A Bad Day for Pigs
Luke 8:26-39
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Key Text: Luke 8:33
“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.”
People familiar with children’s literature have probably read Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, by Judith Viorst. Disney made a movie version in 2014: it returned such a nice profit that Alexander’s bad day became a very good day for the producers.
Have you ever had one of those days? A long, hard day filled with obstacles?
In the biblical text we look at today, Luke builds on Mark’s depiction of a long, hard day in the life of Jesus (Mark 5). There were obstacles along the way, but because Jesus was involved, what started as a bad day for many people turned into the best day of their lives. [DD]
The day is described in the form of two stories in two places, and the second story is a story within a story. A common thread runs through all three of the stories. Jesus met three people in hopeless situations, three persons who were absolutely helpless until they met Jesus. Our text for today deals with the first of these three hard cases. [DD]
A wild man (vv. 26-30)
The story begins on a sun-washed morning on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee, a mountainous area where the land slopes sharply into the water. The region was sometimes called “Decapolis” after ten Roman cities that had been built in the area.
The specific area Jesus visited is unclear (see “The Hardest Question” online for more), but fortunately our understanding of the story does not depend on it. Luke sets the account “in the country of the Gerasenes,” but the action takes place at the water’s edge.
“As he (Jesus) stepped out on land” – that is, as soon as Jesus got out of the boat – “a man of the city who had demons met him” (v. 27a). [DD]
Though some still hold to a belief in evil spirits as conscious entities that prey on humans, most modern folk would recognize the man in this story as having severe mental illness, so crippling that he refused to wear clothes and chose to live among tombs (often in caves) rather than in a house (v. 27b). [DD]
The ancients imagined that demons were drawn to cemeteries, and the narrator reports a belief that the man’s demons had given him superhuman strength, enabling him to break through chains used to restrain him (v. 29b). His madness was overwhelming.
While we may use different categories to describe mental health, we must read and appreciate the story from the perspective of the original audience, for whom demons explained all manner of human troubles.
The text uses both singular and plural forms, speaking both of “the unclean spirit” and “the demon” in v. 29, and as “demons” and “many demons” in vv. 27 and 30. This may suggest that the story has grown with the telling, but the number of his inner demons – whether we think of them as literal or metaphorical – is beside the point. The question is whether Jesus could do anything to help the man, whose inner turmoil had made him certifiably insane.
Commentators often note that the man was not only troubled, but almost certainly a Gentile. Jesus had come to a place that was “opposite Galilee” (v. 26), Luke’s way of reminding us that he had entered Gentile territory. The man was a citizen of that area, which was inhabited largely by Gentiles and replete with pigs, which were anathema to Jews. [DD]
Despite his troubled mind, there was a wisdom about the wild man that the other people missed. When he was in the presence of divinity, he knew it, and said so.
Jesus “had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man” (v. 29a), speaking not so much to the man as to the sickness within him. The wild man’s response, interpreted as the voice of his inner demons, was fearful: “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me” (v. 28).
Jesus demanded the man’s name, to which he replied “Legion,” Luke said, “for many demons had entered him” (v. 30). [DD]
A wild stampede (vv. 31-33)
The story has the demons recognize that they are subject to Jesus, but they plead with him “not to order them to go back into the abyss” (v. 31). While the root meaning of “abyss” describes a very deep hole or chasm, in Jewish thought it was a common name for an underground abode that was home to the devil and his evil minions.
The account takes a surprising turn – one troubling to many – when Jesus agreed to a negotiation with the evil spirits, who asked to be sent into a nearby heard of pigs rather than being consigned immediately to the abyss.
Once forced from the man and allowed to enter the pigs, the demons’ presence prompted a porcine parade that turned into a stampede as the pigs ran down a steep embankment and into the sea, where they were drowned (vv. 32-33).
A tenet of Hellenistic demonology held that demons could not survive in water, so Jesus’ diversion of the demons through the swine did not prevent their destruction.
But why would Jesus deal with demons at the cost of much valuable pork on the hoof?
From a Jewish perspective, pigs were unclean, so the destruction of a large herd would be of no real consequence. If anything, Jewish readers might applaud the notion of fewer pigs in the world.
