Jesus heals the Gerasene Demoniac

Jenny Tymms
22 June 2004

We no longer understand mental illness or psychological disturbance as the possession of someone by demons. Science and medicine has taught us a lot about illness and its connection with the body. It has given us a range of new treatments that by altering body chemistry alleviate psychological symptoms. Science and medicine has taught us that a lot of our superstitions and fears about psychological illness have led us to mistreat sufferers.

But I think it is true that modem medicine also fails us. Modem medicine has difficulty looking beyond the physiological — beyond the body. It tends to become mechanistic in its approach — you complain of a sense of unwellness — dis-ease? — then here is something chemical for your body that will make you well. Modem medicine and even a lot of alternative medicine will often try to explain everything that is wrong with us as something that has gone wrong in our bodies. The spiritual dimension is missing. I would not encourage anyone to go back to the literal view that people are invaded and possessed by demons = but there are significant insights for us in the biblical stories. The biblical stories of demon possession help us to understand what it feels like when things are not OK. The stories shed light on the way we tend to deal with those who are suffering because things are not OK. And the stories also reveal an extraordinary truth. When things have gone badly wrong in our lives and we feel we are coming apart we cannot always make things better on our own. We cannot heal ourselves simply by our own desire to or by the action of our own wills. We need help from beyond ourselves.

Let us turn to the story of the healing by Jesus of the Gerasene Demonic. The man no longer wore clothes. He went around naked. What kind of experience does this language convey to us? It speaks of a person who is stripped, laid bare to the world, utterly vulnerable and unprotected. Someone who has lost all sense of self-worth or ability to take care of themselves — to value themselves. I have spoken to adults who have suffered childhood sexual abuse or physical violence and they speak of their acute sense of vulnerability in language like this — as if their selves have been stripped and they are exposed to all the elements. They speak of shame and guilt that they are afraid all the world can see. Some women have spoken of the difficulty they have had as adults in maintaining appropriate boundaries between themselves and others. It’s as if having been abused when they were young they become available for further abuse by anyone else who comes along. They don’t know how to protect themselves.

The Gerasene man no longer lived in a house with other people, relating in a rewarding way with other members of his family. He lived among the dead in the local cemetery — as if he too was dead and decaying. He is described as being tormented by a whole host of unclean spirits that were strong enough to break the chains that people bound him with and which drove him into the wilds.

When things have gone badly wrong in someone’s life they will often describe the experience as something that has happened to them. Something has invaded them from outside- something over which they have no control. And this thing is destroying them -pulling them in all different directions, fragmenting their sense of self, undermining their ability to function normally. The person has trouble maintaining ordinary human relationships. This thing drives the person to behave in destructive ways. I have heard this kind of language from victims of violence. And from children whose parents have broken up. I have heard this kind of language particularly from people who have become addicted — addicted to alcohol, addicted to drugs, addicted to gambling, addicted to shopping, addicted to sex, to work, or trapped in compulsive eating disorders like anorexia or bulimia. The experience of addiction is often described as like being controlled by invading demons that destroys family relationships by all kinds of destructive behaviours. The person trapped in an addiction starts to lie, and steal, to cheat, to pretend, to have fits of rage when confronted by members of their family, to become violent, to turn their backs on their responsibilities, to reject the people around them who they love — sometimes to neglect their appearance and to live as one of the living dead &mdash as if they are already in the cemetery. It’s no accident when we see what happens to someone who becomes an alcoholic that we refer to that demon drink or to liquor as “spirits” or to someone “driving under the influence”.

If we think about it, we live in a society that has many many people who understand from the inside what it feels like to be possessed by demons. For there are many of us who have suffered from childhood abuse, or have been victims of physical or psychological violence as adults, or have been raped or been victims of other kinds of violent crime, or have suffered from addictions. If we haven’t — chances are we know someone who has and who is still struggling with it. The story of the man possessed by demons is not such an old and irrelevant story as we might think.

The trouble is our attitudes towards people who suffer in this way have probably not changed all that much either. In the biblical story what do the people of the city who know the man possessed by demons, do for him? They either keep away from him or they manage him. They find means to try to control him. But they have got used to him. There are no real attempts to heal him. We are told that he was kept under guard and that he was bound with chains and shackles — though it seems that he had to be shackled up again and again because he kept breaking free.

How do we keep sufferers in shackles — how to we try to control them — keep them bound?

