Matthew chapter 8 interpretation. Russian synodal translation. On the expulsion of demons into a herd of pigs

Commentary (introduction) to the entire book of Matthew

Comments on Chapter 8

INTRODUCTION TO THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

SYNOPTIC GOSPELS

The Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke are usually called Synoptic Gospels. Synoptic comes from two Greek words that mean see together. Therefore, the above-mentioned Gospels received this name because they describe the same events in the life of Jesus. In each of them, however, there are some additions, or something is omitted, but, in general, they are based on the same material, and this material is also arranged in the same way. Therefore, they can be written in parallel columns and compared with each other.

After this, it becomes very obvious that they are very close to each other. If, for example, we compare the story of the feeding of the five thousand (Matthew 14:12-21; Mark 6:30-44; Luke 5:17-26), then this is the same story, told in almost the same words.

Or take, for example, another story about the healing of a paralytic (Matthew 9:1-8; Mark 2:1-12; Luke 5:17-26). These three stories are so similar to each other that even the introductory words, “said to the paralytic,” appear in all three stories in the same form in the same place. The correspondence between all three Gospels is so close that one must either conclude that all three took material from the same source, or two were based on a third.

THE FIRST GOSPEL

Examining the matter more carefully, one can imagine that the Gospel of Mark was written first, and the other two - the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke - are based on it.

The Gospel of Mark can be divided into 105 passages, of which 93 are found in the Gospel of Matthew and 81 in the Gospel of Luke. Only four of the 105 passages in the Gospel of Mark are not found in either the Gospel of Matthew or the Gospel of Luke. There are 661 verses in the Gospel of Mark, 1068 verses in the Gospel of Matthew, and 1149 in the Gospel of Luke. There are no less than 606 verses from Mark in the Gospel of Matthew, and 320 in the Gospel of Luke. Of the 55 verses in the Gospel of Mark, which not reproduced in Matthew, 31 yet reproduced in Luke; thus, only 24 verses from Mark are not reproduced in either Matthew or Luke.

But not only the meaning of the verses is conveyed: Matthew uses 51%, and Luke uses 53% of the words of the Gospel of Mark. Both Matthew and Luke follow, as a rule, the arrangement of material and events adopted in the Gospel of Mark. Sometimes Matthew or Luke have differences from the Gospel of Mark, but it is never the case that they both were different from him. One of them always follows the order that Mark follows.

REVISION OF THE GOSPEL OF MARK

Due to the fact that the Gospels of Matthew and Luke are much larger in volume than the Gospel of Mark, one might think that the Gospel of Mark is a brief transcription of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. But one fact indicates that the Gospel of Mark is the earliest of them all: so to speak, the authors of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke improve the Gospel of Mark. Let's take a few examples.

Here are three descriptions of the same event:

Map. 1.34:"And He healed many, suffering from various diseases; expelled many demons."

Mat. 8.16:"He cast out the spirits with a word and healed everyone sick."

Onion. 4.40:"He, laying on everyone of them hands, healed

Or let's take another example:

Map. 3:10: “For He healed many.”

Mat. 12:15: “He healed them all.”

Onion. 6:19: "... power came from Him and healed everyone."

Approximately the same change is noted in the description of Jesus' visit to Nazareth. Let's compare this description in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark:

Map. 6.5.6: “And he could not perform any miracle there... and he marveled at their unbelief.”

Mat. 13:58: “And he did not perform many miracles there because of their unbelief.”

The author of the Gospel of Matthew does not have the heart to say that Jesus couldn't perform miracles, and he changes the phrase. Sometimes the authors of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke leave out little hints from the Gospel of Mark that may somehow detract from the greatness of Jesus. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke omit three remarks found in the Gospel of Mark:

Map. 3.5:“And he looked upon them with anger, grieving because of the hardness of their hearts...”

Map. 3.21:“And when his neighbors heard, they went to take him, for they said that he had lost his temper.”

Map. 10.14:"Jesus was indignant..."

All this clearly shows that the Gospel of Mark was written earlier than the others. It gives a simple, lively and direct account, and the authors of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke were already beginning to be influenced by dogmatic and theological considerations, and therefore they chose their words more carefully.

TEACHINGS OF JESUS

We have already seen that the Gospel of Matthew has 1068 verses and the Gospel of Luke 1149 verses, and that 582 of these are repetitions of verses from the Gospel of Mark. This means that there is much more material in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke than in the Gospel of Mark. A study of this material shows that more than 200 verses from it are almost identical among the authors of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke; for example, passages such as Onion. 6.41.42 And Mat. 7.3.5; Onion. 10.21.22 And Mat. 11.25-27; Onion. 3.7-9 And Mat. 3, 7-10 almost exactly the same. But here's where we see the difference: the material that the authors of Matthew and Luke took from the Gospel of Mark deals almost exclusively with events in the life of Jesus, and these additional 200 verses shared by the Gospels of Matthew and Luke deal with something other than that. that Jesus did, but what He spoke. It is quite obvious that in this part the authors of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke drew information from the same source - from the book of sayings of Jesus.

This book no longer exists, but theologians called it KB, what does Quelle mean in German - source. This book must have been extremely important in those days because it was the first textbook on the teachings of Jesus.

THE PLACE OF THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW IN THE GOSPEL TRADITION

Here we come to the problem of Matthew the Apostle. Theologians agree that the first Gospel is not the fruit of Matthew's hands. A person who was a witness to the life of Christ would not need to turn to the Gospel of Mark as a source of information about the life of Jesus, as the author of the Gospel of Matthew does. But one of the first church historians named Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, left us the following extremely important news: “Matthew collected the sayings of Jesus in the Hebrew language.”

Thus, we can consider that it was Matthew who wrote the book from which all people should draw as a source if they want to know what Jesus taught. It was because so much of this source book was included in the first Gospel that it was given the name Matthew. We should be eternally grateful to Matthew when we remember that we owe to him the Sermon on the Mount and almost everything we know about the teaching of Jesus. In other words, it is to the author of the Gospel of Mark that we owe our knowledge of life events Jesus, and Matthew - knowledge of the essence teachings Jesus.

MATTHEW THE TANKER

We know very little about Matthew himself. IN Mat. 9.9 we read about his calling. We know that he was a publican - a tax collector - and therefore everyone should have hated him terribly, because the Jews hated their fellow tribesmen who served the victors. Matthew must have been a traitor in their eyes.

But Matthew had one gift. Most of Jesus' disciples were fishermen and did not have the talent to put words on paper, but Matthew was supposed to be an expert in this matter. When Jesus called Matthew, who was sitting at the toll booth, he stood up and, leaving everything but his pen, followed Him. Matthew nobly used his literary talent and became the first person to describe the teachings of Jesus.

GOSPEL OF THE JEWS

Let us now look at the main features of the Gospel of Matthew, so that when reading it we will pay attention to this.

First, and above all, the Gospel of Matthew - this is the gospel written for the Jews. It was written by a Jew to convert the Jews.

One of the main purposes of Matthew's Gospel was to show that in Jesus all the Old Testament prophecies were fulfilled and therefore He must be the Messiah. One phrase, a recurring theme, runs throughout the book: “It came to pass that God spoke by the prophet.” This phrase is repeated in the Gospel of Matthew no less than 16 times. The Birth of Jesus and His Name - Fulfillment of Prophecy (1, 21-23); as well as flight to Egypt (2,14.15); massacre of the innocents (2,16-18); Joseph's settlement in Nazareth and the raising of Jesus there (2,23); the very fact that Jesus spoke in parables (13,34.35); triumphal entry into Jerusalem (21,3-5); betrayal for thirty pieces of silver (27,9); and casting lots for Jesus' clothes as He hung on the Cross (27,35). The author of the Gospel of Matthew made it his main goal to show that the Old Testament prophecies were fulfilled in Jesus, that every detail of Jesus' life was foretold by the prophets, and thereby convince the Jews and force them to recognize Jesus as the Messiah.

The interest of the author of the Gospel of Matthew is directed primarily to the Jews. Their appeal is closest and dearest to his heart. To the Canaanite woman who turned to Him for help, Jesus first answered: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (15,24). Sending the twelve apostles to proclaim the good news, Jesus told them: “Do not go into the way of the Gentiles and do not enter the city of the Samaritans, but go especially to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (10, 5.6). But one must not think that this Gospel excludes the pagans in every possible way. Many will come from the east and west and lie down with Abraham in the Kingdom of Heaven (8,11). "And the gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world" (24,14). And it is in the Gospel of Matthew that the order was given to the Church to set out on a campaign: “Go therefore and teach all nations.” (28,19). It is, of course, obvious that the author of Matthew's Gospel is primarily interested in the Jews, but he foresees the day when all nations will be gathered together.

The Jewish origin and Jewish orientation of the Gospel of Matthew is also evident in its attitude towards the law. Jesus did not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it. Not even the smallest part of the law will pass. There is no need to teach people to break the law. The righteousness of a Christian must exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees (5, 17-20). The Gospel of Matthew was written by a man who knew and loved the law, and saw that it had a place in Christian teaching. In addition, we should note the obvious paradox in the attitude of the author of the Gospel of Matthew to the scribes and Pharisees. He recognizes their special powers: “The scribes and Pharisees sat in the seat of Moses; therefore whatever they tell you to observe, observe and do.” (23,2.3). But in no other Gospel are they condemned as strictly and consistently as in Matthew.

Already at the very beginning we see the merciless exposure of the Sadducees and Pharisees by John the Baptist, who called them "born of vipers" (3, 7-12). They complain that Jesus eats and drinks with publicans and sinners (9,11); they declared that Jesus casts out demons not by the power of God, but by the power of the prince of demons (12,24). They are plotting to destroy Him (12,14); Jesus warns the disciples to beware not of the leaven of bread, but of the teachings of the Pharisees and Sadducees (16,12); they are like plants that will be uprooted (15,13); they cannot discern the signs of the times (16,3); they are killers of prophets (21,41). There is no other chapter in the entire New Testament like Mat. 23, in which it is not what the scribes and Pharisees teach that is condemned, but their behavior and way of life. The author condemns them for the fact that they do not at all correspond to the teaching they preach, and do not at all achieve the ideal established by them and for them.

The author of Matthew's Gospel is also very interested in the Church. From all the Synoptic Gospels the word Church found only in the Gospel of Matthew. Only the Gospel of Matthew includes a passage about the Church after Peter's confession at Caesarea Philippi (Matthew 16:13-23; cf. Mark 8:27-33; Luke 9:18-22). Only Matthew says that disputes should be resolved by the Church (18,17). By the time the Gospel of Matthew was written, the Church had become a large organization and truly a major factor in the lives of Christians.

The Gospel of Matthew especially reflects an interest in the apocalyptic; in other words, to what Jesus spoke about His Second Coming, the end of the world and the Day of Judgment. IN Mat. 24 provides a much more complete account of Jesus' apocalyptic reasoning than any other Gospel. Only in the Gospel of Matthew is there a parable of the talents. (25,14-30); about wise and foolish virgins (25, 1-13); about sheep and goats (25,31-46). Matthew had a special interest in the end times and the Day of Judgment.

But this is not the most important feature of the Gospel of Matthew. This is an eminently meaningful gospel.

We have already seen that it was the Apostle Matthew who gathered the first meeting and compiled an anthology of Jesus’ teaching. Matthew was a great systematizer. He collected in one place everything he knew about the teaching of Jesus on this or that issue, and therefore we find in the Gospel of Matthew five large complexes in which the teaching of Christ is collected and systematized. All these five complexes are associated with the Kingdom of God. Here they are:

a) Sermon on the Mount or Law of the Kingdom (5-7)

b) Duty of Kingdom Leaders (10)

c) Parables about the Kingdom (13)

d) Greatness and Forgiveness in the Kingdom (18)

e) The Coming of the King (24,25)

But Matthew not only collected and systematized. We must remember that he wrote in an era before printing, when books were few and far between because they had to be copied by hand. At such a time, comparatively few people had books, and so if they wanted to know and use the story of Jesus, they had to memorize it.

Therefore, Matthew always arranges the material in such a way that it is easy for the reader to remember it. He arranges the material in threes and sevens: three messages of Joseph, three denials of Peter, three questions of Pontius Pilate, seven parables about the Kingdom in chapter 13, sevenfold "woe to you" to the Pharisees and scribes in Chapter 23.

A good example of this is the genealogy of Jesus, with which the Gospel opens. The purpose of a genealogy is to prove that Jesus is the son of David. There are no numbers in Hebrew, they are symbolized by letters; In addition, Hebrew does not have signs (letters) for vowel sounds. David in Hebrew it will be accordingly DVD; if these are taken as numbers rather than letters, their sum would be 14, and the genealogy of Jesus consists of three groups of names, each containing fourteen names. Matthew does his best to arrange Jesus' teachings in a way that people can understand and remember.

Every teacher should be grateful to Matthew, because what he wrote is, first of all, the Gospel for teaching people.

The Gospel of Matthew has one more feature: the dominant thought in it is the thought of Jesus the King. The author writes this Gospel to show the kingship and royal origin of Jesus.

The genealogy must prove from the very beginning that Jesus is the son of King David (1,1-17). This title Son of David is used more often in the Gospel of Matthew than in any other Gospel. (15,22; 21,9.15). The Magi came to see the King of the Jews (2,2); Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem is a deliberately dramatized declaration by Jesus of His rights as King (21,1-11). Before Pontius Pilate, Jesus consciously accepts the title of king (27,11). Even on the Cross above His head stands, albeit mockingly, the royal title (27,37). In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus quotes the law and then refutes it with the royal words: “But I say to you...” (5,22. 28.34.39.44). Jesus declares: "All authority has been given to me" (28,18).

In the Gospel of Matthew we see Jesus the Man born to be King. Jesus walks through its pages as if dressed in royal purple and gold.

ACTUAL LOVE

Of all the evangelists, Matthew presents the material most methodically; he never delivers it haphazardly. And if in the Gospel of Matthew one thing follows another in a certain sequence, then there are always reasons for this, and here there is also a reason for this. IN chapters 5, 6 and 7 Matthew cited the Sermon on the Mount. In other words, he gave us in these chapters his exposition words Jesus; and now, in chapter 8 he talks about acts Jesus. IN chapters 5, 6 and 7 we see heavenly wisdom in words; V chapter 8 we see heavenly love in action.

Chapter 8 - this is the chapter of miracles. Let's look at these miracles in general before looking at them in detail. There are seven miraculous incidents in this chapter.

1. Healing the leper (8,1-4). Here we see Jesus touching the untouchable. Lepers were expelled from human society. To touch them, or even to approach them, meant breaking the law. We see a man from whom everyone keeps their distance, but Jesus gives him the pity and compassion of God's love.

