Ephphatha

Ephphatha is the Aramaic word, meaning be opened, spoken by Jesus when he healed a deaf man with a speech impediment in the region of the Decapolis (Mark 7:34). Jesus took the man aside privately, put his fingers into his ears and touched his tongue with spittle, looked up to heaven, sighed, and spoke the word. Immediately the man's hearing was restored and his speech impediment removed.

Mark, writing primarily for a Gentile audience, translates the term for his readers (as he does with other Aramaic words preserved in the tradition), suggesting that the actual Aramaic word was retained in the oral tradition as particularly significant—perhaps because the eyewitnesses remembered the exact utterance. The healing is notable for its intimate and deliberate method, contrasting with healings by mere word at a distance, and for the crowd's response of astonishment: He has done all things well; he makes the deaf hear and the mute speak—echoing Isaiah's description of messianic miracles. Ephphatha has been retained in some liturgical rites as an element of baptismal ceremonies, symbolizing the opening of ears to hear the gospel.