Matthew 8:34

Mat_8:34

Besought Him that He would depart.

God coming near to us.

I. The way in which God formerly presented himself to men.

II. The way in which he does so now.

III. The way in which men decline His presence. (E. M. Goulburn.)

Gods goodness and mans ingratitude

The Gadarenes, in return for Christs works of love, majesty, and mercy, besought Him to depart. They eared more for the swine which the devils had destroyed than for the poor man Christ had restored. (A. Jones.)

Mans dislike and dread of Christ

Still the same in our own day! Let us mark

I. The coming. It was a universal movement, and a most interesting one. A whole city flocking out to meet Jesus! How seldom had such a thing been seen, or is seen now.

II. The seeing. They did not remain afar off, but came nigh-they saw for themselves, and that aggravated their guilt.

III. The refusing. An awful request in many ways. Was there ever a request so sad, so fatal? Why was this? There was something in Jesus that drew them; but there was more that they disliked. They would like Him as the physician of the body, but not of the soul. His company seemed dangerous and terrible. So they besought Him to depart. Their depart from us is the foreboding of His depart from Me (Mat_25:41).

1. How near salvation they were.

2. How they wronged the Saviour.

3. How they wronged themselves. (H. Bonar, D. D.)

The case of the Gergesenes

That the rejection of Christ sometimes arises from imperfect knowledge of Hint; and that deeper knowledge wilt frequently lead to deeper love. I try to place myself in the position of these people.

1. I observe that almost the whole knowledge which they had of our Lord was confined to the miracle of the destruction of the swine. Can we wonder that they wished to get rid of a visitor at once so powerful and destructive? True, they had another chapter of evidences, the healed men to bear witness to the healing and restoring character of Him who had destroyed the swine. There was a problem of loss and gain; some palliation of their error.

2. If these Gergesenes, instead of the last seven verses, had had the whole of this chapter before them, would they have asked Him to leave their coasts? I doubt it.

3. If they had heard His teaching contained in the Sermon on the Mount, would they have acted so? Think of the goodness and gentleness pervading it.

4. The magnitude of the responsibility of rejecting Christ-intellectually and speculatively, or rejecting Him virtually by despising and forgetting His precepts-depends upon the knowledge which we have of Him, and in spite of which we reject Him. Those who have, as it were, a casual visit from Christ may not be much better or worse for it; it is otherwise with those who have the whole picture of His life before them. (Bishop of Carlisle.)

The conduct of the Gergesenes explained

Why the Saviour is not welcome.

1. Because the need of Him is not felt.

2. They look upon Christ as questionable Benefactor. He will take notice of everything unlawful and unholy. We like the aids of religion in domestic government, but not its restrictions.

3. The time will come when the Son of man will be admitted. Who may abide the day of His coming? He will not be shut out then. (T. E. Headline on, M. A.)

Rejecting salvation

To me it is specially appalling that a man should perish through wilfully rejecting the Divine salvation. A drowning man throwing away the life-belt, a poisoned man pouring the antidote upon the floor, a wounded man tearing open his wounds, any one of these is a sad sight; but what shall we say of a soul putting from it the Redeemer and choosing its own destruction? (C. H. Spurgeon.)

Christ should be welcomed

If you do but hear when the king is on his road to your town, you raise your bells to ring him in, and stay not till lie be entered the gates. The birds they rise betimes in the morning, and are saluting the rising sun with their sweet notes in the air. Thus should we strike up our harps in praising God at the appearance of a mercy. (Gurnall.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

8:34 The tragedy of the incident is that those who witnessed the Son of God’s power to give salvation feared having their world upset, so they rejected him.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Mat 8:34.[387] Παρεκάλεσαν, they besought) Those who are held fast by concern about their property, more easily and readily repel than pursue. Even avarice is timid. Or perhaps they besought our Lord with no evil feeling.[388] See Luk 5:8.[389]

[387] Πᾶσα ἡ πόλις, the whole city) Such great commotion do earthly interests cause!—V. g.

