It was exactly due to his righteousness and his love for God that he killed two thousand pigs. So much for sola scriptura. Very interesting. So whats the point because Pastor John Piper feels the pigs were less important and John LOL MacArthur just jokes about the slaughter neither reaction seems sensible. The gospels. It's almost like the demons are inexorably drawn to Jesus. In other words, they believe the one who killed the pigs with the demons is equal to the Father. Jesus was teaching the way to live life so demons would not have a place in us to possess. A great deal of the Law applies only to priests (Leviticus 6:3) and to Levites (Numbers 7:9), so how could Jesus, of the tribe of Judah, keep one of those commandments? Over the centuries, many scribes spent an enormous amount of time, energy and resources copying them, thereby lending credibility to them. viii. The Gospels tell us that Jesus did most of His work among the Jewish people. This means that these miracles are especially meant to teach believers something. This is the only sensible interpretation which remains consistent with all Scripture. The apostle had been busy preaching in Demetriuss hometown of Ephesus and Pauls message about the one true God was catching on. And was the Master doing the right thing sacrificing someone elses pigs. .hide-if-no-js {
Sinai. The Man Jesus Renamed | Reformed Theological Seminary In the story of the Gerasene demoniac, Jesus invades enemy territory and defeats a powerful army to deliver people from bondage. Can we really point the finger at him? This city was better known than Gadara or Gergesa; indeed in the Roman age no city of Palestine was Ha, ha.. yeah lemme ummm.. tell ya about those pigs.., 2 ) Like any rational redneck, they smelled their Gentile neighbors having a pork BBQ and said DAAAANG, Hoss! Top Ten Reasons Why There Were Pigs In Gerasenes In a similar way, we see that Scripture is the same; it doesnt change. He couldnt introduce a new religion. Lord God, even as we sing this hymn, cause those who do not know Him to love Him and cause those who love Him to love Him more than anything else in this world. Next, what if our imaginary Jew damaged a ton of Gentile property under their very noses. Its all a matter of being logical. The majority admits they are clueless and throw their hands up, stating the herd was just a , The pastors attempts to laugh off the haunting question about the meek and lowly Son of Man killing all the pigs is, Besides the jokes being in poor taste, they make his sermon seem less than professional. Late Latin Gerasenus, Gergesenus, from Greek Gerasnos, Gergesnos, from Gerasa, Gergesa ancient town in Palestine. Marks Jesus is a warrior who conquers Gods enemies. And so they begin crying out, Don't cast us into the abyss.. Well Ill explain that too, later on. In Luke 4 and 5, great multitudes are following Jesus Christ when He does His miracles. And low and behold, two gospels specify that Jesus didnt go into Tyre (part of modern Lebanon), but that he was only in the vicinity of the city (Matthew 15:21; Mark 7:24 and Mark 7:31). Worse yet, dont trust one who says Scripture evolves. Inhabitants of Gadara, known from an alleged miracle of Jesus (Matt. Amen, and thus ends this reading of God's holy, inspired, and inerrant Word. Lots of non-Jews lived there. Read it for yourself. Every place the Master went on his travels it was to minister to a Jew, just as Paul said, To the Jew first (Romans 1:16 and Romans 2:9-10; ever notice that the New Testament never mentions Christians, just Jews and Gentiles?! What about sheep? Gods altar was also separate and distinct and holy. IV. The site is identified today with the town of Kersa, or Gersa, just below Wadi es-Samak. In the three Synoptic Gospels and John 2:15, Jesus forces all the sellers out of the Temple courts. The majority admits they are clueless and throw their hands up, stating the herd was just a casualty of war. Another who admits he has no idea why the gentle Jesus jettisoned all those unclean demons unto the swine is John MacArthur. The hard-hearted views of the Bishop of Hippo are not biblical because righteous people are obliged by God to be considerate to all animals, even wild animals, as discussed below. Archeologists identify it with the modern Jarash. We gotta git us some!, 1 ) [your turn. Matt 8:28). Gergasa (modern name Kersa) was a small village nearby, and Gadara was the larger region of which the village was a part, with Gerasa as the regional capital. They tried to kill us. We Clearly, Luke is telling you this because he wants you to show the amazing power of Jesus Christ, even over demons. If the interpretation from, If a bunch of little children want a ball to play with and I toss them a grenade, am I off the hook if a kid pulls out the pin? "It became one of the proudest cities of Syria." This, Also, this study shows that Jesuss actions in Mark 5 were on the surface contrary to the deep-rooted Jewish respect for domestic and/or wild animals. it depends on the text you read, but one of the four Greek words is sometimes neuter, sometimes masculine a big deal in this language and in this verse. Instead, his conscious act of casting the demons into the swine resulted in the entire herds destruction. WebApparently Gerasa was rebuilt by the Romans before the revolt began, prob. were the gerasenes gentiles All we know now is that the demoniac could have been either: Jew or Gentile. At this distance from the Sea of Galilee, Gerasa could not have been the site of the healing of Legion. It is doubtful that Jesus ever visited it. Instead they joke around and give pat answers. And it is reveals a great deal comparing the reactions of the Gentiles in the two towns. Scripture makes it clear that Ashers tribal land-boundary ended around the coastal city of Tyre (Joshua 19:29). Now what happens in this passage? For one, Leviticus 22:28 forbids righteous farmers from killing a cow and its calf on the same day. Living in rural Central Africa villages for ten years, I heard many stories from locals about demon spirits living in streams and trees and boulders. Many of you have seen, maybe fewer of you have read, a book by the famous British philosopher and skeptic, Bertrand Russell. Lets dwell on that he added no new commands to his disciples. A discussion occurred between Professor Huxley and Mr. Gladstone in "The Nineteenth Century" for 1892 as to the morality of the act, the critical questions being whether (1) Gerasenes were Jews; and (2) if so, was it lawful for them to keep swine?