2. Healing of the centurion's servant (8,5-13). The centurion was a pagan, and therefore in the eyes of a strictly Orthodox Jew he was only fuel for the fire of hell.

He was in the service of the occupiers, and therefore nationalist Jews would say that he should be killed rather than helped; Moreover, the servant was a slave, and the slave was nothing more than a living tool. Here we see how the love of God comes to the aid of a man whom all people hated, and a slave whom all people despised.

3. Healing of Peter's mother-in-law (8,14.15). This miracle took place in a humble home in Palestine. There was no great publicity here, there was no admiring public; there was only Jesus and the family circle. Here we see how God's boundless love manifests its power in the family circle.

4. Healing of all the demon-possessed and sick who were brought in in the evening (8,16.17). This shows the all-inclusive love of God in action. In the eyes of Jesus, everyone was worthy of consideration; He did not divide His time into work time and rest time. Anyone could come to Him at any time and receive the generous and voluntary help of God's love.

5. The scribe's reaction (8,18-22). At first glance this little passage seems out of place here in the chapter of miracles, but it is a miracle of the person of Jesus Himself. The very fact that some scribe could decide to follow Jesus is no less than a miracle. This scribe seemed to have forgotten his “devotion” to the law of the scribes; and although Jesus refuted everything to which this scribe devoted his life, for some reason he saw in Him not an enemy, but a friend, not an adversary, but standing above himself.

It was an instinctive reaction. The scribe saw in Jesus a radiance and greatness that he had never seen in any other person. The miracle happened, and the scribe’s heart turned to Jesus Christ.

6. The miracle of taming the storm (8,23-27). Here we see Jesus taming the sea and the waves that threatened to swallow people. As Eduard Pusey put it after the death of his wife: “All this time, it was as if someone was holding my chin to cheer me up.” It is the love of God that brings peace and clarity to frustration and turmoil.

7. Healing of the possessed in the country of Gergesinskaya (8,28-34). In ancient times, people believed that all diseases came from demons and their actions. Here we have before us the power of God, dealing with demons; here we see the generosity of God eliminating earthly evil and the love of God speaking out against the destructiveness and malevolence of evil. Here, kindness and love protect people from the death that threatens them.

ALIVE AS DEAD (Matthew 8:1-4)

In ancient times, leprosy was the most terrible disease. “No disease makes a person such a terrible wreck for so long,” wrote one specialist.

It can begin with small skin pimples that gradually ulcerate and fester. The ulcers bleed pus, the eyebrows fall out, the eyes become motionless, the vocal cords also become ulcerated, the voice becomes rougher, and breathing becomes hoarse. The arms and legs constantly fester, and the patient gradually turns into an ulcerated mass. Such leprosy lasts an average of nine years and ends in mental disorder, then coma and death.

Leprosy can begin with loss of sensitivity in some part of the body, nerve trunks are affected; the muscles become exhausted, the tendons contract so much that the hands become like bird claws; hands and feet ulcerate and suppurate; fingers and toes are gradually lost until finally an entire arm or leg falls off. This type of leprosy disease lasts from twenty to thirty years. This is a kind of gradual dying, during which a person dies off centimeter by centimeter.

The physical condition of the lepers was terrible; but this was further aggravated by the fact that, as the ancient historian Josephus says, the lepers were treated "as if they were already quite dead." As soon as it was established that a person had contracted leprosy, he was completely expelled from human society. “As long as the plague remains on him, he must be unclean; he is unclean; he must live apart, his dwelling is outside the camp.” (Lev. 13:46). The leper had to walk around in torn clothes, with his head disheveled and uncovered, covered with a cloth up to his lips and shout: “Unclean! Unclean!” (Lev. 13:45). If in the Middle Ages someone fell ill with leprosy, the priest took a crucifix in his hands, brought the person to church and read the funeral service over him. From a human point of view, he was already dead.

During the time of Jesus, lepers in Palestine were prohibited from entering Jerusalem and all cities that had walls. In the synagogue, a small secluded room was provided for the leper, three meters high and two meters wide, which was called Mehitsah. The law listed 61 different contacts that could make a person unclean, and the defilement to which a person came into contact with a leper was ranked second in importance to the defilement of touching a dead body. If such a leper stuck his head into a house, the house was considered unclean right down to the roof beams. The law forbade even greeting a leper on the street. No one could approach the leper closer than four cubits (1 cubit - 45 cm). On the windward side, the distance to the leper had to be at least 100 cubits. One rabbi refused to eat an egg bought on a street where a leper had passed. Another rabbi even boasted that he threw stones at lepers to keep them at a distance. Some rabbis hid or took to their heels only when they saw the leper from afar.

There has never been another disease that could so isolate a person from his fellow humans. And this is the man Jesus touched. For a Jew, there was no more startling sentence in the New Testament than the simple phrase: “Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him (the leper).”

COMPASSION WHICH IS ABOVE THE LAW (Matt. 8:1-4 (continued))

In this story it is necessary to pay attention to appeal leper and on answer Jesus. There are three elements to note in the leper's conversion.

1. The leper turned to Jesus with confidence. He had no doubt that if Jesus wanted, He could cleanse him.

No leper would ever approach an orthodox scribe or rabbi; he knew very well that he would be stoned, but this man came to Jesus. He was completely convinced of Jesus' willingness to accept a man whom everyone would stone away. No one should feel too unclean to approach Jesus.

He had complete confidence in the power of Jesus. Leprosy was a disease for which there was no rabbinically prescribed cure. And this man was confident that Jesus could do something that no one else could do. Since Jesus came, no one should consider his body incurable or his soul unworthy of forgiveness.

2. The leper came to humility. He didn't demand healing; he just said: "If you want, you can cleanse me." He seemed to be saying: "I know that I am of no importance either to You or to others; I know that others would leave me and would want nothing to do with me; I know that I cannot demand anything from You, but perhaps, in Your Divine condescension, You will give from Your power even to someone like me." A humble heart, which is aware only of its own need, goes to Christ.

3. The leper came with a feeling of respect. The Bible says he came up bowing to Him. In Greek it is a verb proskunain, and this word is used only in the meaning worship the gods; it always conveys the feelings of a person and his behavior before the deity. The leper could never tell anyone what he thought about Jesus or who he thought Him to be, but he knew that when he was in the presence of Jesus, he was in the presence of God. There is no point in putting all this in theological or philosophical language; suffice it to say that when we are in the presence of Jesus Christ, we are in the presence of the love and power of Almighty God.

And Jesus’ reaction to such an appeal from the leper followed. First, and above all, in this reaction there was compassion. The law required Jesus to avoid touching the leper and threatened Him with terrible desecration if He allowed the leper to come within two meters of Him and Jesus still reached out His hand to him and touched him. The medical experience of the time said that Jesus was putting himself at terrible risk of contracting a terrible contagious disease, but Jesus reached out and touched him.

For Jesus, there was only one duty in life - to help. There was only one law - the law of love. The duties of love were above all other norms, laws and statutes; they forced Him to neglect all physical risks.

To a good doctor, a patient with a disgusting disease does not seem like a terrible sight. This is just a human being who needs his medical skill. In the eyes of a doctor, a child with an infectious disease is not a danger, but a child who needs help. So is Jesus, so is God, and so should we be. A true Christian will break any rules and regulations and risk everything to help a fellow man in need.

But there are two other ideas worth noting in this healing that show that although Jesus was willing to ignore the law and risk infection to help a person, He was not frivolous and did not forget the requirements of forethought.

1. He told the sick man not to tell anyone about what He had done for him. This instruction is typical of Jesus (Matt. 9.30; 12.16; 17.9; Mark. 1.34; 5.43; 7.36; 8.26). Why does Jesus command silence? Palestine was an occupied country, and the Jews were a proud people. They never forgot that they were God's chosen people and dreamed of the day when their heavenly deliverer would come. But they, above all, dreamed of this day as a day of military victory and the acquisition of political power, and therefore Palestine was the most explosive country in the world; she lived in a whirlpool of shocks and revolutions. More and more new leaders appeared, won glory, and then disappeared in the face of strong Rome. And if now this leper went and told everywhere what Jesus had done for him, the Jews would hasten to make a man with the abilities of Jesus their political leader and military leader.

Jesus had to first prepare people, educate and change their ideas, show them that His strength and authority is love, and not the power of weapons. He had to work almost in secret until people came to know Him for who He really was - a lover and not a destroyer of human lives. Jesus commanded those whom He helped to remain silent, so that people would not want to use Him to achieve their goals, instead of allowing God's definitions to be fulfilled. These people were to remain silent until they learned to say about Him what they really had to say about Him.

2. Jesus sent the leper to the priest to make the proper sacrifice and receive certification that he was now clean. The Jews were so afraid of contracting leprosy that there was a prescribed ritual in the unlikely event that someone would be cured of leprosy.

This ritual is described in Lion. 14. The leper had to be examined by a priest. The priest had to take two birds and kill one of them over the living water. It was also necessary to take cedar wood, scarlet thread and hyssop (a plant that was used for sacrifices). The priest had to soak all this, along with the living bird, in the blood of the slaughtered bird, and then release the living bird to fly free. The man had to wash himself, wash his clothes and cut his hair. After seven days he was to be examined again. After that, he had to shave all his hair, head, beard, eyebrows. After this, he made certain sacrifices, including two rams without blemish, 0.3 ephra (ephra - 40 liters) of wheat flour mixed with oil, and 1 log (0.55 liter) of oil. The priest was to take the blood of the guilt offering and place it on the edge of the right ear of the person being cleansed, on the thumb of his right hand and on the big toe of his right foot, and then anoint the same places with oil. Finally, the leper was examined again and, if the healing was truly complete, he was released, given a certificate that he was cleansed.

Jesus commanded the healed man to go through this ritual. And this is for our edification. Jesus told this man not to ignore the treatment available to him at that time. By ignoring the medical and scientific treatment available to us, we will not wait for any miracle. People must do everything in their power, only then will the power of God help in our efforts. A miracle will not come on its own if you carelessly wait for God to do everything Himself; it is the combination of the efforts of a person filled with faith with the boundless grace of God.

PRAYER OF A GOOD MAN (Matthew 8:5-13)

Although this centurion appears only briefly on the scene of the New Testament, he is one of the most attractive characters in the Gospels. Centurions, or centurions, formed the backbone of the Roman army. The Roman legion numbered six thousand people, it was divided into 60 hundred, each with 100 people, and each was commanded by a centurion, a centurion. Centurions were long-term, permanent soldiers in the Roman army. They were responsible for discipline in the regiment. Both in peacetime and in wartime, the moral composition of the army rested on them. The Greek historian of the second to the first centuries BC, Polybius, describing the Roman army, characterizes the centurion this way: “They should not be so much recklessly brave seekers of danger as men who can command others; firm and balanced in action and reliable. They are not must be too eager to fight, but in the face of the fierce onslaught of the enemy they must hold their position and be ready to die in their place.” Centurions were the best people in the Roman army.

It is interesting to note that all the centurions that are mentioned in the New Testament are spoken of with respect: the centurion who recognized Jesus on the Cross as the Son of God; Cornelius, the first pagan convert to Christianity; the centurion who suddenly discovered that Paul was a Roman citizen and saved him from the fury of the rioting crowd; the centurion who learned that the Jews were going to kill Paul on the way from Jerusalem to Caesarea and took steps to destroy their plans; the centurion, to whom the Roman procurator of Judea Felix entrusted the guard of Paul; the centurion who accompanied Paul on his trip to Rome, who treated him politely and even acknowledged his direction of all actions when a storm wrecked the ship (Matt. 27.54; Acts 10.22; 23.17.23; 24.23; 27.43).

But there was something unusual about this centurion in Capernaum: his attitude towards his servant. This, of course, could only be a slave, and the centurion was saddened by his illness and was ready to do everything to help him. And this was sharply different from the usual attitude of the owner towards his slave. In the Roman Empire, a slave meant nothing; no one cared if he suffered from illness; no one cared whether he lived or died. Discussing all kinds of friendships, the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote: “There can be no friendship or justice in relation to an inanimate object, not even in relation to a horse or a bull, nor in relation to a slave, as such, because the owner there is nothing in common with a slave; a slave is a living tool, just as a tool is an inanimate slave."

The slave was no better than the thing; the slave had no legal rights; the owner could treat him as he wanted - good or bad. The second-century BC Roman legal scholar, Gaius, writes in his Institutes, a classic exposition of Roman law: “We may note that it is a generally accepted fact that the master has power over the life and death of the slave.” The Roman encyclopedist Varro (11627 BC) has a gloomy passage in his book “Agriculture” in which he divides agricultural implements into three classes: articulate, inarticulate and dumb. "Those who speak clearly are slaves; those who speak inarticulately are cattle; those who are dumb are carts." The only difference between a slave, an animal and a cart was that the slave could talk.

Another Roman writer Cato the Elder (234-149 BC) has a passage in his treatise “On Agriculture” that shows how unusual this centurion’s attitude towards the slave was. Cato advises a man taking over a farm: "Keep an eye on the livestock and hold an auction. Sell butter when prices are good; sell surplus grain and wine; sell your spent oxen, sheep with defects, wool, skins, old carts, old tools, old slaves, sick slaves and everything you have in excess." Cato directly advises throwing away sick slaves. Peter Chrysologus sums it up this way: “Whatever the master does to the slave, be it undeservedly, in anger, with desire, against his will, in forgetfulness, consciously, unconsciously - this is all judgment, justice and law.”

It is clear that this centurion was an unusual person for that time, because he loved his slave. Perhaps it was his unexpected tenderness and love that touched Jesus so much when the centurion first came to Him. Love always covers a mass of sins; a person who cares about people is always close to Jesus Christ.

COVERING LETTER OF FAITH (Matthew 8:5-13 (continued))

But this centurion was unusual not only in his attitude towards his servant; he was also a man of extraordinary faith. He needed the power of Jesus Christ to help him and heal his servant, but there was one problem - he was a pagan, and Jesus was a Jew, and according to Jewish law, a Jew could not enter a pagan's house, because the pagan's dwelling was unclean. IN Mishneh It is said: “The dwellings of the Gentiles are unclean.” We can translate what Jesus said as asking, “Are you asking me to come and heal him?” or “Will I come and heal him?”

Clearly Jesus had this prohibition in mind. Not that this law of uncleanness bothered Jesus very much. He would not at all refuse to enter someone's home; He was simply testing the faith of others; and then the centurion’s faith reached its apogee. As a warrior, he well understood what it meant to give an order so that it would be carried out immediately and without complaint, and therefore he answered Jesus: “Lord, You do not need to enter my house; I am not worthy for You to enter under my roof; but just say the word and this command will be carried out.” This was the voice of faith speaking, and Jesus believed that faith was the only cover letter to the blessedness of God.