[388] At all events, though the Gergesenes besought Him with such a request, as did also their neighbours the Gadarenes, yet He left behind a leading one of those who had been possessed (Luk 8:35, viz. the man whom the men of the city had found “sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed, and in his right mind”) as a preacher of the Gospel to them. This one may have been a Gadarene, and the other a Gergesene.—Harm. p. 274.

[389] Where Peter, from humility instead of malignity, exclaims, “DEPART FROM ME, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.”—(I. B.)

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Mat 8:34 . πᾶσα ἡ πόλις : an exaggeration of course, cf. accounts in Mark and Luke. εἰς ὑπάντησιν … Ι ., to a meeting with Jesus. The noun occurs again in Mat 25:1 , and Joh 12:13 ; in Mat 25:6 ἀπάντησιν is used instead of it. εἰς ἀπαν . occurs in Sept [56] for לִקְרָאת . The two nouns are little used in Greek authors. The change from one to the other in Mat 25:1 ; Mat 25:6 implies a slight difference in meaning; ὑπάντησις = accidental chance, or stealthy meeting; ἀπάντησις = an open designed meeting. The stealthy character of the meeting implied in ὑπὸ is well illustrated in ὑπήντησαν , Mat 8:28 , of this narrative. The statement that the whole city went out to meet Jesus implies a report laying the blame of the occurrence on Him. But Matthew’s account is very summary, and must be supplemented by the statements in Mark and Luke, from which it appears that some came from the town to inquire into the matter, “to see what had happened,” and that in the course of their inquiries they met Jesus and learned what they had not known before, the change that had come over the demoniac. It was on their giving in their report to their fellow-townsmen, connecting the cure with the catastrophe, that the action reported in Mat 8:34 took place.

[56] Septuagint.

Mat 8:34 . παρεκάλεσαν : same word as in Mat 8:31 in reference to the demoniacs. They did not order or drive Him out. They besought in terms respectful and even subdued. They were afraid of this strange man, who could do such wonderful things; and, with all due respect, they would rather. He would withdraw from their neighbourhood.

This would be an oft-told tale, in which different versions were sure to arise, wherein fact and explanation of fact would get mixed up together. The very variations in the synoptical accounts witness to its substantial historicity. The apologist’s task is easy here, as distinct from that of the harmonist, which is difficult. The essential outline of the story is this. A demoniac, alias a madman, comes from the tombs in the limestone caves to meet Jesus, exhibiting in behaviour and conversation a double consciousness. Asked his name, he calls himself Legion. In the name of the “Legion” he begs that the demons may enter the swine. Jesus orders the demons to leave their victim. Shortly after a herd of swine feeding on the hills rushed down the steep into the sea and were drowned. Tradition connected the rush of the swine with the demons leaving their former victim and entering into them. But, as already remarked, the causal connection could not be a matter of observation but only of inference. The rush might, as Weiss suggests, be caused by the man, in his final paroxysm, chasing them. But that also is matter of conjecture. The real cause of the catastrophe is a mystery. Rosenmüller suggests that at a hot season of the year one in a herd of swine might undergo a morbid seizure, begin to run wildly about, and be followed sequaciously by the whole flock. He mentions an occurrence of the kind at Erfurt, recent when he wrote. Lutteroth, no rationalist, suggests “vertigo,” permitted by Jesus to befall the swine, that the demoniac might have in their behaviour a sensible sign of deliverance, and so be rid of his fixed idea ( vide his Essai D’Interp. , 3 eme Partie, p. 27, note). On the nature of demoniacal possession, vide my Miraculous Element in the Gospels , pp. 172 190; vide also notes on Mark.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Where men live as swine, there doth not Christ tarry, but devils.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Verse 34. The whole city came out] Probably with the intention to destroy Jesus for having destroyed their swine; but, having seen him, they were awed by his presence; and only besought him to depart from their borders. Many rather chose to lose Jesus Christ than those temporal goods by which they gratify their passions at the expense of their souls. They love even their swine better than their salvation.

