Luke 13:11

‘And behold, a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and she was bowed together, and could in no wise lift herself up.'

‘And behold.' This may well indicate that He suddenly spotted her while He was teaching. What He spotted was a woman who was bent double and could not straighten herself. In view of the connection with an evil spirit it was probably skoliasis hysterica, a partly psychological condition. Others see it as spondylitis ankylopoietica indicating a fusion of the spinal bones. The one may, of course, have resulted in the other.

The woman had been affected in this way by an evil spirit for ‘eighteen years'. A connection with the ‘eighteen' who perished at Siloam may well be in mind, with the thought that she too was suffering because of sin in the world. She was bowed double and could not lift herself up. She was a picture of a world bent double by sin, and unable to stand tall.