I stood up straight! I looked at him eye to eye! Well, not exactly, because he was taller than I, but eye to chin. A chin! Can you believe, I saw a chin? How long has it been since I saw something other than someone’s feet? No, to be honest, if I twisted my head, I could sometimes see as high as a belt.

Who was this man? Not from here, a Galilean, by his accent. His robe was dusty, tattered. He has traveled—a great deal! Before he spoke to me, when he approached, I remember seeing his sandals. Barely holding onto his feet, they were so tired and worn.

Standing up straight, I looked into his face—a kind face, a well-tanned face, a face used to being out in the sun. His eyes—bright, intelligent, but somewhat sad, like his smile. His words—soft and gentle, encouraging.

Such words I have longed to hear: “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.”

My ailment? Being bent over from my waist? Not able to stand up straight? Not able to look others in the eye? No, I wouldn’t call it an ailment. I called it a curse. A curse from God, all because I had … I don’t know what I had done, what sin God might have been punishing me for.

I had been an obedient wife, although not necessarily willingly. Was that my sin? That I had resented being married so young? I was an obedient wife. I had raised three children from eight births. Was that my sin? That only those three and two more had survived being born? That the other two had died shortly after being weaned? What had I done wrong?

Whatever my sin, whatever my ailment, this man put his hands on me and set me free! How could I not lift my voice in praise to God for my deliverance? He put his hands on me! He touched me! A woman! A woman he did not know. A woman deemed unworthy because of her “ailment.” And a warmth flowed through my body, a warmth that loosened my joints, that softened my bones, that pushed me upright!

For the briefest of moments, I did not know how to respond. I even stopped breathing! I stared at him. He smiled back at me and nodded. “You’re free,” he whispered. “Free to be. Free to be you again.”

How could I not praise God! Softly at first, in a whisper, I offered my thanks to this man. Then my voice grew louder as I remembered the words that the priest used to begin the synagogue service with, one of the psalms of David.

I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless you and praise your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised. God’s greatness is unsearchable.”

But the leader of the synagogue was not pleased. He was not praising God. Instead, he turned to the people and raised his fist. “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.”

And this man replied, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to give it water? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?”

My mind clung to his words. “This woman … a daughter of Abraham … whom Satan bound …” Not punished by God but bound by Satan! Not for my sins! Not for my failures! He called me a daughter of Abraham! A chosen one, not a rejected one! And my voice raised in intensity. I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and ever.

The man turned away and left, leading a small group of others. Some women joined them. Could I follow? Should I follow? Only my son waited for me at home, and I didn’t think he cared.

I could still hear the synagogue leader. He did not seem to have heard, or at least, understood what Jesus had said. The leader continued carrying on: “Six days … come then. Not on the sabbath day!”

In my mind, I saw him bent down, bent over double as I had been. He could only see one thing, protecting the sabbath, his understanding of the sabbath, the sabbath as a day of rest. The sabbath was not a day for healing, offering rest to my broken body, my guilty spirit.

Freedom is rest, but he could not see that. Freedom from pain, freedom from fear, freedom from suffering, freedom from restrictive rules, freedom from oppression.

I did not follow the man that day. Instead, I went home, home to my son, my only son. He did not look up at me when I entered the house. He did not see that I stood straight. He simply continued his normal sabbath routine, reading the scripture and praying until sunset, when the sabbath ended.

Even then, it was morning before Aaron spoke to me. “Mother? What’s wrong with you?”

“Wrong with me? Nothing. I’m fine. I’m better than I have been for years.”

But I was not who he expected me to be. As I prepared his breakfast, I remembered moving in with him after his wife died. They had no children, but he needed someone to care for his daily needs. My husband was failing, so I cared for the two of them until Jacob died. My own body was failing too, bending me over more and more as time passed. But I continued to cook and wash for Aaron. He never took a new wife. Aaron never asked me how I felt. He only spoke to me to tell me what to do.

All day long I caught Aaron looking at me, trying to figure out what was wrong with me. He could not see me as anyone other than who I had been. He could not see me standing straight, only old and bent over.

He was bent over, too, bent over by the past, by what he believed me to be, by what he wanted me to be, dependent on him. I had been dependent on him. No one else would take me in, would accept me the way I had been. No one else saw me with my disability. They simply looked over me. I was not in their line of sight.

I thought about others, others who were bent over by something, by anything. Not physically, as they stood tall, but inside … inside they were bent over by obedience to a set of rules, by fear of change, by fear of difference, by fear of not being who others wanted them to be.

And I realized that we are all bent over by something. Jesus could … Jesus can set us free.

General Questions

1) How does this story follow its Scripture?

2) How does this story expand its Scripture for you?

3) What is the message of this story?

4) How does the message apply to us today?

Specific Questions

5) Why would Jesus touch the bent-over woman when men were not even allowed to speak to unrelated women?

6) Why did babies often die shortly after being weaned?

7) What rules/traditions/doctrines do we defend like the synagogue leader?

8) What bends you over?