One Man's Web

The Key Disciple in Mark

Beginning to Recover our Right Minds

A Way of Reading (1)

After the parables of Chapter 4, Jesus embarks upon a series of works of power. Already there has been healing of individual people. Now, we have the stilling of a storm, and the death of thousands of pigs. After raising a child from the dead, and miraculously feeding thousands of people, Jesus will again aid the disciples out on the sea as a storm is building, this time walking out to them on the water, and climbing into their boat so that again the wind ceases.

These stories have always had those who doubt them. But for many today they are not merely implausible; they are impossible. How, then, do we read them? The reductive materialism of our time sees them as nonsense, their presence calling all of Mark into question. Most of us ignore the hard edge of reductive materialism; we accept the reality of morals and values, beauty, and love, even though such things theoretically have no real meaning. But we know that storms are not quelled with a word. This is a reality which has no wriggle room.

Yet when I sit in the bush and contemplate an enormous gum tree, or ride long in the night with the evening star tracking me, the calming of a storm does not feel quite so offensive. Away from our pretensions to power and control—the computers, the climate-controlled buildings, the GPS-guided self-driving cars—our technological hubris fades. It is not that I somehow adopt (or regress into) a pre-critical naivety about the world. Rather, my insignificance and powerlessness before nature enables me to recognise the limitations of human cognition and the tininess of our alleged technological prowess. I am able to re-enter^[1] the world of poetry^[2] in order to express the inexpressible. C S Lewis wrote:

In a sense, one can hardly put anything into words:  only the simplest colours have names, and hardly any of the smells.  The simple physical pains and (still more) the pleasures can't be expressed in language.  I labour the point lest the devil should hereafter try to make you believe that what was wordless was therefore vague and nebulous.  But in reality it is just the clearest, the most concrete, and most indubitable realities which escape language:  not because they are vague, but because language is. … Poetry I take to be the continual effort to bring language back to the actual. (Letter to Rhona Bodle, 24 June 1949)^[3]

Language is vague, as he puts it, because of our limitations and smallness.

The nature miracles (and the healings) are not examples of human credulity or scientific naivete. They are the expression of what is by creatures who, full of richness and glory, and made in the image of God, know they have yet the barest grasp of reality. Our task is not to account for, and work around, a supposed scientifically naive or foolish story of the stilling of a storm. Our first task is to escape the conceit and deception that our literal, factual, prosaic language, is adequate for dealing with anything but the simplest material issues.

Our second task is to learn to hear and read poetry, to get beyond naive literalism, to go beyond the poverty of one-to-one this-means-that allegory, and to submit to the experience of that which just is, and which cannot be contained by our explanations.

In the poetry of Mark 4:35 to 6:52 we will see the experience of that which just is intermingled with political terror, brute hunger and illness, and the fear of death. This enchanted^[4] life where the just is has entered our perceptions is another aspect of the mystery of the Basileia of God. It is a perception of reality to be coveted rather than scorned or treated with condescension.

A great deal of effort has gone into explaining away the difficulty of the miraculous.  Some healing stories have what I have called wriggle room: We can say to ourselves, "It was psychological healing," or "The story is really about how the person was accepted back into society." Both of these things may have been true, but that is not the key issue here. The true purpose of  seeking wriggle room becomes clear when we consider Vincent Taylor's infamous assertion that in Mark 6:45-56, Jesus was wading triumphantly through the surf.^[5]  The purpose of that statement is obvious; it was theology submitting itself to sceptical (and over-reaching) science in a futile attempt to remain credible and therefore relevant. The perceptions of Jesus and Mark were indeed limited by their times. But to pretend that our perceptions are not similarly limited is to miss the fact that the scientific gaze^[6], or the scientific image^[7]—call it what we will, is an expression of empire. It has been developed^[8] to avoid the claim of God upon Creation; that is, it is an expression of human sovereignty, and it is idolatrous. This aspect of the world view of Mark and of Jesus is not something we have to work around, or have embarrass us; it is something we need to recover. Indeed, our final task—we should call it our hope, for it is something given and done to us rather than something we achieve—our hope is that in this terrifying world, the stilling of the storm becomes for us scientifically educated people, a source of comfort rather than a source of embarrassment or stumbling. 

