# Matt 8:31,32 - Demons sent into swine



## Berean

_31 The demons began to entreat Him, saying, "If You are going to cast us out, send us into the herd of swine."32 And He said to them, "Go!" And they came out and went into the swine, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea and perished in the waters._


In Matt 8:31 we've got the demons begging to be allowed to go into the swine. But the swine were drowned shortly thereafter. Why did the demons want to go into the swine? Where would they have gone if they had simply been cast out? Where did they go after the swine drowned? The same place? What was the advantage of going into the swine for only a few minutes?

The ESV Study Bible seems to say nothing on it. MacArthur says if simply cast out they would have gone into the pit or abyss. So were they able to move on after the pigs were dead and possess someone else?


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## Peairtach

The movements and activities of demons seems more than somewhat mysterious.

Maybe the demons were hoping that Christ would not cast them into the place of punishment. Maybe the drowning of the pigs in "the abyss" signified that they ended up in the place of punishment anyway (?)

Remember that in the Bible "down" and "below" and water and the sea is associated with the place of the dead and punishment and chaos and evil e.g. the Beast from the Sea in Revelation, while "up" is associated with Heaven e.g. Christ's ascenscion. (?) 

Not that anyone really believed, or should have believed, that Hell was under the Earth, or that God's Heaven was beyond space. These were appropriate symbols provided by God in nature to help the Covenant people visualise their world/cosmogony (?) 

This is an aspect of Biblical thought about which I'm talking "off the top of my head", and on which I could do with further teaching by a Reformed guide!!


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## Skyler

Berean said:


> The ESV Study Bible seems to say nothing on it.



Nor does my NIV or KJV. My guess is it's one of those things we don't need to know.


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## BobVigneault

The demonic operating system is too advanced for a swine motherboard architecture. The demons didn't know about this incompatibility issue but Jesus did (being the creator). The demons thought they were tricking Jesus. Once the migration was complete the demon OS severely overclocked the swines CPU and crashed with dramatic results. Stupid demons!

I suppose the moral of the story is, be careful what you pray for... you just might get it.


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