And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and said unto him,
Ephphatha,
that is,
Be opened.
Read Chapter 7
Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
So open your ears and enjoy the good odor of eternal life which has been breathed upon you by the grace of the sacraments. This we pointed out to you as we celebrated the mystery of the opening and said: “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened,” so that everyone about to come to the table of grace might know what he was asked and remember the way he once responded. Christ celebrated this mystery in the Gospel, as we read, when he healed the one who was deaf and dumb.
Every sabbath we witness the “opening up” of a mystery. It is in outline form the type of that liturgical opening when the minister once touched your ears and nostrils. What does this mean? Remember in the Gospel, our Lord Jesus Christ, when the deaf and dumb man was presented to him, touched his ears and his mouth: the ears, because he was deaf; the mouth, because he was dumb. And he said: “Ephphatha,” a Hebrew word, which in Latin means adaperire [be opened]. In this way the minister is now touching your ears, that your ears may be opened to this sermon and exhortation.
And looking up to heaven (because from thence come words to the dumb, hearing to the deaf, healing for all infirmities, says Bede), He groaned; both because He sympathised with the misery of the deaf and dumb Prayer of Manasseh , as because in groaning He prayed and obtained healing for him from God.
Ephpheta, which Isaiah , Be thou opened, ie, which so signifies. "Where," says Bede, "the two natures of the one and the same Mediator between God and man are plainly set forth. For, looking up to heaven as Prayer of Manasseh , He groaned, being about to pray to God; presently by a single word, as having the power of Divine Majesty, He healed." For we all have eyes, but the blind have theirs shut and closed, which in the Syriac idiom are elegantly said to be opened when their shutters are unclosed, as Angelus Caninius says (in Nom. Heb. c10). Moreover, the Heb. patach signifies to open. From whence is the imperative passive, or Niphal, hippateach, by crasis hippatach, for which the Syrian...
Ephphetha, a Syriac word. Jesus Christ, in the cure of this man, uses many and various actions; but as of their own nature they are no ways equal to such a cure, they shew: first, that the cure was miraculous; and secondly, the virtue, which his divinity communicated to his sacred body. (Bible de Vence)
We must not suppose that our Saviour here groaned on account of any difficulty he experienced in working this miracle, but only from commiseration for the man, whom he was about to heal; as likewise to shew, how very difficult is the cure of those who are spiritually deaf and dumb by sin. He was affected in a similar manner when he raised Lazarus to life, to show with what difficulty a man, dead and buried in sin by evil habits, can arise from that miserable state. (Denis the Carthusian)
