Mark 5:1-10 And they came over unto the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes. And when he was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit, Who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains: Because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces: neither could any man tame him. And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones. But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him, And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the ost high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not. For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit. And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many. And he besought him much that he would not send them away out of the country. (see also Luke 8:26-39)
Matthew 8:28-31 And when he was come to the other side into the country of the Gergesenes, there met him two possessed with devils, coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass by that way. And, behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time? And there was a good way off from them an herd of many swine feeding. So the devils besought him, saying, If thou cast us out, suffer us to go away into the herd of swine.
We have quoted relevant portions of this story to address two questions of discrepancy. Here are the issues:
- Where did this incident take place? Matthew says in the land of the "Gergesenes"; Mark says (though not in the KJV) "the country of the Gerasenes"; Luke says "country of the Gadarenes." What's the location, and is there a contradiction?
We can elimiate "Gergesenes" right away -- that is a textual error found only in later mss.; better mss. say "Gadara" as Luke does (though a good case has been made by Gundry that it was the original reading). And Luke may have said "Gerasa" -- the textual tradition is not clear on that either {Archer, Bible Difficulties, 323]. So if there is any dispute, it is between Gadara and Gerasa -- maybe.
The differences, by the muddled textual issue, may have arisen at a time of later scribal activity, but it is also possible that one gospel writer said Gerasa, and others said Gadara. Why would they do this, and do they contradict?
They do not contradict, because all the Gospels speak generally of the "country" of the town named, and both Gerasa and Gadara were part of the Decapolis, and this was part of Decapolis territory.
But, the critic may ask, why would they give different cities in the first place? We can only offer sound speculation based on data, and in so doing offer a general lesson in harmonization.
Geresa as a city grew "tremendously" during the period of 22-76 AD, and may have even been the capital of the Decapolis for a while. We might see why, in this light, someone like Mark would use it as a reference: It was the better-known of the two cities, and Mark's Roman audience would perhaps know Gerasa better than they knew Gadara.
On the other hand, Matthew's Palestinian and Syrian readers lived near the area and would know about Gadara. My own life situation offers a parallel to this: I live in an incorporated suburb of Orlando that has its own name and identity. When I talk to people in this area, I tell them I live in that suburb and I mention it by name. But when I talk to someone from another state, I give Orlando as my residence -- knowing that they likely have never heard of such booming sites as "Winter Garden," "Oakland," or "Pine Hills".
This is a key to understanding differences in the Gospel accounts. Each writer had a different audience. Each writer also had different experiences, education, and vocabulary. What they write had to be written with these frames of reference in mind. This was especially essential in an era when only 10% of people could read, and had to retain details in their heads. Everything had to be done to make material easier to remember.
And this leads into the next issue, which is the big one:
- Was there one demoniac (Mark, Luke) or two (Matthew)? The common and simple answer given is by Archer:
If there were two of them, there was at least one, wasn't there? Mark and Luke center attention on the more prominent and outspoken of the two, the one whose demonic occupants called themselves "Legion" (Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties, p. 325).
Practically speaking, this answer is correct, if not complete, and does resolve the alleged contradiction. However, one Skeptic responds:
As an argument, it grants entirely too much freedom of selection to the writers and completely ignores the fact that they were presumably being verbally guided by the Holy Spirit. Why then would the same Holy Spirit decide when he was "inspiring" Mark and Luke that only one demoniac and blind man needed to be mentioned but when he was "inspiring" Matthew, he suddenly decided that both demoniacs and blind men should be mentioned?
In response we would note that a modern Skeptic has neither the qualifications nor the right to determine what constitutes "too much freedom" for a writer removed from them by over 2000 years and by a vast difference in culture. The evaluation is made by a writer living in an environment with ample supplies and a potential audience that is over 95% literate and has plenty of time for leisure activities.
Why would the inspiration allow for such freedom? Rather than make statements like these, let's put ourselves into the first century and the minds and experiences of these writers and see why they would write things differently.
If you have a red-letter Bible, look over Matthew. You'll notice that the teachings of Jesus form 5 major sections.
This is something Matthew INTENTIONALLY did, for many reasons -- but our main reason of concern is that he was writing his Gospel as a showcase for the teachings of Jesus. A handbook, if you will. Jesus' miracles were of secondary concern and used only to the extent that they provided connecting narrative frameworks that allowed Matthew's gospel to fit properly in the genre of bioi (ancient biography).
Thus it is no surprise that he lacks the sort of detail Mark and Luke give for the story. His main interest isn't in Jesus' actions, but in Jesus' words. Think how your pastor might use a Bible story -- if he wants to emphasize one part of it, he'll talk more about it in his sermon and less about other parts. This is more or less what Matthew is doing.