And here Jesus uses a famous and vivid Jewish picture. The Jews believed that when the Messiah came, there would be a great festive feast at which all the Jews would sit and feast. The hippopotamus, the largest land-dwelling animal, and the leviathan, the whale or crocodile, the largest sea-dwelling animal, will serve as food for the feasters. "...Kept it so that it could be food for those whom You want and when You want" (4 Rides 6.52).“And the hippopotamus will emerge from its place, and the leviathan will come out of the water, these two huge monsters, which I created on the fifth day of creation and will maintain until that time; and then they will be food for everyone who remains” (2 Bar. 29.4).

The Jews were looking forward to this messianic feast with all their hearts, but it never even occurred to them that any pagan would sit at this feast. By that time, they believed, all pagans would be exterminated. “For the people and kingdoms that do not want to serve you will perish, and such nations will be completely destroyed.” (Isa. 60:12). But now Jesus says that many will come from the east and the west and sit down at the banquet table.

Worse, He says that many sons of the kingdom will be excluded. The son is the heir; Therefore, the son of the kingdom is the person who will inherit the kingdom, because the son is always the heir, but the Jews will lose their inheritance. According to the Jewish worldview, “the inheritance of sinners is darkness”! (Psalms of Solomon 15:11). The rabbis had a saying: “Sinners in hell will be covered in darkness.” To the Jew it seemed unusual and amazing that some pagan would sit as a guest at the feast of the Messiah, and the Jews, who would be greeted there with open arms, would be cast out into outer darkness; Hume will have to change places with the pagans; a completely different fate awaits them.

The Jews had to understand that the ticket to the Presence of God was not belonging to any nation, but faith. The Jew believed that he belonged to the chosen people, and that just because he was a Jew, he was dear to God. He believed that he belonged to dominant nation and this is already enough to automatically gain salvation. Jesus taught that the chosen ones in the Kingdom of God are only the chosen ones of faith. Jesus Christ does not belong to any one people or one race; Jesus Christ belongs to the man who has faith in his heart, no matter what race or nation he belongs to.

POWER AND STRENGTH FOR WHICH THERE IS NO DISTANCE (Matthew 8:5-13 (continued))

And so Jesus spoke the word, and the centurion’s servant was immediately healed. Previously, this would have seemed like an amazing miracle to people. It is not so difficult to imagine Jesus healing the sick when He was in contact with the sick person, but to imagine Him healing at a distance from the sick person, healing with the word of a person whom He did not know at all and whom He had never touched - this can seem incredible. But something else is strange: even science has begun to understand that there are forces whose action is mysterious, but which cannot be denied.

People again and again encountered a force that did not come through ordinary connections, ordinary paths and channels. One classic example of this comes from the life of Emanuel Swedenborg. In 1759, he was in Gothenburg and described a fire that took place in Stockholm, 500 kilometers away. He made a report to city officials describing when and where the fire started, the name of the home owner, and when the fire was extinguished; the ensuing investigations confirmed everything he said in detail. He learned all this in a way unknown to people.

There is no doubt that the influence of one person can influence another person at a distance in some way that we are beginning to see but are still far from understanding. If the human mind can achieve this, how much more could the mind of Jesus achieve? Strange, but the modern understanding of the world has not made it difficult, but has made it easier to understand this miracle.

MIRACLE IN THE HOUSE OF PETER (Matthew 8:14.15)

If we compare Mark's description of the events with their description in Matthew, we see that this happened in Capernaum on the Sabbath, after Jesus attended a service in the synagogue. When Jesus was in Capernaum, He stayed in Peter's house because Jesus never had a home of his own. Peter was married and, according to legend, his wife subsequently became his assistant in the field of evangelism. Clement of Alexandria (Stromateis 7:6) relates that Peter and his wife suffered martyrdom together. According to Clement of Alexandria, Peter had the sad fate of witnessing the torment of his wife before he suffered the torment himself. “Seeing that his wife was being led to death, Peter called out to her, encouraging her and comforting her, saying: “Remember the Lord.”

This time it turned out that Peter’s mother-in-law was sick with fever. In Palestine there were three typical forms of fever: one was called the Maltese fever and was characterized by weakness, anemia and exhaustion, lasting for months and often ending in complete exhaustion and death. Another, the so-called intermittent fever, was similar to typhoid fever, apparently typhoid malaria. In those places where the Jordan River flowed into and out of the Sea of ​​Galilee, the area was swampy; mosquitoes bred and grew there, and malaria was widespread in both Capernaum and Tiberides. It was often accompanied by jaundice and feverish chills; the condition of the patients was terrible and disgusting. Most likely, Peter’s mother-in-law was sick with just such malaria.

This miracle tells us a lot about Jesus and quite a lot about the woman He healed.

1. Jesus came from the synagogue where He had healed a man possessed by an unclean spirit. (Map. 1.21-28). According to Matthew, He healed the centurion's servant on the way home. Miracles did not come easy to Jesus: with each healing, strength flowed out of Him, and, without a doubt, He was tired. He must have come to Peter's house to rest, but barely had He entered the house when they again turned to Him for help and healing.

Nothing here served the purpose of fame and glory; there was no crowd here to watch, admire and wonder. There was only a simple hut and a poor woman, restlessly tossing about in a fever. Yet Jesus used all His power in these circumstances.

Jesus was never too tired to help; human needs never seemed to Him an intolerable nuisance. Jesus was not one of those who were at their best in public and at their worst at home. No situation seemed too simple and modest for him to help people. He didn't need an admiring audience to make it very good. Whether in a crowd or in a simple hut, He gave His love and His strength to anyone who needed it.

2. But this miracle also tells us something about the healed woman. As soon as He healed her, she began to take care of Him and the other guests. It is clear that she viewed herself as "saved to serve." He healed her and her only desire was to use her newfound health to be useful to Him and to others.

How do we use the gifts of Christ? The English writer Oscar Wilde once wrote, as he himself put it, “the best story in the world”:

“Christ came from the white plain to the purple city and, as He passed along the first street, He heard voices and saw a drunken young man hanging from the windowsill. “Why are you wasting your soul in drunkenness?” He asked. “Lord,” said young man, “I was a leper, and You healed me, what else can I do?” A little further in the city, Jesus saw a young man following a woman of easy virtue and He said: “Why do you dissolve your soul in fornication?” And the young man the man replied, “Lord, I was blind, and You healed me. What else can I do?" Finally, in the center of the city, He saw an old man crawling on the ground and weeping; when Jesus asked him why he was weeping, the old man replied: "Lord, I was dead, and You raised me to life, What can I do but cry?"

This terrible parable is about how people use the gifts of Christ and the mercy of God. Peter's mother-in-law used her restored health to serve Jesus and others. So we must use every gift of God.

MIRACLE AFTER MIRACLE (Matthew 8:16.17)

As we have already seen, from the information given by Mark it becomes clear that all these events took place on the Sabbath (Map. 1.21-34). This explains why these miracles happened in the evening. According to the Sabbath law, which prohibited the performance of any work on Saturday, it was also forbidden to heal on this day. It was possible to take steps to ensure that the person did not get worse, but it was impossible to take steps to at least somehow improve his condition. The general rule was that on the Sabbath, medical care could only be provided to those whose lives were truly in danger. In addition, on Saturday it was forbidden to carry heavy objects, and anything that weighed more than two dried figs was considered heavy. Consequently, it was impossible to carry the sick from place to place, either on a stretcher, on arms, or on shoulders, because this would mean carrying heavy loads. Officially, the Sabbath ended when two stars could be seen in the sky, because at that time there were no clocks by which time could be set. This is why the crowd in Capernaum waited until evening to come to Jesus for healing.

But let's think about what Jesus did on that Sabbath day? He was in the synagogue where He healed someone possessed by an unclean spirit. He sent healing to the centurion's servant. He healed Peter's mother-in-law. No doubt He preached and taught all day, and no doubt He met some who bitterly opposed Him; and now evening has come. God gave people both a day for work and an evening for rest. Evening is a time of rest, when work is put aside, but not for Jesus. And while He might have hoped to rest, He was surrounded by urgent human needs, and He supplied all selflessly, without any complaint and with Divine bounty. As long as any soul had need of anything, there was no rest for Jesus Christ.

And this scene evoked in Matthew’s memory the statement of the prophet Isaiah, which speaks of the servant of God who took upon himself our infirmities and bore our illnesses (Isa. 53:4).

A follower of Christ should not seek peace while there are people who need help and healing; and strangely enough, in the service of others he will feel the relief of his weariness and the strengthening of his weakness. He will feel that as demands arise, so will strength, and he will feel that he can take a step for others when he is no longer able to take a step for himself.

A CALL TO WEIGH ALL CIRCUMSTANCES (Matthew 8:18-22)

At first glance, this passage may seem completely out of place in this chapter. This is a chapter of miracles, and at first glance these words seem out of place in a chapter that deals with miracles. Why then does Matthew place them here?

It has been suggested that Matthew placed these words here because his thoughts were directed towards Jesus as the suffering servant of God. Matthew just quoted words from Is. 53.4:“He took upon Himself our infirmities and carried our sorrows.” (Matthew 8:17), and it is said that this picture directed Matthew's thoughts to the picture of a man who had nowhere to lay his head. As it was once said: “The life of Jesus began in a rented manger and ended in a rented tomb.” And so it has been suggested that Matthew inserted these lines here because both they and the verses immediately preceding them show Jesus as the suffering servant of God.

Perhaps this was the case, but it is even more likely that Matthew inserted this passage into the chapter of miracles because he also saw it as a miracle. After all, the scribe wanted to follow Jesus. He gave Jesus the most honorable title in his mouth. "Teacher!" - he said; in Greek it is didaskalos, which is usually used to translate Hebrew rabbi. To him, Jesus was the greatest teacher he had ever heard or seen.

And it really was a miracle that some scribe called Jesus by this title and wanted to follow Him. Jesus meant the destruction and end of all that narrow-minded legalism on which the religion of the scribes was built, and it was truly a miracle that any scribe saw something beautiful and desirable in Jesus.

The impression one person makes on another can truly lead to amazing results. Very often, people began to study science and achieved significant success only because they were greatly impressed by a prominent scientist. Many have come to Christianity and to a life of Christian service because of the impact that a major Christian figure has had on their lives.

So about one major English actress Edith Evans writes the following: “When her husband died, she came to us full of grief and sadness... In our living room... she poured out her feelings for an hour or so, and these feelings had deep sources. Her personality filled the entire room. The room was small for several days; it was felt that the room was as if electrified, the woman poured out her experience with such force."

And here we have a message about the impact that the personality of Jesus had on the Jewish scribe. And today it is fair to say that it is not so much about telling people about Jesus as it is about confronting them with Jesus, showing them [Him], and the person of Jesus will do the rest.

But that's not all. As soon as the scribe expressed this attitude towards Him, Jesus replied that foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests where they can rest, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head. Jesus seems to be saying to this man: “Before you come after Me, think about what you are doing. Before you follow Me - weigh all the circumstances."

Jesus did not need followers who could quickly be overwhelmed and carried away by some feelings that could quickly flare up with a bright flame and just as quickly fade away completely. He didn't need people who could be carried away by a tide of feelings that quickly rises and subsides just as quickly; He needed people who knew what they were doing. He said that everyone must take up their cross (Matthew 10:38). He said that His disciples should rise above the closest relationships in life (Luke 14:26). He spoke about the need to give his property to the poor (Matthew 19:21). He always told people: “Yes, I know that your heart yearns for Me, but do you love me enough to do this?

In every walk of life, people should be well aware of the facts. If a young man says he wants to study and know a lot, we should ask him: “Okay, are you ready to sacrifice pleasure and work hard every day?” When an explorer begins to recruit people for an expedition, people bombard him with offers, but he can separate the romantics from the realists by saying: “Okay, are you ready for the cold, or the heat and swamps, for fatigue and overload?” When a young man wants to become a master of sports, the coach must tell him: “Okay, are you ready for self-denial and self-discipline? Because only then will you be able to achieve the good results and fame that you dream of.” This does not necessarily have to discourage enthusiasm, but enthusiasm that is not backed by knowledge of the facts will soon turn into cold ashes rather than flames.

No man can say that he followed Jesus because he was misled: Jesus was uncompromisingly honest. We would be doing Jesus a very disservice if we tried to convince people that the path of the Christian life is simple and easy. The path of Christ is a path that takes your breath away, and there is nothing equal to the glory that awaits a person at the end of this path; but Jesus never said it was the easy way. The path to glory is always the way of the cross.

THE TRAGEDY OF THE UNUSED MOMENT (Matthew 8:18-22 (continued))

But there was another man who wanted to follow Jesus if Jesus would allow him to go and bury his father first. Jesus answered this: “Follow Me and let the dead bury their dead.” At first glance this phrase may seem very cruel; for a Jew it was a sacred duty to provide a dignified burial for a deceased parent. When Jacob died, Joseph asked Pharaoh for permission to go and bury his father: “My father cursed me, saying: “Behold, I am dying; in my tomb, which I dug for myself in the land of Canaan, bury me there." And now I would like to go and bury my father and return." (Gen. 50.5). Several explanations have been put forward for this statement of Jesus, which at first glance seems stern and unsympathetic.

1. It has been suggested that there was an error in translation from the Aramaic used by Jesus into Greek, and that Jesus was actually saying that a man could leave his father's burial to official gravediggers. There is such a strange phrase in Ezek. 39.15:“And when one of those who go around the earth sees a human bone, he will put a sign near it, until the buryers bury it in the valley of the hordes of Gog.” One gets the impression that there were such officials - burials, and it has been suggested that Jesus is saying here that a man may leave his father's burial to the officials. But such an explanation does not seem justified.

It has been suggested that this is indeed a harsh statement, and that Jesus is thereby clearly saying that the society in which this man lives is dead in sin, and he himself must leave this society as soon as possible, even if this means leaving his father; that nothing, not even such a sacred duty, should delay his formation on the Christian path. But the real explanation undoubtedly has to do with the way the Jews used the phrase, “I must bury my father,” as it is still used today in the East.

The literature contains the following conversation between a missionary in Syria, M. Waldmeier, and an intelligent and wealthy young Turk. M. Waldmeier advised the young man to complete his education by traveling around Europe to broaden his horizons. The Turk replied: “I must first bury my father.” The missionary expressed his condolences and sympathy to the young man regarding the death of his parent. But the Turk explained that his father was in perfect health, and by this expression he meant that he must first fulfill all his obligations towards his parents and relatives before leaving them and going on such a journey; that he cannot leave the house until his father’s death, which, perhaps, will not happen very, very soon.

Without a doubt, this is what the man who spoke to Jesus meant. He wanted to say: “I will follow You someday later, when my father dies and I am free.” He put off following Jesus for many years.