Certain doctors in both sciences, divinity and physic, gravely tell us that these demoniacs were only common madmen, and that the disease was supposed, by the superstitious Jews, to be occasioned by demons. But, with due deference to great characters, may not a plain man be permitted to ask, by what figure of speech can it be said that "two diseases besought - went out - filled a herd of swine - rushed down a precipice?" c. What silly trifling is this! Some people's creeds will neither permit God nor the devil to work and, in several respects, hardly to exist. For he who denies Divine inspiration, will scarcely acknowledge diabolic influence. See Clarke on Mt 8:16, and See Clarke on Lu 7:21.

It is said, The whole city came out to meet Jesus. This means no more than all the inhabitants of that place, which, most probably, was no more than a small country village; or perhaps but a few houses. I have observed that the inhabitants of the Zetland Isles, in the North Seas, denominate any collection of houses a town, even where there are but three or four: and thus I think that the Jews denominated their villages, often calling them cities.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(34) The whole city—i.e., the population of Gadara or Gerasa (more probably the former), according to the reading which we adopt in Mat_8:28. St. Mark and St. Luke add, that they found the demoniac “clothed, and in his right mind, sitting at the feet of Jesus,” in the clinging gratitude of faith. The narrative half suggests the thought that the garment which he now wore as the outward sign of a new self-reverence had been supplied by the pity of the disciples.

Besought him that he would depart.—It was characteristic of the wild, half-heathen population that they were led to look on the Prophet who had wrought so great a work as a Destroyer rather than a Saviour, and therefore shrank from His presence among them. Not so with the demoniac himself. He felt, with a faith which was real, though weak, as if he were only safe while close to his Deliverer. He followed Him to the boat, and as He was in the act of embarking (Mar_5:18), prayed that he might be with Him. But this was not the discipline which was needed for his spiritual health. Retirement, renewed fellowship with his kindred in his own house, the quiet witness borne there that the Lord had had compassion on him—this was better for him than the work of a more avowed discipleship. And so he went his way “proclaiming,” or “preaching,” what Jesus had done for him—a true evangelist to a people whose panic terror showed that they were as yet in darkness and the shadow of death.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34. that he would depart] The motive for the request was fear lest a greater disaster should follow (Meyer).

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34 And, behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus: and when they saw him, they besought him that he would depart out of their coasts.

Ver. 34. They besought him to depart] This was as great madness, as to wish, because they had been scorched by the sun, they might see no more of it. And yet how many, alas, are there at this day that cry out of this madness, and yet imitate it! How many that prefer haram domesticam arae dominicae, as one long since complained, a swine sty before a sanctuary! (Petr. Blessensis.) We are now become Gergesites, said that martyr in Queen Mary’s days, that would rather lose Christ than our porkets. Take up your cross is a hard saying; therefore Christ must be prayed to be gone, lest all our pigs be drowned. The devil shall have his dwelling again in many men’s selves rather than in their pigs. Therefore to the devil shall they go and dwell with him, &c. Thus Mr Bradford. And oh how justly shall Christ regest one day upon all unworthy Gadarenes, Depart from me, ye wicked!

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

That he would depart from their coasts. St. Jerome thinks these people did this out of a motive of humility, looking upon themselves unworthy of his presence: others judge that the loss of the swine made them apprehend lest Christ, being a Jew, might do them greater damages. (Witham) --- The fear lest his presence might cause them some fresh loss, seems to have overbalanced, in their estimation, the advantages they might have expected from his visit. (Bible de Vence) --- How often has our good Lord wished to visit us, to honour us with his sacred presence, to enrich us with his divine inspirations; and how often, like these Gerasens, have we desired him to depart from our territories? Some worldly interest, sensual enjoyment, or supine listlessness on our part, has occasioned us to neglect the proffered advantages. Oh! can there be more marked ingratitude than this! Oh! how shall we one day grieve for having lost, by our culpable indifference, immense spiritual treasures, which have been made over to others far more deserving than ourselves! Yes, the day will certainly arrive, when we shall value a single additional degree of the divine favor and grace, infinitely more than all the united honours, riches, and pleasures of this world. (Haydock)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Both Mark and Luke here add much. Mark saith, Mar 5:14-20, And they went out to see what it was that was done. And they come to Jesus, and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the Legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid. And they that saw it told them how it befell to him that was possessed with the devil, and also concerning the swine. And they began to pray him to depart out of their coasts. And when he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that he might be with him. Howbeit Jesus suffered him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee. And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him: and all men did marvel. Luke saith, Luk 8:37-39, Then the whole multitude of the country of the Gadarenes round about besought him to depart from them; for they were taken with great fear: and he went up into the ship, and returned back again. Now the man out of whom the devils were departed besought him that he might be with him: but Jesus sent him away, saying, Return to thine own house, and show how great things God hath done unto thee. And he went his way, and published throughout the whole city how great things Jesus had done unto him. By

