How many demoniacs lived among the tombs?
Posted on May.19, 2009. Filed in Luke, Mark, Matthew. Average rating: 7.5 / 10 (Rate It).
The incident where Jesus cast a number of demons into a herd of pigs is recorded in all three of the synoptic gospels. In each account, the demons recognise Jesus and beg him to send them into the pigs rather than do anything worse. The demon-possessed pigs then rush down a steep bank into a lake in which they drown. One detail on which the accounts differ, though, concerns how many men the demons had possessed.
In Mark, the demons possess just one man:
They came to the other side of the lake, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when he had stepped out of the boat, immediately a man out of the tombs with an unclean spirit met him. He lived among the tombs; and no one could restrain him any more, even with a chain; for he had often been restrained with shackles and chains, but the chains he wrenched apart, and the shackles he broke in pieces; and no one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains he was always howling and bruising himself with stones. When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed before him; and he shouted at the top of his voice, ‘What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.’ For he had said to him, ‘Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!’ Then Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’ He replied, ‘My name is Legion; for we are many.’ He begged him earnestly not to send them out of the country. Now there on the hillside a great herd of swine was feeding; and the unclean spirits begged him, ‘Send us into the swine; let us enter them.’ So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the lake, and were drowned in the lake. [Mark 5:1-13]
Luke too puts the demons in just one man:
Then they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, ‘What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me’–for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) Jesus then asked him, ‘What is your name?’ He said, ‘Legion’; for many demons had entered him. They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss. Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned. [Luke 8:26-33]
In Matthew, though, the demons possess two men:
When he came to the other side, to the country of the Gadarenes, two demoniacs coming out of the tombs met him. They were so fierce that no one could pass that way. Suddenly they shouted, ‘What have you to do with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?’ Now a large herd of swine was feeding at some distance from them. The demons begged him, ‘If you cast us out, send us into the herd of swine?’ And he said to them, ‘Go!’ So they came out and entered the swine; and suddenly, the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and perished in the water. [Matthew 8:24-32]
The details in the accounts are similar enough to make it clear that the same incident is being described. So did Jesus cast Legion out of one man or two?
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May 19th, 2009 on 2:11 pm
You have to say that Mark and Luke don’t actually rule out the presence of a 2nd demoniac. Still, the obvious reading of them is that there was just one man. Perhaps, if you believe the author of Matthew is Matthew, you can say he had a better knowledge of what actually happened.
May 19th, 2009 on 4:00 pm
I can understand why Matthew, having a pericope involving two demoniacs, might remove one to simplify the narrative. I find it harder to understand why, having a pericope involving one demoniac, he would add a second (yet he does this not just with demoniacs but also with blind men). Any suggestions?
May 19th, 2009 on 5:42 pm
Are you asking for a non-inerrantist explanation? My suggestion would be that curing two men looks more impressive than curing one…
May 19th, 2009 on 7:12 pm
I am hereby moving my high rating regarding the region in which the demoniac(s) lived to this case. The region problem seems less difficult.
This problem seems more difficult. As I’ve said elsewhere, I tend to follow early church historians and adopt Matthean priority. Which might then mean that Mark (and then Luke) removed a demoniac to simplify the narrative.
So that may be an explanation of the elision.
But it does not strike me as a distinctively inerrantist explanation. Somehow this elision seems much more serious than leaving out an unridden mother donkey or the intermediaries in the interchange with the centurion. Strictly speaking, I suppose that if there were two demoniacs, then there was one as well. But that chafes at me.
The idea that Matthew added a second demoniac to make the story more impressive seems very unlikely to me. For starters, it doesn’t seem that simply increasing the demoniac count renders the story more impressive. Apart from that, even if two are more impressive than one, why not three, or seven?
May 19th, 2009 on 9:01 pm
Indeed, I’ve no good explanation. But he does indeed make a similar addition with the blind man/men at Jericho as well (or if you prefer, Mark and Luke make a similar simplification).
May 19th, 2009 on 9:02 pm
“Apart from that, even if two are more impressive than one, why not three, or seven?”
On that point at least there’s a simple reply: the more you add the less plausible it becomes. There’s not that many demoniacs roaming around. :)
May 19th, 2009 on 9:20 pm
Willoughby Allen gives two possible explanations in (1907) A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to S. Matthew:
1. The author of Matthew, summarising Mark, was perhaps relying on memory and did not bother to unroll the gospel all the way to Mark 5.
2. The author of Matthew had already omitted one story of a demoniac (I imagine this means Mark 1:23ff) and so adds a second one here to compensate. A similar explanation applies to the two blind men at Jericho (since the author of Matthew omits Mark 8:22-26).
May 19th, 2009 on 9:35 pm
On remark #5
Unlike demoniacs-living-in-tombs-whose-demons-are-cast-into-swine-who-run-headlong-into-the-sea, blind men were more prevalent. I’m more willing to suppose that there are multiple healings of blind men in the Gospels. There may even be multiple healings of blind men on the road to or on the road from Jericho. So I view this as a more serious problem than the blind men near Jericho.
