Demons’ Effects on Humans
The main effect of demons on humans is possession. This idea was as central to second-century Christian literature as it was to the Gospels. For example, in the Apocryphal Acts, just as in the Gospels, possession can cause sickness, usually mental illness[432] In the Acts of John, 56-57, two boys, possessed since their birth, look ill and suffer.
In the same Acts, luxury is a δαιμών who dwells inside a person, and it can be interpreted as ψυχική παρην ανοια, άκατάσχετος νόσος, as an illness of the soul[433] [434]Usually, demons act as evil spirits inside humans: the seven spirits that dwell inside Mary of Magdala can be interpreted as the seven spirits of sins known from the Testament of Ruben, an idea that we can find in Herma’s Shepard.39 This is a psychological interpretation of the demonic action, similar to what we find in the Acts of John’s account of the young Callimachus: after the death of his beloved Drusiana, Callimachus, possessed by an insane desire, tries to violate her corpse. This evil desire is defined as an illness that dwells inside him, preventing him from being rational.[435] Evil spirits enter into the human mind and seem sometimes to prevent humans from regaining control over themselves. In the Ascension of Isaiah, when Sammael/Belkira takes control of Manasse, it is not possible to understand if it is the king or the demon who condemns Isaiah to death, because the king seems to be not responsible for his actions[436]
The role of demonology in the apologists’ reflection is quite different. Possession is not always present in their works in the same way that it occurs in other second century Christian texts.
Justin Martyr makes some references to possession, as he says that the possessed are those who are thrown away from themselves by the souls of the dead, a possible reference to the Enochic tradition of the Giants.[437] [438] Justin does not explain how humans can be possessed by demons, but he evidently knows that this can happen. Possessed people exist and they can live in synagogues, because Jews lack the knowledge to send evil spirits away.43 But Justin Martyr is interested in other aspects of demonology: demons try to take humans away from God by inducing them to venerate other gods, as suggested by Ps. 106:5, and by transmitting to them a false knowledge, which may be magic, astrology or sacrifices.All of the apologists seem to be more interested in these topics. They have to face Hellenistic culture and so, with the aid of Ps. 106:5 and the widespread idea about the false knowledge taught by fallen angels, they try to persuade their audience that all or a great part of the knowledge of the other nations comes from demons, particularly knowledge concerning religious traditions. In this way, demonology can be used by the apologists as a powerful weapon against traditional religions.
According to Athenagoras, demons induce humans to venerate them and thus to not worship God anymore. But demons do not do this by possession— an idea that seems unknown to him, or at least that he does not like to speak about as it is not a good argument for a pagan audience. Moreover, demons negatively influence humans by using their movements, which can affect human destiny. The disorder they produce in the material life results in a second kind of Providence, different from the one provided by God. As a result, demons are responsible for the prominent role of chaos in the world. This idea of two Providences is common in Tatian, as we will see.
Demons also make people believe in their power by creating a false perception in their mind.
In doing so, they compel people to worship the statues of false gods as if they have real power. Demons can do this only if the human mind allows it. The human soul, having a ratio, can resist demonic attack. But, if the soul does not know the truth or if it is too attached to the material world, demons can enter it.The demons act by inspiring a mental image, which is different from the truth, and making the human mind think it is true. In order to do this, they use a weakness in human perception: the soul is able to sense true or false things depending on its movements, which can be rational or not.[439] The demons take advantage of the irrational movements, which are in accordance with their own characteristics?[440] Although they are not the same as idols, demons are able to deceive humans into thinking that they are idols and that idols possess great power.
But idols are only representations of dead people who are known from myths. Demons use the names and images of these people to corrupt humans, but the power they show is only imaginary. Idols have no power by themselves. They are made of bronze or stone, but bronze or stone do not have any power when they do not represent an image. In fact, with the same substances, we can make another image that will either not have the same power or will have no power at all.4[441]
If we infer that the power belongs to the people represented by the idols, Athenagoras states that it is not possible that these people would not have used this power to save themselves from whatever illness caused their death— therefore these people could not have had any real power. Thus the power must reside in a third element, namely the demon.
Athenagoras uses the Stoic theory of perception to explain how demons influence the human mind. This is straightforward because the Stoic term for mental images is the same εϊδολα[442] Athenagoras emphasises the two Greek words to create an identification between the mental image and the false divine image.
According to Athenagoras, demons interfere with divine Providence and with the human mind by means of irrationality. This is not very different from Tatian, who also believes in the existence of two kinds of providence, although Tatian does not explain his theory as clearly as Athenagoras.[443] [444] According to Tatian, demons have introduced destiny into the world with astrology, the worst learning that angels taught to men. When the angels fell to the earth, they were no longer able to stay in heaven, and so they made animals worthy of staying in the sky and placed them there?9 Humans believed that the animals were gods and worshipped them, because astrology seemed to bring rationality to a world that demons had made irrational. The fate that astrology can predict is correct because demons control both destiny and astrology. It is vain, therefore, to worship demons on account of such correct predictions.
The aim of bringing evil and destiny into the world is only due to demons' κακοήθεια: but demons themselves are subject to destiny, which is tied to passions. And demons, more than humans, have great passions. They are, therefore, not only involved in destiny, but also upset by it. In fact, only those who are subject to passions are under this second kind of providence. Good Christians, who must not have passions, are free from demonic destiny. This idea has two important effects. First, Christians are the only people who can live without the terror of demons. Second, those who are under the effects of demons were not, even before possession, truly Christians. Tatian can thus explain why Jesus defeated demons and why demons still exist in the world. Only true Christians benefit from Jesus's victory, and so they have a real protection against all evil that comes from demons including possession. The two consequences of this line of thought are evident, above all, in Origen, who analyses the question from a more speculative perspective: as every moral decision comes from humans, it is impossible for the devil to take control of a person: negative events, produced by demons, can strike people but are not able to separate them from God. Only man has control of his destiny.
