Matthew 4:24

throughout all Syria The fame passes to the north and east, rather than to the south. Galilee is connected by trade and affinity with Damascus rather than with Jerusalem.

torments The original Greek word signifies a "touch-stone," then "torture," the touch-stone of justice; then a disease that racks and agonizes the limbs like the torture which many a poor Galilean had experienced in the courts of law.

possessed with devils The possession of the human soul by spiritual powers or beings is distinguished from ordinary diseases here, and also by St Luke, who, as a physician, is exact in his description of the various forms of disease. The distinguishing feature of such demoniacal possession may be described as the phenomenon of double consciousness. The occult spiritual power becomes, as it were, a second self, ruling and checking the better self. The Greek word in the text, lit. subject to a dæmon or dæmonion, has no precise English equivalent. The word "devil" should be confined to the translation of διάβολος, see note, ch. Matthew 4:1. It is most unhappily used as a rendering of δαιμόνια in 1 Corinthians 10:20-21. In classical Greek the word is used of the divine voice which warned Socrates, and of the divine power or force which Demosthenes sometimes fancied to be hurrying on the Hellenic race in a fatal course.

those which were lunatick Lit. affected by the moon; the changes of the moon being thought to influence mad persons. The passage is important as distinguishing dæmoniacal possession from lunacy.

The only special instance of curing a lunatic is recorded in ch. Matthew 17:14-21 and in the parallel passages. The origin of mental disease may often be traced to licentious living. Observe the frequent instances of unclean spirits met with in these districts.

The Christian Church has followed her divine Founder's example in this tendance of bodily ailment. The founding of hospitals and the care of the sick are distinguishing features of Christianity and among the most blessed fruits of it. A deeper respect for life and a deeper sense of purity have followed as necessary consequences.

It is contended by some that the "several house" of 2 Chronicles 26:21 was a hospital. Possibly this was so, but the spirit of Judaism in this respect was not the spirit of Christianity. It may readily be acknowledged, however, that the Jews of the present day are the foremost in works of charity and tender regard for the sick.