A Way of Reading (2)

We now meet three crucial pericopes in Mark; crucial for glimpsing his understanding of the Mystery of the Basileia, and crucial because they rehearse the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. For this reason I am going to outline one possible reading before the textual commentary, which I hope will alert us to the depth of the text, and the connections within it:

We are still by the sea, as we were at the beginning of Chapter Four. The pericope of the storm begins at Mark 4:35 with the words "on that day," linking the parable of the Mystery of the Basileia^[9] to the crossing of the sea. The terrorised man immediately comes to the shore of the sea in which the pigs are drowned. Jesus then crossed over the sea again to heal and raise the two women from death; Jairus comes to Jesus while he is by the sea. Only after raising the little girl from the dead does Jesus leave the sea. The presence of the sea delineates the narrative as a connected whole.

It seems Mark is written just after the destruction of Jerusalem. In Chapter 13, Mark is speaking in the voice of Jesus while clearly reciting recent history.^[10] His audience  know the destruction of the temple, the starvation, the mass crucifixions outside the city walls, the betrayals within the new family of Jesus, the collaboration. As now, no one was entirely free of the shame, terror, and survivor guilt that the massacre of the city caused. In Chapter 3, Mark has already carefully redefined what the word family means for his community, and Chapter 13 will especially remind the community of its great shame: We betrayed each other. When a community is "fear-filled and trembling, knowing what had been done" for it,^[11] what extra shame and grief does it feel when it looks at the ruins of Jerusalem and can only ask, "Where was Jesus in all this!?"

As Mark is writing, Jerusalem is occupied by the Roman Army. Jewish people are not allowed in the remains of the city. The occupation force is the same Legio X Fretensis which committed the massacres. Upon its standards is the head of a boar so, again, where is Jesus in all this? 

Jesus again crosses over to the other side where a woman is slowly bleeding to death. Her situation is hopeless. And the child who is her, or is her daughter—they are linked by the number 12, dies. Jesus walks through the jostling crowd to save her. Is this a picture of the victim's path to the cross, or is Jesus leading the way to salvation?  In either case, Mark here links the story of the women to the story of the cross.

Mark 4:35-41 - The storm, a pre-emptive strike

³⁵And he says to them on that day, when evening had come,  'Let us cross over to the other side.' ³⁶And dismissing the crowd, they take him with (them) when he was back in the boat. And other boats were with him. ³⁷A great storm of wind comes, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat is already being swamped. ³⁸But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they wake him up and say to him, 'Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?' ³⁹And being awakened he rebuked the wind, and said to the sea,  'Silence! Be still!' Then the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. ⁴⁰He said to them, 'Why are you afraid?; Have you still no faith?' ⁴¹And they feared a great fear and said to one another, 'Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?' (NRSV alt)

