Luke 7:6–9 with St. Thomas Aquinas
“And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to him, ‘Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. Therefore I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed. For I too am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me: and I say to one, “Go,” and he goes; and to another, “Come,” and he comes; and to my servant, “Do this,” and he does it. When Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’”
The story of the centurion and his sick servant is full of meaning on several levels, and usually when we read this story we tend to focus, and rightly, on the centurion. His faith is remarkable, and even more remarkable is what Jesus points out: this Gentile’s faith exceeds that of God’s chosen people.
St. Thomas Aquinas helps to draw our attention to a detail that might otherwise go under appreciated: “When Jesus heard these things, he marveled” (Lk. 7:9). The Greek word for marveled can be also be translated as “was amazed” or “was filled with wonder.” This reaction is a beautiful one, not only for highlighting the centurion’s faith, but also for redirecting our gaze to the figure of Christ. As St. Thomas points out, “We experience wonder in the face of those things whose causes we do not know.” Wonder is a distinctly human phenomenon, precisely because it involves the combination of knowing something and being ignorant of the reasons for it, and this combination is only possible for the finite intellectual capacity that human beings possess.
By attributing this phenomenon of marveling to Christ, Thomas sees the gospel affirming that Christ really was human and, just like us, experienced that quintessentially human experience of wonder. Moreover, by affirming the true humanity of Christ, the gospel also affirms our humanity and can help us recall what we are made for: we are made to stand before the truth and to pursue it ever more deeply, and it is wonder that arouses us to this pursuit, leads us to persevere, and awakens in us the delight that only wisdom can bring.[1]
