THERE is perhaps no Bible narrative which teems with more helpful lessons for workers in Christian Science than that of the healing of the Gadarene, recounted in the Gospels of Mark and Luke. Jesus and his disciples were crossing the sea of Galilee, and on their way they encountered a terrific storm of wind and tempest, which lashed the sea to such fury that the boat and the little company were in great jeopardy. Fear and terror took possession of the disciples, but Jesus, we read, "was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow." Aroused by their appeal for help from the terror that overwhelmed them, his gentle "Peace, be still," calmed at once both the turbulence of the elements and the fear of the disciples.
This experience formed a fitting prelude to what was to follow, for as they reached the other side of the sea and landed in the country of the Gadarenes, a poor raging maniac came rushing toward the little band, a creature in such a state of self-hate and misery that no man could tame him. As he approached the Master, he ran to him, beseeching him not to torment him. Jesus had rebuked the unclean spirit, but the poor Gadarene, believing the evil to be in himself and recognizing that evil could but suffer torment in the presence of the purity and peace he felt before him, failed to see in Christ Jesus a deliverer, but only a judge and a destroyer. The Master's answer was one of perfect spiritual understanding. He saw the worship of the poor Gadarene, his ready recognition of purity and holiness, and his willingness to pay all homage to it: saw, too, with infinite compassion, the shackles of fear and hate which the belief of his unity with evil was putting upon him, and asked this question, "What is thy name?" The question was one of mighty import. To the man it was a reminder of his real nature, awakening him from the lie by which he had been deceived, perhaps recalling to his mind the well known question of his own prophet, "Who art thou, that thou shouldest be afraid . . . and forgettest the Lord thy maker?" It was of equal import to the false sense of evil, forcing it to see itself for what it really was and to destroy itself. As the question did its work, a great stir took place in the human consciousness, the evil was roused to seeming activity, and voiced itself in the boastful declaration, "My name is Legion: for we are many."
Let us pause for a moment to consider what this implied to the Gadarene himself, and to those who heard it. They were Jews, and the word "Legion" brought to the Jew of that day the thought of the pomp and pride and tyranny of the crushing power of Rome, that which had overrun their country and laid it low: the power before which they had proved helpless as babes, and entirely unable to cast it off. All this, evil claimed to be its name and nature; and so far as material evidence went, the claim seemed justified. How terrible it must have been to those who heard it. What a sense of hopeless bondage it must have conveyed. But the Master knew its nothingness; he does not seem even to have contradicted it: unmoved, he waited while the truth behind his question roused the man to the knowledge of what he really was, and so to the impossibility of his being part of evil or possessed by evil: with the result that the false concept was separated from him, and evil, which a moment before had been claiming the supremacy and immovability of a Roman legion (having no self-existence), was heard pleading that if cast out it might go into its native element, into the swinishness and animality to which pride and boastful personal sense belong. Jesus merely answered, "Go," and the evil rushed to its destruction.
