In some unnamed synagogue He sat and taught. A man whose right hand was withered stood before him. Had he been brought there to serve the purposes of these watchful enemies who wished, not simply to have his own acts to bring up against him (for these, as the acts of a prophet, might be regarded as privileged) but to get from him a distinct categorical reply to the question whether it was lawful for any man who had the power of healing to exert it on the Sabbath day? So soon at least as they saw his eye fastened upon the man with the withered hand, and before he did anything, they interpose their question, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath days?” The question is met by an appeal to their own practice: “What man shall there be among you that shall have one sheep, and if it fall into a pit on the Sabbath day, will he not lay hold on it and lift it out? How much then is a man better than a sheep! Wherefore it is lawful to do well on the Sabbath days.” But they shall not only have its lawfulness asserted, they shall see the good done before their eyes. Jesus bids the man with the withered hand stand forth. But ere he cures him, he turns to the scribes and Pharisees and puts in his turn a question cutting deep into their deceitful hearts: “Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath days,”—as I am doing—“or to do evil?”—as ye do in suspecting and maligning me;—“to save life,”—as I do—“or to kill,”—as ye are doing who are already meditating my death? There is no answer to this question. They stand speechless before him, but unconvinced and unrelenting. Jesus knew that healing the diseased on the Sabbath day would be regarded as a breach of divine law, would shock the Pharisees, and run counter to the convictions of the great mass of the community. Did he abstain from effecting cures upon that day? He might easily have done so, as no applications were made to him. Much as they desired to have the benefit conferred, the people shrank from bringing their diseased to be cured on the holy day. Jesus had only to meet their prejudices by doing nothing. But he did not choose to be thus silent and acquiescent. No less than seven miracles are recorded as wrought by him on the Sabbath day, some of them among the most conspicuous and memorable in his ministry. 1. The cure of the paralytic on the occasion of his second visit to Jerusalem. 2. The cure of the demoniac in the synagogue of Capernaum, when opening his ministry in Galilee. 3. The cure of Peter's wife's mother the same afternoon in the same city. 4. The cure of the man with a withered hand, a few Sabbaths afterward in the same city. 5. The cure of the man born blind, who sat begging in the porch of the temple at Jerusalem. 6. The cure of a woman who had the spirit of infirmity for eighteen years. 7. The cure of the man with a dropsy, who happened to be present at a feast given on a Sabbath day in the house of a chief publican, an invitation to which Jesus had accepted.—Hanna.