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Satan, Demons, and the Kingdom of God

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

Extract

As reported in the synoptic gospels, one of the most characteristic features of Jesus' activity was his campaign against the household of Satan, the demons. And yet Jesus' work as demon-exorcist has generally received little attention. Perhaps this is because for some time now the idea of demon-possession has been alien to the viewpoints of both liberal and conservative interpreters of his ministry. We do not believe in Satan and demons; surely Jesus could not have done so either!

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1974

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References

page 35 note 1 See also Acts 10.38.

page 35 note 2 Bultmann, Rudolf, Jesus and the Word (New York: Scribner, 1958), p. 56Google Scholar; see also pp. 27f, and Bultmann, , Jesus Christ and Mythology (New York: Scribner, 1958), pp. 1315Google Scholar. Günther Bornkamm also ‘demythologises’ or psychologises the demons away: the demoniacs are freed from ‘the fetters of their obsession’; for those freed from the demons, ‘a world has come to its end’. Jesus of Nazareth (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1960), pp. 60, 63.Google Scholar

page 35 note 3 Major, H. D. A., ‘Incidents in the Life of Jesus’, in Major, H. D. A., Manson, T. W., and Wright, C. J.. The Mission and Message of Jesus (New York: Dutton 1938), pp. 3032, 63fGoogle Scholar; Taylor, Vincent, The Gospel According to Mark (London: Macmillan, 1955), p. 239Google Scholar. Taylor explains Jesus' belief in demons as ‘part of the conditions necessary to a real Incarnation’.

page 36 note 1 E.g., Hunter, A. M., Introducing Mew Testament Theology (London: S.C.M., 1957), pp. 2831Google Scholar; Bornkamm, , Jesus, pp. 130ffGoogle Scholar; Zahrnt, Heinz, The Historical Jesus (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), p. 113Google Scholar; Ebeling, Gerhard, Word and Faith (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1963), pp. 226ffGoogle Scholar; Riesenfeld, Harold, The Gospel Tradition (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1970), pp. 72, 84fGoogle Scholar; Reumann, John, Jesus in the Church's Gospels (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968), pp. 199ffGoogle Scholar; Schweizer, Eduard, Jesus (Richmond: John Knox, 1971), pp. 43ff.Google Scholar

page 36 note 2 Otto, Rudolf, The Kingdom of God and the Son of Man (London: Lutterworth, 1943, 1951), pp. 101fGoogle Scholar; see also pp. 1021, 104, 107; Manson, William, Jesus the Messiah (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1946), p. 64Google Scholar; Barrett, C. K., The Holy Spirit and the Gospel Tradition (London: S.P.G.K., 1947), pp. 68, 92Google Scholar; Bornkamm, , Jesus, pp. 130f, 149Google Scholar; Zahrnt, , Historical Jesus, p. 113Google Scholar; and Keck, Leander E., A Future for the Historical Jesus (Nashville: Abingdon, 1971), pp. 126, 183.Google Scholar

page 37 note 1 Statements to the effect that the ‘powers of the Kingdom of God’ were present or operative are especially strange in view of Mark 9.1 which, if anything, means that the Kingdom had not yet come ‘with power’ (en dunamei).

page 37 note 2 See Hiers, R. H., ‘Why Will They Not Say, “Lo, here!” Or “There!”?’, JAAR, 35 (1967), 379384.Google Scholar

page 37 note 3 Luke 17.23; Matt. 34.23–6; Mark 13.21f.

page 37 note 4 Bultmann, , Jesus Christ and Mythology, pp. 12f.Google Scholar

page 37 note 5 John 2.23; 4.54; 10.38; 12.18; 20.30.

page 38 note 1 The Johannine Jesus did not exorcise demons, a point to be understood, perhaps, in connexion with the general tendency of the Fourth Evangelist to ‘demythologise’ the tradition in the direction of a ‘realised eschatology’. See, however, 1 John 3.8.

