matthew 9:20-22 || Mark 5:25-34 || Luke 8:43-48, set inside the raising of [Jairus's daughter]: Jesus is on his way to the dying girl when this happens.

Narrative

A woman who has had a flow of blood for twelve years, who "had suffered many things by many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better, but rather grew worse", comes up behind Jesus in the crowd and touches the fringe (tassel) of his garment, saying to herself, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be made well." Immediately the bleeding stops, and she feels in her body that she is healed.

Jesus, perceiving that power has gone out from him, turns: "Who touched my clothes?" The disciples object, the crowd is pressing him. But he keeps looking. The woman, fearing and trembling, falls down before him and tells him the whole truth. Jesus: "Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace, and be cured of your disease."

Theological significance

Faith reaching out. The woman's faith is real but mixed with a near-magical hope in the garment itself. Jesus does not rebuke it, he personalizes it: "your faith has made you well," redirecting her from the fringe to himself. Power did go out, but it is faith in him, not the cloth, that heals and saves (sōzō, "made well / saved").

Uncleanness reversed (again). A continual flow of blood made her perpetually unclean under the Law (Leviticus 15:25-27), and made unclean anyone and anything she touched. For twelve years she has been cut off from worship and ordinary contact. By the logic of purity she should defile Jesus; instead his power makes her whole. Jesus then draws her out publicly not to shame her but to declare her clean and restored, and to call her "Daughter," the only woman in the Gospels he addresses so.

The Markan "sandwich." Mark frames this story inside the Jairus account (the technique of intercalation): two "daughters" (the woman; Jairus's twelve-year-old girl), the recurring number twelve, both restored, one by reaching out in faith, the other through a father's faith tested by delay. The interruption that seems to doom the girl becomes the setting for "don't fear, only believe."

Theological framing (multiple views)

All traditions read genuine faith and genuine healing here, with the accent on Jesus dignifying a ritually unclean, impoverished, anonymous woman and commending faith over fear. Readings differ on how much weight to give the "power went out" detail (impersonal force vs. Jesus' deliberate, knowing response, the narrative's "he turned and looked" favors the personal). The text is presented here as it stands.

Sources, trace every one

Every cited verse, in full. Tap any reference to open it in the reader.

  • Matthew 9:20bsb

    Suddenly a woman who had suffered from bleeding for twelve years came up behind Him and touched the fringe of His cloak.

  • Mark 5:25bsb

    And a woman was there who had suffered from bleeding for twelve years.

  • Luke 8:43bsb

    including a woman who had suffered from bleeding for twelve years. She had spent all her money on physicians, but no one was able to heal her.

On contested questions we show every major view, attributed and cited, and pick no winner. Answers are synthesized from primary sources, truth you can trace, not opinion.

Healing the Woman with the Issue of Blood · Bubble Bible