Did Jesus allow it as a way of demonstrating his power, knowing that the sight of the panicked pigs would have impressed all observers and helped convince their former victim that he had been freed from their influence?
Local people may have been awed, but the swine stampede was a major economic blow that would certainly spark enmity rather than leading the locals to feel kindly toward Jesus.
Commentators sometimes cite this as an example of how Jesus can upset social and economic norms, but that wasn’t why Mark, Matthew, and Luke preserved the story.
They wanted readers to understand that Jesus’ power over evil extended beyond that of exorcising stray and pesky spirits: with a word he could send legions of demons to their doom.
What is more, he could do it on Gentile soil. God’s power was not limited to the Jewish homeland, and Jesus’ salvific mission extended beyond the Jews: he brought healing and hope to ham-eating Gentiles, too.
A world of difference (vv. 34-39)
The men tending the pigs were so taken aback that “they ran off and told it in the city and in the country” (v. 34), no doubt reporting the loss to the herd’s owners. Like crowds gathering to watch a house fire or to examine a whale carcass washed up on shore, people from the city came out to see what the excitement was about.
To their astonishment, they found the local wild man sitting calmly, wearing clothes without complaint, and apparently conversing clearly enough for all to judge that he was in his right mind. They had once feared the man because of his violent mental turmoil. In a surprising twist, seeing him healed frightened them even more (vv. 35-36).
The word Luke uses to express their fear is from the verb phobeō, from which we get the English word “phobia.” The wild man had once been plagued by fierce phobias, but now his healing – along with the mass suicide of swine – had left his former neighbors feeling phobic and fearful around him.
As the man had once been seized by his inner demons, his countrymen were now “seized with great fear,” so terrified of what Jesus might do next that they asked him to leave. Without argument, “he got into the boat and returned” to the other side of the lake (v. 37).
The story ends with something of a flashback, for though v. 37 says Jesus had already sailed away, vv. 38-39 record a conversation between him and the no-longer-wild man. Feeling a natural attachment for the one who had freed him, and perhaps fearful that his demons would return, the man begged to get in the boat and stay with Jesus.
One might expect that Jesus – who often bade others to follow him – would welcome him aboard. Instead, Jesus told the man to go back to his home “and declare how much God has done for you.” Disappointed but obedient, “he went away, proclaiming throughout the city how much Jesus had done for him.”
So it was that Jesus appointed an ex-madman to go and tell of God’s work among his fellow Gentiles, even before he sent the disciples out on preaching missions of their own.
Here, as elsewhere, the gospel story is marked by surprising turns of events and unexpected twists, with the result that Jesus’ power was magnified and more people were touched by the inbreaking kingdom of God.
And how might we be touched by this story?
Are we plagued by inner demons of our own, fears or habits or temptations we can’t seem to control? Do we believe the liberating Spirit of Christ is still active in the world and available to us?
It’s possible that we might believe in the power of Christ to bring change, but – like the Gerasenes – we’re afraid of that that change might mean. Some of us may prefer to hold on to the demons we know for fear that liberation might include the loss of our piggish possessiveness and solitary selfishness.
Jesus might even send us to declare how much God has done for us. Are we ready for that?
Adult Teaching Resources
Download the PDF of teaching resources for this lesson.
This PDF contains the Teaching Guide, Digging Deeper, and Hardest Question pages.
Read Scripture online: Luke 8:26-39
Youth Teaching Resources
Parent Prep
Students can be stopped in their tracks by the things that fear them. Fear is powerful and can be used to control what we do, when we do it, and even why we do it. But fear causes anxiety and not freedom. It is choosing not to do something instead of doing something. How do you help your students ease their fears? How do you help your students overcome their fears? Being present can go a long way in these situations. Knowing that they aren’t alone can allow someone to work through their fears.
Additional Links/Resources
Read Scripture online: Luke 8:26-39
Download the PDF for youth teaching resources using the button below. This PDF contains the Teaching Guide for this lesson:
Video
Encourage youth to check out this video ahead of the lesson.
“Bruce Wayne Embraces his Worst Fear” from Batman Begins
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