The Second Touch
"They came to Bethsaida, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man’s eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, “Do you see anything?” He looked up and said, “I see people; they look like trees walking around.” Once more Jesus put his hands on the man’s eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly."
— Mark 8:22-25
Bethsaida sat on the northeastern shore of the lake, near the point where the Jordan runs in. John's Gospel names it as the home town of Philip, and of Andrew and Peter. In the first century saliva counted as a remedy rather than an insult. Pliny the Elder, who wrote in that same century, lists it among treatments for eye trouble. So the method itself would have looked like ordinary medicine to anyone watching. What no one expected was the pause in the middle. Every other healing Mark reports happens in a single moment. This is the only one in the four Gospels that arrives in two stages, and Mark placed it where he did on purpose. Just before it, in the boat, he asks the twelve why they still do not understand. Right after it, Peter calls him the Messiah and then argues with him about the cross. A cure given in two stages stands between two scenes of men who grasped only half. Work that is not finished yet is still work he is doing.