Jesus was wise; He knew human nature well and He knew well that if this person did not follow Him immediately, he would never follow Him. We often have these impulsive moments when we strive for high things, and we often let them pass without doing anything. Very often the tragedy of our lives comes down to the tragedy of an unused moment. An urge to take some action arises in us, an urge to give up some weakness or habit; we want to say something to someone, a word of sympathy or warning or encouragement; but the moment passes, the deed remains imperfect, the vice remains unconquered, the word remains unspoken. And in the best of us there is a good share of lethargy and inertia, a certain habit of putting things off from day to day, some fear, some indecision, and very often the moment of wonderful impulse never translates into action and becomes a reality.

Jesus said to this man: "Now you feel that you must leave this dead society in which you move; you say that you will leave it in many years, when your father dies; leave now or you will not get out of it at all."

The great English science fiction writer Herbert Wells talks in his autobiography about one such critical moment in his life. He was an apprentice to a cloth merchant and it seemed to him that he had no future, or at least very little chance of one. And then one day some inner prophetic voice told him: “Get out of this business before it’s too late; get out at all costs.” He didn't wait and left, and that's why he became a writer.

May God grant us such determination that will save us from the tragedy of an unused moment.

REST IN HIS PRESENCE (Matthew 8:23-27)

In some ways it was a completely typical Sea of ​​Galilee scene. The Sea of ​​Galilee is very small: its length is 21 km from north to south, and its width is 12 km from west to east. The Jordan Valley forms a deep chasm in the earth's surface and the Sea of ​​Galilee is part of this chasm, which is located 208 m below sea level, which provides it with a warm and favorable climate, but this also entails some dangers. On the western side of the lake there are hills with valleys and ravines, and when the westerly wind blows, these valleys and ravines act as kind of giant funnels. The air in them seems to be compressed and rushes out onto the lake with wild force and surprisingly suddenly, so that momentary calm can turn into a furious storm the next moment. Storms on the Sea of ​​Galilee are unique in their suddenness and strength. The English traveler W. G. Thomson describes his impressions on the shores of the Sea of ​​Galilee:

“We pitched our tents on the shore and stayed for three days in a terrible wind. We had to additionally strengthen all the fastening ropes and often had to hang on them with all our weight so that the swaying tent would not be blown away entirely into the air... The whole lake, as far as it was clear that it was raging; the waves often reached our doors and attacked the ropes with such force as if they wanted to carry away the fastening pegs. Moreover, the winds were not only violent, but they came suddenly and often in a completely clear sky. nearby in the hot tubs and before I knew it, it came from the mountains the wind was so strong that I had great difficulty getting to the shore again."

Another Englishman, who spent many years in Galilee, describes one incident this way:

“A group of tourists stood on the shore of Lake Tiberias and, admiring the smoothness of the water surface and the small size of the lake, everyone expressed doubts about the storms described in the Gospels. And almost suddenly the wind blew up. After 20 minutes, the sea was white with foam-covered waves. Large waves of surf crashed against the towers , standing at the corners of the walls, and tourists had to seek refuge from the blinding spray even here, at a distance of almost 200 m from the shore."

The same thing happened then with Jesus and His disciples. The words of the original Greek are very eloquent. Storm, in the Russian Bible excitement, named seismic, what does it mean earthquake. The waves were so high that the boat was covered in waves - kaluptesfay - what does it mean hiding as if in a hole, when the crests of the waves rose above her. Jesus was sleeping.

While reading Mar. 4.1 is visible. That before going out to sea He used the boat as a platform to address people and, without a doubt, he was tired. In fear, the disciples woke him up and the storm subsided.

CALM IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STORM (Mark 8:23-27 (continued))

But this story says a lot more than just calming a storm at sea. If Jesus actually calmed the furious storm on the Sea of ​​Galilee around 28 AD, that would indeed be an amazing fact, but it would have very little to do with us. It would be a story about some isolated miracle that has nothing to do with us, people of the twentieth century. If there were nothing more to the story, we might ask, "Why doesn't He do this now? Why does He allow those who love Him today to drown in a furious sea and not rescue them?" If we see in this story only the story of the calming of storms and bad weather, then problems will arise that can break the hearts of many people.

But there is much more to this story. Its meaning is not that Jesus calmed the storm in Galilee, but that where Jesus is present, the storm of life subsides. This means that in the presence of Jesus the worst storms are calmed.

When the cold, dark wind of sorrow blows, the presence of Jesus Christ gives us peace and comfort. When the heat of passion strikes, the presence of Jesus Christ gives us peace and protection. When a hurricane of doubt tries to tear out the very roots of our faith, in the presence of Jesus Christ we find lasting security. Every storm that shakes the human heart subsides when Jesus Christ is with us.

There is such a wonderful story. In a small mountain village, a teacher was talking about how Jesus calmed the sea. Soon after this a terrible snow storm arose. When school ended, the teacher had to literally drag the children through the storm; they were in real danger. In the middle of the storm, the teacher heard a little boy talking as if to himself: “This Jesus could use us here now.” The child correctly grasped the essence of the story; she must have been a wonderful teacher. This story teaches us that when the storms of life begin to shake our souls, Jesus is always with us and in His presence the fury of the storm turns into a peace that no storm can carry away.

A WORLD FULL OF DEMONS (Matthew 8:28-34)

Before we begin to study this passage in detail, let us try to understand one difficulty that all students of the Gospels face. The Gospel writers were not entirely sure where exactly this event took place. This uncertainty is reflected in the differences between the three Gospels. Matthew says that it took place in the country Gergesinskaya (Matthew 8:28), Mark and Luke say it took place in the country Gadarene (Mark 5:1; Luke 8:26). There is even a great deal of variation between the different copies of each Gospel. In the revised English and German translations of the Bible, made according to the best copies and taking into account all modern scientific research, the event takes place according to Matthew in Gadarene country (in Radar), and according to Mark and Luke - in Gerasenskaya country.

The difficulty is that no one has yet been able to conclusively determine where this place is. It's unlikely that it was Gerasa, because the only Gerasa known to us was located 60 km southeast of the Sea of ​​Galilee, and it is safe to say that Jesus did not go that far from the Sea of ​​Galilee. Almost probably this Radar, because Radar - this is a city that was located at a distance of about 10 km from the Sea of ​​Galilee and it is quite natural that the city’s cemetery and its pastures were located at some distance from the city. Gergesinskaya the country most likely dates back to a correction made by the great third-century Alexandrian scholar Origen, who knew that it could not be Gerasa. He also doubted whether it could be Radar, but he knew for certain that the village of Gergesa was located on the eastern shore of the lake, and therefore decided that this place was called Gergesa. The differences resulted from the fact that none of the scribes of the Holy Scriptures knew Palestine well enough to be sure where it happened.

The miracle itself again confronts us with the idea of ​​demons and those possessed by demons, so typical of the Gospels. The ancient world persistently and undoubtedly believed in evil spirits. In the minds of the ancients, the air was so densely populated with demons that it was impossible to even turn the tip of a needle in the air without disturbing one of them. Some believed that the number of these demons reaches 7.5 million, 10 thousand on the right and left hand of each person, and each of them seems to be just waiting to harm a person. They were believed to live in unclean places such as graves and other places where there was no water for purification. They lived in deserts where you could hear their howls. It was believed that they were especially dangerous for a lonely traveler, a woman in labor, newlyweds, for children leaving the house in the dark, as well as for night travelers. In addition, it was believed that they were especially dangerous during the midday heat and between sunset and sunrise. Male demons were called let's go, female - lilin, named after Lilith. In the minds of the Jews, female demons had long hair and were especially dangerous to children; that's why children had their own guardian angels (cf. Matt. 18:10).

There were different points of view about the origin of demons and demons. Some believed that they had been present since the creation of the world. Others believed that these were the spirits of vicious, evil people who died, but even after death continue to carry out their dirty work. But most often they were associated with a strange story in Life 6.1-8, where it talks about how sinful angels descended to earth and seduced mortal women. And so demons and demons were considered the fruit of this vicious union.

And all illnesses were attributed to these demons and demons, not only like epilepsy and mental illnesses, but also physical illnesses. The Egyptians believed that a person had 36 organs and that a demon could live in each of them. It was believed that one of the demons’ favorite ways to get inside a person was to watch a person while eating and get into him through food.

All this may seem fantastic to us, but the ancients unconditionally believed in demons and demons. If the thought occurred to a person that he was possessed by a demon, he began to show all the symptoms of demonic possession. He could sincerely convince himself that such a demon was sitting inside him. And today a person can convince himself that he is sick, or that something hurts him; This could have happened even more easily in an era when there were many, as we call them, superstitions, and when human knowledge was much more primitive than it is now. Even if there were no such thing as demons, in order for a person to be healed, it was necessary to assume that, at least for him, demons were a very real thing.

EXORCTION OF DEMONS (Matthew 8:28-34 (continued))

When Jesus crossed to the other side of the lake, He was met by two demon-possessed men who lived in the tombs, because, according to them, the demons themselves lived there. These two were so fierce that they posed a danger to passers-by, and a prudent traveler would have kept a respectful distance from them.

W. M. Thomson relates in his book The Earth and the Book that in the nineteenth century he himself saw people exactly like these two demon-possessed people in the tombs at Gadara.

“Today there are very similar cases - terrible and dangerous maniacs who wander the mountains and sleep in caves and tomb crypts. During the most terrible attacks they are completely insane and monstrously strong... Typical of this madness is the refusal of the sick to wear clothes “I have often seen them completely naked on the crowded streets of Beirut and Sidon. There are also cases where the sick rush wildly around the country and scare everyone around.”

Above all, Jesus showed extraordinary courage by stopping to talk to them at all. To find out the details of this story, you need to turn to the Gospel of Mark. Mark's story (Mark 5:1-19) much more detail, but Matthew gives only a brief summary. The story of this miracle caused a lot of controversy and speculation, which mainly concerned the death of a herd of pigs. Many considered this to be at least strange, and the act of Jesus, who destroyed a herd of such animals, heartless.

But in our opinion, you cannot compare the value of an immortal human soul with the value of a herd of pigs. After all, no one will refuse to eat ham for breakfast and pork for lunch. Our sympathy for the plight of pigs does not go so far as to prevent us from eating them; Should we then complain that Jesus restored sanity to two men at the expense of the death of a herd of pigs? This does not mean that we encourage or even turn a blind eye to animal cruelty. Here it remains simply to say that in life one must always maintain a sense of proportion and relative value.

But the most tragic thing in this story is its end. The swineherds ran into the city and reported what had happened, and as a result the people of the city asked Jesus to leave their city immediately.

This is human egoism: these people were not interested and did not care that two people had their minds restored, they only cared that their pigs died. People often say this: “I don’t care what happens to others if it doesn’t harm my benefit, my peace and my comfort.” One can only marvel at the callousness and heartlessness of the inhabitants of the Gadarene land, but we also should not be indignant if helping others requires us to give up some of your privileges.

1–4. Healing a leper. – 5–13. Healing of the centurion's servant. – 14–17. Healing of Peter's mother-in-law and many other sick people. – 18–22. A story about people who wanted to follow Christ. – 23–27. Taming the storm on Lake Galilee. – 28–34. Healing of the Gadarene demoniacs.

Matthew 8:1. When He came down from the mountain, many people followed Him.

“Multitude of people” (ὄχλοι πολλοί). Explaining this expression, John Chrysostom says that Christ was now followed not by any of the rulers and scribes, but only by those who were alien to guile and had a sincere disposition. Throughout the Gospel one can see that only these latter cleave to Him. So when He spoke, they listened silently and did not add anything to His words, and did not look for an opportunity to catch Him, like the Pharisees, and at the end of the sermon they followed Him in amazement. The people in the New Testament are also called πλῆθος, which means “many”, sometimes with the addition πολύ (Mark 3:7), which means “a great multitude” or “a multitude of people” (πλῆθος τοῦ λαοῦ), or “the whole multitude” (πᾶν τὸ πλῆθος), and as in the case under consideration, ὄχλος. For an explanation of this word, see the commentary on Matt. 5:1.

Matthew 8:2. And then a leper came up and, bowing to Him, said: Lord! if you want, you can cleanse me.

(Compare Mark 1:40; Luke 5:12.)

Mark tells about the same healing of a leper (Mark 1:40–45), as does Matthew, with significant digressions and in a slightly different connection. Luke (Luke 5:12–14) says that the leper was healed in the city, and not just on the way from the mountain. Therefore, it is assumed that these events took place in this order. When Jesus Christ came down from the mountain, he went to Capernaum. On the way, He entered a city, which is unknown, where a leper met Him and He healed Him. He then continued His journey and arrived at Capernaum. The leper probably was not on the mountain and did not hear His sermon. This idea is actively supported by Chrysostom and other interpreters. According to his “prudence” and “faith,” the leper “did not interrupt the teaching, did not try to force his way through the meeting, but waited for a convenient time, and arrived already when Christ came down from the mountain. And not simply, but with great fervor, he fell on his knees before Christ, as Luke tells about this, and asked Him for healing.”

Leprosy was a terrible disease that still occurs today, and not only in hot countries. In ancient times, it was considered incurable, although laws were established “on the cleansing of lepers,” which, of course, there would be no need to establish if all lepers were irrevocably sentenced to death. Leprosy was, in any case, one of the most serious diseases. Some consider it non-contagious and prove this by the fact that Naaman was a leper and, however, served as a military commander for the Syrian king; Gehazi, although a leper, speaks with the king of Israel (2 Kings 8:4–5). The priests had to examine the lepers carefully, but nowhere was it visible that they were infected with leprosy. The opinions of modern scientists are also cited as proof of the non-contagiousness of leprosy. However, the precautions against it taken by both Jews and residents of other countries show that it cannot be considered completely non-contagious. The disease affected the members of the body, they rotted and fell off, the teeth became loose and fell out, the palate collapsed. While alive, every leper was considered a living death, had to behave as if he were dead, and everyone had to treat him as if he were dead. Every leper was unclean.

Christ, as usual, treated the leper with love. Some explain the meaning of his request like this: if You want, then cleanse me; You can do it. This is supposedly required by the conditional particle ἐάν, indicating the future tense or some possible event. According to Tsang, the expression: “if you want,” indicates the leper’s doubt in the inclination of Jesus Christ to perform the healing. The doubt stemmed from the very nature of his illness. It is difficult, of course, to judge how it was in reality; the original does not give any right to speak either for or against such interpretations. Origen explains the leper’s request better and more artlessly: “Lord! Everything is done through You; for if You want, You will have the opportunity to cleanse me. Your will is the work, and everything obeys Your will. You cleansed Naaman the Syrian from leprosy before, and if you want, you can cleanse me too.”