OS Supported: Windows 98SE, Windows Millenium, Windows XP (any edition), Windows Vista, Windows 7 & Windows 8 (32 & 64 Bit). Webwere the gerasenes gentiles. Israel was to be a nation of priests, prophets, and missionaries to the world (Exodus 19:46). But this view is shocking because it places Gods Son on an equal footing with the unclean spirits and thus flies in the face of the normal presentation of Jesus in the Gospels. California - Do Not Sell My Personal Information. They do not bother mentioning Scriptures emphasis on being holy before God. The most likely answer is to the country of the Gerasenes: i.e., Gerasa, a Greek town thought to be the same as the similarly-named Kersa on the east shore of Lake Tiberias. The vision had nothing to do with shrimp rings or BLTS. Yet being part of the Godhead means Messiah cannot not flip-flop his opinions. Here, then, Jesus faced two of Gods enemies: hostile spiritual powers and death itself. He specifically banned pig in Leviticus 11:6 but to make sure we heard God repeats the command (Deuteronomy 14:8), adds that eating it makes a person unclean (Leviticus 11:43), adds that touching their carcasses defiles a person (Leviticus 11:28), adds that righteous people must not become defiled (Leviticus 20:25), and then sends His prophet a prophesy like, no one uncircumcised or anything unclean (/tameh) will anymore enter Zion or Jerusalem (Isaiah 52:1), and then openly judges pork-eaters as wicked (Isaiah 65:2-5), and then hotly repeats that identical point (Isaiah 66:15-17), and once more (Ezekiel 44:23-27) and once again, but now in the New Testament (Revelation 21:27), so where is that pastor who dares suppose the Almighty can change His mind about pigs? He wouldnt have lived long enough to get to a cross to die. If pigs were considered unclean then would the demons not wanted unclean to possess. On the other hand, it is unfortunate that the rabbis today dont see the even stronger connection between Genesis 3:3 and Revelation 22:18, because Jews dont read the New Testament all that much. The distinction between the two is clear (now). Wed also have to confess that the farmers were not Gentile. He wrote under his own name, and also as John Oxenham for his poetry, hymn-writing, and novels. This solution is as old as Origen (Commentary on John, VI, 24) who, faced with the textual problem, suggested that the precise site of the healing of Legion was Gergesa, the small town in the territory of Gadara, but hardly in the more remote territory of Gerasa. These authors were Biblical (Peter, James, Paul, Hebrews, etc) and to a lesser extent, non-biblical (Josephus, Pliny, etc). He is more open with Gentiles because it fits His purpose about revelation to the Gentiles and the new inclusion in the kingdom. Fourthly, Jesus specifically went to the land of the Gentile Gadarenes or Gerasenes, east of the Sea of Galilee, to minister to them. Deuteronomy 4 and 12 only state that none should add or remove what Moses was commanding, which sounds a little nebulous. Jesus was upholding all the kosher laws within the Land of Israel it was part of his job description. 2 Just as Jesus was getting out of the boat, a man with an unclean spirit came For our Creator, one lost person saved is worth the death of many animals. What do you have that youre captive to, that youre enslaved to? He is utterly sovereign. And if he missed one, he didnt do it perfectly. Pig meat, according to Scripture, is as unclean as the demons that Jesus sent into the swine. He's a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ now. In other words, they believe the one who killed the pigs with the demons is equal to the Father. This man, when Jesus says, What is your name? effectively says, I do not know my name. The most plausible reason Jesus chose the pigs was because he regarded people as precious and priceless, But are these good pastors on the right track? One possible reason the Son of David chose the pigs was that he had no choice. He was constrained to act just like the other prophets before him. They ask Him if they can enter some nearby pigs, and He lets them. Years earlier, when the ancient Israelis came to the border of the Promised Land, part of the eastern shore was controlled by the Geshurites (and the Maakathites) but Joshua told Israel to possess their land (, Last Fact: The coming Judgement Jews First, We have seen that God Almighty loves animals as much as humans, so Jesus randomly killing two thousand swine seems senseless, unless we remember God has commanded righteous people to avoid defiling food, such as pork. If the pig farmers were Gentile, why would non-Jewish farmers be so gentle with a Jew (who was also an outsider) who was messing around with their farm animals? And Luke intends this to be a display of an extraordinary case. These ruins date from the 2nd to the 7th centuries and show that the city flourished during this period as a center for religion, culture, and commerce. Is