Thought of the Day 05.28.08

This morning over breakfast, I was reading the account of Jesus’s capture in John 18, but I noticed something strange. Verses 10-11 describe Peter cutting off Malchus’s ear and then being rebuked by Jesus for it. But that’s all there was. There was no mention of Jesus healing the ear. In fact, not just John, but Matthew (26:51-56) and Mark (14:47-50) also omit this detail.

Yes, we might still have suspected something else happened since Peter wasn’t arrested for aggravated assault and attempted murder. Yet only Luke confirms this suspicion (22:49-53). So the omission reminds us that God sometimes entices us to solve textual mysteries by looking elsewhere.

Still, to omit such an impressive miracle is amazing, and it reminds us of another important principle of Biblical interpretation: when the Bible omits things, it also usually omits the reason for the omission. And speculation to fill the void begins to look dangerously like adding to the Scripture our own un-inerrant words.