Matthew 8:3. Jesus, stretching out his hand, touched him and said: I want you to be clean. And he was immediately cleansed from leprosy.

(Compare Mark 1:41–43; Luke 5:13.)

The last expression is literally: “and immediately his leprosy was cleansed.” Luke's expressions are almost literally similar to those of Matthew (in the Greek text); Mark adds: “having mercy on him.” To heal the leper, the Savior reached out His hand and touched him, this was prohibited by Jewish law. But here is Jesus Christ, to prove that He “heals not as a slave, but as a Lord, He touches” (St. John Chrysostom). Elisha, according to John Chrysostom, did not go out to the leper Naaman, keeping the law. But the hand of the Lord did not become unclean by touching the leper, while the body of the leper became clean from the holy hand. The Lord, speaking in words spoken by the leper himself, answers: “I want, be cleansed.” In the first case, the verb “cleanse” was used by the leper himself exactly in the active voice, in the last two – in the passive voice. Jerome notes that one cannot read along with “many Latins”: “I want to purify” (volo mundare), but separately; First Christ said: “I want,” and then he commandingly says: “Cleanse yourself.” We must look at the healing of the leper, quick, miraculous, as an actual historical fact, and not as an allegory that had a symbolic meaning. Christ now moves, according to Matthew, from teaching to miracles. Much has been said about the fact that miracles were performed by Christ in order to confirm His teaching. But here, at least, the command to the leper not to say anything about the miracle indicates the opposite.

Matthew 8:4. And Jesus said to him: See that you do not tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded as a testimony to them.

(Compare Mark 1:44; Luke 5:14.)

The healed person should simply go to the priest in silence. Not the words, but the deed itself, the very miracle of healing the leper, should have testified about Christ both before the people and before the priests. This was the direct command. The indirect idea was that the leper should remain silent about the miracle. “And indeed, what necessity was it for the leper to communicate in speech what his body testified to?” (Jerome). The Savior requires the announcement of a miracle by deed, not by word - and first of all to the priests, in order to gain access to Israeli society, in accordance with the legal regulations set forth in the book of Leviticus (Lev. 14).

The leper had to go to Jerusalem, present himself there to the priests for examination and make the prescribed sacrifices. The expression “for a witness to them” is not very specific, because it is not known who exactly is meant by “them.” Some say that this generally means all the people who could see the leper and with whom he could enter into communication. A much larger number of interpreters accept that only priests are meant here. This is the opinion of St. John Chrysostom and many others, and the testimony of the healed person should have consisted either in the fact that Jesus Christ observed legal regulations, or simply in a statement of recovery. That the plural “im” refers to the class of priests, Tsang considers natural and grammatically indisputable (cf. Luke 23:50, next – βουλευτὴς αὐτῶν; also 2:22; Rom. 3:1–2). In Jerome, the uncertainty of speech is eliminated by introducing into the text and interpretation the word sacerdotibus (priests).

Matthew 8:5. When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him and asked Him:

(Compare Luke 7:1.)

There is a strong discrepancy between the accounts of Matthew and Luke here. The best explanation of this discrepancy is given by Augustine and Calvin. The first suggests that Matthew's purpose was to highlight the centurion's faith. Therefore, historical details and accurate reporting of events were not important to him. Luke, on the contrary, aimed to convey exactly the historical fact itself. Calvin notes that the difference in the stories is simply insignificant (nihil), although it, of course, exists, as can be seen from his own words, because an insignificant difference is still a difference. According to Morison, Matthew did not want to give a scientific account of the fact. For the evangelist's eyes, the centurion “was truly present near the Lord through his subjects.”

We will stick here to the story as it is given in Matthew. The centurion, apparently, approached the Savior on His way through the streets of Capernaum. One might even think that this was not at the beginning, but at the very end of the journey, when Christ was already near the centurion’s house. The evangelist missed the words of the messengers and was forced to put them into the mouth of the centurion himself. That this does not in any way harm the accuracy of the historical narrative is evident from the fact that in both Matthew and Luke the words belong to the centurion himself.

Only little can be said about the latter’s personality. Since there is no news that Roman troops were stationed in Capernaum at that time, one must think that the centurion served with Herod Antipas, whose troops, according to Josephus, consisted of mercenaries. Centurions are called in the Gospels and Acts ἑκατοντάρχος, χης or κεντυρίων (centurio, Mark 15:39, 44–45). The Roman legions were divided into 10 cohorts (Acts 10:1), or regiments, each cohort having three maniples, and each maniple consisting of hundreds; if this number decreased, a hundred did not cease to be a hundred. Each legion had 60 hundreds. The centurion was obviously a pagan. This, according to Tsang, is self-explanatory and constitutes the essence of the story. They even think that Matthew deliberately placed two stories side by side - about the healing of a leper and a pagan servant, who were both unclean from a ritual point of view. The centurion could be unclean even if he were a Jew, because the Jews, if they joined armies consisting of foreign soldiers, then, according to the testimony of Josephus, were considered as publicans. But he probably belonged to the pagans who were inclined towards Judaism and took an active part in the worship of the synagogue. The ruins of the synagogue built by the centurion in Capernaum are still pointed out today.

Matthew 8:6. God! my servant lies at home in relaxation and suffers cruelly.

Matthew 8:7. Jesus says to him: I will come and heal him.

Literally: “my boy is stricken in the house, paralyzed, terribly tormented.” Regarding the Greek word for “boy” (παῖς), it should be said that it is also used in the sense of “son,” as it is translated in other places (John 4:51; Acts 3:13, 26), and “slave” or “servant” in Luke (Luke 12:45, 15:26). In the passage under consideration, this word undoubtedly means “slave”, because it is explained this way in Luke (Luke 7 - δοῦλος). The name of the disease is uncertain. Referring to 1 Mac. 9:55–56, Alford says it may have been tetanus, which ancient physicians confused with paralysis. This disease is more common in hot countries than here. According to Luke, the boy was dying. They thought that this was the reason why the centurion himself did not appear to Christ asking for his healing. But John Chrysostom does not agree with this explanation, believing that the centurion’s non-arrival was as much a matter of his faith as his words. This was, according to Jerome, the first paralytic healed by Christ. Matthew's description of the illness does not contradict Luke's testimony (Luke 7:2), but Matthew's is somewhat more detailed and precise.

Matthew 8:8. The centurion, answering, said: Lord! I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will recover;

(Compare Luke 7:6–7.)

In Luke, the centurion’s “unworthiness” is presented as the reason not only for the fact that he does not ask Christ to come to his house, but also for the fact that he himself did not come to Christ.

Matthew 8:9. for I am a subordinate man, but, having soldiers under my command, I say to one: go, and he goes; and to another: come, and he comes; and to my servant: Do this, and he does.

(Compare Luke 7:8.)

Already the ancient interpreters paid attention to the arrangement of words (in the Greek text). If in the Slavic text a comma is placed after “I am a man” (ἐγὼ ἄνθρωπός εἰμι), then it should be translated as follows: I am a man who has warriors under my authority, etc.; if after the expression “under authority”, then the expression will mean that the centurion himself is under authority (“subordinate”, as in Russian), and, being under authority, has “under him” (in Russian translation - “in submission” ), i.e. also under his authority, and warriors. The latter opinion is shared by St. John Chrysostom. The meaning of the centurion’s speech will be more understandable if we relate the beginning of verse 9 to λόγῳ (“word”) of verse 8 and consider verse 9 as a continuation of this expression. The centurion thought that the “word” of Christ was subject to Him. It is under His authority and He has authority over it. Thus the continuation becomes clear. The “Word” of Christ is under His authority or in His power, for I am also under the authority... The centurion compares himself not with Christ Himself, but with His Word. It is more difficult to explain “because” (γάρ). It has a very subtle and almost imperceptible meaning here. We can present the centurion’s speech in such a common paraphrase: “Your word is under Your authority, You dispose of it according to Your will. Why? Because (γάρ) I know this from my own experience. You are not under power, I am under power. However, if I say only one word, they obey me.”

Matthew 8:10. When Jesus heard this, he was surprised and said to those following Him, “Truly I say to you, even in Israel I have not found such faith.”

(Compare Luke 7:9.)

There is no exaggeration in Christ's words, because the centurion was one of the first fruits of the pagan harvest, which would be abundant and surpass the harvest of Israel. The explanation of the words can be found in part in Matt. 11:11; OK. 7:28. Here “Christ already makes it known to everyone that salvation comes from faith, and not only from works of the law.”

Matthew 8:11. I tell you that many will come from the east and the west and lie down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven;

It is rightly noted that the Savior here did not directly mention the pagans, which would be offensive to the Jews, but expressed it descriptively: “many from the east and west” (literally: “from the east and west”). This particular case gives reason to take a prophetic look at the future, when pagans will be crowded into the Church of Christ. This prophecy has been fulfilled and is being fulfilled literally. The faith of only one pagan who lived among Israel gave rise to its utterance. What follows is a depiction of the Messianic feast, of course, only metaphorical. This metaphor about the Messianic feast, as Edersheim and others show, was common among the Jews. The features that depict the Messianic feast were borrowed by Christ from contemporary customs when arranging feasts. It does not say “they will sit down,” but “they will lie down.” Reclining at a feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob was the highest happiness that a Jew could imagine in the days of the Messiah, and it was not so much worldly as spiritual.

Matthew 8:12. and the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness: there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 8:13. And Jesus said to the centurion, Go, and as you have believed, so be it done to you. And his servant was healed at that hour.

The preaching of the kingdom began among the Jews, and in this sense they were recognized sons of the kingdom (ὑιοί), but since they did not want to enter it, they were rejected. The expression: “outer darkness” is found only in Matthew (cf. Matthew 22:13, 25:30). By external darkness one can most closely understand “darkness outside the house” - this figurative expression indicates the dark street of a dirty eastern city and the position of a person outside the kingdom. The expression: “there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth” is characteristic of Matthew (cf. Matt. 13:42, 50, 22:13, 24:51, 25:30) and is found only once in Luke (Luke 13:28). The article before the words “crying” and “grinding,” according to Bengel, is significant: in real life, grief is not yet grief. The article is used because it probably refers to some real facts accessible to general observation in Jewish life at that time. It is clear that this expression has a figurative meaning here: in the next world there will be no crying and gnashing of teeth, but only torment.

Matthew 8:14. Arriving at the house of Peter, Jesus saw his mother-in-law lying in a fever,

Matthew 8:15. and he touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she arose and ministered to them.

(Compare Mark 1:29–30; Luke 4:38.)

Literally: “I saw his mother-in-law, defeated and suffering from a fever.” The time when this was, Matthew does not indicate precisely, and, reading his Gospel, anyone can think that it was after Christ’s descent from the mountain and departure to Capernaum; On the way, a leper approached him, then the centurion asked for the servant to be healed, and finally, He arrived in Capernaum and immediately entered Peter’s house. The amendment made by Mark makes it possible to see that the healing of the centurion's servant and Peter's mother-in-law are events told by Matthew not in chronological order and not closely related in time. According to Mark, the miracle in Peter's house took place “immediately” or “soon” (εὐθύς) after Jesus Christ left the synagogue where he was teaching (Mark 1:21–22) and healed the demoniac (Mark 1:23–28 ). Luke’s story also agrees with this, although the expressions are different (Luke 4:31–39). The last mentioned events took place, according to Mark, immediately after the calling of some disciples (Mark 1:17-20; cf. Matthew 4:19-22). By saying “soon” (Mark 1:29), Mark also wanted to indicate time. Matthew only spoke about the miracle, without indicating the time (St. John Chrysostom). Another difference is that Christ was asked to come to Simon's house (Mark 1:30; Luke 4:38), but Matthew is silent about this.

Regarding the fact that Peter had a mother-in-law and that, therefore, he was married, Theophylact notes that “marriage does not interfere with virtue, for the first of the apostles had a mother-in-law.” In the same house, in addition to Peter, his wife (whom the evangelists do not mention) and mother-in-law, lived his brother, Andrew (Mark 1:29). If John (John 1:44) says that Peter and Andrew were from Bethsaida, then there is no contradiction with the present story. There were two Bethsaidas, one (Julia) - on the northeastern side of Lake Galilee, the other, Galilean, on the western, or, better, northwestern. The latter, as Edersheim believes, was a suburb of Capernaum, and the name means “house of fishing,” i.e. fishing town or fishing settlement. There will be no contradiction even if Capernaum is identified with Khan-Miniya, and Bethsaida with the modern village of AinTabiga, about two-thirds of a mile (about one verst) north of Khan-Miniya, because even then Bethsaida would be almost a suburb of Capernaum ( Tell Huma).

The illness from which Peter's mother-in-law suffered is not clearly defined. The description of the disease in Matthew is stronger than in Mark (in the latter κατέκειτο lay, instead of βεβλημένη). The word πυρέσσουσα from πύρ - fire, has a connection with the Latin word febris - fever, but this disease, obviously, was severe, and it is better to translate the word “fever”, in general some kind of inflammatory process that made the patient suffer greatly (which explains the treatment to Christ) and to be cast down on the bed – βεβλημένη.

Matthew 8:16. When evening came, they brought many demon-possessed people to Him, and He cast out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick,

(Compare Mark 1:32–34; Luke 4:40–41.)

Matthew's speech is shortened compared to Mark and Luke. From the messages of the last two evangelists it can be deduced that it was in the evening of the day when Jesus Christ taught in the synagogue. This was on the Sabbath (Mark 1:21; Luke 4:31). This explains why the sick were brought or brought to Christ only in the evening, since on the Sabbath itself neither treatment nor treatment was allowed. To the words of Matthew: “when evening came,” Mark adds: “when the sun went down”; also that all the people gathered at the “doors” (to the door); that the sick suffered from "various diseases" and that Christ "did not allow the demons to say that they knew that He was the Christ." Luke also has additions, partly the same as in Mark, and partly different: Christ laid hands on the sick, and demons came out (not from all), but “from many,” and exclaimed: “Thou art the Christ, the Son of God.” This last addition, although indirectly, throws light on the reason why the Savior forbade the demons to call Himself so. It obviously consisted in the reluctance of demons to proclaim Him the Son of God. As for the reason why Matthew mentions the demon-possessed first of all, this is explained by the fact that on this Saturday morning Christ healed a demon-possessed man (Mark 1:23-27), and this aroused a great movement among the people. Thus, from a comparison of the testimony of the evangelists, a more or less complete picture is obtained of what the evangelist Matthew briefly talks about in the passage in question. It is very important to note that for the true and omnipotent Healer there seemed to be no restrictions in the manifestation of His miraculous power. Luke's expression (Luke 4:41) ἀπὸ πολλῶν (“out of many,” but not all who were demon-possessed, demons came out) does not in itself indicate the limitations of the manifestation of divine power, and it should be interpreted in accordance with the testimony of other evangelists who claim that Christ healed “all” (πάντας) the sick, who actually “had bad things” or felt bad. And among ordinary people there are healers, but usually not all who resort to them receive healing, so in some cases it is quite possible to explain the healing even by natural causes. But it’s a different matter when not only “many” are healed, but “all”; such a fact cannot be explained by any natural causes, but as if the unintentional pointing out to it by the evangelists can serve for apologetics as one of the strongest proofs of the presence in Christ of extraordinary divine miraculous power.