page 38 note 2 Robinson, James M., The Problem of History in Mark, S.B.T., no. 21 (London: S.C.M., (1957)Google Scholar; Kee, Howard Clark, ‘The Terminology of Mark's Exorcism Stories’, NTS, 14 1968), 232246.Google Scholar

page 38 note 3 Kallas, James, Jesus and the Power of Satan (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968), pp. 89, 92.Google Scholar

page 38 note 4 Manson, William, Jesus and the Christian (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967)Google Scholar, hereafter cited as Manson, Jesus, esp. pp. 77–88; Cranfield, C. E. B., The Gospel According to Saint Mark (Cambridge University Press, 1959), esp. pp. 5880CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cranfield proposes to overcome this apparent contradiction by referring to the presence of the Kingdom in Jesus as a ‘veiled manifestation’ (p. 66).

page 39 note 1 ET, , Jesus' Proclamation of the Kingdom of God (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1971), esp. pp. 7481.Google Scholar

page 39 note 2 NT 2 (1958), 116–37.

page 39 note 3 See Strack-Billerbeck IV/I, 501–33: ‘Zur altjüdischen Dämonologie’; also Weiss, Johannes, Die Predigt Jesu vom Reiche Gottes (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, (1900, 1964), pp. 26f, 230–35Google Scholar; Grundmann, Walter, Der Begriff der Kraft in der neutestamentlichen Gedankenwelt Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1932), pp. 4755Google Scholar; Volz, Paul, Die Eschatologie der jüdischen Gemeinde, 2nd ed. (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1934) pp. 8ff, 68, 83–89.Google Scholar

page 39 note 4 E.g., Isa. 10.5ff; Jer. 5–6; and esp. Isa. 40.1–2.

page 39 note 5 His first and only appearance in the canonical OT are in the prologue of Job, Zech. 3.If, and I Ghron. 21.1, all of which passages are evidently postexilic.

page 40 note 1 E.g., Dan. 2.31–45; 7.2–28; Jubilees 10.6–8; Enoch 21.1–10; IQM 1.1–7; Rev. 12–13. See Volz, , Eschatologie, p. 68Google Scholar; Manson, , Jesus, pp. 78fGoogle Scholar; Betz, , ‘Heiliger Krieg’, pp. 117ff.Google Scholar

page 40 note 2 Job 1–2;cf. Dan. 2.37ff; Luke4.5f. One rabbinical theory was that the demons first gained power over men in the days of Enosh in consequence of men's worship of idols (Strack-Billerbeck IV/I: 521). See also Jubilees 7.27; 10.1–3, 6–11.

page 41 note 1 See Volz, , Eschalologie, pp. 7fGoogle Scholar, 83–9, and 1 John 5.19. Though Jesus performs no exorcisms in the Gospel according to John, Satan is frequently described there as ‘the ruler of this world’, who menaces Jesus' followers, if not Jesus himself: 12.31; 1 3.2; 14.30;17.15; cf. 10.12, 28f.

page 41 note 2 See Burrows, Millar, ‘Thy Kingdom Come’, JBL, 74 (1955), esp. pp. 7fGoogle Scholar. Cranfield characterises the situation by stating that for Jesus and then contemporary Jewish thought, God's Kingship was at present hidden and ambiguous; in the future, it would be decisively and unambiguously revealed (St. Mark, pp. 64f., 168).

page 41 note 3 Matt. 13.19. See also Mark, 4.14ff, and the role of Satan in Job 1–2; and I Pet. 5.8; Eph. 6.16; James, 4.7; and I Tim. 5.15. Note the sense of the verb harpazein in Matt. 13.19 and cf. 11.12, 12.29, Mark 4.15ff, and John 10.12. See also Strack-Billerbeck IV/I: 523, 527; Manson, Jesus, pp. 78f, 82f; Cranfield, St. Mark, pp. 59, 138.

page 41 note 4 Matt. 4.8f=Luke 4.6f. Cf. Luke 22.28 where Jesus refers to the ‘trials’ (peirasmoi) which he and some of his disciples have already experienced; and Jesus' prayer, with his disciples, that they might be spared the final temptation (peirasmos) associated, at least in Matt. 6.13, with the activities of the ‘Evil One’: Luke 11.4; Mark 14.38f and par.

