Marcos 5

The ‘legion’

1 Then they came to the other side of the sea, to the region of the Gadarenes.*A very small handful (0.3%; 5 mss out of some 1,700) of objectively inferior Greek manuscripts have ‘Gerasenes’ instead of ‘Gadarenes’ (as in NIV, NASB, LB, TEV, etc.). Gadara being the Roman capital of the province of Perara, located some six miles from the Sea of Galilee, ‘the region of the Gadarenes’ is a perfectly reasonable description of the site, especially since Mark was writing for a Roman audience. For a more detailed discussion, please see the Appendix: The ‘Legion’ and the pigs; where was it? 2 And when He got out of the boat, right away a man with an unclean spirit met Him, coming from the tombs. 3 —He had his dwelling among the tombs. No one could bind him, not even with chains, 4 because he had often been bound with shackles and chains, only to have had the chains torn apart by him, and the shackles broken in pieces; no one had been strong enough to tame him. 5 Always, night and day, in the tombs and in the mountains, he was crying out and cutting himself with stones.*Here in Brazil, where Spiritism and Satanism are out in the open, this sort of thing is well known. The demons ‘heal’ the victims so they don’t become incapacitated.— 6 When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and kneeled down to Him,*I find this to be curious: this was an unusually powerful demon, yet he kneeled to Jesus, whereas many lesser ones evidently did not (although they all knew who Jesus really was). 7 and with a loud cry he said: "What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I implore you by God,*Now really, a demon appealing to God! Since he had recognized, correctly, that Jesus was ‘Son of the Most High God’, he was appealing to Him through His Father—pretty shrewd! (I assume that he had been informed that the attempt to destroy Jesus with the storm had failed.) don’t torment me!" 8 Because He was saying to him, "You unclean spirit, come out of the man!" 9 Then He asked him, "What is your name?" And he answered, saying, "Legion*A full Roman legion was 6,000 men, but many legions had only half that many. On the basis of verse 12, one wonders if there could have been 2,000 demons. This being the only recorded instance where Jesus asked a demon’s name, I wonder why He did. Since He presumably already knew, I take it that He did it so we would have a record of demonic infestation. I see no basis here for needing to know a demon’s name before you can cast it out. is my name, because we are many." 10 He started begging Him repeatedly that He would not send them out of that region.*Demons are territorial. (See also Daniel 10.) The parallel passage in Luke records that they also begged not to be sent to the Abyss. 11 Now a large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside. 12 So all the demons*Perhaps 5% of the Greek manuscripts omit ‘all the demons’, to be followed by NIV, NASB, LB, TEV, etc. (except that some supply ‘the demons’, but not ‘all’). begged Him saying, "Send us into the pigs, so that we may enter them." 13 And forthwith Jesus gave them permission; and coming out the unclean spirits went into the pigs (there were about two thousand); but the herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea, and they were drowned by the sea.*For the demons to destroy the herd would be self-defeating; I take it that the pigs preferred death to demons (animals often show better sense than people do). Since the Law forbad eating pork, presumably Jesus was not particularly disturbed (and I suppose it is possible that He Himself stampeded the pigs).

14 So those who were tending the pigs ran off and reported it in the town and the countryside. And they went out to see what it was that had happened.