Lukas 4:41

4:41 Demons also came out ¹  of many, crying out, ²  “You are the Son of God!” ³  But he rebuked ⁴  them, and would not allow them to speak, ⁵  because they knew that he was the Christ. ⁶ 

Lukas 8:27-28

8:27 As ⁷  Jesus ⁸  stepped ashore, ⁹  a certain man from the town ¹⁰  met him who was possessed by demons. ¹¹  For a long time this man ¹²  had worn no clothes and had not lived in a house, but among ¹³  the tombs. 8:28 When he saw ¹⁴  Jesus, he cried out, fell ¹⁵  down before him, and shouted with a loud voice, “Leave me alone, ¹⁶  Jesus, Son of the Most High ¹⁷  God! I beg you, do not torment ¹⁸  me!”

[4:41]  ¹ sn Demons also came out. Note how Luke distinguishes healing from exorcism here, implying that the two are not identical.

[4:41]  ² tn Grk “crying out and saying.” The participle λέγοντα (legonta) is redundant in English and has not been translated here.

[4:41]  ³ tc Most mss (A Q Θ Ψ 0102 Ë^1,13 Ï) read “the Christ, the Son of God.” But the earliest and best mss, along with several other witnesses (א B C D L W Ξ 33 579 700 1241 2542 lat sa), lack “the Christ” here. It is likely that later scribes wished to bring the demons’ confession in line with what Luke says they knew later in the verse.

[4:41]  ⁴ tn Or “commanded,” but “rebuke” implies strong disapproval, which seems to be more in keeping with the context here (L&N 33.419).

[4:41]  ⁵ sn Jesus would not allow the demons to speak because the time for such disclosure was not yet at hand, and such a revelation would have certainly been misunderstood by the people. In all likelihood, if the people had understood him early on to be the Son of God, or Messiah, they would have reduced his mission to one of political deliverance from Roman oppression (cf. John 6:15). Jesus wanted to avoid, as much as possible, any premature misunderstanding about who he was and what he was doing. However, at the end of his ministry, he did not deny such a title when the high priest asked him (22:66-71).

[4:41]  ⁶ tn Or “Messiah”; both “Christ” (Greek) and “Messiah” (Hebrew and Aramaic) mean “one who has been anointed.”

[4:41]  sn Note how Luke associates Son of God with Messiah (Christ) in this context, a regal connection with OT roots (Ps 2:7). Also, see the note on Christ in 2:11.

[8:27]  ⁷ tn Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[8:27]  ⁸ tn Grk “he”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[8:27]  ⁹ tn Grk “stepped out on land.”

[8:27]  ¹⁰ tn Or “city.”

[8:27]  ¹¹ tn Grk “who had demons.”

[8:27]  ¹² tn Grk “he”; the referent (the demon-possessed man) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[8:27]  ¹³ tn Or “in.”

[8:28]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “And seeing.” The participle ἰδών (idwn) has been taken temporally. Here δέ (de) has not been translated.

[8:28]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “and fell,” but καί (kai) has not been translated since English normally uses a coordinating conjunction only between the last two elements in a series of three or more.

[8:28]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “What to me and to you?” (an idiom). The phrase τί ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί (ti emoi kai soi) is Semitic in origin, though it made its way into colloquial Greek (BDAG 275 s.v. ἐγώ). The equivalent Hebrew expression in the OT had two basic meanings: (1) When one person was unjustly bothering another, the injured party could say “What to me and to you?” meaning, “What have I done to you that you should do this to me?” (Judg 11:12; 2 Chr 35:21; 1 Kgs 17:18). (2) When someone was asked to get involved in a matter he felt was no business of his own, he could say to the one asking him, “What to me and to you?” meaning, “That is your business, how am I involved?” (2 Kgs 3:13; Hos 14:8). These nuances were apparently expanded in Greek, but the basic notions of defensive hostility (option 1) and indifference or disengagement (option 2) are still present. BDAG suggests the following as glosses for this expression: What have I to do with you? What have we in common? Leave me alone! Never mind! Hostility between Jesus and the demons is certainly to be understood in this context, hence the translation: “Leave me alone….”

[8:28]  ¹⁷ sn On the title Most High see Luke 1:35.

[8:28]  ¹⁸ sn The demons’ plea “do not torment me” is a recognition of Jesus’ inherent authority over evil forces. The request is that Jesus not bother them. There was an appointed time in which demons would face their judgment, and they seem to have viewed Jesus’ arrival on the scene as an illegitimate change in God’s plan regarding the time when their sentence would be executed.