Jesus used miracles to teach deeper spiritual realities. Understanding these two healings as having metaphorical significance is not reading one’s theology into the text. It will be maintained that the two healings that begin and end the discipleship section are pictures of the metaphorical blindness of the disciples. Clearly this is a metaphorical blindness. Immediately before the healing at Bethsaida the Lord tells the disciples that they are blind. In Mark 4:11-12 the Lord uses lack of sight to describe spiritual blindness. It is not surprising that blindness would be used to describe the disciples in a spiritual sense. Both healings are illustrations of discipleship. 3 The ending of this section also involves the healing of a blind man-Bartimaeus.
The spittle healing of Mark 8:22-26 also begins what can be called the discipleship section of Mark, which runs through Mark 10:52. The eyes of these disciples would also be opened in stages. The man is not healed all at once, but in stages. That is also the only healing Jesus performs in stages.
Such actions, in the first century, were shocking. That is the only miracle in the NT where Jesus spits in the face of a person. The use of the spittle indicated that what Jesus was about to say to them about this topic was disgraceful and disgusting in their eyes.
They did not understand what following Jesus meant. In a recent article in this journal, I argued that when Jesus used spittle to heal a blind man in stages in Mark 8:22-26, it was a picture of the “blindness” of the disciples.
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