the whole city, or the whole country, we must understand a very great part of it.

Came out to meet Jesus: Mark expounds it, to see what it was that was done, and to pray him to depart out of their coasts. They saw him, and not him only, but him that had been possessed of the devils, sitting at his feet clothed, in his right mind. A great miracle wrought! They did not only see it, but they heard their servants, the swine herds, attesting it; they had all the external means of faith imaginable. How are they affected? The text saith, they were afraid. An awe of this great person seized them, and possibly they were afraid lest he should have done them some further evil. What is the effect of this fear? Surely they will fall down at his feet beg his grace and favour, and that he would continue with them, and be the author of more good amongst them. Though they had lost two thousand swine, yet they were delivered from the fear of him that was possessed with the devil; and that poor creature was delivered from as great an affliction as we can imagine. Nothing of all this. They came, and prayed, and besought him to go out of their coasts. Certainly, our Saviour’s knowledge of the nature of this people, and what was in their hearts, provoked him to give the devils such a liberty as he did to destroy their swine: we are ordinarily punished in the thing wherein we offend, we need no more than our ordinary wishes and prayers to ruin us: who shall hereafter tell us of a power in man’s will to do that which is spiritually good upon a moral persuasion? What higher moral persuasion could these Gadarenes have had, than the sight of Christ, and what he had done, afforded? yet (for aught appears) they were unanimous in this desire, that Christ should be gone. They do not do what was in their power to do, desiring him to stay. But oh how dangerous a thing it is for men to reject Christ! He immediately departeth, and we do not read that he came here any more. But he out of whom the devils were cast abideth with him, sits at his feet, desires he may go along with him; How great a difference there is betwixt seeing and hearing of Christ, and tasting how good he is! The poor demoniac would have left his country, and gone with him. But Christ suffered him not; probably he saw it would be more for the glory of God for him to stay; he therefore commands him to return to his house, and show what God had done for him, and how he had compassion on him. We cannot, more show our thankfulness to God, than by declaring his wonderful works, and what in particular he hath done for us. This poor man doth accordingly, and publisheth the name of Christ in Decapolis, which name comprehends a space of the country within which were ten cities, (as the word doth signify), whereof Gadara (saith Pliny) was one; from which city these people had their denomination of Gadarenes, that is, citizens of Gadara; or, inhabitants of the country adjacent to that city.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

And, behold. The third of the stages (vers. 29, 32) in this incident that were apparent to all. The whole city; i.e. Khersa, from the parallel passages (ver. 28, note); all the city (Revised Version, though a similar phrase is not altered in ver. 32); pasa h poliv . Not really less comprehensive, but giving a less vivid representation of one united body than olh h poliv ; (Mar_1:33, and especially Luk_8:39) cf. Mat_4:23, Mat_4:24, en olh th Galilaia eiv olhn thn . Came out to meet Jesus (eiv upanthsin tw Westcott and Hort margin, tou Ihsou). A distance of half a mile or so would satisfy the expression. The true reading, upanthsin , (also Mat 25:1Jo Mat_12:13) would seem to suggest the closest proximity, (cf. Bishop Lightfoot on upenantiov Col_2:14) while apanthsin (Mat_25:6 Act_28:15 1Th_4:17) connotes a, contrast to the place left. Sunanthsin , again (Textus Receptus here, and Joh_12:13, D, el. ), emphasizes the thought of companionship. And when they saw him, they besought him that he would depart out of their coasts; from their borders (Revised Version). These Gerasenes, vexed at the loss of wealth, felt, like the demoniacs, that there was nothing in common between themselves and Jesus, but, unlike them, showed no consciousness of sin. Without this he could do nothing for them, so he granted their request. (Mat_9:1) St. Peter also once bade Jesus depart, (Luk_5:8) but his reason, "for I am a sinful man, O Lord," showed a heartfelt desire after the deepest union with him. With the ungranted request of the man to remain with Jesus, and his subsequent preaching to these Gerasenes and others (parallel passages), St. Matthew does not concern himself.