Matthew 8:17. that what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled, saying: He took upon Himself our infirmities and bore our sicknesses.

The passage is taken from Deutero-Isaiah 53:4, which the evangelist calls Isaiah, in the language of his time. The circumstance that the passage from the evangelist is borrowed from Deutero-Isaiah 53:4 is not “not important,” but must be significant for scientific exegesis. All exegetes agree that the passage of Isaiah is given here not according to the translation of the Seventy, but according to the Hebrew text, and, moreover, “independently” of any translations and interpretations. In Isaiah this passage reads like this: “Truly He lifted up our illnesses and bore them our sufferings (tortures”). In translating this passage, the Seventy replaced the Hebrew expression “our sicknesses” (“halaynu”) with the word “sins” (ἁμαρτίας). Whether the reason for this was the translators’ misunderstanding of the Hebrew text or whether it was due to the difficulty of translating the Hebrew words (“halaynu” and “makovna”), which have almost the same meaning, cannot currently be said with certainty. But the evangelist in his translation did not mention “sins”, but translated the word “halainu” through “infirmities”, and translated the Hebrew word “nasha”, which means to lift upon oneself, through ἔλαβεν - took, in contrast to having the same with “ours” " meaning of the Hebrew "sabal", which he translated with the word "carried" (ἐβάστασεν). But no matter how we translate this passage, the difficulty lies not in the translation, but in the application of this passage to the circumstances just described by the evangelist. He just spoke about Christ’s healings of the demon-possessed and the sick, and this gives him a reason to cite the said prophecy of Isaiah. In what sense can we understand that, by healing the sick, Christ took upon Himself our infirmities and illnesses? Did He Himself suffer and be sick, or was it only the sight of human suffering that caused His own suffering to occur in Him? Or is the prophecy given by the evangelist in the sense that His own strength was wasted on healings and He suffered from fatigue and exhaustion? All these questions were raised at different times and were resolved, as one would expect, differently - in the affirmative sense. One exegete solves the problem this way: Jesus Christ healed the sick, as the healings just told show. By doing this, He “took and bore” illnesses in every sense in which this can be said of a doctor. The translator chooses two colorless words λαμβάνειν and βαστάζειν to express the Hebrew text.

To clarify this matter somewhat, let us say that the words of the evangelist are a conclusion and generalization of what he said earlier. If, therefore, earlier he set out the details, now he expresses a general view, bringing the particulars to unity. If the evangelist, which is likely, was an eyewitness to the works of Christ, then this evening, in connection with the subsequent activities and sufferings of the Savior, reminded him of the words of the prophet Isaiah. The evangelist did not understand them scientifically, like modern critics who see in the “Man of Sorrows” the prophet Isaiah a person responsible for the people before the avengers, who demand for an insult the extradition of one person as a defendant for a common guilt, with a threat, in case of failure to fulfill this demand, to exterminate everyone, as required by ancient concepts of revenge. The evangelist, citing a prophecy from Deutero-Isaiah, first of all points to the ideal sufferer - the Servant of Jehovah, predicted by the prophet. But the Personality predicted by the prophet is not something abstractly ideal for the evangelist; it is fully embodied in the Servant of Jehovah, whom the evangelist saw before him, i.e. in Jesus Christ. The ideal Servant of Jehovah foretold by Isaiah is the literal Savior of His people. By His suffering He saves, delivers from torment and suffering His tribe, His people, who should have perished if there had not been such a replacement. The embodiment of the ideal Sufferer, predicted by the prophet, in the person of Christ has not one or two, but many sides, and the evangelist wants to present these sides clearly to his readers. As we have seen, before the Savior sets out for the work of public service, a messenger appears before Him, “the voice of one crying in the wilderness,” exactly corresponding to φωνὴ βοῶντος ἐν τῇ ἐρήμῳ (Isa. 40:3, see comments on Matt. 3:3). The rapprochement of Christ with the Servant of Jehovah depicted in Isaiah can be observed further, in the circumstances of baptism and temptation. Now the same Servant of Jehovah appears before us, but only from completely new sides - coming into contact with human infirmities, illnesses and suffering, from which He frees people. Since the Servant of Jehovah in the prophet is undoubtedly portrayed as such a Person who takes our infirmities and bears our illnesses, this gives the evangelist, with a new rapprochement between the Servant of Jehovah predicted by Isaiah and the real Christ, to attribute to Christ the same traits that were characteristic of the Servant of Jehovah in Isaiah. The meaning of this was that if Christ healed diseases, it meant that He took responsibility for them before God, made people innocent and, therefore, not subject to illnesses and infirmities, transferring the guilt of the people onto Himself and thus exposing Himself its consequences. This is not yet quite clear from the passage in Matthew under consideration. Here, one might say, only the beginning of the illnesses of the Messiah is depicted, which should end in the literal fulfillment of the prophecy - in His suffering and death on the Cross. Thus, in the 3rd, 4th and 8th chapters of Matthew we can observe a very subtly but clearly conveyed main idea - about the Servant of Jehovah suffering for humanity. This idea is also carried out, but not so clearly, in the 1st and 2nd chapters of Matthew, where the origin and stay in Egypt of the same Servant of Jehovah is actually depicted; and, perhaps, even in the Sermon on the Mount, where His characteristic “power of spirit” is depicted. The entire subsequent gospel story outlined in Matthew also points to the Servant of Jehovah. The rapprochement of the Servant Isaiah with Christ in the verse under consideration is not, therefore, mechanical, but has a deep inner and hidden meaning, corresponding to the idea of ​​the Gospel. The evangelist now sees in the activity of Christ participation in our weaknesses and illnesses and in this sense applies the prophecy of Isaiah to Him in view of the great similarity of the ideal sufferer with Christ. With this interpretation, it becomes clearer why the Seventy replaced the prophet’s “sicknesses” with “sins.” Jehovah's servant, as an atoning Sacrifice, is not actually responsible for illnesses, but for sins that bring vengeance on people because of the insulted “truth” (cf. Matt. 3:15).

Matthew 8:18. When Jesus saw a large crowd around Him, He ordered [the disciples] to sail to the other side.

(Compare Mark 4:35–36; Luke 8:22.)

According to Mark and Luke, the departure was in the evening of the day when Jesus Christ spoke to the people in parables. The fact itself is reported by all the evangelists in agreement, although each has differences in details. The simple “commanded” found in Matthew is replaced in Mark and Luke by the actual speech of the Savior, indicating that it was at evening.

Matthew 8:19. Then one scribe came up and said to Him: Teacher! I will follow You wherever You go.

(Compare Luke 9:57.)

The verbs indicating “departure” in verses 18 and 19 are the same, but in different tenses - ἀπελθεῖν and ἀπέρχῃ. Russian translators rendered the verb in verse 18 ἀπελθεῖν more in meaning than in its actual meaning, because this verb does not actually mean “to sail,” but simply “to depart” or “to depart.” But if the path is by water, then, of course, the verb also means “to sail.” The scribe who approached Christ used the same Greek verb, and this means that he asked Christ to take him with Him into the boat when leaving for the other side. Luke talks about the same circumstance, but again in a different connection, and at the same time it is indicated that it was on the “way,” that is, on the road to the lake. A formal, but not real, contradiction that cannot be eliminated. That there really is no real contradiction here is clearly shown by Augustine when he says: “If, according to Matthew, this (i.e. the scribe’s request) was when Christ ordered to cross the lake, and according to Luke, when they (i.e. .e. Christ and the disciples) walked along the road, then there is no contradiction here, because in both cases they walked along the road to approach the lake.” In any case, one cannot decisively conclude from Matthew’s testimony that the request was not on the way, but near the lake itself. But one might think that verses 19–22 were inserted here by Matthew out of connection and that the correct connection is in Luke. It could be that the thought of the Savior as a carrier of diseases inspired or reminded Matthew of the words of Christ about the homelessness of the Son of Man, and in order to prove this, he cites one incident from the life of the Savior, and in connection with it another (verse 21), somewhat different from the first. To what has been said, it must be added that Luke reports not about two persons who wanted to accompany the Savior, but about three (Luke 9:61–62 - the third).

The word “one” has an obvious relation to the “other” of verse 21 and is a simple enumeration of the persons who approached Christ with a request. However, Blass (Gram., S. 140) and WienerSchmiedel (S. 243) believe that “one” is used here in the sense of the indefinite pronoun “some” (τις), which is quite understandable, since numerals are often used in this sense . The scribe calls the Savior Teacher, the Greek word taken from the usual Hebrew (Aramaic), which expressed respect for persons who knew how to teach or taught well. The reasons that prompted the scribe to turn to Christ with a request for permission to follow Him are defined differently. Hilary of Pictavia, in whose interpretation there is much allegorical, gives here, however, an interesting and witty explanation. “This scribe is one of the teachers of the law, he asks whether to follow it; as if there were no indication in the law that it was Christ who could profitably be followed. Thus the scribe expressed his disbelief in an incredulous question, because the believer should not ask, but follow.” This opinion has its reasons. The scribes, Jewish scholars, devoted themselves to the study of the scriptures. But while studying their letter, they lost understanding of their spirit. Christ's further speech shows that He did not believe the scribe's sincerity.

Matthew 8:20. And Jesus said to him: The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.

(Compare Luke 9:58.)

In Luke, “says” is replaced by the word “said,” otherwise the verse is literally similar to that considered in Matthew. From this verse it is clearer than from the previous one that one can see why the Savior rejected the scribe. The latter saw the greatness of the miracles performed by Christ, and wanted, as Jerome, Theophylact and others believe, to follow Him in order to receive profit from this, wanting exactly the same thing that the sorcerer wanted to receive from Peter and Simon. The fact that the scribe really had earthly benefits in mind can be deduced from the very words of Jesus Christ, in which they rightly indicate His poverty - “Son of Man.” This name is often found in the New Testament, according to Zahn - in Matthew 30 times (according to others - 33 times), in Mark 13 times (according to others - 14, and Mark 8 is no exception), in Luke 24 times, in John 12 times (according to others - 11). This name is not found at all in the Apostle Paul; in Acts only once (Acts 7:56). When looking at the passages related here, you can see that other people never called Jesus Christ the Son of Man, with the only exception (John 12:34), where the people only repeat the expression of Christ Himself. He calls Himself the Son of Man only Himself. The name is never used as a predicate, but always either as a subject or as an object. The meanings in which it is used can be divided into three groups:

1) it generally points to the earthly life of Jesus Christ (examples: Mark 2:10, 2:28; Matt. 8:20; Luke 19:10);

2) on His suffering life and death (examples: Mark 8:31, 9:31, 14:21);

3) for His glory in the present and future (examples: Matt. 24:30, 25:31).

It can now be considered proven, after the work of numerous scholars who have been engaged in the study of this subject, that the expression “Son of Man” in the days of Christ was not a popular name for the Messiah. But the expression was well known in the Old Testament and was used there either to denote human weakness, imperfection, helplessness, dependence on God, etc. (for example, Ps. 8 and often in Ezekiel, in whose book this title is applied to the prophet up to eighty times), or greatness (Dan. 7:13–14). If, as has been said, the expression “Son of Man” was not the name of the Messiah in the days of Christ, then it could, however, pass into popular speech and, being popular, could be borrowed by Christ and applied to Himself. In what sense? Many theories have been proposed in response to this question. But the most probable and best explanation of the matter seems to be the one according to which the work of Christ on earth was the foundation and establishment of the Divine Kingdom on earth; He Himself proclaimed Himself as the King of this Kingdom. The ideal King was presented in Daniel (Dan. 7:13-14), but this idea of ​​Christ, to whom was given power, glory and kingdom, was combined with the idea of ​​the Man of Sorrows or the suffering Servant of Jehovah in the prophet Isaiah. Christ applies to Himself all these ideas - the Old Testament idea of ​​human weakness, helplessness and dependence on God, the idea of ​​​​the prophet Daniel's full of glory and power, and the idea of ​​Jehovah's suffering Servant Isaiah, expressing all these three ideas in the words “Son of Man.” For the immediate listeners of Christ, such a name could not seem like the name of the Messiah, but was associated with expressions familiar to Jewish ears. Among the idioms of the Hebrew language is the use of the words “son” (“ben”, “bar”) and “daughter” (“bat”), “house” (“bet”) in such cases where in other languages ​​these words are not at all are used. Thus, the expression “ben-adam” (the same as the Son of Man) could not contain anything unusual for outsiders. But in the mouth of Christ it was a covert name for Him as the Messiah and a designation of His messianic dignity, and precisely in its three indicated senses, as a representative of humanity, the King of the Kingdom and the suffering Servant of Jehovah. The best proof that this was really the case, that Christ, calling Himself the Son of Man, proclaimed Himself precisely as the Messiah, is that this expression was subsequently truly understood in the messianic sense by His disciples.

Matthew 8:21. Another of His disciples said to Him: Lord! let me first go and bury my father.

(Compare Luke 9:59.)

Why such a request was made to Christ is not clear from Matthew. Luke's addition makes it clearer. According to Luke, Christ Himself said to one of His disciples (αὐτοῦ is missing, however, in some codes): “Follow Me.” In response to this, the disciple said the words given almost identically in both Matthew and Luke (instead of μοι πρῶτον ἀπελθόντι θάψαι (and so on). This story is given by Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, III), and it says that the Lord spoke these words to Philip. But such an addition can hardly be considered accurate. They think that this was some person from among the disciples of Christ in the broad sense, and not from those who belonged to the 12. the disciple did not ask Christ whether he should follow Him, but only asked Him to allow him to delay following, because he had no doubt that he should follow (Hilary, it is clear that he could not take part only in the journey and crossing). to the eastern shore of the lake. His request was, as Alford noted, very reasonable and honorable, if we omit the word πρῶτον (before).

Matthew 8:22. But Jesus said to him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”

(Compare Luke 9:60.)

“Come (follow) Me,” Matthew places the words omitted in verse 21 and found in Luke here. It could be that the disciple followed Christ to the shore of the lake, but when he saw that Christ wanted to cross to the other side, he asked Him for permission to return to bury (θάψαί) his father. The Savior responds to this natural and legitimate request, apparently with a callous refusal. But it should be noted that in other cases, the Savior placed love for Himself above love for father, mother and closest relatives. Matthew also talks about this (cf. Matthew 19:29, 12:48–50). If Jesus Christ invited the disciple to follow Him, leaving the deceased (as can be seen from the speech itself) father and leaving his burial to other persons, then this did not in any way eliminate or weaken filial feelings, but only replaced them with higher ones - love for Himself. Thus, the invitation of the Savior does not give rise to any moral difficulties on our part.

