Note 37 — Chapter IX · MIRACLES OF JESUS.

The method adopted for the cure of the demoniacal state was, especially among the Jews, in conformity with what we have ascertained to have been the idea of its nature. The cause of the malady was not supposed to be, as in natural diseases, an impersonal object or condition, such as an impure fluid, a morbid excitement or debility, but a self-conscious being; hence it was treated, not mechanically or chemically, but logically, i.e. by words. The demon was enjoined to depart; and to give effect to this injunction, it was coupled with the names of beings who were believed to have power over demons. Hence the main instrument against demoniacal possession was conjuration,37 either in the name of God, or of angels, or of some other potent being, e.g. the Messiah (Acts xix. 13), with certain forms which were said to be derived from Solomon.38 In addition to this, certain roots,39 stones,40 fumigations and amulets41 were used, in obedience to traditions likewise believed to have been handed down from Solomon. Now as the cause of the malady was not seldom really a psychical one, or at least one lying in the nervous system, which may be acted on to an incalculable extent by moral instrumentality, this psychological treatment was not altogether illusory! for by exciting in the patient the belief that the demon by which he was possessed, could not retain his hold before a form of conjuration, it might often effect the removal of the disorder. Jesus himself admits that the Jewish exorcists sometimes succeeded in working such cures (Matt. xii. 27). But we read of Jesus that without conjuration by any other power, and without the appliance of any further means, he expelled the demons by his word. The most remarkable cures of this kind, of which the gospels inform us, we are now about to examine.