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Catena Aurea by St. Thomas Aguinas

8:28–34

28. And when he was come to the other side into the country of the Gergesenes, there met him two possessed with devils, coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass by that way.

29. And, behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time?

30. And there was a good way off from them an herd of many swine feeding.

31. So the devils besought him, saying, If thou cast us out, suffer us to go away into the herd of swine.

32. And he said unto them, Go. And when they were come out, they went into the herd of swine: and, behold, the whole herd of swine ran violently down a steep place into the sea, and perished in the waters.

33. And they that kept them fled, and went their ways into the city, and told every thing, and what was befallen to the possessed of the devils.

34. And, behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus: and when they saw him, they besought him that he would depart out of their coasts.

CHRYSOSTOM. Because there were who thought Christ to be a man, therefore the dæmons came to proclaim His divinity, that they who had not seen the sea raging and again still, might hear the dæmons crying; And when he was come to the other side in the country of the Gergesenes, there met him two men having dæmons.

RABANUS. Gerasa is a town of Arabia beyond Jordan, close to Mount Gilead, which was in the possession of the tribe of Manasseh, not far from the lake of Tiberias, into which the swine were precipitated.

AUGUSTINE. (De Cons. Ev. ii. 24.) Whereas Matthew relates that there were two who were afflicted with dæmons, but Mark and Luke mention only one, you must understand that one of them was a person of note, for whom all that country was in grief, and about whose recovery there was much care, whence the fame of this miracle was the more noised abroad.

CHRYSOSTOM. Or; Luke and Mark chose to speak of one who was more grievously afflicted; whence also they add a further description of his calamity; Luke saying that he brake his bonds and was driven into the desert; Mark telling that he ofttimes cut himself with stones. But they neither of them say that there was only one, which would be to contradict Matthew. What is added respecting them that they came from among the tombs, alludes to a mischievous opinion, that the souls of the dead become dæmons. Thus many soothsayers use to kill children, that they may have their souls to cooperate with them; and dæmoniacs also often cry out, I am the spirit of such an one. But it is not the soul of the dead man that then cries out, the dæmon assumes his voice to deceive the hearers. For if the soul of a dead man has power to enter the body of another, much more might it enter its own. And it is more unreasonable to suppose that a soul that has suffered cruelty should cooperate with him that injured it, or that a man should have power to change an incorporeal being into a different kind of substance, such as a human soul into the substance of a dæmon. For even in material body, this is beyond human power; as, for example, no man can change the body of a man into that of an ass. And it is not reasonable to think that a disembodied spirit should wander to and fro on the earth. The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, (Wisd. 3:1.) therefore those of young children must be so, seeing they are not evil. And the souls of sinners are at once conveyed away from hence, as is clear from Lazarus, and the rich man. Because none dared to bring them to Christ because of their fierceness, therefore Christ goes to them. This their fierceness is intimated when it is added, Exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass that way. So they who hindered all others from passing that way, found one now standing in their way. For they were tortured in an unseen manner, suffering intolerable things from the mere presence of Christ. And, lo, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of David?

JEROME. This is no voluntary confession followed up by a reward to the utterer, but one extorted by the compulsion of necessity. A runaway slave, when after long time he first beholds his master, straight thinks only of deprecating the scourge; so the dæmons, seeing the Lord suddenly moving upon the earth, thought He was come to judge them. Some absurdly suppose, that these dæmons knew the Son of God, while the Devil knew Him not, because their wickedness was less than his. But all the knowledge of the disciple must be supposed in the Master.

AUGUSTINE. (De Civ. Dei, ix. 21.) God was so far known to them as it was His pleasure to be known; and He pleased to be known so far as it was needful. He was known to them therefore not as He is Life eternal, and the Light which enlightens the good, but by certain temporal effects of His excellence, and signs of His hidden presence, which are visible to angelic spirits though evil, rather than to the infirmity of human nature.

