Commentary on the Gospel of
The Jews were no sailors: in fact they feared and hated the sea. They did not even bother to distinguish the different bodies of water correctly: they spoke of the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea, though both of these are lakes, not seas. At the bottom of the sea, it was said, lurked Leviathan, the mythological monster of chaos. The significance of Jesus’ walking on the water is then clear: he has conquered evil. (How we turn miracles into conjuring tricks, missing their meaning! We have lost the power of symbolism.) A Christian is not allowed the grim pleasure of being fatalistic about evil. Evil will not be victorious, Christ has triumphed over evil and death.