Well, one thing we do — especially with victims of violence and abuse. And it usually because we are maid. We keep them quiet. We don’t want to hear their stories. We don’t want to be upset by hearing the horrible things they might tell us. We are afraid that our own world will be turned upside down by finding out that a member of our own family or a close family friend is an abuser. Or that domestic violence is happening behind the closed doors of a family living near by. As a church we don’t want to know that one of our ministers might be betraying their calling. So we let the sufferer know by our body language and our attitudes that there are certain things that are out of bounds — that must not be talked about. We avoid them and we silence them — and in silencing them, we shackle them. Or we refuse to believe the story of hurt and pain that we are told. It is one way we reduce our own level of shock. We tell them they are making it up, or that what happened was their own fault — or that what happened was a long time ago and should be forgotten — “you have to get on with your life, dear, and not dwell in the past” or, “you must not raise it now because it will hurt other people”, or, “this is not the time and the place”. And the person is shackled again. Or we shackle the addict by pretending that everything is perfectly normal, we pretend that they are still at home — when we can see that they are really living in the cemetery. We pretend that behaviour that is destructive is really ok, so we don’t have to confront the problem.

And then Jesus enters the story. People suffering from addictions and from traumatic events in their lives (and often the two go together) will often say that they were powerless to heal themselves. The healing had to come from outside. Medical measures are never enough in themselves. Alcoholics Anonymous recognises this even though it is not a religious organisation. In the twelve steps which are the central principles governing recovery from alcoholism, one of the steps requires the alcoholic to acknowledge that they have no control over their addiction. Another step requires the alcoholic to have faith in a higher power beyond themselves. To have faith in God who can heal that which is out of control.

Jesus arrived at the country of the Gerasenes and as he stepped out onto land, the man possessed by demons met him. And Jesus talked with him. When you think about it, this in itself is an unusual and courageous thing to do. Jesus has just stepped out onto the beach into pagan territory and he is met by a wild looking man, dirty, dishevelled, naked with broken chains hanging from his wrists and dragging from his ankles — and Jesus meets with him and talks with him. I think I know how I would have responded. I think I would have been back in that boat and rowing for all I was worth. But Jesus stood his ground, an act of great courage. The two met, the demon was named and the demon was banished.

It is difficult to know what passed between Jesus and the demoniac when they met on the beach. What non-verbal communication took place between the two? Peter Horsfield has written this (in an article titled, “The Gerasene Demoniac and the Sexually Violated”):

Was the one with the demon struck by the fact that here was someone who didn’t run away, who could face him as he was? Was there the perception that here was someone whose integration was stronger than his disintegration? Was there a sense of spiritual presence in Jesus that commanded authority? Whatever it was it was apparently communicated in such a way, with such compassion and confidence, that the one with the demons was restored to wholeness — the deep divisions, conflicts and wildness were removed.

After he was healed the man wanted to come with him. But Jesus told the man to return to his home and to tell others how much God had done for him.

How do we embody the healing presence of God in the lives of people tormented by demons?

Perhaps it is by finding the courage and the caring to stand with the sufferer and to listen to the horrible story we might be told. Perhaps it is by finding the courage to face the challenge the story poses to our perceptions of particular people or of our organisations and social institutions. Perhaps it is by naming the personal and social demons for what they really are rather than chaining the sufferer or running away.

One would have thought that the people who came out of the town to see what had happened would have been delighted to find the man once possessed by demons sitting peacefully at the feet of Jesus clothed and with a new sense of self. But they weren’t. They were afraid and asked Jesus to leave.

It is easier to live with evil, with the destructive results of trauma on other people, with disintegrating relationships — it is easier to accommodate and manage demons than to face the changes that go with real healing. I believe our society accepts that there will be human sacrifices in the maintenance of social order. I believe our society thinks it is worth it that there are groups of people who suffer so that the rest of the community can hum along as usual with the minimum of disruption. It’s just too bad if you are one of the ones to get caught up in the suffering, more hidden side of our society. Deal with your problems yourself by all means but don’t expect the very structures of our society to change so that such suffering might be prevented. For example, it’s worth it, it seems, in economic terms to have a proportion of the population permanently out of work. Too bad about the pain in all kinds of different ways for so many families. For the good of the whole it is better that those who are grappling with demons — grapple with them on their own in the cemetery — not somewhere and in not such a way that it will disrupt the rest of us.

Someone should have told Jesus that!

Do you want to make a comment? Have a conversation about this issues raised here? Go to the message board.

Back to Home Page
Back to Sermons