Читать книгу Deliver us from the Evil one - Bernardo Olivera - Страница 13

After taking this critical look at the witness of the three Synoptic Gospels, we can draw several conclusions from what they are saying. The principal one is that there is a conviction in the entire gospel tradition – from the historical life of Jesus himself, to the final text of the gospels and beyond – that the Devil exercises a destructive power that goes directly against the kingdom of God.

A second conclusion is that the presence of Satan in human existence is in continuity with the temptations of Jesus before beginning his public ministry. The Devil’s action is illustrated in the parable of the sower, “The ones on the path where the word is sown, when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them” (Mk 4:15).

A third conclusion is that a possessed person, a demoniac, cannot be adequately identified as someone sick, because with the sick Jesus is kind and merciful, whereas with the possessed he is demanding and authoritarian. However, it is not always easy to distinguish between sickness and possession, since their respective symptoms are sometimes present in both cases, so Jesus talks and acts in accordance to his instinctive discernment of the situation.

Jesus often goes against what people expect of him. This is because he himself evaluates a situation and judges whether it is a question of sickness or of possession. His conclusion conditions his intervention, which is sometimes merciful and at other times authoritative. He can also be disconcerting because demoniacs generally have a split personality and Jesus does not speak directly to the possessed person, but to the “unclean spirit.” In all this, he is not like other Jewish exorcists of his time, since he performs exorcisms directly, by his own words and authority, not with amulets, talismans or prescribed prayers.

What is most important in all these exorcisms is the underlying principle of the personal identity of Jesus as the divine Savior sent by God to establish the kingdom of heaven on earth. Satan acts directly in opposition to this project, which makes him the “Adversary” (1 Peter 5:8), as becomes clear in the life of the apostles and in the primitive Church.22

13 See Mt 10:25; Mk 3:22. 30; Lk 11:18-19; Jn 7:20; 8:48-52; 10:20-21.

14 See also Mt 9:32-34; Lk 10:17.

15 In Mk 1:23-28; Lk 4:31-37.

16 See Mt 11:21.24; Lk 10:13-15.

17 Lk 8:31, in contrast to Mk 5:12.

18 See Mk 9:25-29 and its parallels.

19 Almost all modern versions omit here the words, “and fasting,” saying that the phrase is not authentic, although it comes from “ancient authorities.”

20 See Jn 7:20; 8:48; 10:20

21 Lk 11:20, that is, the Holy Spirit.

22 See Mk 6:6; Acts 8:7; 10:38; 19:12-16.