page 42 note 1 Matt. 12.28 = Luke 11.20. For exegesis, see Hiers, R. H., The Kingdom of God in the Synoptic Tradition (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1970), pp. 3035Google Scholar. See also Luke 10.17ff and Matt, 10.1, 7ff.

page 42 note 2 Strack-Billerbeck IV/I 524ff; Betz, Otto, What do We Know About Jesus? (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1968), pp. 5871.Google Scholar

page 42 note 3 As Mos. 10.1; Isa. 33.24; 35.5–10; 65.18ff. Note the ancient tradition concerning the exclusion of the blind and lame from the Jerusalem Temple: 2 Sam. 5.8.

page 42 note 4 Cf. Mark 9.43–7; Matt. 5–29f.

page 43 note 1 Robinson, , Problem of History, pp. 26 ff.Google Scholar

page 44 note 1 Cranfield maintains, on one hand, that Jesus himself, as the stronger one, had already bound Satan, but on the other hand, that ‘Satan is clearly still strong’, without resolving the tension between the two propositions (St. Mark, pp. 137f.) The difficulty here seems to derive from Cranfield's assumption that Jesus understood his exorcisms to mean that the Kingdom was present. Had it been, Satan's power indeed would have been finished. It would seem more plausible to treat the exorcisms in connexion with the ministry of preparation for the future coming or manifestation of the Kingdom, rather than as a manifestation of its presence in a time when Satan was ‘clearly still strong’. For exegesis of Luke 10.17f, see Hiers, , Kingdom of God, pp. 5056.Google Scholar

page 44 note 2 Contrary to Conzelmann's thesis in The Theology of St. Luke (New York: Harper & Row, 1961)Google Scholar. See Francis, Fred O., ‘Eschatology and History in Luke-Acts’, JAAR, 37 (1969), 4963Google Scholar, and Hiers, , Kingdom of God, pp. 2229.Google Scholar

page 44 note 3 Weiss, Thus J., Predigt (1900), p. 90.Google Scholar

page 45 note 1 See Clark, Kenneth W., ‘Realised Eschatology’, JBL, 59 (1940), 377Google Scholar. Clark refers to the appearance of the expression in Judges 20.42 (LXX) and states: ‘This is precisely the form and syntax of Matt. 12.28 = Luke 11.20, and the context makes plain beyond all doubt the sense of pursuit and imminent contact, rather than the idea of an actual conflict.’

page 45 note 2 See Clark, , ‘Realised Eschatology’, pp. 367383.Google Scholar

page 45 note 3 Mark 6.7 = Matt. 9.1 = Luke 9.1; cf. Luke 10.19; Matt. 16.18f.

page 45 note 4 See Matt. 12.43–45 = Luke 11.24–26.

page 45 note 5 See Kee, ‘Terminology’, pp. 232–46. Note Mark 1.25 = Luke 4.35; Mark 3.12 = Matt. 12.16 = Luke 4.41; Mark 9.25 = Matt. 17.18. = Luke 942. Cf. Luke 4.39 where Jesus ‘rebukes’ the fever, Mark 4.39 and par. where he ‘rebukes’ the stormy sea, and Mark 8.33 where he ‘rebukes’ Peter (Satan). See also Volz' discussion of Jewish references to the preliminary exorcistic work to be carried out by the hidden messiah or Son of man, Eschatologie, pp. 189ff, 208f, 216.

page 46 note 1 Matt. 11.12 = Luke 16.16. For exegesis, see Hiers, , Kingdom of God, pp. 3642Google Scholar. Cf. Schweitzer, Albert, The Mystery of the Kingdom of God (New York: Macmillan, 1950), p. 86Google Scholar, and Manson, , Jesus, p. 84.Google Scholar

page 46 note 2 So also Johannes Weiss and Otto Betz, cited above, in footnotes. See Manson, Jesus, pp. 192f: ‘Jesus by driving back the forces of the enemy is clearing a space for the reign of God.’ In this case, however, exorcism would still be more a matter of preparation for the coming or establishment of the Kingdom than a mark of its presence. Elsewhere Manson notes that in the synoptic gospels it is understood that the presence of the demons results in ‘the frustration of God's will to establish his reign’ (p. 79).