JEROME. But both the Devil and the dæmons may be said to have rather suspected, than known, Jesus to be the Son of God.

PSEUDO-AUGUSTINE. (Hil. Quæst. V. et N. T. 9, 66.) When the dæmons cry out, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? (1 Cor. 2:8.) we must suppose them to have spoken from suspicion rather than knowledge. For had they known him, they never would have suffered the Lord of glory to be crucified.

REMIGIUS. But as often as they were tortured by His excellent power, and saw Him working signs and miracles, they supposed Him to be the Son of God; when they saw Him hungry and thirsty, and suffering such things, they doubted, and thought Him mere man. It should be considered that even the unbelieving Jews when they said that Christ cast out dæmons in Beelzebub, and the Arians who said that He was a creature, deserve condemnation not only on God’s sentence, but on the confession of the dæmons, who declare Christ to be the Son of God. Rightly do they say, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? that is, our malice and Thy grace have nothing in common, according to that the Apostle speaks, There is no fellowship of light with darkness. (2 Cor. 6:14.)

CHRYSOSTOM. That this should not be thought to be flattery, they cry out what they were experiencing, Art thou come to torment us before the time?

AUGUSTINE. (De Civ. Dei, viii. 23.) Either because that came upon them unexpectedly, which they looked for indeed, but supposed more distant; or because they thought their perdition consisted in this, that when known they would be despised; or because this was before the day of judgment, when they should be punished with eternal damnation.

JEROME. For the presence of the Saviour is the torment of dæmons.

CHRYSOSTOM. They could not say they had not sinned, because Christ had found them doing evil, and marring the workmanship of God; whence they supposed that for their more abundant wickedness the time of the last punishment which shall be at the day of judgment should not be tarried for to punish them.

AUGUSTINE. (De. Cons. Ev. ii. 24.) Though the words of the dæmons are variously reported by the three Evangelists, yet this is no difficulty; for they either all convey the same sense, or may be supposed to have been all spoken. Nor again because in Matthew they speak in the plural, in the others in the singular number; because even the other two Evangelists relate that when asked his name, he answered, Legion, shewing that the dæmons were many. Now there was not far from thence a herd of many swine feeding; and the dæmons prayed him, saying, If thou cast us out hence, send us into the swine.

GREGORY. (Mor. ii. 10.) For the Devil knows that of himself he has no power to do any thing, because it is not of himself that he exists as a spirit.

REMIGIUS. They did not ask to be sent into men, because they saw Him by whose excellence they were tortured existing in human shape. Nor did they ask to be sent into sheep, because sheep are by God’s institution clean animals, and were then offered in the temple of God. But they requested to be sent into the swine rather than into any of the other unclean animals, because this is of all animals the most unclean; whence also it has its name ‘porcus,’ as being ‘spurcus,’ filthy, and delighting in filthiness; and dæmons also delight in the filthiness of sin. They did not pray that they might be sent into the air, because of their eager desire of hurting men. And he saith unto them, Go.

CHRYSOSTOM. Jesus did not say this, as though persuaded by the dæmons, but with many designs1 therein. One, that He might shew the mighty power to hurt of these dæmons, who were in possession of the two men; another, that all might see that they had no power against the swine unless by His sufferance; thirdly, to shew that they would have done more grievous hurt to the men, had they not even in their calamities been aided by Divine Providence, for they hate men more than irrational animals. By this it is manifest that there is no man who is not supported by Divine Providence; and if all are not equally supported by it, neither after one manner, this is the highest characteristic of Providence, that it is extended to each man according to his need. Besides the above-mentioned things, we learn also that He cares not only for the whole together, but for each one in particular; which one may see clearly in these dæmoniacs, who would have been long before choked in the deep, had not Divine care preserved them. He also permitted them to go into the herd of swine, that they that dwelt in those parts might know His power. For where He was known to none, there He makes His miracles to shine forth, that He may bring them to a confession of His divinity.

