Mark 2:1-12

1. The healing and forgiveness of a paralytic 2:1-12 (cf. Matthew 9:1-8; Luke 5:17-26)

". . . as Rabbinism stood confessedly powerless in face of the living death of leprosy, so it had no word of forgiveness to speak to the conscience burdened with sin, nor yet word of welcome to the sinner. But this was the inmost meaning of the two events which the Gospel-history places next to the healing of the leper: the forgiveness of sins in the case of the paralytic, and the welcome to the chief of sinners in the call of Levi-Matthew." [Note: Edersheim, 1:499.]