They cast out many demons, and anointed many with oil who were sick and healed them.
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 13. It was usual for the Jews to prescribe oil as a proper thing to anoint the sick; but its virtue in the present instance, when used by the apostles, was not natural but supernatural, and was derived from him who sent them; because this unction always produced a certain and constant cure in those who were anointed. This miraculous gift of healing the sick with oil, which Christ conferred on his apostles, was a prelude or gradual preparation to the dignity to which he raised this unction, when he established it a perpetual rite in his holy Church. Rutter.—With oil, and so forth This anointing the sick, was at least a figure of the sacrament, which Christ was pleased to institute for the spiritual relief of persons in danger of death: and which is fully expressed by Saint James, in his Catholic Epistle. Calmet. 5. The Council of Trent says this sacrament was insinuated in Saint Mark, and published in the Epistle of Saint James. Trid. sess. xiv. chapter 1. Witham.