Luke and Mark are MORE concerned with action, though. You see fewer (in Mark) and more scattered (in Luke) "red letter" parts in their Gospels (especially Mark, which is an "action" gospel that moves at a quick pace -- as an example, look how often he uses the word "immediately"). They would be inclined to describe what happened in more detail.
So why would they leave one man out? Three responses come to the fore.
- The first is a theory that Matthew here (and elsewhere) doubles to fit the criteria of "two witnesses". However, Matthew does not double characters consistently enough for this to make a worthwhile explanation [Keener, 282]. It also doesn't make a lot of sense because Matthew already has at least a dozen witnesses present in the form of Jesus and his disciples.
- A second idea is that Matthew, copying Mark, has followed a normal literary procedure for the day, in that he has left out other accounts by Mark (1:23-6 of the demoniac; also the blind man of 8:22-26) and so has chronologically displaced them, quite intentionally.
Of course we do not agree that Matthew copied Mark, at least not in his original Aramaic edition; but the same process could conceivably have taken place using common oral tradition or an Aramaic original.
- The third idea is simply practical: the second guy didn't do much, or as much. While the one guy came forth yelling and saying Legion and all that, the other probably hung back in the bushes yelling and physically cowering.
We don't know exactly what happened, but the bottom line is that if he didn't do anything special, and Mark and Luke are emphasizing action, they aren't going to divert from the main story and tell all about the guy hiding in the bushes that had to be called out or chased down, and change their whole story to accommodate him.
We can see an actual example of this within Luke's Gospel. Wright in The Resurrection of the Son of God [613] notes within Luke the example of how Peter is reported only to have gone to the tomb, yet on the Emmaus Road the disciples say that "some of our number" went to the tomb. Clearly, "Luke is quite capable of highlighting one person when he knows, and tell us later, that more than one was involved....If Luke can say that there was one person, and then later that there was more than one, the numerical differences between the different accounts of the women and the angels cannot be regarded as serious historical problems." Obviously this would apply to the demoniac story as well.
At present, I am inclined to think some variation on the second point is the most likely, though the third is not impossible. Both options, however, involve matters of freedom in literary composition associated with ancient writers.
A couple of other points to keep in mind. In the NT era only 10% of people could read at most. Stories for the average person had to be easy to remember when read out loud to them. Adding extra detail beyond your purpose would have made your readers have to work too hard and they'd lose track of the main point.
Imagine all you'd have to remember if you couldn't read or write (and it cost money you didn't have to have someone do it for you -- and there aren't any charities to help you learn to read or anything like that). Furthermore, writing materials such as parchment and ink are very expensive and very hard to get. You have only a limited amount of space to write something, and if you have an area of concentration, you don't need distracting "by the way" elements running around in your account. You get to that point, and you don't waste expensive and limited resources talking about what in your context is a non-essential. (For more on this, see link 1 below.)
I hope this gives the reader some idea of just how little awareness critics show when they object, "one demoniac or two?" and approach it as though it were some sort of unsurmountable, irreconcilable difficulty. They're living in a world full of conveniences the ancients didn't have, and without difficulties the ancients had to overcome.
But then again, we moderns often "fail" on the same points. In my essay comparing the four biographies of Lincoln (link 2 below) I found exactly the same sort of "mistakes" the critics find in the Gospels, including one that is a perfect match for this one: One bio says Lincoln shot a turkey; another says there was a flock of turkeys.
So would the critic say: "So, was there one turkey, or more than one? This allows entirely too much freedom of selection to writers who are professional historians."
Indeed.
One additional point of notice. One Skeptic tried to devalue this sort of explanation by appealing to 2 Peter 1:20-1:
Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
According to this Skeptic, this makes it impossible that the Gospels or any Biblical book should in any sense reflect the view of the author and be subject to such variations as we have described, for that would constitute the "will of men" being involved in the process.
But Peter refers here to prophecies of Scripture -- not "narratives" like the Gospels. He is speaking within a specific genre-context, and this is confirmed by the reference to "holy men of God" that "spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." The content in question is prophetic oracles spoken by a specific class of persons.
Moreover, understand what is meant here by the "will" of man: it refers to the choice or pleasure of men. It does not even mean in this context that the men who spoke became automatons with no ability to couch the message in terms understandable to their audience.
Finally, one could ask: Why could God not have chosen men of different backgrounds who He knew would make such adjustments in order to provide the message the best way possible to a certain set of readers? Skeptics often make much of a perception that God "plays favorites"; yet giving the universal message of salvation in multiple-level formats indicates a "non-favoritism" orientation.
-JPH