³⁵Καὶ λέγει αὐτοῖς ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ὀψίας γενομένης· διέλθωμεν εἰς τὸ πέραν. ³⁶καὶ ἀφέντες τὸν ὄχλον παραλαμβάνουσιν αὐτὸν ὡς ἦν ἐν τῷ πλοίῳ^[12], καὶ ἄλλα πλοῖα ἦν μετ' αὐτοῦ. ³⁷καὶ γίνεται λαῖλαψ μεγάλη^[13] ἀνέμου καὶ τὰ κύματα ἐπέβαλλεν εἰς τὸ πλοῖον, ὥστε ἤδη γεμίζεσθαι τὸ πλοῖον. ³⁸καὶ αὐτὸς ἦν ἐν τῇ πρύμνῃ ἐπὶ τὸ προσκεφάλαιον καθεύδων^[14]. καὶ ἐγείρουσιν αὐτὸν καὶ λέγουσιν αὐτῷ· διδάσκαλε, οὐ μέλει σοι ὅτι ἀπολλύμεθα^[15]; ³⁹καὶ διεγερθεὶς ἐπετίμησεν τῷ ἀνέμῳ καὶ εἶπεν τῇ θαλάσσῃ·^[16] σιώπα, πεφίμωσο. καὶ ἐκόπασεν^[17] ὁ ἄνεμος καὶ ἐγένετο γαλήνη μεγάλη. ⁴⁰καὶ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς· τί δειλοί ἐστε; οὔπω ἔχετε πίστιν; ⁴¹καὶ ἐφοβήθησαν φόβον μέγαν καὶ ἔλεγον πρὸς ἀλλήλους· τίς ἄρα οὗτός ἐστιν ὅτι καὶ ὁ ἄνεμος καὶ ἡ θάλασσα^[18] ὑπακούει αὐτῷ; (NA28)

Translation Notes and Comments

On that day (vv35) The phrase on that day is telling us to connect the parables of the seeds and the sower, and what we make of them, to the story which follows. The great storm and the defeat of the Legion are a part the mystery of the Basileia of God.

Cross over to the other side (vv35) This phrase continues Mark's challenge to us about "those outside." Jesus does not use "those outside" as a category to exclude people. Instead, he crosses over to the other side. Nowhere in the text does it say that this is "Gentile" place although the presence of pigs, and the mention of the Decapolis (vv20) might suggest that interpretation on the part of the listener/reader.^[19]

When evening had come (vv35)  Jesus is crossing at night. Even though people typically fished at night,^[20] the sea was seen as a dangerous place, the place of chaos, and setting the scene in the night adds to this.

Dismissing the crowd (vv36) NRSVa has Jesus leaving the crowd behind. The word aphentes is alternatively translated as leaving (cf Mark 1:20) and dismissing. In this pericope where Jesus rebukes the wind, the context seems to lean to the idea of the crowd being dismissed rather than Jesus leaving them.

When he was back in the boat (vv36)  The meaning of this phrase is a little uncertain. NRSVa has they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. It is tempting to think that this tells us we should take Jesus "just as he is," not in the form we think he should be.  But the phrase may simply be an artefact of translation: In the phrase hōs ēn en tō ploiō, (just) as he was, in the boat, the word hōs can also be translated as when. This would mean the verse says that after he sent the crowd away the disciples took him along once he was back in the boat. This assumes Jesus left the boat during the dismissal of the crowd.^[21]

Other boats were with him (vv36) The boats on the sea are not with them, but with him—Jesus. For the reader, this might imply that if we are on stormy seas in the boat of the church, he is with us. And the key person is Jesus. In these pericopes people come to Jesus. (cf 5:2, 15, 22)

The boat (vv 4:1, 36, [twice] 37, 5:2, 21) is mentioned 6 times, more than the 4 mentions of the sea. If Mark has no theology of the ploion of the church, he certainly started us on the journey to the nave of the church!

A great storm of wind (vv37) Although NRSVa's gale and NIV's squall are indeed wind storms, wind is also a feature of the later pericope where Jesus is walking on the water. The use of gale to translate anemou hides this parallel between the two pericopes.

The waves (vv37) Waves are kumata; cf the note on the sea below.

In the stern (vv38) The boat carrying Jesus would likely have a stern platform for the tillerman, with a covered area underneath, and it is most likely here that Jesus was asleep.^[22]

The sea (vv39, 41) Thalasa, sea, the symbol of chaos and danger is repeated twice. Lake storms are often extremely dangerous, but the use of Mark's sea links us to one of the great themes of the Faith: The Ark of Noah, the crossing of the Red Sea, and the Psalms where God controls the sea and the waters and storms.^[23] The use of lake risks domesticating the poetry of Mark.

