Matthew (The Expositor's Bible Commentary) by D. A. Carson & D. A. Carson

Author:D. A. Carson & D. A. Carson
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: REL006070 Religion / Biblical Commentary / New Testament
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2017-03-06T23:00:00+00:00

43“When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. 44Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order. 45Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation.”

COMMENTARY

43 When an evil spirit (see comments at 8:28; 10:1) leaves a man (lit., “the man,” but the article presents a typical case), it goes “through arid places” in search of rest. This conforms to the view that demons have an affinity for such places (Tob 8:3; cf. Rev 18:2). Ultimately, however, they seek another body in order to do even more harm.

44 Verse 43 implies the possibility of repossession. While v.44 may be theoretically interpreted as a universal fact of experience, that would make Jesus’ exorcisms an invitation to catastrophe. So it is better to take the language of the text as a Semitic paratactic conditional protasis to v.45 (i.e., “If the demon on his arrival finds the house unoccupied, etc.”; cf. H. S. Nyberg, “Zum grammatischen Verständnis von Matth. 12:44f.,” ConBNT 13 [1949]: 1–11; Jeremias, Parables of Jesus, 197–98) or to take the details of the story as representing a dangerous contingency (Beyer, Semitische Syntax, 281–86).

45 Though the seven evil spirits may have been harder to drive out than just one (cf. Mk 5:9; 9:29), the text mentions only their greater wickedness. The man from whom the demon had been driven out is now in a far worse condition than before. Jesus’ final statement in this pericope—“That is how it will be with this wicked generation” (omitted by Luke)—does not change the point of the story from one of demon-possession to the nation’s failure to recognize Jesus, for both Matthew and Luke understand the story to demand recognition of Jesus Messiah. But what Matthew adds (1) closes off the main part of the pericope by referring again to “this wicked generation” (cf. v.39)—a common but overlooked Matthean device (see comments at 15:20)—and (2) makes the warning less cryptic than Luke (cf. v.40; Lk 11:30). Though Luke knows the danger into which the Jews’ rejection of Jesus (Lk 21:20–24) will place them, this is not for him, as it is for Matthew, a major theme.

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