May 19th, 2009 on 9:59 pm
It’s interesting here, that Matthean priority seems to provide a lot more plausible explanations of Matthew’s famous ‘double-vision’ that Markan priority does.
The idea that Matthew would add a second demoniac or a second blind man to make up for one he’d left one out seems like quite a stretch. It’s not like readers would be keeping a demoniac score card or something. At least Allen doesn’t argue that Matthew added a second donkey to make up for the donkey he’d left out ;-).
And arguing from an assumption of Markan priority that, in essence, (the author of) Matthew didn’t consult Mark seems somehow self-stultifying.
On the other hand, if Matthew is first, it makes some sense (though doesn’t make me particularly happy as an inerrantist) to say that Luke and Mark just left out the extra demoniac and extra blind man for narrative purposes.
May 19th, 2009 on 10:20 pm
“arguing from an assumption of Markan priority that, in essence, (the author of) Matthew didn’t consult Mark seems somehow self-stultifying”
Well. The suggestion that Matthew had read Mark – but didn’t actually have the text before him at that particular moment – seems within reason.
May 19th, 2009 on 10:33 pm
Assuming Markan priority, I think it’s most reasonable to suppose that Matthew did everything he could to have Mark in front of him when he wrote. But, before the days of the printing press, it goes without saying that everything Matthew could do in that area might not have been enough. So the point you make in #10 is a fair one.
Still, the explanation you get from Matthean priority seems much more natural in this case.
May 20th, 2009 on 11:07 am
“1. The author of Matthew, summarising Mark, was perhaps relying on memory and did not bother to unroll the gospel all the way to Mark 5.” (Willoughby Allen, #7)
Matthew’s account is very similar to Mark’s in its language, suggesting close dependence. It isn’t another account of the incident, it’s the same account with an extra demoniac.
Interestingly, Matthew’s account is much shorter than Mark’s and Luke’s. Compared to Mark’s, Matthew heavily cuts the description of the demoniac (which contains lots of singular pronouns), heavily cuts the conversation between Jesus and the man (which contains lots of singular pronouns), includes the conversation with the demons and the demise of the swine in full (no singular references to the man there), heavily cuts the reaction of the locals (lots more singular references to the demoniac), and omits completely the response of the man (lots more problematic singular references).
If Matthew had started with Mark’s account but wanted to add a second demoniac, cutting as many of the singular references to the original demoniac as possible while leaving everything else untouched would have been an easy way to do it, and would have resulted in exactly what we read in Matthew.
If Matthew had been working from memory, but only half-remembered Mark, it would be surprising for him to remember the sections that work with a second demoniac so well, and the sections that don’t so poorly.
This looks to me like deliberate editing with full access to the text, rather than accidental divergence due to limited access to the text, particularly given that this isn’t the only case where Matthew adds an extra character.
May 20th, 2009 on 6:58 pm
#12 “This [Matthew] looks to me like deliberate editing with full access to the text [Mark].”
If you are right, and you are assuming Markan priority, then you’ve ruled out your most promising explanation of why Matthew would add a second demoniac. The remaining explanations are that Matthew added the second demoniac…:
1)…because exorcising two demoniacs is more impressive than exorcising one.
2)…to make up for not telling about the exorcism of an earlier demoniac.
Neither of these reasons for adding the second demoniac are very good. I’m not sure which is worse.
For starters, the second demoniac doesn’t really demonstrate any additional power in Christ. But there is more to say. Maybe it’s just me, but I find Mark’s account far more impressive because it so vividly describes the terrible bondage in which the Legion held their victim(s) and from which Christ freed him. Matthew says next to nothing about that. Apart from making the demoniac(s) live in the tombs, you might think that demon-possession was not a big deal.
I don’t know where to start with alternative #2. According to that alternative, Matthew is trying to remedy the fact that he overlooked an earlier demoniac. Clearly, there is another, better, remedy for that oversight: don’t overlook the other demoniac…tell his story also.
On the other hand, if Matthew is first, then there were two demoniacs, and Luke and Mark edited out one of them. This doesn’t seem as hard to explain. In fact, we may even have an explanation in Mark 5:18 where the demoniac begs to follow Jesus. Perhaps the second demoniac is not mentioned by Mark because that demoniac did not try to follow Jesus.
I’m still not convinced that this account (assuming Matthean priority) harmonizes the passages. But I’m warming up to it.
December 13th, 2009 on 11:19 am
I can’t accept the “If there were two then there was one” argument – it clearly goes against the natural reading.
I also reject the idea that both Mark and Luke simplified the narrative by removing one demoniac, since both passages are much longer than Matthew’s account. Neither the detailed description of the demoniac, nor the conversation with Jesus make sense if there are two demoniacs.
The evidence for Matthean embellishment is strong – the blind men at Jericho seems too much of a coincidence.
That said, I can’t think of a reason why Matthew would embellish these accounts – I am guessing there is some prophetic reference in the OT that is a little obscure … ?