Much of Jesus' teaching and healing happens by the sea, often with almost incidental comments. Mark 7:31 says

Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the region of the Decapolis. And they brought to him a man who was deaf^[24] …

Why not simply say

Then he returned from the region of Tyre,  and went through Sidon, and they brought to him a man who was deaf?

Is it because we must live and faith^[25] beside the sea which symbolises the chaos and depths of empire?

 He rebuked the wind… Silence! Be still  (vv39)  (Siōpa pephimōso)  The word for rebuked is epetimēsen. This is the same word used in Mark 1:25. In that event an unclean spirit is also told to be quiet (phimōthēti) which is a form of pephimōso which is used here in Chapter 4 and translated as be still.^[26] The implication is that the storm is not simply bad weather; rather, Jesus is using language which rebukes the demonic. KJV and NRSVa say that Jesus said, Peace, be still but there is nothing irenic about the word siōpa. It is a command to silence.  The storm is a function of the demonic and is silenced.

A great calm (vv39) NRSVa translates galēnē  megalē as a dead calm which highlights the contrast to the storm. But that translation also hides a threefold structure in this story: There is a great (megalē) storm, a great calm, and a great fear. (vv37, 39, 41)

Feared a great fear^[27]  (vv41) ephobēthēsan  phobon megan. Fear of Jesus, or what he has done, is everywhere in this part of Mark. (cf Mark 4:41, 5:15, 5:33, 5:36) What will be relevant is people's response to their fear. (Note that the structure  here in 4:41 is mirrored by that of Mark 5:44: they were amazed with a great amazement.)

Reckoning with Jonah

Mark carefully shapes the story of the sea storm so that we see similarities and contrasts with the story of Jonah.

• Both Jonah and Mark's stories involve crossing the sea by boat; note that the same word ploion is used for Jesus' boat and Jonah's ship.^[28] In each story the ploion is mentioned repeatedly; Mark emulates the style of Jonah here
• Each crossing is interrupted by a violent storm which begins to sink the vessel
• The central character of each story is asleep in a similar part of the ship, although it seems that Jesus was not a snorer^[29]
• In deliberate contrast to Jonah and Jesus' sleeping, everyone else on the ploion is terrified
• The main character is central to a miraculous calming of the waters in both stories
• In both stories the sailors marvel at the calming of the storm
• The Greek texts of Mark and LXX^[30] Jonah use the same words for great, sea, perish, and sleep. And as noted above, ship and boat are the same word. When Jesus rebukes the sea and the storm ceases  (ekopasen), and when the sailors ask Jonah "What shall we do to you, that the sea may die down (kopasei)" and Jonah replies, "Cast me into the sea, and the sea shall die down (kopasei)" (1:11-12), both words are forms of the verb kopazō, abate, or die down.

But there are contrasts,

• Where Jonah is fleeing God's will, Jesus is doing God's will
• Jonah is avoiding "crossing over" to the Gentiles of Nineveh, but Jesus is deliberately crossing over into Gentile territory. This adds to the interpretation that the Gerasene miracle is in a Gentile place.
• The sailors "each cried to his god," and then asked Jonah to intercede with God for them, while Mark's sailors turn to Jesus
• In Jonah, the sailors see the obvious presence of God, but in Mark, the disciples are curiously blind: "Who then is this that even the wind and the sea obey him!?" While their words beg the question of Jesus' relationship to God—what else could be at work here ! —the reader also wonders if perhaps they see less than the sailors who threw Jonah overboard
• In Jonah, the storm is raised up by God for God's own purposes. In Mark, the storm is a function of the demonic, as we see (above) from the language Jesus uses to still the storm.^[31]

On reflection, we may also notice that Jesus sleeps as one who has the power and the peace of doing God's will, but that as "the sailors stand and cry [out to their gods] Jonah escapes into a stupefied sleep.^[32]

Jonah is also the story of a scapegoating. We need to remember that on the surface, myth^[33] lies: Girard understood that we create myths to justify "the originary sacrifice" of our tribe or community, to invisibly cover the victim by blaming them so that no one HAS doubts about the victim’s guilt, or that they  deserve punishment. Even the victims accept the lies and assert their own guilt.^[34] It is when we find the scapegoats within our origin stories that we can see the deep truth about ourselves, because our myths tell us how we exonerated ourselves of violence and persecution. 

