Lucas 8:33

And the demons came out from the man, and entered the herd of swine: and the herd rushed down the steep into the lake, and were drowned.

The ethical question raised by the Lord's permitting the destruction of this property is raised by some who wish to cast a reflection upon our Lord, but there is really no honest objection that may be raised. It is not necessary to suppose that the swine were illegally held, Jews not being permitted to own them; and, besides, this was Gentile territory; nor to suppose that Jesus could not have healed the man without permitting the exorcised demons to enter the herd. Of course, he could have cast them into the abyss, as their pleas admitted. Therefore it must be concluded that it was Jesus' will that the swine should have been destroyed through the instrumentality of the demons. Why? By permitting those malignant demons to have their will regarding the swine, Jesus demonstrated, once and for all, what is the true purpose of Satan and all his agents. God permitted the glimpse of this same destructive purpose of the evil one in what the devil was permitted to do to Job (Job 1:12-22). The calamities that befell that patriarch are justified upon the premise that God was showing to all men the malignant purpose of Satan and the true faith of Job. The same is true here, with the significant difference that swine were destroyed instead of human children, as was the case with Job. How reprehensible it is therefore for men to quibble about this, even charging the Lord with a capital offense for destroying property,[18] while blindly refusing to see that Christ has here given men a glimpse of their true enemy, Satan. Once Satan enters a man, or any society, the decline is swift, certain, and fatal.

Of overwhelming significance is the fact that it was not Christ, but the demons, who destroyed the property, just as they were destroying the life of the unfortunate man from whom they were exorcised by Jesus' all-powerful word. As for the sophisticated arrogance that would blame God for what God permits, such is both sinful and illogical. It is incredible that a scholar like Summers would deny this, saying:

What right did Jesus have to destroy the property of others? ... the simple expedient of holding that Jesus did not destroy them; the demons did ... is inadequate ... an unsatisfactory way of dealing with the type of detailed action involved in this event.[19]

Of course, such an objection to obvious truth is inadequate and unsatisfactory. The acceptance of such a monstrous proposition would require men to blame God for all the natural disasters of history, such things as earthquakes, floods, droughts, hurricanes, and pestilences. The Black Death wiped out "the moity of mankind"[20] during the fourteenth century. God permitted it; is he therefore to be blamed? Furthermore, it is perfectly clear from Jesus' rebuke of the winds and waves (Luke 8:24) that satanic instigation of at least some of the natural disorders which plague humanity is an unqualified fact. Therefore, the blaming of Jesus for what these malignant demons did is to establish a pattern of thought which would blame Almighty God for every disastrous thing in his whole universe that God does not prevent. Such a view is absolutely untenable. Those who would impose blame upon the holy Christ must do so upon other grounds than any which appear to exist here.

[18] Will and Ariel Durant, The Age of Voltaire (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1965), p. 120.

[19] Ray Summers, op. cit., p. 100.

[20] Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Philadelphia: Henry T. Coates and Company, 1788), Vol. 3pp. 641-644.