JEROME. The Saviour bade them go, not as yielding to their request, but that by the death of the swine, an occasion of man’s salvation might be offered. But they went out, (to wit, out of the men,) and went into the swine; and, lo, the whole herd rushed violently headlong into the sea, and perished in the waters. Let Manichæus blush; if the souls of men and of beasts be of one substance, and one origin, how should two thousand swine have perished for the sake of the salvation of two men?

CHRYSOSTOM. The dæmons destroyed the swine because they are ever striving to bring men into distress, and rejoice in destruction. The greatness of the loss also added to the fame of that which was done; for it was published by many persons; namely, by the men that were healed, by the owners of the swine, and by those that fed them; as it follows, But they that fed them fled, and went into the town, and told all, and concerning them that had the dæmons; and, behold, the whole town went out to meet Jesus. But when they should have adored Him, and wondered at His excellent power, they cast Him from them, as it follows, And when they saw him, they besought him that he would depart out of their coasts. Observe the clemency of Christ next to His excellent power; when those who had received favours from Him would drive Him away, He resisted not, but departed, and left those who thus pronounced themselves unworthy of His teaching, giving them as teachers those who had been delivered from the dæmons, and the feeders of the swine.

JEROME. Otherwise; This request may have proceeded from humility as well as pride; like Peter, they may have held themselves unworthy of the Lord’s presence, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. (Luke 5:8.)

RABANUS. Gerasa is interpreted ‘casting out the dweller,’ or, ‘a stranger approaching;’ this is the Gentile world which cast out the Devil from it; and which was first far off, but now made near, after the resurrection being visited by Christ through His preachers.

AMBROSE. (in Luc. 8. 30.) The two dæmoniacs are also a type of the Gentile world; for Noah having three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japhet, Shem’s posterity alone was taken into the inheritance of God, while from the other two sprang the nations of the Gentiles.

HILARY. Thus the dæmons held the two men among the tombs without the town, that is, without the synagogue of the Law and the Prophets; that is, they infested the original seats of the two nations, the abodes of the dead, making the way of this present life dangerous to the passers by.

RABANUS. It is not without cause that he speaks of them as dwelling among the tombs; for what else are the bodies of the faithless but sepulchres of the dead, in which the word of God dwells not, but there is enclosed the soul dead in sins. He says, So that no man might pass through that way, because before the coming of the Saviour the Gentile world was inaccessible. Or, by the two, understand both Jews and Gentiles, who did not abide in the house, that is, did not rest in their conscience. But they abode in tombs, that is, delighted themselves in dead works, and suffered no man to pass by the way of faith, which way the Jews obstructed.

HILARY. By their coming forth to meet Him is signified the willingness of men flocking to the faith. The dæmons seeing that there is no longer any place left for them among the Gentiles, pray that they may be suffered to dwell among the heretics; these, seized by them, are drowned in the sea, that is, in worldly desires, by the instigations of the dæmons, and perish in the unbelief of the rest of the Gentiles.

BEDE. (in Luc. 8.) Or; The swine are they that delight in filthy manners; for unless one live as a swine, the devils do not receive power over him; or at most, only to try him, not to destroy him. That the swine were sent headlong into the lake, signifies, that when the people of the Gentiles are delivered from the condemnation of the dæmons, yet still they who would not believe in Christ, perform their profane rites in secret, drowned in a blind and deep curiosity. That they that fed the swine, fled and told what was done, signifies that even the leaders of the wicked though they shun the law of Christianity, yet cease not to proclaim the wonderful power of Christ. When struck with terror, they entreat Him to depart from them, they signify a great number who, well satisfied with their ancient life, shew themselves willing to honour the Christian law, while they declare themselves unable to perform it.

HILARY. Or; The town is a type of the Jewish nation, which having heard of Christ’s works goes forth to meet its Lord, to forbid Him to approach their country and town; for they have not received the Gospel.

Catena Aurea Matthew 8