Are There Demons of Sex and Alcohol?

by
Jason Dulle
JasonDulle@yahoo.com

Question:

Do you believe that there are demons of sex, pornography, cigarettes, alcohol, prostitution, headaches, anger, homosexuality, carousing, etc.? I know there are some ministers in all facets of Christianity that do.

Now let's look at Galatians Chapter 5: 19-22. Verse 19 begins a list of human vices saying, "Anyone can see the kind of behavior that belongs to the lower nature..." (NEB). If God is not a puppet master, then neither is Satan, correct? We humans must acknowledge personal resposiblity in all that we do or sayl, correct?

Demons have a history of possessing some of us humans through our sinful natures and actions, correct? When the minister of God is ministering to a demon possessed individual, sometimes the minister asks for its name. Upon uttering its name(s), the minister uses this name(s) to cast out the unclean spirit. Could it be that the name(s) that these demons use when possessing a person (e.g., sex/drugs/adultery/deaf and dumb,etc.) are really only acturate word pictures of our human weaknesses and human sinfulness?

 

Answer:

While I cannot speak for the beliefs, nor for the justification of the beliefs held by various ministers, I can speak for mine when I say that I do not favor the idea that there are demons of the various things you listed to me. It may be that there are, but we have no Biblical evidence saying so (obviously some of the things mentioned did not exist in Biblical times such as cigarettes and pornography, and thus we would not expect them to be named in the Bible even if they truly exist), and I have never personally encountered demons who named themselves as such. If other ministers have truly encountered a demon who named himself as alcohol, then maybe there are demons of such a thing. I just have not encountered them myself, and find no Biblical evidence for such, and thus have no epistemological basis for claiming their reality. There is Biblical evidence for demons of specific sicknesses (such as deaf or mute spirits) and other evils. Following is a list of spirits named in the Bible:

familiar spirit--Lev 20:27; ISam 28:7-8; IChron 10:13; IIChron 33:6; Is 29:4
lying spirit--IKings 22:22-23; IIChron 18:20
jealous spirit--Num 5:14, 30
perverse spirit--Is 19:14
spirit of whoredoms--Hos 4:12; 5:4
unclean spirit--Zech 13:2; Mat 12:43; Mk 1:23, 26; 3:30; 5:2, 8; 7:25; 8:29; 9:42; 11:24
spirit of infirmity--Lk 13:11
spirit of divination--Acts 16:16
spirit of antichrist--IJn 4:3
dumb spirit--Mk 9:17
deaf spirit--Mk 9:25
foul spirit--Rev 18:2

The caution I give is that even if such demons do exist (the ones you named), we should not and cannot assume that every person who drinks or has a headache, for example, has a demon. It may be that they truly have a demon of alcohol, but it may be that they do not. It may be that they have a demon causing their headaches, or it may be that it is a purely physical issue with no spiritual cause. Unless we specifically know that a demonic force is behind a particular sin or sickness, we ought not try to cast one out. It could cause unnecessary fear and anxiety to a person who truly has no demon. Many things we want to attribute to demonic spirits are nothing more than the works of the flesh that Paul spoke of in Galatians 5 (as you mentioned). If it is a human spirit that is causing one to drink or commit sexaual immorality we cannot cast that out. We can only cast out demonic spirits. If we could successively cast out a human spirit, that would cause the person to physically die!

Assuming the genuine existence of demons of alcohol, etc., I do not believe we should get the idea that particular demons only do particular things. While I could be mistaken, I do not get the impression that demons are all specialized agents in a particular sin, each wearing his own name-tag to identify what type of demon he is. What may happen is that a person begins practicing a work of the flesh, either of their own accord and will, or as influenced by a particular demon, and then after they begin practicing this work they open themselves up for demonic influence and possibly demonic possession. Because the demon is inciting a particular work of the flesh, the demon may identify himself as that particular evil, thus a demon of sex or drugs.

Concerning ministers asking for the names of demons, and then naming those demons to cast it out, if there is no demon behind the particular sin or sickness then there would be no one to answer the minister's question. If there is a demon present and it names itself as sex, then I would have to believe that this is more than a mere word picture of human weakness, but would be as I described above, where a demon has identified itself with a particular work of the flesh that the person had already chosen to exercise, and has been exercising. As you have pointed out though, neither God or Satan is a puppet-master. We cannot divorce personal responsibility from the behavior of the individual (in the case of sin, but not necessarily sickness). While demons can entice and incite us to sin they cannot make us do anything against our will. They can only work in concert with our will.

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