John 5:8 - Exposition

Jesus smith to him, Rise, take up thy bed ( κράββατόν σου )—thy mattress or pallet; the word is said to be of Macedonian origin, it is Latinized in the vulgate into grabbatus, and is not unfrequently found in the New Testament; the ordinary Greek word σκίμπους σκιμπόδον — and walk. These are in part the identical words which Jesus addressed to the paralytic ( Mark 2:9 ). He did not touch him or use any other means than his own life-giving word to confer the cure. He put forth, in royal might and spontaneous unsolicited exertion, the miraculous force.

The energy of the Lord's will mastered the palsied will of the sick man, and infused into him the lacking energy. Archdeacon Watkins supposes that the man did possess incipient and recipient faith, moved by the generous tenderness and sympathetic interest of the Stranger in his ease. The very striking fact mentioned in the synoptic cure of the paralytic, viz. that he was borne into the presence of Jesus by four friends, ought to have prevented Thoma's caricature of criticism, which makes this narrative a mere idealization of that.