When Spirits Call

That evening, at sundown, they brought to Jesus all who were sick or possessed with demons. And the whole city was gathered around the door. And he cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons; and he would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him. Mark 1:32-34

Remember when you believed in demons and evil spirits?

I mean, really believed in them? 

For many of us, it was in early childhood when these creepy creatures danced in the shadows of our darkened bedrooms. We saw them, heard them, felt their sinister presence, and often communicated with them.

Some philosophers say we are born with an awareness of the other side – the angels as well as the demons – but our cognizance dims in direct proportion to our ability to communicate it. By the time we develop a rudimentary vocabulary, all memories of the other side have disappeared except for those occasional childhood glimpses of disembodied entities.

Somewhere in the recesses of our minds are memories of moving shadows that interrupted our childhood sleep. We’d cry out for our parents who, long blind to the other side, would shuffle wearily into our rooms to assure us there was no such thing as monsters under the bed. After Mommy or Daddy repeated that blessed assurance a few hundred times, we started to believe it. By the time most of us entered elementary school, we stopped seeing the spirits, and by the time we reached the seventh grade, we stopped believing we ever had. Or so goes the theorizing of some philosophers.

In the days before radio and television – and, God knows, long before three-dimensional, quadraphonic experiences with Harry Potter – evil spirits were an essential ingredient of childhood imagination. The reason fairy tales had the power to terrorize kids is that haunted forests filled with ravenous wolves, ogres, trolls, and witches already existed in their minds. 

Perhaps these horror stories were intended to entertain the young, but they were also used to warn kids about life’s dangers and to keep children under control. Some parents warned children about the boogey man who would “get you” if you didn’t behave. 

There are dozens of theories about where the boogey man came from, but my favorite can be traced back to Napoleon Bonaparte. When England prepared for a potential invasion by Napoleon in 1803, “Boney” – later “Boogey” – was used to scare naughty English children into submission. In the words of a charming nursery rhyme:

Baby, baby, naught baby,  

Hush! you squalling thing, I say; 

Peace this instant! Peace! or maybe 

Bonaparte will pass this way.

Napoleon never invaded England. He was defeated twice and exiled twice. There is a story that when Napoleon was exiled for the last time on St. Helena Island in 1815, the children of his British guards remembered the rhyme and Bonaparte soon became aware of it. Witnesses occasionally saw him placing his index fingers like horns against his head and chasing laughing kids away from his chateau. 

But the hair-raising persona of “the Boogey Man” is based more on his other-worldly origins than on Bonaparte’s earthly power. The Boogey Man creeped children out because of they knew instinctively evil spirits exist and can be dangerous.

That evil spirits exist I have no doubt. But is it always possible to recognize one when you see one?

Jesus immediately discerned the malevolence lodged in the man who came to the synagogue in Capernaum, and the spirit recognized Jesus. Mark’s minimalist Gospel describes a dramatic scene, but nothing as harrowing as scenes in The Exorcist. Jesus says to the spirit, come out of him, and the unwilling host convulses as the spirit screams and departs. Just like that. 

Mark would have been a lousy screenwriter. When unclean spirits are portrayed, Hollywood producers want to see American Horror Story; they want to see Linda Blair twist her head 360 degrees and vomit green slime; they want to see huge, hideous faces with multiple rows of blackened teeth; they want to see monstrous gargoyles that freeze hearts and make audiences scream.

But what do unclean spirits really look like? Given their incorporeal nature, it would be hard to tell, but chances are we’d be surprised at their appearance.

When I was two or three I had an imaginary friend. I have no memory of him beyond a vague impression that he looked like Dagwood Bumstead. My parents said I seemed to have a relationship with this figure, who remained with me until my baby brother Larry was old enough to be a more relatable companion. There is a photograph of me at 2 playing with a hose near an old barn, and if you look closely there is a ghostly image of a child standing patiently by the barn door. No one saw the figure that day. It does not appear to be double exposure, but what is it? My imaginary friend? A guardian angel? An evil spirit? 

These are unknowable and generally meaningless questions, except for the role they play in my genetic memory. But I suspect they are not unique. Of course we all have similar memories hidden in the caverns of our unconsciousness. They are like dreams: windows into a world we knew before we were born and to which we will one day return.

The biblical allegories offer vague and imprecise descriptions of that world beyond. Jesus’ encounter with the unclean spirit in the synagogue is one of those allegories. It tells us this much: evil spirits exist; they have the potential of doing great damage to souls and their surroundings; but good spirits also exist in the form of a loving creator, a solicitous advocate, and a savior with the moral authority to rebuke evil and order it away from us: 

“Be silent and come out.”

Even so, the origin of evil in the world, the question of why God allows it, and the fundamental nature of evil spirits – it’s all a puzzle. 

There are wonderful biblical and extra-biblical accounts of fallen angels like Lucifer who hate God and exist to seduce humans away from God’s love and refuge. But since humans would not be seduced by hideously and horrifyingly ugly devils, one has to wonder: what does evil look like?

I suspect devils are quite beautiful: desirable creatures who lure us away from God with the promise of instant gratification and the assurance that we can do anything we want as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else.

In C. S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters, an allegorical book of letters from a junior devil seeking advice from his senior on how to seduce humans away from God, an interesting image emerges. The two demons augment their influence over their “patients” by concealing their identity and encouraging humans to be content with their apathy toward God and religion. “Talk to (your human) about ‘moderation in all things,’” Screwtape advises. “If you can once get him to the point of thinking that ‘religion is all very well up to a point,’ you can feel quite happy about his soul.”

In his introduction to the book, Lewis writes: “There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a magician with the same delight.”

Unfortunately, upon these “opposite errors” are where many of us stand. 

Many obsess daily over books and films about vampires, zombies, witches, wizards and ravenous fiends – some with unexpected twists, such as Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. The millions of dollars generated by vampire and zombie films are evidence of what C. S. Lewis calls an “unhealthy interest.” 

But many more of us – perhaps most – scoff at the existence of evil spirits and attribute evil behavior to psychosis and inadequate psycho-pharmacology. 

The more reasonable path, Lewis suggests, is down the middle.

That path involves trusting our earliest instincts that evil spirits exist and attempt to seduce us away from God’s protection.

And the path requires a calmness of faith that shields us from the temptation to panic at the presence of evil, or the temptation to obsess over media-generated distractions that portray evil as harmless thrills before the credits roll.

In Mark’s first chapter, it unfolds like this:

Jesus, still an unknown itinerant from Nazareth, is preaching eloquently in a nearby synagogue. 

Unexpectedly, a possessed man wanders in, and the evil spirit within him recognizes the preacher.

“What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth,” the spirit cries out. “Have you come to destroy us?”

Calmly – perhaps without raising his voice – Jesus responds. “Be silent, and come out of him.”

And the spirit comes out. Just like that.

The reaction in the synagogue is amazement.

“What is this?” They asked. “A new teaching – with authority? He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.”

This is the proper balance when it comes to confronting evil: a calm recognition that the Lord of our Lives teaches with an authority that leads us to salvation as surely as it delivers us from evil.

That is the path to which we have been called, and with God’s help, that is the path we shall seek.

And no wonder.

As one cinematic scene of exorcism reminds us: 

The power of Christ compels us.