A much more difficult question is what He means by “dead” in the first case (“leave ἄφες to the dead to bury their dead”). The second word “dead” is not difficult; it can be understood in the literal sense. But what does the first word mean? This question is resolved in different ways. Theophylact says that the father of the petitioner was an “unbeliever” or “infidel” (ἄπιστος) and that this is clear from the words “leave to the dead,” that is, Theophylact explains, “to the unbelievers.” But if those who buried them were “unbelievers,” then how does it follow that the father was also an “unbeliever”? Augustine explains the Savior’s answer somewhat differently. The Savior said something like this: “Your father is dead; there are also (autem) other dead who will bury their dead, because they are unbelievers.” Here, unbelief is attributed not to the father of the petitioner, but only to the burying ones. The newest exegetes repeat this thought of Augustine in different ways. Thus, Meyer believes that in the first case νεκρούς means “spiritually dead” (cf. Matthew 4c John 5:21, 25 and Luke 15:24) and cites a passage from Origen, according to which ψυχὴ ἐν κακίᾳ οὖσα νεκρ ά ἐστιν – the soul that remains in evil is dead. Alford and others agree with Meyer. This interpretation can be considered generally accepted and widespread. But if in both cases, or only in one of them, we replace “dead” with the word “unbelievers,” then should we not infer from this that Christ’s speech was contemptuous and insulting to the disciple whom He had just invited to follow Him? Could this disciple understand it in the sense that Christ by “dead” means “spiritually dead”, “those who are in evil” and “unbelievers”? A way out of this difficulty is hardly possible even if we assume that Christ’s expression was a “proverb”, the meaning of which is: “turn away from the past when the present requires your attention.” If we accept this interpretation, then we can think that Christ did not speak about the dead at all. But this is hardly true. Further, there is no evidence to suggest that the expression in question was a proverb. It seems to us that the matter can be explained if instead of the word “dead” in the first case we put the word “mortal”. The Greeks apparently made little distinction between these concepts. The word that can be translated through “mortal” is θανατόεις and θνητός. Although it cannot be proven that νεκρός in the first case here means “mortal,” the meaning of Christ’s words will be completely understandable only if this word is interpreted in the indicated sense. In any case, “spiritually dead” - this concept was more sophisticated to the ears of the then disciples of Christ than simply “mortal” - this concept is, moreover, almost identical with “spiritually dead”. According to word usage in the New Testament, νεκρός sometimes means not dead, but living, although once dead (see Luke 7:15, 15:24; Acts 20:9; 1 Thess. 4:16).

Matthew 8:23. And when He entered the boat, His disciples followed Him.

(Compare Mark 4:35–36; Luke 8:22.)

This verse resumes the thread of the story, interrupted from the 19th verse by the insertion about persons who wanted to follow Christ, and this brings the testimony of Matthew closer to the testimony of Mark and Luke. It is necessary to imagine the matter in such a way that the Savior first entered the boat, the same one that was prepared at His command (verse 18), as indicated by the article before the word “boat” (τὸ πλοῖον), however, omitted in some codes and publications. Judging by the fact that, in addition to Christ, His disciples and, as they think, other persons also entered the boat (ἄνθρωποι - verse 27), it was quite roomy. Mark: “They took Him with them, as He was in the boat.” By disciples, some do not mean the 12 apostles on the grounds that they are called in the Gospel of Matthew οἱ δῶδεκα (Matthew 10:1–2, 5, 11:1, 20:17, 26:14, 20, 47). But in further speech those who entered the boat are also called disciples (cf. Matthew 10 - τοὺς δῶδεκα μαθητάς; Matthew 11 the same; Matthew 12 - simply οἱ μαθηταί, etc.). If, according to the testimony of other evangelists, the journey took place after the utterance of parables, then it is not incredible that exactly 12 disciples entered the boat. Theophylact even says that the Savior “kept only some of the disciples so that they could see the miracle.” Origen notes that, having performed great and amazing miracles on land, Jesus Christ goes to the sea to show even more excellent deeds there - to the extent that here He shows Himself as the Lord of earth and sea.

Matthew 8:24. And behold, there was a great disturbance on the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves; and He was sleeping.

Matthew 8:25. Then His disciples, approaching Him, woke Him up and said: Lord! save us, we are perishing.

Matthew 8:26. And he says to them: Why are you so fearful, you of little faith? Then, getting up, he rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great silence.

(Compare Mark 4:39–40; Luke 8:24–25.)

In Matthew, the reproach to the disciples for their lack of faith is expressed before the storm calms down, in the other two weather forecasters - after. This difference is not of great importance, since in general evangelists, when talking about events, sometimes string together fact after fact in their speech, caring little about the exact determination of time and chronological sequence.

Matthew 8:27. The people, amazed, said: Who is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?

(Compare Mark 4:40; Luke 8:25.)

Literally: “the people were surprised, saying: where is He from, like the winds and the sea,” etc. The word “people” is translated from the Greek οἱ ἄνθρωποι. The article before this word indicates that these were the people who were in the boat. But why are they called “people” here and not “disciples”? This expression has long caused interpreters difficulties, which are increased by the fact that other weather forecasters (Mark 4:40; Luke 8:25), when talking about the event, do not mention either the disciples or the people. An attempt to resolve the question of who was in the boat is found in Origen, who asks: “But what kind of people were surprised?” - and answers: “Do not think that the apostles are indicated here, because there is never such a name for the disciples of the Lord that does not correspond to their dignity, but they are always called either apostles or disciples. Consequently, the people who sailed with Him, to whom the boat belonged, were amazed.” Jerome expresses himself even more clearly about this subject, saying that it was not the disciples who were surprised, but the boatmen and those who were in the boat. If anyone argues against this and says that the people who were surprised were disciples, then we will answer that here are people named who did not yet know about the power of the Savior.” Many newer exegetes hold similar views. However, such an explanation should be recognized as not entirely natural. According to him, it turns out that the miracle, in any case, was the object of surprise not for the disciples, but only for other people, and this is because the disciples were already familiar with the miracles of the Savior and could not now ask: who is this? But why couldn’t the disciples be surprised? Why couldn’t they ask “who is this” about the Person Whom they did not yet know as the all-powerful tamer of the storm? It is possible to assume that there were other people in the boat along with Christ and the disciples. But, not wanting to indicate that only some disciples were surprised, or only other people, the evangelist brought them all under one category - οἱ ἄνθρωποι - all the men who were in the boat, and even, perhaps, those who were in the boats floating by proximity (Mark 4:36).

Matthew 8:28. And when He arrived on the other side in the country of Gergesin, He was met by two demoniacs who came out of the graves, very fierce, so that no one dared to pass that way.

(Compare Mark 5:1–6; Luke 8:26–27.)

The place where the Savior arrived, Matthew calls ἡ χώρα τῶν Γαδαρηνῶν, the country of the Gadarenes. In ancient times there were three cities from which the evangelists could have borrowed their names for this area.

1. Gerasa - this city was located far southeast of Lake Galilee, on the border with Arabia, two days' journey from the southern shore of Lake Galilee, somewhat north of the Jabbok River, a tributary of the Jordan. All that remains of the city are the most significant ruins in the area. It stood on the site of present-day Jerash. It is assumed, however, that he could not provide the name of the area near Lake Galilee and that the name γερασνῶν found in some manuscripts is only a corrupted γεγρεσηνῶν.

2. Closer to the lake was Gadara, south of the Yarmouk River, also a tributary of the Jordan. Josephus says that Gadara was the fortified capital of Perea. The words of Eusebius are not clear; he reports that Gadara was located opposite (ἀντικρύ) Scythopolis and Tiberias to the east, on a mountain where there were hot healing springs. The ambiguity here is that Tiberias was somewhat north of Gadara on the other (eastern) side of the Jordan, and Scythopolis (Beosan) was much further south. Gadara was known for its hot springs far beyond the borders of Palestine, which, by the way, is mentioned by Strabo. This city was destroyed by the Jews, but then rebuilt by Pompey, and many coins remained from it. Gadara was inhabited mostly by pagans, and Josephus calls it πόλις ἑλληνίς - a Greek city. It was one of the ten cities of the so-called Decapolis. Currently called Um-Keys. The district of Gadara bordered on the district of Scythopolis in the west, and on Ippon in the north. Gadara owned part of the strip on the eastern side of the lake. What relation this Gadarian strip had to the strip of Ippon, who also owned the lake shore in the middle eastern part of the lake, is difficult to say, and this difficulty is the main thing.

3. According to the testimony of both Origen and Eusebius, there was Gergesa, of which no trace remains (the area is now known under the name Kersa). It is difficult to say whether, and if so, how, Gergesa belonged to Gadara, if only the Ippon district was located between them, and why this district was not called by the name of the last city. Tsan, however, confidently assumes that this entire district was called Gadarian, including the place where Gergesa was located. This explains the differences in the testimony of the evangelists, one of whom (Matthew) calls the area (according to a more probable reading) the country of the Gadarenes, and the other two weather forecasters (also according to a more probable reading), Mark - γερασηνῶν (Mark 5:1), and Luke - γεργεσηνῶν (Luke 8:26; in the Russian Bible in Matthew - “to the country of Gergesin”, and in Mark and Luke - “Gadarene”). Thus, it must be assumed that the Savior came ashore near Gergesa and wanted to head from here along the road to Gadara, if only there was such a road.

The further communication brings even more difficulties. According to Matthew, two demoniacs came to Christ, but according to Mark and Luke, only one. There is no other way to reconcile the evangelists except by the assumption that Matthew paid attention to two persons, and the other forecasters only to one, comparatively even more ferocious than the other. This second one, less fierce, does not appear clearly in Matthew, as if somewhat obscured. However, some interpret Mark’s expression (Mark 5:9) “because we are many” in the sense that in that world there were many not demons, but those possessed by demons. There was one demoniac, or there were two of them, or even several, this cannot be decided with precision. What is known is that they lived in coffins. Travelers even now on the road to Gadara encounter tombs (cemeteries) carved into the mountains. The reason why the possessed lived in tombs was explained by the fact that it was a Jewish superstition, according to which demons primarily lived in tombs and cemeteries, and the possessed only followed this superstition. But the most natural way to explain the life of the possessed in coffins is that they were expelled from cities and villages. What did they eat? This question is again difficult to answer precisely. Perhaps with plants and herbs, or perhaps some people brought them food, although this latter, of course, is doubtful. The expression of the Evangelist Matthew: “no one dared to pass that way” should almost be understood only in a conditional sense, namely, that the path was dangerous for one or more persons, and not that all communication between Gadara or Gergesa and the lake ceased due to the presence of demoniacs. That they were not dangerous for everyone is evident from the fact that they even tried to bind at least one demoniac (Mark 5:4; Luke 8:29). The danger of the possessed was that they were χαλεποὶ λίαν, not just, but too ferocious.

Matthew 8:29. And so they cried out: What have you to do with us, Jesus, Son of God? You came here ahead of time to torment us.

(Compare Mark 5:7–10; Luke 8:28–31.)

Literally: “what is it for us and for you” (cf. Judges 11:12; 1 Kings 17:18; 2 Kings 3:13). In the Russian text, the meaning of the words is well expressed: “What do you care about us?” - i.e., therefore, with their question the demons simply asked Christ not to touch them. According to Augustine, the demons called Christ the Son of God more out of suspicion. The words “before time” can be combined either with the word “came” or with the word “torment.” In both cases, the demoniacs wanted to say that Jesus Christ came to torment them before His messianic glorification, before His final victory over hell and death. The word "Jesus" is not found in many of the best codices, but is believed to have been inserted here from the margins of the manuscript, after the manner of the expressions of Mark and Luke. The speech of the demoniacs to Jesus Christ shows that they were Jews and not pagans.

Matthew 8:30. Far from them, a large herd of pigs was grazing.

Matthew 8:31. And the demons asked Him: if you drive us out, then send us into the herd of pigs.

(Compare Mark 5:11–12; Luke 8:32.)

The expression “from them” is vague, i.e. it is unknown whether it is from Christ and His disciples, or from the demon-possessed, or from all of them. But since the speech in verses 29–31 is primarily about those possessed by demons, it is more correct to understand “from them” in the sense of “from those possessed by demons.”

“Far away” (μακράν) should be understood in a relative sense: not too far away, so that the herd could be seen. With this assumption, there will be no contradiction between Matthew, on the one hand, and Mark and Luke, on the other, who say that the pigs grazed “there,” i.e. where the demoniacs were located. If the latter were Jews, then the owners of the pigs, the inhabitants of the Gadarene country, were most likely pagans. Keeping pigs was prohibited by Jewish law. And among other peoples, the pig was also considered an unclean and nasty animal, for example, among the Egyptians. But the latter had swine herds and shepherds. Herodotus reports about the Egyptians that they “consider the pig an unclean animal, and this to such an extent that, firstly, if someone, passing by, accidentally touches a pig even with his clothes, he immediately goes to the river and bathes in it , and, secondly, the pig herders, although natural Egyptians, are the only inhabitants of Egypt who cannot enter the temple. And no one gives their daughters in marriage to them or takes their daughters as wives, so among the pig herders, marriages take place exclusively within their own class” (“History”, XI, 47). Among the Jews, only the “lower classes” were engaged in pig breeding, and especially those who were in more or less close communication with the pagans. Travelers report that there are a lot of pigs in the indicated area and at the present time, they graze there in the wild and eat what they can, being in a “wild state.” Pigs were also a subject of Jewish trade.

Matthew 8:32. And He said to them: Go. And they went out and went into the swine herd. And so, the entire herd of pigs rushed down a steep slope into the sea and died in the water.

(Compare Mark 5:13; Luke 8:32–33.)

Why did Christ allow demons to enter the pigs when they left the people? Answering this question, Chrysostom points to three reasons for the permission given by the Savior. He did this not because He was convinced by the demons, but, firstly, to show the people freed from evil spirits the extent of the harm they were doing to them, and secondly, so that everyone would learn that the demons would not have dared to enter the pigs without Him permission, thirdly, that the demons would have done much worse to the people they were in if, by a lucky chance, they had not gotten rid of them as a result of God's providence. This answer does not resolve the issue essentially, because Christ could have taught people all this without resorting to the death of the entire flock. But it is the only one that can be given without going into any too subtle reasoning. Theophylact notes that Christ wanted to show what bitterness (πικρίαν) demons inflict on people, and that if they have power and no one bothers them, then they treat people worse than pigs. Christ protects the possessed so that demons do not kill them.