there a connection? No, I've checked my facts, anticipated the arguments, remembered my own arguments from he past, and now Im ready to present my conclusions for Christians to consider. Such alternative readings include arguments that the swine were meant to represent the Roman army or "unclean and unfaithful" people; that pigs were considered "unclean", so destroying them might be consistent with care for other animals; and that Jesus did not actually "send" the devils into the pigs. (, Therefore you should understand that the LORD your God, Because God is so steady, and doesnt reverse or repeal, He can be trusted to do what He promises; good or, If the Eternal One, blessed be He, had said just, But the Almighty said it so many times. Remember, Jesus took direct, extensive action against a significant group of Gentile pig farmers he didnt just say something bad against the pigs. And so this man comes to Jesus, he seeks Him out, and Jesus says to him, What is your name? And the man doesn't know his name. This Priceless People Interpretation comes from another sunny California pastor, John Piper. Coincidentally, three Gentiles showed up for lunch, and the following day, he met a Roman convert when finally Peter figured it out and declared the Lords view of Gentile believers, But God has shown me that I should not call ritually impure or defiling any man (Acts 10:28). Now not only did the Jewish people not eat bacon, and not only were they forbidden by Moses to eat bacon, but they were not allowed to raise bacon even to sell it to the Gentiles. Also in a side note theres a rock with what looks like a human footprint in it, it is said this is Christs footprint. Dr. Ligon Duncan | December 13, 2009. III. The stories in the gospels may or may not have happened but, regardless, they are told in a way that makes a theological point and were never intended to be understood as factual history. The list in the first chapter of Leviticus contains only bovine, sheep, goats and pigeons; all typified later, in Leviticus 11, as clean/pure animals. The NT references (Mark 5:1; Luke 8:26; cf. In this immediate area, steep hills come down to the shoreline and fit the story of the swine rushing headlong into the sea. Two thousand pigs together is quiet unimaginable. And because they did not hear Him, they lost even what they had. The best text in Matthew reads Gadarenes, in Mark and Luke it reads Gerasenes, whereas some MSS preserve Gergesenes and Gergustenes (cf. Therefore, I repeat again that I believe the pastors are dishonest for not admitting this fact. Thy powersBring loss to us and ours.Our ways are not as Thine.Thou lovest men, weswine.Oh, get you hence, Omnipotence,And take this fool of Thine!His soul? That amazing phrase, all of you be holy for I am holy did not start with Peter (1 Peter 1:16), because the apostle is quoting Leviticus. Explained by Sharing Culture Expert Answers: Gergesenes means "those who come from pilgrimage or fight." Go be a witness to Me. Incredible. Now the big-mouth irking this Greek artisan was our good friend, the Apostle Paul. Interested in joining the Ligonier team? If we agree Messiah wrote the Law of God, we should then wonder why on earth he would come to Earth to take what he authored out of circulation or to annul it? And were you aware that the New Testament repeats the same two commands from Deuteronomy? ix. The list in the first chapter of Leviticus contains only bovine, sheep, goats and pigeons; all typified later, in Leviticus 11, as clean/pure animals. Admittedly the whole event with the demon-crazed pigs is odd you dont see it every day but the writer wanted us to believe it genuinely happened. It deeply disturbed Bertrand Russell that Jesus allowed a herd of two thousand pigs to be destroyed. The tricky bit is finding the correct reason why gentle Jesus dumped hundreds of murderous, unclean spirits on so many swine. Kursi - The Gerasene Site of Jesus' Miracle on the East Side of Lake He does. were the gerasenes gentiles The normally merciful Messiah destroyed the pigs in accordance with Gods Law about clean and unclean meat. No, at the very best, Scripture is a dazzling lily that started out as a small flower bud, grew and expanded overtime, until finally it opened to show us all its beauty, a beauty that there inside the bud since the beginning, but not fully shown. You can bet your bottom drachma there is. The Garasenes were not Jewish but the country was close to Galilee and Jesus had been to that side of the sea before. This city was better known than Gadara or Gergesa; indeed in the Roman age no city of Palestine was better known. Jesus made him whole. But there is a message in this for all of us and it is simply this we may not be possessed by demons, but if we are possessed by what we want or by what we have and if what we want or what we have is not God in the Gospel of His dear Son, Jesus Christ, then we are no less in the thrall of sin that this man.