Bible Synapse
Was Jairus’s daughter dying or already dead when he came to Jesus?
Hard question · The life of Jesus · raised by 3 of the lists sceptics circulate
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A ruler tells Jesus that his daughter has just died, and asks him to come and lay his hand on her so that she will live.
While he spake these things unto them, behold, there came a certain ruler, and worshipped him, saying, My daughter is even now dead: but come and lay thy hand upon her, and she shall live. And Jesus arose, and followed him, and so did his disciples.
Jairus begs Jesus to come, for his little daughter is at the point of death.
And, behold, there cometh one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name; and when he saw him, he fell at his feet, And besought him greatly, saying, My little daughter lieth at the point of death: I pray thee, come and lay thy hands on her, that she may be healed; and she shall live.
Messengers from his house report that the girl is dead.
While he yet spake, there came from the ruler of the synagogue’s house certain which said, Thy daughter is dead: why troublest thou the Master any further?
Jairus’s only daughter, about twelve years old, is dying.
And, behold, there came a man named Jairus, and he was a ruler of the synagogue: and he fell down at Jesus’ feet, and besought him that he would come into his house: For he had one only daughter, about twelve years of age, and she lay a dying. But as he went the people thronged him.
The objection
In Matthew the ruler tells Jesus, “My daughter is even now dead.” In Mark and Luke, Jairus says she is dying, and only later do messengers come to say that she has died. Was she alive or dead when her father first came to Jesus?
The answer
Mark and Luke tell the story in full and Matthew in brief: he takes nine verses (Matthew 9:18–26) where Mark takes more than twenty (Mark 5:21–43). Matthew leaves out the messengers altogether and gathers into the father’s one request both what he asked at the start and what he learned on the way. When Jairus left home his daughter was at the point of death (Mark 5:23); while Jesus was delayed by the crowd and the woman who touched his garment, she died (Mark 5:35). Matthew gives the request as it finally stood: come and raise her.
Augustine explained the passage this way around AD 400: for brevity, Matthew put into the father’s words what he wished and what Christ in fact did. Matthew’s Greek, arti eteleutēsen, ‘has just now died’, also fits a father who had left his child at her last breath and could only suppose that she was gone. All three accounts agree on what matters: a desperate father, a girl beyond human help, and Jesus raising her to life.
Other answers Christians give
He said both
Others suggest that Jairus said both things: that his daughter was at the point of death, and that by now she must be dead. Mark and Luke report the first, Matthew the second.
From the classic commentators
by reason of brevity in the narrative, Matthew has preferred to express it as if the Lord had been really asked to do what it is clear He did actually do, namely, raise the dead to life.Augustine, Harmony of the Gospels II.28 (c. 400), tr. S. D. F. Salmond (1888)
when Jairus left his house, his daughter was in the agony of death, just ready to give up the ghost; so, that he concluded, by the time he was with Jesus, she had made her exit; as it appears she had, by a messenger, who brought the account of her deathJohn Gill, Exposition on Matthew 9:18 (1746–1763)
Sources
- Augustine, Harmony of the Gospels, Book II, chapter 28, at New Advent
- John Gill, Exposition of the Bible: Matthew 9, at Bible Hub