Blind Bartimaeus !  !!!

Blind Bartimeus at the gates
Of Jericho in darkness waits;
He hears the crowd;--he hears a breath
Say, "It is Christ of Nazareth!"
And calls, in tones of agony,

The thronging multitudes increase;
Blind Bartimeus, hold thy peace!
But still, above the noisy crowd,
The beggar's cry is shrill and loud;
Until they say, "He calleth thee!"

Then saith the Christ, as silent stands
The crowd, "What wilt thou at my hands?"
And he replies, "O give me light!
Rabbi, restore the blind man's sight.
And Jesus answers, ''
!

Ye that have eyes, yet cannot see,
In darkness and in misery,
Recall those mighty Voices Three,
!
!
!
 

This poem was written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, sometime in the 1800's.  You are all familiar with this true story as told only by the Gospel writer, Mark, in Chapter 10, verses 46 through 52.  If you care, open your Bible and read those verses right now....if you don't have a Bible handy, then CLICK HERE and read it online.  (Note---Bartimeus is simply another spelling for the man you read about in these verses).  In our Bibles (or online) we immediately see Jesus' reply to the sorrowful plea of this sightless man, "Go your way, your faith has made you well." (NKJV).  Yet, in this poem, those words by Jesus were replaced with an exclamation mark (!).  (In another versions of this same poem, the word "GREEK" in parantheses are placed before each of the four exclamation marks.) And then, Henry takes the story a little bit farther than what is recorded by Mark, and adds the last three lines of text and the three additional exclamation marks, one to each line.   Henry definitely used his poetic license in composing this rendition of a hapless man living in darkness.

So, without analyzing too deeply the story told by Mark, except suffice it to say that it was the demonstrated faith of Bartimaeus which touched Jesus enough to heal this man, why the mystery suggested here by Henry with the use of punctuation?

An exclamation mark (EM), if I remember my high school english correctly, there are three times this punctuation is used:

  • after an exclamatory sentence 
  • after an interjection    and
  • after a strong command
    •  
    The first time the EM is used alone in this poem correlates to a command given by Jesus -- "Go, your faith has healed you." (NIV)  Although not a strong command, an extraordinary one, especially to Bartimaeus and the crowd of people outside of Jericho.   This is one EM we see used a lot in our lives.  Strong commands exist everywhere.  "Stay off the Grass!" , "Repent!", "Stop!", "Help!"...well, you get the (exclamation) point.  Many commands we get from the Lord could conceivably be followed by this punctuation.  The use of this EM in this way is for getting one's attention.  The Biblical punctuation, both NKJV and NIV (and am sure many others) do not end Jesus' command with an EM, but simply a period.  This man's attention was already achieved by Jesus, and after the man was healed, I imagine Jesus also achieved the attention of the onlookers, both believers and non-believers.  Unfortunately, most of our lives, we keep repeatedly seeing the EM in Jesus' commands, at least in our minds and hearts.  This is simply because of our lack of faith.  I imagine not many of you have seen a blind person healed by someone else (maybe vision improvement by medical folks, yes, but healed?, probably not.  We need exclamation marks in our lives to keep getting our attention.  We 'forget' from day to day.  Especially about the command, Repent!.
     
    The last three times the EM is used in this poem, remain a mystery to me.  (Even if preceeded by the all-caps word "GREEK" in parantheses, it is still a mystery.)  Perhaps, Henry wants us to 'imagine' what was said.  The last stanza of the poem hints that whatever would be inserted before the EMs that Jesus may have spoken those words, much like He would have said about ears and hearing (Mk 11:15, 13:9,43, Mk 4:9,23, Lk 8:8, 14:35 and in chapters 2, 3 and 13 of Revelation).  And then, perhaps not.  These 'missing' words (which might have been Greek lexicons) were probably either explanatory sentences, interjections, or strong commands, or a combination of any of them.  It is left to the reader to imagine what might go there.  That is what I like about this poem....it gets one to think, imagine, dream.  Rote memory and blind following is not what disciples should concentrate on, but thinking, imagining and dreaming.  How much of that do you do?  Are you intrigued by Biblical teachings?  Enough to study on your own?  If so, I challenge you to start with this poem, and just imagine what could have been inserted before those last three EMs. 
     
    For me, I think that the three voices COULD be that of God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit.  Each 'separate' entity of the Holy Trinity has spoken in different ways throughout the Bible, both Old and New Testaments where applicable.  Maybe God is saying something first, like "Love Me with all your heart, mind soul and strength, and you will get enough faith to be healed of your inequities!"  Maybe Jesus is speaking second, and saying "Get a faith even the size of mustard seed, and that will be enough to eliminate mountains of sin in your life!"  Maybe the Holy Spirit is encouraging us by saying "Blind faith will lead you down the path of destruction, but faith in your Lord will give you eternal life!"
     
    Whatever Henry meant to do using this technique, it can be effective if it gets people to think, imagine and dream about faith.  The faith of Bartimaeus saved him from a life of darkness.  Your faith can also do the same.  Have faith even though with our eyes, we cannot see.  Tell someone today about your faith in Jesus.  But do it with sentences ending in an EM! !!!
     
    To God be the Glory!  Amen!