Asclepius, Jesus, and Healing by Touch

This article seeks to overturn more than one hundred years of scholarship that has suggested that Asclepius, the preeminent Greek god of healing, was reputed to heal by touch. Previous scholars have interpreted a small number of Attic votive reliefs as depicting touch-miracles analogous to those attributed to Jesus in the New Testament. In light of epigraphic and literary depictions of Asclepius as a divine physician, I argue that some of these reliefs show Asclepius administering medical or surgical cures, while others represent Asclepius employing the physician's compassionate hand (παιωνία χείρ). In contrast, Jesus is portrayed as a source of divine power, which he is able to transfer to a sick or injured person by means of a simple touch without any need for a physician's techniques. Similar touch-miracles in the Septuagint and the Genesis Apocryphon indicate that antecedents for touch-miracles attributed to Jesus can be found not in Greek healing cults but rather in Jewish traditions.