Seven Sons of Sceva - Acts 19:13-16

Part of Paul’s “special miracles” was the casting out of evil spirits. There is an account of “the vagabond Jews, exorcists” who started casting out evil spirits in “the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, We adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preacheth.” One of the chief priests named Sceva, had seven sons who performed exorcisms and I assume that priest craft was their main source of income. On one of these sons’ attempted exorcisms, “the evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are ye?” This is another example of even Satan and his followers recognizing priesthood authority and who really holds it. After implying to these men that he doesn’t have to respect their authority, the evil spirit “leaped on them, and overcame them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.”

I really didn’t understand what this was talking about because when the evil spirit spoke to Jesus, recognizing him during his mortal life, Jesus told him to be quiet and not speak, so why did it matter here that the spirit identified Paul and Jesus. It also seems a little bit like, this evil spirit that is tormenting someone recognized Jesus and Paul, either as a friend, which implicates them in this problem, or as an enemy, which begs the question to the community, why didn’t Paul just stop it in the first place? Seems like kind of a no win situation. I also didn’t understand the evil spirit jumping on the guys, I thought that it meant that he came out of the body of the possessed man and into the bodies of the seven men, but apparently what happened was that this possessed man seemed to have super human strength, to the point that he was able to beat seven men absolutely bloody and have them run away fearing for their lives.
In an excellent article discussing “who were the seven sons of Sceva,” from gotquestions.org the event was explained, saying, “There were some religious charlatans in Ephesus who pretended to have special miracle-working powers… Seeing the success that Paul had in exorcising demons the seven sons of Sceva began using a new formula invoking the name of Jesus… This ploy of Sceva’s seven sons backfired one day. A demon they were trying to cast out refused.” It then goes on to say that the evil spirit beat these seven sons bloody because “the seven sons of Sceva were no match for the demonic power they were toying with.”
This clarifies for me that it wasn’t the evil spirit itself who beat up these men, but that it was the possessed man who did the beating. It also helped me see that these men had been performing this “ritual” for quite some time but then appropriated Jesus’ name in to their incantations, mimicking Paul’s actions. I don’t know why they would change their formula if it was working. Maybe the people responded to Paul’s words, maybe it was to get in on the Christian movement that was percolating in the city. I imagine that priest craft is not looked upon kindly by Jesus, but it must be particularly grievous when it starts to involve implications of his authority and/or approval.
The article goes on to point out that we can learn several lessons from these seven men’s encounter with an evil spirit. It says, “First, demons are dangerously powerful spirit beings- much stronger than we- who can cause the people they possess to do incredibly violent and uncontrollable things. The seven sons of Sceva obviously didn’t have the proper respect for demons.” While I disagree with the phrase “much stronger than we” this statement would be completely accurate. Joseph Smith as taught that those who have bodies have power over those who do not, indicating that evil spirits are not stronger than us. But I do feel like we don’t understand the strength that evils spirits can have if we yield to them.
During his mortal ministry, we have several accounts of evil spirits just wrecking the body of the person they were possessing. We know that under their influence, the physical body is capable of almost super human strength and movement. So while it does seem a bit extreme to say that this one man who was possessed was able to beat up seven grown men by himself, it is not completely unreasonable to believe because we’ve seen what possessed bodies can do on the whims of their occupants.
Touching on the brothers’ lack of respect for the demons, this is something that I think many people don’t have. We have to decide whether ghosts are real or not, can they touch us, how hard is it to become possessed, but a lot of people don’t understand is that engaging in activities that are wicked is an open invitation for Satan to start working in your life. My kids have talked about Ouija boards and séances and stuff like that, and I have to tell them, I don’t think you understand what kind of power you are playing with when you do those things, or even talking about them in an admiring manner. It’s all fun and games until you get a feel for just how evil Satan’s intentions are. I feel like we are pretty sheltered by the Holy Ghost as baptized members of the Church especially and really for most people in general, we just don’t really understand just how dark Satan’s realm is. And I think that the lack of respect is born out of ignorance.
The second point made by the article says, “Demons recognize valid authority, and they fear God. It’s important to note that the authority over demons belongs only to Jesus and to those to whom Jesus gave it. The demon in Acts 19 says that it known Jesus and Paul (one of Jesus’ chosen apostles). It refused o recognize any other authority in Ephesus… There is no power in incantations, even if the include the name of Christ. The power belongs to Jesus alone. Probably the greatest mistake the seven sons of Sceva made was their failure to realize that Paul was not doing exorcisms. Jesus Christ was doing the exorcisms through Paul.” This is really an excellent article and you’d be profited by reading it in it’s entirety.
I would be curious to know that these men’s track record with exorcisms was. They must have had some success in casting out spirits previously, otherwise, they wouldn’t be attempting this one this time. I wonder how they had done it before, and why those spirits obeyed when this one refused. This type of priest craft would be similar to me taking someone into a body of water, reciting the baptismal words and fully immersing them in the water. I might have done it exactly the same way as is required, but because I have no priesthood authority, it would just be me dunking someone in the water. And it would probably be quite the mockery of God because I know better. This was probably a big scene in the city of Ephesus because the regular demon exorcisers weren’t able to finish a job and then got super beat up by a single guy. And it would have probably given credibility to Paul because the demon called him by name and implied that he would only yield to Paul’s command to depart.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.gotquestions.org/amp/seven-sons-of-Sceva.html