This Sunday, the lectionary invites us to ponder Luke 8:26-39. The English Standard Version supplies the verses with the heading “Jesus Heals a Man with a Demon.”
The story is found in the gospels according to Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Each evangelist places the story right after Jesus calms the storm on the Lake of Galilee.
They present the stories together, in that sequence, deliberately. They want to show us the breadth of Jesus’ powers. They want us to see that Jesus could instantly command both the elements and the evil spirits.
The story is set in the land of the Gerasenes, where the majority of the population were Gentiles, non-Jews. This is made plain by the fact that they farmed pigs, an animal which is repulsive to Jews and shunned by them as unclean, as “polluting.”
Jesus arrived by boat, from across the water. He stepped foot on the land. A demon-possessed man, in chains, came up to him. Jesus saw the man. Jesus commanded an “unclean spirit” to come out of the man.
A voice came from the man. It said,
“What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me.”
There is some ambiguity, because one voice spoke, and referred to itself as one, but we’ll soon learn that there were thousands of demons within the man.
Jesus played along. He said, “What’s your name?” He didn’t ask the man’s name. He asked the demon’s name.
This is the only time Jesus asked the demon’s name.
So, when we perform an exorcism, should we ask the demon’s name?
The answer of course is that we’re guided by the Spirit. There’s no one formula for all exorcisms. This one is special; it has a teaching purpose.
This is an exorcism performed in Gentile-dominated territory. Jesus did it to show that his ministry wasn’t limited to Jews. He’d come to release from bondage everyone, not just Jews.
All Jesus did was speak. No theatrics. No repetition of formulas, mantras. Luke doesn’t even bother to tell us what words Jesus uttered.
The evangelists want to show us that the demons were quick to realize who Jesus was. Quicker even than Jesus’ hand-picked Twelve.
What happens next is unexpected. The spokesman of the demons answered with the name, “Legion,” for there were many of them. Note that “Legion” is also a division of 5-6,000 troops in the Roman army.
Then, language fails Luke. He switches to multiples. He no longer speaks of “the spirit.” He speaks of “them” and “they.”
It gets more unexpected. The demons make three requests. Though they’ve tormented the nameless man for ages, they ask Jesus not to torment them. Then, they ask Jesus not to send them to the abyss, the place of eternal torture. Then, they ask Jesus to send them into the pigs.
Why didn’t the demons just leave, like in all the other exorcisms? Does this mean that when demons club together, they have a voice? Does this mean that normally, demons who’re cast out go to the abyss?
We’re not given any answers. All we’re told is that Jesus gave the demons what they wanted. He let them go into the pigs. They did. And the result was plain for all to see: the pigs rushed into the lake and drowned.
A reader familiar with the Old Testament story of the Exodus, of God saving the Israelites, will hear echoes of the Exodus in this story.
Just as the Red Sea parted to let the freed Jewish slaves pass onto dry land, the storm calmed to let Jesus and his disciples pass onto dry land. Just as the Jewish slaves were freed, the demon-enslaved man was freed. Just as Pharoah’s soldiers drowned, the pigs drowned.
Those are echoes. Do they carry meaning? It’s hard to be sure. We have a sense we may be missing something. That’s as far as we can go.
But one thing is clear. When people are freed of their bondage to demons, the economy may suffer. Pigs may die. Guards and soldiers may lose their jobs, even their lives. Those who’re freed may lose their incomes, for example the fortune-telling girl we hear of in Acts 16:16-24.
The saddest part of the story?
The people of the land turn Jesus away. They don’t consider the deaths of the pigs worth the freeing of the man. They tell Jesus to leave. He leaves.
But the man wants to go with Jesus. Wants to become one of Jesus’ disciples. Jesus says no. Then Jesus does something so different from what he’s told everyone else whom he’s freed or healed.
Jesus told everyone else not to tell anyone what he’d done for them; told them just to thank God in the prescribed ways. But he tells this man to go tell everyone what God had done for him.
Do you see? The first Jesus-appointed-witness to what God was doing in Jesus was sent to the Gentiles.
The man went. He spoke of what Jesus had done for him. For he knew. He knew Jesus was God. He understood.
But the people! The people spoke only of the dead pigs. If media had existed then, the media would’ve focused on the pigs. Perhaps us also?
Peace be with you.
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