An Atheistic Bible Study Of The Gospels Jesus Kills A Herd Of Pigs

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One of the most controversial act of Jesus, and one many Christians are nervous even to talk about. It rarely gets mentioned in church sermons or readings though covered in three of the four Gospels. Matthew 8:28-33 Jesus visits Gergesa, the region of the Gergesenes, which is only mentioned in these Biblical chapters, and nowhere else in the scriptures. Jesus is approached by two men who are possessed by demons. They block the path and accuse Jesus of coming to torment them, as if he is some kind of torturer or cruel judge and in effect admitting that they are powerless if it comes to a confrontation with him. The demons request that if Jesus casts them out of their human hosts, he forces them into the bodies of a herd of swine (pigs) feeding nearby. Jesus obliges and the demons enter the herd which immediately throws itself over the cliffs to drown in the sea below. The pig-farmers run to the town to spread the news of the miracle. The Gergesenes are believed to be more Gentile that Jewish. That is why they would breed pigs, while Mosaic Law would forbid pork consumption. This may explain why Jesus was then indifferent to destroying the farming communities herd instead of disposing of the demons in some other fashion. After all, he has cast out demons without having to give them new host bodies before. The killing of the innocent animals seems unfounded. He could well be ruining the local economy through his actions. Mark 5:1-21 There are a few significant contradicting differences in Mark’s account. 1/. Jesus is not travelling alone in the land of the Gadarenes (as they are now spelt). He is with an unspecified number of followers, and he has only just stepped off a boat after crossing the Sea Of Galilee. 2/. There is only one man possessed by demons, not two. (there could often be multiple demons possessing a single person in Scripture). This man has been running round desecrating local burial tombs and the Gadarenes have tried to catch him and get him chained up, without success. He creates a lot of noise in the night, hides in the mountains, and self-harms with sharp-rocks. The community seem to want to catch him for his own safety more than anything else. The man sees Jesus and immediately starts praying to him for forgiveness and begs Jesus not to harm him. Jesus asks the demons to leave the man. They do not immediately do so as they did in Matthew’s account. Jesus asks the man his name. The demons reply instead with the line, “My Name Is Legion,” adding, “We are many.” The demons beg Jesus not to cat them out of the country. They then see the pigs grazing nearby and ask to be put into the herd. Mark tells us there were 2,000 pigs. Jesus permits the demons to leave the man and enter the pigs, which as with Matthew’s description, make like lemmings, and commit mass suicide. As in the previous account, the swine-herders are frightened by the destruction of their livestock, though they see the man once possessed is now rational and cured of his madness. Mark takes the tory further with the Gadarenes telling Jesus to get out of their lands (presumably while they still have some farm animal left to ell and eat). Jesus reluctantly agrees to go, and the man he has healed begs to go with him, but Jesus refuses to let him, and insists that the man stays behind to help convert the people there and recognise Jesus as Lord as he has done. The man does so, with some success in the town of Decapolis. Jesus recrosses the Sea Of Galilee and finds more loyal followers on the opposite shore. Luke 8 26:40 As Mark’s account, rather than Matthew’s. The single man (who we are told is a city dweller) possessed is described as naked and living in the graveyard, rather than raiding it from a base in the mountains. In Luke, the man has already been caught by his pursuers, and bound in chains and hackles which he has broken with upper-human effort before escaping to the graveyard on the edge of the Wilderness. After allowing the mass suicide of the communities food supply, Jesus gets the now sane man to put clothes on. As with the description in Mark’s Gospel, Jesus is banished from the region but leaves the former demon-host there as an evangelist-missionary. In all the accounts, the demons request transfer to the pigs. Why does Jesus play along with their requests? Why do demons that could live in one human man, need a herd of 2,000 pigs to take over? Why not just sacrifice one pig, or even put the demons in a tree or just kill them? The loss of an entire herd could starve a country, so what Jesus has done seems inexcusably bizarre. It is no wonder the people of Gedesa banish him, and few priests, vicars or rabbis quote this episode in their regular church services. Arthur Chappell