Haftarah: M’lakhim Bet (2 Kings) 4:1-23 (S), 1-37 (A)
B’rit Chadasha: Luke 7:1-23
The Theme
The second benediction of the Amidah
is called “Might,” or “God’s Might,” but to the Jew, the measure of God’s power
has never been as most of humanity measures it. When we speak of the President
of the United States as the most powerful man in the world, we think of his
power to control the world by steering our nation’s great economy or of his
ability to destroy whole cities through our enormous military and arsenal of
nuclear weapons. But when the Jew thinks of God’s might, it isn’t in His power
to force others to do his bidding or to destroy, but rather to His ability to
create life and resurrect the dead.
Isaac, the son of the Shunemite woman, and Yeshua all had two things in common:
They were all the products of miraculous births, showing God’s ability to create
life, and they were all recipients of resurrection from the dead
(metaphorically, in Isaac’s case), showing His authority to return it. Yeshua
demonstrated this same authority in the little village of Nain, which lay just
on the other side of the hill from Shunem, when like Elisha, He raised a woman’s
son from the dead—and He will show it yet again, when He sounds the shofar
and Resurrects the dead who are united with Him at His Coming!