Gospel of Mark Chapter 1 Vs. 43

 Jesus Cleanses a Leper

Mark 1:43 “And he straitly charged him, and forthwith sent him away;”

he straitly charged... Implies that Jesus was for some reason angry or irritated, as does the vivid sent him away, the same verb (as in verse 12). Perhaps Jesus was indignant at the outrage of mankind’s sickness and suffering, affronts to a loving God’s power to redeem His creation from all that is tainted by the imperfect and ultimately evil.

Strictly charged (ἐμβριμησάμενος)

Rev., sternly, in margin. The word is originally to snort, as of mettlesome horses. Hence, to fret, or chafe, or be otherwise strongly moved; and then, as a result of this feeling, to admonish or rebuke urgently. The Lord evidently spoke to him peremptorily. Compare sent him out ἐξέβαλεν; lit., drove or cast him out. The reason for this charge and dismissal lay in the desire of Jesus not to thwart his ministry by awaking the premature violence of his enemies, who, if they should see the leper and hear his story before he had been officially pronounced clean by the priest, might deny either that he had been a leper or had been truly cleansed.

Jesus sent the cleansed man away. Jesus told the man not to tell anyone of his healing, but the gratitude of the man being brought back as it were from the dead, was too great. He told everyone he saw.

But is it very remarkable that Christ, Who was born under the law, never betrayed any anxiety about cleanness. The law of impurity was in fact an expression of human frailty. Sin spreads corruption far more easily than virtue diffuses purity. The touch of goodness fails to reproduce goodness. And the prophet Haggai has laid stress upon this contrast, that bread or pottage or wine or oil or any meat will not become holy at the touch of one who bears holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, but if one that is unclean by a dead body touch any of these, it shall be unclean (Hag. 2:12-13). Our hearts know full well how true to nature is the ordinance.

But Christ brought among us a virtue more contagious than our vices are, being not only a living soul, but a life-imparting Spirit. And thus He lays His hand upon this leper, upon the bier at Nain, upon the corpse of the daughter of Jairus, and as fire is kindled at the touch of fire, so instead of pollution to Him, the pureness of healthful life is imparted to the defiling and defiled.

The forceful words sent him away (exebalen; cf. Mark 1:12), at once (euthys; cf. Mark 1:10), and a strong warning (cf. Mark 14:5) emphasize the need for prompt obedience to the instructions in Mark 1:44.