Today, 25 October 2015, the Orthodox Christians are in the 23rd Sunday after Pentecost. The Church scheduled for the Divine Liturgy the text from the Holy Gospel according to Saint Luke 8:26-39, on the Healing of the Gerasene demoniac.
”Then they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. And as he stepped out on land, there met him a man from the city who had demons; for a long time he had worn no clothes, and he lived not in a house but among the tombs.When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell down before him, and said with a loud voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beseech you, do not torment me!”(For Jesus was commanding the unclean spirit to come out of the man). The unclean spirit had often seized the man and he was kept under guard, and bound with chains and fetters, but he broke the bonds and was driven by the demon into the desert.Jesus then asked him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Legion”, for many demons had entered him.And they begged him not to command them to depart into the abyss.Now a large herd of swine was feeding there on the hillside; and they begged him to let them enter these. So he gave them leave.Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned.When the herdsmen saw what had happened, they fled, and told it in the city and in the countryside.Then people went out to see what had happened, and they came to Jesus, and found the man from whom the demons had gone, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. And those who had seen it told them how he who had been possessed with demons was healed.Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenesasked him to depart from them; for they were seized with great fear; so he got into the boat and returned.The man from whom the demons had gone begged that he might be with him; but he sent him away, saying:“Return to your home, and proclaim how much God has done for you”. And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city what great things Jesus had done for him”.
His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church, delivered the sermon in the chapel dedicated to Saint Gregory the Enlightener, in which he explained the teaching of this Gospel text.
The demoniac no longer thinks with his own powers of the soul
The Patriarch of Romania explained that the Gospel text of the 23rd Sunday shows us the divine power of Jesus Christ, our Saviour, as power healing of the demon-possessed people.
“The presentation of the deplorable state of the Gerasene demoniac is very distressing. The Gospel tells us that he did not wear clothes, and did not live in a house but in tombs. He did no longer live with the humans, but was naked and alienated. Although alive, he behaved as a dead man living in the tombs. The demoniac no longer think with his own powers of the soul, because he is possessed; namely his mind and soul do not serve him anymore, but are used by the demons who torture him”, His Beatitude said.
The demons acknowledge the divinity of Jesus
“It is in this deplorable state that Jesus Christ, our Saviour, found this man tortured by demons. The Gospel does not say that somebody else would have intervened to Jesus to heal this man. The impure spirit that possessed him shouted in fear at Jesus: “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beseech you, do not torment me!” (Luke 8:28). In the Gospel according to Matthew, demons have a question to Jesus: „Have you come here to torment us before the time?” (Matthew 8:29). Thus, we see that it was not the man that was talking with the human voice, but the demons that were torturing him.
The demons were acknowledging that Jesus is the Son of the Most High God and knew that Jesus would judge and punish them at the last judgement. For them, the Judge of the living and the dead had come too early. Thus, Jesus healed the demoniac not because he had asked Him to, but because Jesus had pity on him”, His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel underlined.
Christ the Lord shows His mercy to the demoniac restoring his good health and freedom
The Primate of the Romanian Orthodox Church has also explained the fact that the life of the demoniac was an ordeal and that he was dead from a spiritual and social point of view.
“The attempt of the community of the Gerasene city to keep this man among humans failed. On the contrary, having been tortured by demons, he wanted loneliness, not community, alienation, not people around. His life was an ordeal, because although he was alive he was living among the dead, namely in tombs. He was dead from a spiritual and social point of view. But it is just this man tortured by demons and alienated from humans that becomes the focus of the merciful attention of Jesus Christ, our Saviour. Having seen that Jesus went to the man they were torturing, the demons asked Him to let them go into a herd of pigs, not send them to the depth, which is the deepness of hell. The Saviour agreed to let the demons go into the herd of pigs, after getting out of the man they were torturing. But when the demons got into the herd of pigs, they jumped into the sea and drowned.
Many people could wonder why Jesus Christ, the Saviour, allowed the demons to come out of the possessed man and enter the herd of pigs. Why did He release the man and let a herd of pigs die? That is because Jesus Christ, our Saviour, knows that the human soul has infinite value that cannot be compared to anything in this world, neither to the price of animals nor to that of the things, no matter how many or expensive they may be. How do we know that? It is from the teaching of the Saviour who says: “What does it profit if someone, to gain the whole world, loses his life? For what will someone give in exchange for his life?” (Mark 8:36-37).
Salvation and eternal joy – the purpose of the human life
“For Jesus Christ, our Saviour, this man has a value infinite greater than all the Gerasenes’ (or Gadarenes’) riches (because the miracle occurred in the space between the cities of Gerasa and Gadara). Why that? First of all because the human being is created in the image of the Eternal Living God and so, he is called to eternal life. Therefore, the human desire of communion and eternal joy is embedded in his soul just like a programme for his definitive or eternal future. Secondly, it appears that these inhabitants of the Gerasenes land were too much concerned with the commerce with pigs, were too much connected with the material profit and too little with the spiritual life. Sometimes God allows some material damage to make us yearn for the soul’s profit of the spiritual life. We do not know why our animals happen to die, why a storm comes which destroys our houses, or floods which make us lose in one moment a wealth that we earned all our lifetime. Yet, when using this pedagogy or care, God does not feel any pleasure in punishing us, but uses some harsh means to call us to Him, to the spiritual life, to salvation”, His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel explained.
Next Sunday, the Orthodox Church will be on the 22nd Sunday after Pentecost.