In the storm the lots conveniently fall upon Jonah, who is carefully drawn as the odd man out, and is therefore the ideal scapegoat. The story is constructed to show his assumed guilt—he is fleeing from the presence of the Lord—so that the sailors can claim innocence. And as in Mark 5, where the victim stones himself, Jonah "the victim goes along with the lie and asserts his guilt."^[35]  (See the comments on Mark 5:5. "he was always howling and bruising himself with stones.") But the author of Jonah, already sensitive to the demonisation of outsiders, senses something of what is going on, for the sailors seek to avoid the violence against Jonah, and then beg God's forgiveness when they fail. In a remarkable statement, they recognise Jonah is "innocent blood." Their inability to keep him onboard, despite their insight, is testament to how deeply scapegoating is embedded in our cultural identity, and to our powerlessness before it.

Jesus is also "innocent blood," and will give himself like Jonah. But the reader sees he is far greater than Jonah for he is able to rebuke the wind and save his followers. The irony, not to mention the paradox, is that his way will cost him his life, not three days in the belly of a big fish.  (Matthew makes the link of the three days explicit. Matt 12:40-41, 16:4) Jesus is not Jonah, but in the end he is the scapegoat.

A First Reading of the Stilled Storm

With the image of all the "birds of the air" sheltering under the shrub^[36], Jesus has already indicated that the culture/kingdom of God will include those we  have designated as outsiders.

 Now he is about to cross over to what is often characterised as a Gentile region^[37]. Such an interpretation is encouraged by the fact that he then returns to a clearly Jewish situation, interacting with the leader of a synagogue. The interpretation is reinforced by the pericope's echoes of Jonah's crossing to Nineveh.  But does the presence of pigs necessarily signify that the people who were "in the city and in the country" were Gentiles? I wonder if the Gentile characterisation has been, for me, an easy reading which avoids the subtleties of "othering," and my complicity in othering. The text does not say he "comes home to Jewish Jairus"; rather he again crosses over. There is something here which is deeper and greater than race.

A racial reading ignores the fact of the Jewish communities in the area^[38] of the Decapolis. It ignores insider/outsider structures among Jesus' own people and Mark's first listeners.  Jewish people made choices, or had choices thrust upon them, which led to both estrangement from God,  and to afflictions similar to those of the Gerasene man and his neighbours.  The image of Jewish people surrounded by pigs is a potent symbol of this. Indeed, in Luke 15 it is a Jewish son who looks after pigs:

¹⁴ When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. ¹⁵ So he went and joined himself to one of the citizens^[39] of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs.

Reading Luke, we may forget God is the One who sends famine as a reminder of our sin, and as a grace which calls us back to God's self; for example,  Jacob and his family, far from God because of their behaviour regarding Joseph, have famine fall upon them. In that story, Joseph shows mercy, which leads to healing of the family. But in the Lukan story of the Profligate Father, the younger son, graced with the sign of famine, at first chooses to join himself to a person who is not Jewish, and to herd pigs, rather than repent and go home.

The swine in our current story are symbols of enslavement, whether by an external force, or as consequence of our own choices. They are not a symbol of race.  To characterise the people in this story as Gentile may too easily excuse our own "herding of swine."^[40] While we may take a lesson from the fact that Jesus' travels indicate that Gentile Gerasenes, people in Syrophoenica, and the likely Gentile people of the second feast, are not excluded from the Basileia, the deeper lesson is that we, even we who are of his family, are often "on the other side" and that there are forever be pigs close by.

