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Acts 19:15-16 …”I recognize Yahushua, and I know about Paul, but who are you?” 16 And the man, in whom was the evil spirit, leaped on them and subdued all of them and overpowered them so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.
The word recognize in Greek is ginôskô, and it simply means to come to know, recognize, perceive, and understand.7 In fact, the ESV, NKJV, NIV, and other mainstream translations each translate verse 15 as, “Yahushua I know…” This leads us to the question, what exactly did they know? Who do demons believe Yahushua is?
We are told that whenever Yahushua encountered demons, they would identify him as the Son of Yahuwah.
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Who do demons believe Yahushua is? In general, we are told that whenever Yahushua encountered demons, they would identify him as the Son of God [Yahuwah]:
Mark 3:7-8, 11-12 Yahushua withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and also from Judea, 8 and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon, a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him…11 Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they would fall down before Him and shout, “You are the Son of God!” 12 And He earnestly warned them not to tell who He was.
Some interpret Son of God to be the equivalent of God the Son. However, the latter title is never used in Scripture. On the contrary, Son of God, when used of Yahushua, is understood to be a title synonymous with Christ or Messiah, that is, the promised king of Israel:
Matthew 16:16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
Matthew 26:63 But Yahushua kept silent. And the high priest said to Him, “I adjure You by the living God, that You tell us whether You are the Christ, the Son of God.”
John 1:49 Nathanael answered Him, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God; You are the King of Israel.”
While some have used the title Son of God to denote Yahushua’s deity, neither the Judaism nor the paganism of Yahushua’s day understood the title in this way.
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Professor Douglas McCready explains that those in the first century did not understand the title Son of God to mean Yahushua was God:
While some have used the title Son of God to denote [Yahushua’s] deity, neither the Judaism nor the paganism of [Yahushua’s] day understood the title in this way. Neither did the early church.” 8
Harper Collins Bible Dictionary also explains the meaning of the Son of God in early Christianity:
The use of the word “appointed” [about the Son of God] in Romans 1:4 indicates that at this stage in the history of Christian thought, the title Son of God denoted an office or function in salvation history rather than a metaphysical quality as in later dogmatics. This usage is in accord with O.T. Jewish thinking.9
Thus, unclean spirits understood Yahushua to be the promised Messiah. But what about Yahushua’s nature? As part of the spirit realm, these fallen angels10 who rebelled against Yahuwah would have known whether or not he was the second member of a supposed Trinity. Did they ever identify Yahushua as Yahuwah? The best way to answer this question is to examine their own words.
When Yahushua came to the country of the Gerasenes,11 he met a man with an unclean spirit who had been living among the tombs. The dramatic encounter is recorded in the synoptic gospels. How did the demon, whose name was “Legion; for we are many,” address Yahushua:
Mark 5:6-9 Seeing Yahushua from a distance, he ran up and bowed down before Him; 7 and shouting with a loud voice, he said, “What business do we have with each other, Yahushua, Son of the Most High God? I implore You by God, do not torment me!” 8 For He had been saying to him, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!”12
The demon declared Yahushua to be the Son of the Most High God. By definition, there can be only one Most High God. Thus, the son of the Most High God cannot be the Most High God. Furthermore, the evil spirit implored Yahushua by Yahuwah, thus identifying Yahuwah as someone other than Yahushua.
The following example is just as specific as the first. When Yahushua traveled to Capernaum, he taught in the local synagogue, where there was a demon-possessed man among the congregants. Listen to what he had to say about Yahushua:
Demons Speaking: "Let us alone! What business do we have with each other, Yahushua of Nazareth? Have You come to destroy us? I know who You are—the Holy One of God!" (Luke 4:34)
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Luke 4:31-34 And He came down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and He was teaching them on the Sabbath; 32 and they were amazed at His teaching, for His message was with authority. 33 In the synagogue, there was a man possessed by the spirit of an unclean demon, and he cried out with a loud voice, 34 “Let us alone! What business do we have with each other, Yahushua of Nazareth? Have You come to destroy us? I know who You are—the Holy One of God!”13
The demon rather emphatically declared that he knew who Yahushua was. He loudly cried out that the Nazarene was the Holy One of God. Not the One God who is holy, but the holy one who is of God. The word holy in Greek is hagios, and it means sacred or holy.14 Thayer’s Greek Lexicon defines hagios in this passage as meaning that which has been “set apart” by or for Yahuwah “to be, as it were, exclusively his.”15 In other words, Yahushua is not Yahuwah, but the one who has been set apart by Yahuwah for His plans and purposes. Indeed, Yahushua is the promised Messiah. The demon, being a part of the spirit realm, knew this to be the case.
Yahushua Silenced DemonsEarlier, we read in the gospel of Mark that Yahushua warned the demons not to reveal his identity:
Mark 3:11-12 Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they would fall down before Him and shout, “You are the Son of God!” 12 And He earnestly warned them not to tell who He was.