On the one hand, Tatian accepts the notion that people bound to demons are in themselves evil, if not for their actions then for their refusal of good: this bond can be caused by faith in astrology and, as we will see, by possession and by the use of pharmacology. On the other hand, in a more complex way, he demonstrates that there is an escape from evil by remaining bound to goodness and to its laws. Demons know this, and so they have to convince humans by various means to abandon goodness. Thus, in order to make humans stray far from God and from the truth, they act on the human mind and perception too: this leads to a status that is comparable to the common idea of possession.
According to Tatian, human souls are made up of two parts: an inferior one, similar to matter in composition, that dies with the body and returns with the resurrection; the other, superior, one is not involved with matter and is always inclined towards the light. Usually, the superior part controls a person, but a demon can induce the inferior part to take control on account of its connection with matter, which demons can rule.[445] [446] [447] In this way, demons make humans worship them and forget the true knowledge that comes from God. Knowledge is a very important part of Tatian's demonology. It is only if humans refuse divine knowledge that demons can act on their minds. Humans are only able to remain good and safe from demonic attack if they know very well the Word of God and absolutely obey it. In Tatian's Address to the Greeks, the role of demons is particularly tied to false knowledge, even about possession. This is interesting because it accords with the Enochic tradition, in which fallen angels teach humans forbidden sciences, but good angels reveal permitted knowledge to prevent or to heal the demonic influenced In Tatian's thought, even medicine and pharmacology are maleficent sciences by which demons bind humans to themselves. Tatian's reasons for rejecting medicine come across as a bit banal: God cannot have created minerals or vegetables in order to treat human diseases because the diseases themselves did not exist before demons caused them. Such critiques of medicine, however, are not so banal because, in the end, they depend on the status of materiality. According to Tatian, people should not value their bodies because this demonstrates their love for materiality, which is the cause of the fall of humans and angels. Matter is φαύλος: it is bad and does not have real value. Tatian has to admit, however, that all of God's creation must be good, so even matter must be good. But the consideration of matter in Tatian's thought is very complex, hence the idea of his heterodoxy as transmitted by Iraeneus, Clemens and Hippolytys: they are the first to inform us that, after the death of his teacher Justin, Tatian would have taken a clear Gnostic position that can sometimes be nearer to that of Valentinus or to the Encratites, an heretical and ascetic group which, according to Eusebius, he may have helped found.[448] [449] [450] [451] [452] Demons seem to have power over the material world. They are able to use the inferior matter from which human bodies and minds are made.54 But they cannot do anything if humans wear spiritual armour made by the Holy Spirit. For Tatian, as for Athenagoras, the superior part of the soul, which Tatian sometimes simply calls the soul, can protect even the body.55 As we have seen, this idea is similar to what we find in Erma's Shepard: the πονερός πνεύμα of the Gospels cannot affect humans if the soul is protected by the presence of the Holy Spirit. Every good Christian possesses the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, to guide and to inspire to good works. There is no way evil spirits can take the Holy Spirit away from Christians. Christians, however, can open themselves up to evil and thus make the Holy Spirit go away.56 It is important to note that, for Tatian, medicine is one way of doing this because it allows something bad to enter a person. Furthermore, faith in something that is not good is in itself an evil that prevents God's help. Pharmacology is only an έπιτέχνεσις created by demons, by which humans serve the will of demons because they use a material thing that can corrupt human souls. Every material thing must be avoided because matter attracts humans as an effect of their fall. By this very attraction, which demons well understand, demons can mislead humans. So, medical knowledge is as wrong as astrological knowledge. The fallen angels do not teach these two arts to humans thinking that they are good, as suggested in the Enochic tradition.57 Demons spread false sciences that they themselves created, knowing that they are evil and only exist to corrupt humans. But Tatian, as sometimes happens, seems to contradict himself by saying that medicine can be used if the user knows that true remedies only come from God.[453] Tatian does not describe in a well-defined way the effects of demons on the human body. In order to emphasise that demons lack real power, Tatian states that demons usually take advantage of an already existing sickness, even if he admits that they have some power over the human body's inferior matter. Demons are not the cause of the sickness and so they cannot truly heal it. But they make humans believe in their healing power, in order to gain their worship. We do not know if demons can really affect bodies according to Tatian, because he does not express himself in a clear and explicit way on this topic, but it is certain that they can act against the human mind. Demons can inspire dreams or produce mental illness by means of possession. The demon takes possession of the body by first inspiring a dream in his victim, promising to free the body from a sickness which, according to Tatian, usually already exists. The demon then departs when the body is healed naturally. The demon, therefore, does not really heal—instead, he may cause a mental disease, or at least use a pre-existent physical disease, and then free the victim. When the demon goes away, the sickness may take some time to disappear, but Tatian does not explain if this happens for mental or physical diseases. This use of illness is a form of propaganda intended to recruit more worshippers. Possession, or mental and physical diseases produced by demons, from this perspective, becomes a way of seducing humans away from God, particularly those who are not protected by spiritual armour and whose thoughts demonstrate that they are far from the Holy Spirit. This attack, in other words, may affect the body, but is conducted against the mind and the faith. Its true aim is the conquest of human souls that cannot be conquered if the faith and the mind are strong.