It should be noted that some exegetes try to find a way out of the difficulty by arguing that the Greek word ἐπέτρεψεν, found in Mark and Luke, does not mean “allowed,” but only “did not hinder.” This is the meaning (concedo, sino) of the verb, and thus in the present case Christ did not give any positive command. Matthew uses the word ὑπάγετε, which, apparently, also does not express a positive command. When thinking about this event, one must not lose sight of the fact that in order to capture some moral truth both in the Holy Scriptures and in life itself, not only plants and animals, but also people are often sacrificed. The repeated extermination of people in the Old Testament would not make sense if each time some new idea or moral truth did not emerge, indicating, on the one hand, a deviation from the correct order, and on the other, outlining it. Life and death, therefore, probably do not have the same meaning in the eyes of God as they do for people. He who created life can restore it and therefore uses death to admonish people. Thus, the question in the present case can only be about what moral lessons can be drawn from the fact in question, and not about why it had such a form and not another. The first moral lesson is that God loves people more than animals, and for demons both have equal dignity. They enter into people and animals with equal pleasure, just to stay in the country. The second lesson is about the power of God over demons.

Matthew 8:33. The shepherds ran and, having come to the city, told about everything, and about what had happened to the possessed.

Matthew 8:34. And behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus; and when they saw Him, they asked Him to depart from their borders.

(Compare Mark 5:14–20; Luke 8:34–39.)

“Notice,” says St. John Chrysostom, “the meekness of Jesus Christ, combined with power. When the inhabitants of that country, so favored by Him, forced Him to leave, He withdrew without resistance and left those who had shown themselves unworthy of His teaching, giving them as mentors those freed from demons and herding pigs, so that they would learn from them about everything that had happened.”

. When He came down from the mountain, many people followed Him.

. And so the leper came up and, bowing to Him, said: Lord! if you want, you can cleanse me.

The leper, being reasonable, did not climb the mountain so as not to interrupt the teaching. But when Christ came down from the mountain, he bowed to Him and, showing his great faith, did not say: “if you pray to God, you will heal me,” but “if you want.” That is why Christ acted this way.

. Jesus, stretching out his hand, touched him and said: I want you to be clean. And he was immediately cleansed from leprosy.

. And Jesus said to him: See that you don’t tell anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.

The Lord touched the leper, showing that He is not subject to the law, which commands not to touch the leper, but that He is His Master, that for the pure there is nothing unclean, and that His holy flesh imparted sanctification. However, avoiding glory, the Lord orders not to tell anyone, but to show himself to the priest, for if the priest had not said that the leper had been cleansed, he would have remained outside the city. Christ commands to bring a gift as a witness to the Jews, that is, as if saying: “If I am accused as a lawbreaker,” be a witness, whom I commanded to bring, what is brought by the law.”

. When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him and asked Him.

And this one did not come up to the mountain, so as not to interrupt the teaching. This is the same centurion as in the Evangelist Luke. Although the evangelist Luke says that he sent others as ambassadors to Jesus, this does not contradict Matthew, who says that the centurion himself came. It is obvious that first the centurion sent others, and then, when the danger increased, he went himself and said:

. God! my servant lies at home in relaxation and suffers cruelly.

. Jesus says to him: I will come and heal him.

The centurion did not bring the boy on the bed, believing that the Lord could heal him even when he was absent. And therefore:

. The centurion, answering, said: Lord! I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will recover;

. for I am a subordinate man, but, having soldiers under my command, I say to one: go, and he goes; and to another: come, and he comes; and to my servant: Do this, and he does.

. When Jesus heard this, he was surprised and said to those following Him, “Truly I say to you, I have not found such faith in Israel.”

If, he says, being a slave of the king, I command the soldiers subordinate to me, then all the more can You command death and illness so that they move away from one and turn to another, for bodily illnesses are warriors and punishers with God. Therefore, Christ is surprised, saying: “Even among Israel I did not find such faith as I found in this pagan.”

. I tell you this, that many will come from the east and the west and lie down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven;

. and the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness: there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

He did not say that many pagans would lie down, so as not to upset the Jews, but he said covertly: “from the east and the west.” He mentioned Abraham in order to show that He is not an opponent of the Old Testament. Speaking about external darkness, he showed that there is also internal darkness, lighter than the first, for the degrees and torments differ. He calls the Jews sons of the kingdom, since the promises were given to them: “Israel is My Son, My firstborn.”

. And Jesus said to the centurion, Go, and as you have believed, so be it done to you. And his servant was healed at that hour.

Having healed with a word, the Lord showed that He also spoke the truth regarding the expulsion of the Jews.

. Arriving at the house of Peter, Jesus saw his mother-in-law lying in a fever,

. touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she arose and ministered to them.

He entered Peter's house to eat food; touching the hand, he not only calmed the fever, but also returned the woman to full health, so that her strength returned and she was able to serve. And we really know that it takes a lot of time for patients to get stronger again. While other evangelists say that the Lord was asked and therefore He healed the sick woman, Matthew, caring for brevity, did not say this. For I told you at the beginning that one of them omits what the other says. But learn also that marriage does not in the least hinder virtue, for the chief of the apostles had a mother-in-law.

. When evening came, they brought many demon-possessed people to Him, and He cast out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick,

. may what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah be fulfilled, who says: “He took upon Himself our infirmities and bore our illnesses” ().

The sick were brought in in the evening and at the wrong time, but He, as a lover of mankind, healed everyone. Then, so that you do not have doubts about how He could heal so many diseases in a short time, the evangelist brings Isaiah as a witness. True, the prophet says this about sins, but Matthew applied his words to illnesses, because most of them come from sins.

. When Jesus saw a large crowd around Him, He commanded students sail to the other side.

He was not ambitious, but at the same time he avoided the envy of the Jews.

. Then one scribe came up and said to Him: Teacher! I will follow You wherever You go.

. And Jesus said to him: The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.

A scribe calls one who knows the books of the Law. This one, seeing many miracles, thought that Jesus was profiting from them, so he was trying to follow Him in order to collect riches himself. But Christ, going to meet his intention, almost said this: “by following Me, you hope to collect riches; but don't you see that I don't even have a house? So should My follower be.” The Lord said this for the purpose of convincing him to follow Him, to change his mood: but the scribe leaves. Some people mean demons by foxes and birds. So, the Lord says to the scribe: “The demons have rest in you, therefore I do not find rest for Myself in your soul.”

. Another of His disciples said to Him: Lord! let me first go and bury my father.

. But Jesus said to him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”

After someone has given himself up to God, he should not return again to the things of life. We must honor our parents, but we must place God above them. Here the parent was also unfaithful, as can be seen from here: "leave it to the dead, – that is, incorrect, – bury your dead". If this one did not receive permission to bury his father, then woe to those who, having accepted monasticism, return to everyday affairs.

. And when He entered the boat, His disciples followed Him.

. And behold, there was a great disturbance on the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves; and He was sleeping.

The Lord took only his disciples with Him so that they could see the miracle. Allows them to be exposed to danger in order to prepare them for temptation and so that, having seen a miracle, they will believe all the more. He sleeps for the purpose that the disciples, being frightened, would realize their weakness and turn to Him in prayer. Therefore it is said:

. Then His disciples, approaching Him, woke Him up and said: Lord! save us, we are perishing.

. And he says to them: what are you So fearful, of little faith?

The Lord does not call them unfaithful, but of little faith, because when they said: “Lord, save us,” they showed their faith, but the word “we perish” is not from faith. They had no need to fear as the Lord sailed with them. Please note that by reproaching them as timid, the Lord shows that timidity attracts danger. Therefore, He first calmed their spiritual storm, and then calmed the sea excitement.

Then, getting up, he rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great silence.

. The people, amazed, said: Who is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?

They were surprised because in appearance He was a man, but in deeds He was God.

. And when He arrived on the other side in the country of Gergesin, He was met by two demoniacs,

While those in the ship are perplexed: where does this come from, that both the winds and the sea obey Him? – Demons are preachers. Evangelists Mark and Luke talk about one sick person who had a legion of demons, because one of these sick people was more terrible than the other. The Lord Himself approached them, since no one dared to bring them.

those who came out of the tombs were very fierce, so that no one dared to pass that way.

Demons lived in coffins, wanting to instill in people the idea that the souls of the dead become demons. But let no one think this, because the soul, having left the body, does not wander in this world, but the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God; As for the souls of sinners, they too are taken away from here, like, for example, the soul of a rich man.

. And so they cried out: What have you to do with us, Jesus, Son of God? You came here ahead of time to torment us.

Behold, they proclaim Him to be the Son of God after having previously discovered enmity towards Him. They consider it torment that they were not allowed to harm people; the words "before time" understand in the sense that the demons thought that Christ, not having endured their too strong anger, would not wait for the time of punishment, which in reality is not the case, for they are allowed to fight with us until the end of the century.

. Far from them, a large herd of pigs was grazing.

. And the demons asked Him: if you drive us out, then send us into the herd of pigs.

. And He said to them: Go. And they went out and went into the swine herd.

Demons strive, by destroying pigs, to sadden their owners so that they do not accept Christ. Christ yields to the demons, showing what malice they have against people, and if they had power and did not encounter obstacles, then they would treat us worse than pigs. He protects the possessed so that they do not kill themselves.

And so, the entire herd of pigs rushed down a steep slope into the sea and died in the water.

. The shepherds ran and, having come to the city, told about everything and about what had happened to the demoniacs.

. And behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus, and when they saw Him, they asked Him to depart from their borders.

Saddened and thinking that after this they will suffer worse, they ask Him about it. Find out that where there is a pig's life, it is not Christ who dwells there, but demons.

When He came down from the mountain, many people followed Him.And then a leper came up and, bowing to Him, said: Lord! if you want, you can cleanse me.

Jesus, stretching out his hand, touched him and said: I want you to be clean. And he was immediately cleansed from leprosy.And Jesus says to him: see that you do not tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and bring the gift that Moses commanded as a testimony to them.

When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him and asked Him:God! my servant lies at home in relaxation and suffers cruelly.

Jesus tells him: I will come and heal him.

The centurion, answering, said: Lord! I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will recover;for I am a subordinate man, but, having soldiers under my command, I say to one: “Go,” and he goes; and to another: “Come,” and he comes; and to my servant: “Do this,” and he does.

When Jesus heard this, he was surprised and said to those following Him: Truly I say to you, even in Israel I have not found such faith.I tell you that many will come from the east and the west and lie down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven;and the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness: there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.And Jesus said to the centurion: go, and as you have believed, so be it done to you.

And his servant was healed at that hour.

Arriving at the house of Peter, Jesus saw his mother-in-law lying in a fever,and he touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she arose and ministered to them.

When evening came, they brought many demon-possessed people to Him, and He cast out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick,that what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled, who says: “He took upon Himself our infirmities and bore our sicknesses.”

When Jesus saw a large crowd around Him, He ordered [the disciples] to sail to the other side.Then one scribe came up and said to Him: Teacher! I will follow You wherever You go.

And Jesus says to him: foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.

Another of His disciples said to Him: Lord! let me first go and bury my father.

But Jesus said to him: follow me, and let the dead bury their dead.

And when He entered the boat, His disciples followed Him.And behold, there was a great disturbance on the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves; and He was sleeping.Then His disciples, approaching Him, woke Him up and said: Lord! save us, we are perishing.

And he says to them: what do you So fearful, of little faith? Then, getting up, he rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great silence.The people, amazed, said: Who is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?

And when He arrived on the other side in the country of Gergesin, He was met by two demoniacs who came out of the graves, very fierce, so that no one dared to pass that way.And so they cried out: What have you to do with us, Jesus, Son of God? You came here ahead of time to torment us.

Far from them, a large herd of pigs was grazing.And the demons asked Him: if you drive us out, then send us into the herd of pigs.

And He said to them: Go. And they went out and went into the swine herd. And so, the entire herd of pigs rushed down a steep slope into the sea and died in the water.

The shepherds ran and, having come to the city, told about everything, and about what had happened to the possessed.And behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus; and when they saw Him, they asked Him to depart from their borders.

Chapter 8

1 When He came down from the mountain, a great crowd followed Him.
2 And then the leper came up and bowed to Him and said: Lord! if you want, you can cleanse me.
3 Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him and said, “I want you to be clean.” And he was immediately cleansed from leprosy.
4 And Jesus said to him, “See that you do not tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded as a testimony to them.”
5 When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him and asked Him:
6 Lord! my servant lies at home in relaxation and suffers cruelly.
7 Jesus says to him: I will come and heal him.
8 The centurion answered and said: Lord! I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will recover;
9 For I am a man under authority, but having soldiers under me, I say to one, “Go,” and he goes; and to another: come, and he comes; and to my servant: Do this, and he does.
10 When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Truly I say to you, even in Israel I have not found such faith.”
11 But I tell you that many will come from the east and the west and will lie down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven;
12 And the children of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness: there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
13 And Jesus said to the centurion, Go, and as you have believed, so be it done for you. And his servant was healed at that hour.
14 When Jesus came to the house of Peter, he saw his mother-in-law lying in a fever,
15 And he touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she arose and ministered to them.
16 When evening came, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed, and He cast out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick,
17 That it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophet Isaiah, who said: He took upon Himself our infirmities and bore our sicknesses.
18 When Jesus saw a large crowd around Him, He ordered [the disciples] to sail to the other side.
19 Then one scribe came up and said to Him: Teacher! I will follow You wherever You go.
20 And Jesus said to him, The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.
21 Another of His disciples said to Him: Lord! let me first go and bury my father.
22 But Jesus said to him, “Follow Me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”
23 And when He entered into the boat, His disciples followed Him.
24 And behold, there was a great disturbance on the sea, so that the boat was covered with waves; and He was sleeping.
25 Then His disciples came to Him and woke Him up and said: Lord! save us, we are perishing.
26 And he saith unto them, Why are ye so fearful, O ye of little faith? Then, getting up, he rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great silence.
27 And the people were amazed and said, “Who is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him?”
28 And when He arrived on the other side in the country of Gergesin, He was met by two demoniacs who came out of the tombs, very fierce, so that no one dared to pass that way.
29 And behold, they cried out: What have you to do with us, Jesus, Son of God? You came here ahead of time to torment us.
30 And at a distance from them there was a large herd of swine grazing.
31 And the demons asked Him: If you drive us out, then send us into the herd of swine.
32 And He said to them, Go. And they went out and went into the swine herd. And so, the entire herd of pigs rushed down a steep slope into the sea and died in the water.
33 But the shepherds ran and came into the city and told about everything, and about what had happened to the demon-possessed.
34 And behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus; and when they saw Him, they asked Him to depart from their borders.