In Luke’s parallel account16 we read:
Luke 4:40-41 While the sun was setting, all those who had any who were sick with various diseases brought them to Him; and laying His hands on each one of them, He was healing them. 41 Demons also were coming out of many, shouting, “You are the Son of God!” But rebuking them, He would not allow them to speak, because they knew Him to be the Christ.
The demonic spirits knew Yahushua to be the Son of Yahuwah, that is, the Christ. Yahushua’s refusal to allow them to speak underscores that they could rightly identify him. Unclean spirits never identified Yahushua as God, much less a second member of a triune God, a doctrine that would take an additional 350 years to develop fully.
Nevertheless, some will insist that the fact that Yahushua had authority over demons proves he is Yahuwah. However, Yahushua, himself stated that his ability to banish unclean spirits was because of the Spirit of Yahuwah:
Yahushua, himself stated that his ability to banish unclean spirits was because of the Spirit of Yahuwah.
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Matthew 12:22-29 Then a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute was brought to Yahushua, and He healed him, so that the mute man spoke and saw. 23 All the crowds were amazed, and were saying, “This man cannot be the Son of David, can he?” 24 But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, “This man casts out demons only by Beelzebul the ruler of the demons.” 25 And knowing their thoughts Yahushua said to them, “Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and any city or house divided against itself will not stand. 26 “If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; how then will his kingdom stand? 27 “If I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? For this reason they will be your judges. 28 “But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of Yahuwah, then the kingdom of Yahuwah has come upon you.
The crowds wondered if Yahushua’s power over the demon signaled that he was the long-awaited Son of David, that is, the Messiah. They certainly did not interpret Yahushua’s power to mean that he was God. Luke describes this miracle-working power in his parallel account:
Luke 11:20 “But if I cast out demons by the finger of Yahuwah, then the kingdom of Yahuwah has come upon you.
Yahushua’s power over demonic spirits resulted from the anointing and authority Yahuwah had given him.17
Acts 10:38 “You know of Yahushua of Nazareth, how Yahuwah anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for Yahuwah was with Him.
Yahushua had authority over demons, not because he is Yahuwah, but because Yahuwah was with him. What’s more, Yahushua, in turn, delegated this authority to cast out demons to his disciples.18
Scripture records that the demons believed Yahushua to be the man from Nazareth, the promised Messiah of the Most High God. They never identified him as a deity. On the contrary, they understood, as did the Jews, that Yahuwah is one:
James 2:19 You believe that Yahuwah is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder.
1 Luke 11:18; Matthew 25:41; Ephesians 6:11-12; Revelation 12:9.
2 Luke 8:2; 13:11; Acts 5:16.
3 Luke 8:27; Mark 9:22; Acts 19:15-16.
4 Revelation 16:14.
5 1 Timothy 4:1.
6 Matthew 4:24; 8:16; 28; 33; 9:32; 12:22; 15:22; Mark 1:32; 5:15-18; Luke 8:36; Acts 8:7; 10:38.
7 Strong’s Greek and Hebrew Dictionary, #1097.
8 Douglas McCready, He Came Down from Heaven: The Preexistence of Christ and the Christian Faith, (Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2005), p.56.
9 Harper Collins Bible Dictionary, Paul J. Achtemeier, Editor, 1996 ed., p 1052.
10 The term fallen angels is never used in Scripture, rather it stems from passages such as Luke 10:18 and Revelation 12:4 and 9, where Satan is cast out of heaven for his rebellion, along with a third of the “stars” (angels) that sided with him.
11 The event took place near the city of Gergesa, thus in the country of the Gerasenes. The man is also referred to as the Gadarene demoniac which is named after the area’s largest city, Gadara. https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/dictionaries/dict_meaning.php?source=3&wid=S8128
12 Luke’s account refers to Yahushua as the “Son of the Most High God” while Matthew’s calls him the “Son of God.” (Luke 8:28; Matthew 8:28-29.)
13 See also Mark 1:21-25.
14 NASB Greek-Hebrew Dictionary, #40.
15 Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, https://biblehub.com/greek/40.htm
16 Luke 4:40-41 is associated with Luke 6:17-19 and Mark 3:7-12 in the Gospel Parallels (Thomas Nelson, 1967), p. 18-19, 53.
17 Matthew 11:27; 28:18; John 13:3-4.
18 Mark 3:14-15; 9:38; 16:17; Luke 10:1 and 17-20; Acts 16:16-18; 19:11-12.
This is a non-WLC article. Source: https://oneGodworship.com/who-do-demons-believe-Jesus-is/
We have taken out from the original article all pagan names and titles of the Father and Son, and have replaced them with the original given names. Furthermore, we have restored in the Scriptures quoted the names of the Father and Son, as they were originally written by the inspired authors of the Bible. -WLC Team
