A Blind Man at the Gate

Jericho is one of the oldest inhabited cities in the world, possibly inhabited as early as the dawn of human cities.2 Deuteronomy 34:3 describes it as the city of Palms, fed by copious springs. It has had a population usually ranging around 3,000 people. This is the last of the healing miracles in Mark. It is written as an eyewitness report. Mark rarely recorded the names of people who were healed and so it is possible that the son of Timaeus was a known member of the early church. In contrast to the rich man who had obeyed the commandments from his youth, it was assumed by a judgmental society that the blind man had been disobedient. In contrast to the disciples’ asking for positions of honor, the blind man asks only for mercy. Then Jesus came.

2Gates, Charles (2003). "Near Eastern, Egyptian, and Aegean Cities". Ancient Cities: The Archaeology of Urban Life in the Ancient Near East and Egypt, Greece and Rome. Routledge. p. 18. ISBN 0-415-01895-1. “Jericho, in the Jordan River Valley in Israel, inhabited from ca. 9000 BC to the present day, offers important evidence for the earliest permanent settlements in the Near East.”