The woman with the issue of blood
She was a woman who had suffered from bleeding for twelve years, spent everything she had on doctors and only grown worse. In a crowd she touched the edge of Jesus' cloak and was healed at once, and then Jesus called her daughter and told her that her faith had made her well.
The healing of the woman with the issue of blood is told in three Gospels: Matthew, Mark and Luke (Matthew 9:20–22, Mark 5:25–34, Luke 8:43–48). Mark gives the fullest account. It happens on the way to the house of Jairus, a synagogue ruler whose twelve-year-old daughter was dying (Mark 5:21–24), so the story of one woman’s healing sits inside the story of a girl raised from the dead.
Twelve years of suffering
Mark describes her condition in a few lines.
And a certain woman, which had an issue of blood twelve years, And had suffered many things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse,
Mark 5:25–26 · King James Version (1769)
John MacArthur explains that the bleeding was chronic, perhaps caused by a tumor or another disease, and that in hard cases people of that time went from doctor to doctor and received conflicting and often harmful treatments. Adam Clarke lists some of the remedies recorded in Jewish writings, and it is no surprise that she grew worse. William MacDonald points out that Luke, himself a doctor, says only that no one could heal her, while Mark adds that she got worse.
Her illness was more than a physical burden. The law of Moses said this about a woman with such bleeding.
And if a woman have an issue of her blood many days out of the time of her separation, or if it run beyond the time of her separation; all the days of the issue of her uncleanness shall be as the days of her separation: she shall be unclean.
Lev 15:25 · King James Version (1769)
The New Geneva Study Bible points out that she was ritually unclean, and anyone she touched became unclean as well. MacArthur adds that she was shut out of the synagogue and the temple, and people avoided her. John Gill notes that for all those years she was kept apart from her husband and from the house of God. Twelve years of illness had cost her health, money and fellowship.
A touch of faith in the crowd
Then she heard about Jesus.
When she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind, and touched his garment. For she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole. And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up; and she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague.
Mark 5:27–29 · King James Version (1769)
Albert Barnes explains that she came from behind so as not to be noticed: she was sure Jesus could heal her, but she trembled because she felt unworthy. Her uncleanness was another reason for keeping out of sight. William MacDonald notes that the edge of the cloak was the fringe that every Jewish man wore on his garment as the law commanded (Numbers 15:38–39).
Was it the cloth that healed her? The New Geneva Study Bible answers no: the power went out from Jesus Himself, not from His clothes, and He told her that her faith had saved her. Matthew Henry observes that the cure was immediate and complete, while people who recover from such an illness by natural means regain their strength slowly.