But so much the more went there a fame abroad of him: and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by him of their infirmities.
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Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
The authority of power in the Lord is here compared with the steadfastness of faith manifest in the leper. He fell on his face because it is a mark of humility and modesty that each feel shame for the sins of his life, but shyness did not restrict his confession. He showed the wound, he begged for the remedy, and the very confession is full of piety and faith. “If you will,” it says, “you can make me clean.” He conceded the power to the Lord’s will. But he doubted concerning the Lord’s will, not as if unbelieving in piety, but as if aware of his own impurity, he did not presume. The Lord replies to him with a certain holiness. “I will: be clean. And immediately the leprosy departed from him.” For there is nothing between God’s command and his work, because the work is in the command. Thus he spoke, and they came into being. You see that it cannot be doubted that the will of God is power. If, therefore, his will is power, those who affirm that the Trinity is of One will affirm that it i...
He is commanded to show himself to the priest and sacrifice for his cleansing. In offering himself to the priest, the priest may understand that he was cured not by the ordinance of the law but by the grace of God above the law. When the sacrifice is performed according to Moses’ precept, the Lord shows that he did not destroy the law but fulfilled it. Furthermore, by proceeding according to the law, he was seen to heal above the law those whom the remedies of the law had not healed. “For the law is spiritual,” and therefore it is seen that a spiritual sacrifice is commanded.
Anyone can see the profound and mighty mystery of Christ written for our benefit in Leviticus. For the law of Moses declares the leper defiled and gives orders for him to be put out of the camp as unclean. What if the malady is relieved? It commands that he should then be capable of readmission. Moreover, it clearly specifies the manner in which he is to be pronounced clean…. We may see, then, in the birds (offered at the cleansing of the leper) Christ suffering in the flesh according to the Scriptures but remaining also beyond the power of suffering…. That the one bird then was slain, and that the other was baptized indeed in its blood, while itself exempt from slaughter, typified what was really to happen. For Christ died in our place, and we, who have been baptized into his death, he has saved by his own blood. Commentary on Luke, Homily
