«Let Your Peace Come Upon It»: Healing and Peace in Matthew 10:1-15

Concerns about healing and peace remain central in human experience. They arise in many spheres of life: military, political, economic, medical, religious, spiritual, and domestic. Ancient writings from Greece and Rome, the Israelite-Jewish and Christian scriptures, extracanonical documents, and patristic texts are replete with instances where words and concepts for healing and peace occur together. After examining such occurrences, Father Ridgway undertakes an exegesis of the mission charge in Matthew 10:1-15 in order to define the precise meaning of «peace» (eirene) there and to demonstrate a relationship between the commissions to heal (therapeuein) the sick and to confer eirene on worthy houses. Father Ridgway concludes by discussing implications of his findings for peoples of antiquity and the modern world, both Christian and non-Christian.