Many times, Jesus would heal someone and then tell that person and others not to spread the news about it. Yet occasionally, he healed someone and told that person to go tell others about it. Why this seeming contradiction?
Jesus Told People Not to Tell about His Healings
For example, at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry, all three synoptists record that a leper came to Jesus and asked him to heal him. Mark records, “A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, ‘If you choose, you can make me clean.’ Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, ‘I do choose. Be made clean!’ Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. After sternly warning him he sent him away at once, … But he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that Jesus could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the country; and people came to him from every quarter” (Mark 1.40-43, 45 NRSV; cf. Matt. 8.2-4; Luke 5.12-16). Only Luke says this occurred “in one of the cities” of Galilee (Lk 5.12). And only Mark says Jesus “could no longer go into a town openly.” Why was that?
It Was Due to Religious Opposition
Soon thereafter, Mark records that when Pharisees were present, “Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there who had a withered hand. They watched him to see whether he would cure him on the sabbath, that they might accuse him. And he said to the man who had the withered hand, ‘Come forward.’ Then he said to them, ‘Is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the sabbath, to save life or to kill?’ But they remained silent. He looked around at them in anger; he was grieved at their hardness of heart and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately conspired with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him” (Mark 3.1-6).
The Demonic of Gerasenes Was in Gentile Land
On the other hand, all three synoptics also report that soon after this Jesus cast demons out of a man that went into a nearby herd of about 2,000 swine, and it spooked them so badly that they ran down a hillside and drowned in Lake Galilee. Mark relates it, saying, “They came to the other side of the sea, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when he [Jesus] had stepped out of the boat, immediately a man out of the tombs with an unclean spirit met him. He lived among the tombs; and no one could restrain him any more, even with a chain; for he had often been restrained with shackles and chains, but the chains he wrenched apart, and the shackles he broke in pieces; and no one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains he was always howling and bruising himself with stones. When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed down before him; and he shouted at the top of his voice, ‘What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torture me.’ For he had said to him, ‘Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!'” (Mark 5.1-8).
Actually, a demon spoke through the man, saying there were many other demons who possessed the man as well. This lead demon then asked Jesus, ‘”Send us into the swine.’ So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the sea, and were drowned in the sea” (Mark 5.12-13).
Mark adds concerning Jesus, “As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed by demons begged him that he might be with him. But Jesus refused, and said to him, ‘Go home to your friends, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and what mercy he has shown you.’ And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed” (Mark 5.18-20).
So, why did Jesus tell the leper not to spread the news that he had healed him? It was because of what we learned when Jesus soon healed the man with the withered hand on the sabbath, that Jewish religious authorities seeing it caused them to strategize how they might get him killed since they believed it was a violation of Torah (the Law of Moses) to heal on the sabbath. God had a certain time when Jesus would succumb to these religious authorities to be condemned and crucified, but this was not that time. Thus, Jesus told people not to tell, and he would avoid cities. Yet Jesus did the opposite regarding the demon-possessed man, telling him to proclaim his exorcism to his friends. What was the difference?
It’s All about the Identity of People and Location
It’s all about the people and the location. The New Testament gospels reveal that as Jesus continued to do such healings and even miracles, Jewish religious authorities increasingly attempted to get him killed. But that is because he was doing them before Jews in the land of Israel, mostly in Galilee and sometimes in Judea, where Jewish religious authorities might be present. But that was not the case with the demon-possessed man. He was a Gentile who lived on the eastern side of Lake Galilee, in Gerasenes of the Decapolis, meaning “ten cities.” That was Gentile territory, thus not part of the land of Israel. There were no Jews there who would threaten opposition to Jesus healing people or casting evil spirits out of them. Moreover, we should know it was not in Israel because of the herd of swine. Jews don’t eat pork due to their food laws in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14.
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