Jonah was certain of the otherness of Nineveh and greatly displeased that God chose to spare them:  "And now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live."^[41] Nineveh was the Rome of its time, and yet God sent a prophet to save even Nineveh. In Jesus, God offers the possibility of repentance even to Rome. But unlike the vindictive prophet Jonah, Jesus goes across to the other side willingly, calling his followers to come with him.

The sea is the remnant chaos upon and within which empire has built itself in an attempt at self-creation.^[42] The pigs, symbol of empire, will be driven back to their own place. The book of Jonah draws Nineveh as a city which repents rather than as a place of inflexible idolatry. The point is that (whatever the actual history of the Assyrian empire) anyone can repent, even Nineveh. But Mark is making here a comment about Rome: The storm is Rome—empire far from repenting—making a pre-emptive strike against this prophet of grace, and seeking to destroy him as he comes bringing healing. But Jesus commands the storm to be still, silencing empire.

Death is everywhere in this part of Mark. In the storm, we are reminded of Jonah the scapegoat, thrown to his death, and rescued by God. Then the Gerasene scapegoat, trapped in a living death, will be saved by Jesus, and sit clothed and in his right mind at Jesus' feet. And the two women who signify Israel will raised from death. John, the scapegoat of the royal palace, will be murdered. Jonah, that bitter and grudging prophet, sat in the shade of a gourd, awaiting Nineveh's destruction—more death.

If we ask "who then is this that the wind and the sea obey him," will we be uncomprehending like the disciples, bitter^[43] like Jonah, or will we sit at Jesus' feet as students to our great healing Rabbi, who will go on to teach us through his own life and death, that death is not to be avoided. For he will enter into death and show us it is without power.

After the storm, when Mark's Jesus asks the disciples "Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith," Mark is speaking to those living after the destruction of Jerusalem, and to us as we anticipate a collapse of civilisation as the empires bicker while the planet burns. What hope is there? After hearing the events on the sea, and in the country of the Gerasenes, someone might say to Mark, "But the Legions are still here!" Mark's reply is: "Indeed, so how then, will you live? Will you be seated at Jesus' feet (which is to be in your right mind) or will you choose to roam deranged in among the tombs? There will always be empire until he comes again, but there is life at his feet… even now."

Mark 5:1-20 - In our right minds

^5:1They came to the other side of the sea, to the region of the Gerasenes. ²And immediately when he had stepped out of the boat, a man out of the tombs in an unclean spirit met him. ³He lived in the tombs; and no one could bind him any more, even with a chain; ⁴for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but the chains had been torn apart by him, and the shackles had been broken in pieces; and no one had the strength  to subdue him. ⁵Night and day in the tombs and on the mountains he was always screaming and bruising himself with stones. ⁶When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed down before him; ⁷and he screamed in a great voice, 'What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.' ⁸For he had said to him, 'Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!' ⁹Then He asked him, 'What is your name?' He replied, 'My name is Legion; for we are much (many/much^[44]).' ¹⁰He begged him much not to send them out of the region. ¹¹Now there was near the mountain a great herd of swine feeding; ¹²and the unclean spirits^[45] begged him, 'Send us into the swine; let us enter them.' ¹³So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed over the cliff into the sea, and were drowned in the sea.

¹⁴And those feeding them ran off and reported it in the city and in the country. Then people came to see what it was that had happened. ¹⁵They came to Jesus and saw the demon-possessed man sitting there, clothed and in his right mind, the very man who had had the legion; and they were afraid. ¹⁶Those who had seen what had happened to the demoniac and to the swine reported it. ¹⁷Then they began to beg Jesus [Gk him] to leave their region. ¹⁸As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed by demons begged him that he might be with him. ¹⁹But Jesus [Gk he] refused, and said to him, 'Go home to your own people, and report to them how much the Lord has done for you, and what compassion^[46] he has shown you.' ²⁰And he went away and began to preach in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed.

