Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Easter
The Gospel reading for today from St. John’s Gospel is a powerful one. We find a man who is physically unable to immerse himself in the healing waters of the pool of Bethesda. He tells his problem to Jesus, and Jesus heals the man without even using water from the pool.
Throughout Scripture, and in early Judaism and Christianity, water was often understood as an angelic or demonic realm. Perhaps this had to do with creation in Genesis where the heavenly realm was associated with water (Genesis 1:6-8), and in fact the Hebrew word for water (mayim) is related to the Hebrew word for heaven (shamayim). Perhaps the association had to do with the connection for early Jews and Christians between demons and dragons (e.g., Revelation 12:3, 7, 9), the Hebrew word for which was the same as the water beasts. Whatever the explanation is, there were traditions within Judaism that associated Sheol, the abode of the dead, as a demonic watery abyss below the Temple in Jerusalem, held back by the great rock under the altar. In early Christianity, stories abound of demon-infested waters. Traditions surrounding the pool of Bethesda, however, associate the healing power of the water to angels. In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus’ healing power is implicitly compared to the healing water. It is not the water that heals this man, it is Jesus, who we were told in the chapter (John 4) immediately before the chapter of today’s reading (John 5), provides “living water” (4:10-14). This is connected with today’s first reading.
In the first reading for today, we see Ezekiel’s famous vision of living waters streaming forth from the altar in the Temple in Jerusalem. This is a vision of a new temple, since in Ezekiel’s time the Temple had been destroyed by the Babylonians. We see that this water is living water, because it turns salt water into fresh water and it makes desolate lands fertile, and wherever the water flows, the region teems with new life. In St. John’s Gospel, and only in St. John’s Gospel, we hear about how at Jesus crucifixion water and blood flowed from His pierced side (John 19:34). This is highly significant when we consider that Jesus was offering the sacrifice of Himself at this very moment, from the cross which was His sacrificial altar, and that He was being killed at the time when the Passover lambs were being slaughtered at the Temple. This is because Jesus’ side would not have been the only river of blood and water flowing at that moment, because there was a ravine which ran from the altar in the Temple into the Kidron Valley, where the blood of the lambs was poured out, as well as water libations. So there would have been a river of blood and water flowing from the Temple into the valley, while blood and water flowed from Jesus’ side on the cross. Moreover, in the heavenly Jerusalem, Jesus is the altar and the Temple (Revelation 21:22). In light of the readings for today, as well as the rest of St. John’s Gospel and St. John’s Apocalypse, we can begin to understand how Ezekiel’s vision is not simply about a new temple in Jerusalem that will bring new life to the desert lands, but rather it is about Jesus, our New Temple, Who possesses the true Living Water.
If we are seeking the living waters that will make us whole again, we need only turn to Jesus through the Sacraments whereby we become immersed in the true Living Waters, participating in God’s own divine life. This is especially true of Baptism. For those being baptized, they will be born again to new life in Christ, partaking of the very divine life of the Triune God. All of us who are baptized can “drink” from the Living Waters of Jesus every time we frequent the Sacraments, receiving the gift of life and grace in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and nourished by the spiritual food and drink of Jesus’ Body and Blood in the Most Holy Eucharist. If we are catechumens or candidates approaching our baptism and/or confirmation and first communion at Easter, let us really foster a desire to be more deeply united with the Lord during the rest of this Lenten season. If we are already fully united to Christ in the Catholic Church, let us continue to come to the “living waters” Jesus desires to give us at Confession and Mass.
- Jeff Morrow