The Strange Religious Meaning of Flies

It’s that time of year where we are getting a stray fly in our house here and there. Nothing gives me more pleasure than stalking them with my fly swatter and then, kaboom...dead! I hate flies. So annoying, so persistent, so gross when they land on me or my food. I’m pretty sure everyone hates flies. I mean flies feast on carcasses, open wounds, and excrement. They seek to bury their eggs into anything moist, decaying and rotten. They spread germs and sometimes they’re loud. Why Lord? Why flies? Actually, they do serve a purpose in that they help break down trash and excrement. But there's even an esoteric, supernatural purpose that flies serve as symbols and signs of evil. 

Especially attracted to the smell of blood, death, trash and dung, they are a perfect symbol of evil, temptation, sin and pesky demonic influence or infestation. If we are not spiritually hygienic, taking time to examine our conscience regularly, praying daily, going to Confession regularly and Mass on Sundays we run the risk of attracting spiritual 'flies'.

The fly was regarded by the ancient Jews in particular as impure and demonic. "Extremely annoying when one is eating and since it persistently returns even after being driven away it is the emblem of evil desire. The evil spirit lies like a fly at the doors of the human heart."  (1)

Flies in the Bible

Moses met Pharaoh at the Nile River in the morning and made the demand, speaking on behalf of the Lord, "Let My people go, that they may serve Me." Again, Pharaoh hardened his heart and disregarded the request, resulting in a pronouncement of swarms of flies.  Exodus 8:20, “ Thick swarms of flies entered the house of Pharaoh and the houses of his servants; throughout Egypt the land was devastated on account of the swarms of flies.” The flies cover every living thing and fill the air, but only affect the Egyptians, leaving the Israelites unharmed. Psalm 78:45 says that the flies "devoured them".

Every one of the ten plagues was a judgment by Yahweh on the gods of Egypt. In enacting the plague, God demonstrated his power over these demons disguised as gods.  This fourth plague was a judgment against Uatchit, the Egyptian god of flies. She is also known as the ‘Lady of the marshes’. Her cult was located primarily in the Nile Delta.

Archeologists have discovered fly amulets with golden flies attached by the head to necklaces and bracelets. Similar small fly amulets have been found in Egypt made from gold, silver, bone, lapis lazuli, and other precious stones. 

There’s a story in 1 Kings about how King Ahaziah fell through the lattice in his upper chamber at Samaria and was injured. So he sent messengers, whom he instructed: "Go inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, whether I shall recover from this injury." When the prophet Elijah heard of this he condemned Ahaziah to die by God's words because Ahaziah sought counsel from Baal-zebub, a Philistine god rather than from Yahweh. 

Later Beelzebub is identified in the New Testament as  "the prince of demons", Satan himself. The original name was Ba’al Zebul, lord of heavenly dwelling. Exorcists follow the Bible and intentionally misspell it as a derogatory word, Beelzebub which was a reference to the god being dung and his worshipers being compared to flies feasting on dung. Hence, this name Beelzebub came to be known as ‘Lord of the Flies’. 

Flies and Exorcisms

In an exorcism a Catholic priest once asked the name of the demon and the reply was ‘Beelzebul’. He went on to call the demon that slightly different and offensive name, ‘Bellzebub’ and the demon became enraged. The priest recounted the event, “They feed off these emotions and it fuels their narcissism.  Demons believe in their own self-importance and Satan most of all.  They want to be the focus of everyone's attention...in the midst of an exorcism with the spiritual combat in full swing, the demons will insist on having their names pronounced correctly.”  The demon Beelzebul twice corrected the priest’s  pronunciation in a kind of guttural tone.  Beelzebul does not like to be called Beelzebub, which is a denigration of his exalted title "Lord of the Demons'' to now mean "Lord of the Flies." (2) In a separate exorcism of the same demon Beelzebul another priest said, “I ran into Beelzebul (or Beelzebub- Lord of the Flies) in a third case.  Some of the tell-tale signs of his presence included an inexplicable strange swarm of flies around the possessed.” (3)

Other Fly Related Hauntings 

In the film Amityville Horror (1979), which was based on a true story about a haunted house and exorcism which took place in New York in 1975, there’s a really creepy fly scene. Fr Delaney is in the house to investigate the supernatural hauntings and to bless the house when suddenly he becomes visibly upset and wipes his forehead as if he is perspiring. He puts on his priestly stole and then his fingers go to his temples as if he has a headache. Suddenly the swarm of flies which were at first in the window pane  buzz around and land all over his face and head. Then the door of the room opens on its own and he hears an angry demonic voice saying,“Get out! Get out!”

In a more recent 2011 haunting which took place in Gary Indiana (also a true story), flies played a role as a supernatural sign that the house was not just haunted by some sort of ghost but it was infested with demons. According to the Indy Star Newspaper article which chronicled the ‘demon house' as it became known as, “It's a tale, they say, that started with flies. In November 2011, Latoya Ammons' family moved into a rental house on Carolina Street in Gary, a quiet lane lined with small one-story homes. Big black flies suddenly swarmed their screened-in porch in December, despite the winter chill.

"This is not normal," Ammons' mother, Rosa Campbell, remembers thinking. "We killed them and killed them and killed them, but they kept coming back."

Latoya Ammon’s children were possessed by demons. She tried everything to deal with the problem. One day the Gary Department of Children's Services were at her home. Medical staff said the youngest boy was "lifted and thrown into the wall with nobody touching him," according to a DCS report. "He began to have a weird smile on his face and he charged at the grandmother's stomach and head butted her several times until she grabbed his hands and started praying. "He was speaking in a different deep voice saying 'It's time to die,' 'l will kill you,' and staring around the room. "He had a weird grin on his face and began to walk backwards while the grandmother was holding his hand and he walked up the wall backwards while holding the grandmother's hand and he never let go. "He flipped over and landed on his feet in front of the grandmother and sat down in the chair." Eventually a Catholic priest Fr. Mike Maginot came to rescue and drove the demons out. The story had a happy ending. For more about the Demon House see here. 

Next time you see a fly, don’t panic, it’s probably just an ordinary bug. Get out your fly swatter and end it. But let that ordinary fly be a reminder of the extraordinary, the supernatural, and the pesky persistence of evil in our earthly lives. When you swat it let that too be a sign of your Christian dignity and your baptismal identity as a warrior in the battle of good vs. evil, advancing the kingdom of God one fly-demon at a time. “Take that Beelzebub!”.