Luke 11:18 Fun

Jesus makes two humorous statements in Luke 11:18. He is answering the accusation that he castes our demons by Beelzebub. We certainly cannot see any humor in our Biblical translations.

KJV: If Satan also be divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand? because ye say that I cast out devils through Beelzebub.
NIV: If Satan is divided against himself, how can his kingdom stand? I say this because you claim that I drive out demons by Beelzebul.

To discover this humor, we must hear these lines in the word order in which they were spoken.

First, Jesus sets up the joke, “If… the adversary is split from himself…” The pause follows the setup. The image among the listeners is of a person split in half. Then Jesus delivers the punchline: “How will he stand?” The image is of a person falling in half. The Jesus makes it all a misunderstanding, adding a second subject after the verb as a clarification, “This kingdom of his?” He implies that they misunderstood, which is actually another punchline.

Then he does the same thing again in the second part of this verse, but we can’t see it at all because the punchline is left out of our Bible.

The setup here is when Jesus initially says, "Because you say by Beelzebub I cast out… “ The pause follows this setup. Here, listeners expect to hear “demons,” but Jesus says, “Myself!" “I cast out myself.” This follows their logic, but it is a complete non-sequitur, which is the point. Jesus brings the analogy full circle: if he is against himself, he is casting out himself. In this verse, he again clarifies by correcting himself. This time, it was his mistake. He adds, “These demons." Implying that he mistook himself for demons, which is what his opponents are doing.

By the way, the word satanas" means "adversary." It is not a name. More about it and its relationship to Beelzebub in this article.)