The design of miracle frustrated.

The destruction of the swine is one of the chief difficulties of the gospel narratives. Some common impressions in relation to it need careful correction.

1. They were wild hogs, not what we understand by pigs. Their conduct is that of half-wild creatures.

2. Christ, at the most, gave permission, not command.

3. That the spirits did enter the swine, and that this explains their wild conduct, is the people"s idea, based on the paroxysms of the man when the devils were in him.

4. Similar rushes of animals are due to natural causes. See the stampede of horses, as, some time since, at Aldershot.

5. We need not think a judgment on the people for keeping swine was intended. There is no proof that they were under any Jewish obligations.

We may notice the ends served by the scene.

1. It became an effective proof of the reality of the man"s deliverance. So it answers to the command, "Take up thy bed, and walk." Such a proof was needed by the man, who may have feared it was only a lucid interval.

2. It exhibited the terrible nature of the devils" possession. If the devils wrought such havoc in the swine, what must they have wrought in the man! The people may not have properly felt the sadness and misery of their brother"s condition. See the effects of the incident on the Gadarenes. It was their "day of grace." Opportunity of salvation was afforded them.

I OPPORTUNITY OF SALVATION WAS REJECTED BY THESE GADARENES. All Christ"s offers are associated with some searching test, which makes it hard to accept them, and compels a man to deal resolutely with himself before he accepts them. Illustrate Zacchaeus; young rich ruler; Matthew; St. Paul. Here the test was a mere loss of property. It can never be an easy thing to enter the kingdom. The entrance is a low postern door a "needle"s eye." Tests may now be more subtle; they are not less real, and they are much more searching. Gadarenes failed under their test.

II OPPORTUNITY OF SALVATION WAS REMOVED FROM THESE GADARENES. Their rejection had to be recognized. It might have been recognized by some actual punishment. It was recognized by the immediate removal of the aid they misconceived and feared. Jesus went away grieving, and never came again. This may be your day of grace. It comes with a testing. In the test you may fail, and reject your Saviour. Rejected, he may remove. R.T.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

They besought him to depart out of their coasts - They loved their swine so much better than their souls! How many are of the same mind!

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

34. The whole city came out to meet Jesus. Filled with wonder and fear by the story. Besought him that he would depart. Partly from awe of one with such power; partly, perhaps, from fear of loss of more property. The Lord, bidden to depart, never returned. In this fact is a significant lesson. Mark tells us that the healed demoniac became a preacher of Christ in his own country.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

34. ὑπάντησιν for συνάντησιν. See notes infra.

34. ὅπως μεταβῇ. The motive for the request was fear lest a greater disaster should follow (Meyer).

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34.] This request, which is related by all three Evangelists, was probably not from humility, but for fear the miraculous powers of our Lord should work them still more worldly loss. For the additional particulars of this miracle, see Mar 5:15, Mar 5:16, Mar 5:18-20: Luk 8:35, and notes.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

34. And, behold, all the city went out to meet Jesus. And when they saw Him, they besought (Him) that He would depart from their frontiers.] With these words Mt. abbreviates Mk vv. 14c-17.—παρεκάλεσαν] For Mk.’s ἤρξαντο παρακαλεῖν, cf. Introduction, p. xxi.

εἰς ὑπάντησιν τῷ Ἰησοῦ] For the construction, see Moulton, p. 14, n. 3.

Mk. has here three verses which Mt. omits.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.