21 When Jesus had crossed again in the boat [Other ancient authorities lack in the boat] to the other side, a much^[47] (great) crowd gathered round him; and he was by the sea. (NRSVa alt.)

¹Καὶ  ἦλθον εἰς τὸ πέραν τῆς θαλάσσης εἰς τὴν χώραν τῶν Γερασηνῶν. ²καὶ ἐξελθόντος αὐτοῦ ἐκ τοῦ πλοίου εὐθὺς ὑπήντησεν αὐτῷ ἐκ τῶν μνημείων ἄνθρωπος ἐν πνεύματι ἀκαθάρτῳ, ³ὃς τὴν κατοίκησιν εἶχεν ἐν τοῖς μνήμασιν, καὶ οὐδὲ ἁλύσει οὐκέτι οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο αὐτὸν δῆσαι ⁴διὰ τὸ αὐτὸν πολλάκις πέδαις καὶ ἁλύσεσιν δεδέσθαι καὶ διεσπάσθαι ὑπ' αὐτοῦ τὰς ἁλύσεις καὶ τὰς πέδας συντετρῖφθαι, καὶ οὐδεὶς ἴσχυεν αὐτὸν δαμάσαι· ⁵καὶ διὰ παντὸς νυκτὸς καὶ ἡμέρας ἐν τοῖς μνήμασιν καὶ ἐν τοῖς ὄρεσιν ἦν κράζων καὶ κατακόπτων ἑαυτὸν λίθοις. ⁶Καὶ ἰδὼν τὸν Ἰησοῦν ἀπὸ μακρόθεν ἔδραμεν καὶ προσεκύνησεν αὐτῷ ⁷καὶ κράξας φωνῇ μεγάλῃ λέγει· τί ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί, Ἰησοῦ υἱὲ τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ὑψίστου; ὁρκίζω σε τὸν θεόν, μή με βασανίσῃς. ⁸ἔλεγεν γὰρ αὐτῷ· ἔξελθε τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἀκάθαρτον ἐκ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου. ⁹καὶ ἐπηρώτα αὐτόν· τί ὄνομά σοι; καὶ λέγει αὐτῷ· λεγιὼν ὄνομά μοι, ὅτι πολλοί ἐσμεν. ¹⁰καὶ παρεκάλει αὐτὸν πολλὰ ἵνα μὴ αὐτὰ ἀποστείλῃ ἔξω τῆς χώρας. ¹¹Ἦν δὲ ἐκεῖ πρὸς τῷ ὄρει ἀγέλη χοίρων μεγάλη βοσκομένη· ¹²καὶ παρεκάλεσαν αὐτὸν λέγοντες· πέμψον ἡμᾶς εἰς τοὺς χοίρους, ἵνα εἰς αὐτοὺς εἰσέλθωμεν. ¹³καὶ ἐπέτρεψεν αὐτοῖς. καὶ ἐξελθόντα τὰ πνεύματα τὰ ἀκάθαρτα εἰσῆλθον εἰς τοὺς χοίρους, καὶ ὥρμησεν ἡ ἀγέλη κατὰ τοῦ κρημνοῦ εἰς τὴν θάλασσαν, ὡς δισχίλιοι, καὶ ἐπνίγοντο ἐν τῇ θαλάσσῃ.

¹⁴Καὶ οἱ βόσκοντες αὐτοὺς ἔφυγον καὶ ἀπήγγειλαν εἰς τὴν πόλιν καὶ εἰς τοὺς ἀγρούς· καὶ ἦλθον ἰδεῖν τί ἐστιν τὸ γεγονὸς ¹⁵καὶ ἔρχονται πρὸς τὸν Ἰησοῦν καὶ θεωροῦσιν τὸν δαιμονιζόμενον καθήμενον ἱματισμένον καὶ σωφρονοῦντα, τὸν ἐσχηκότα τὸν λεγιῶνα, καὶ ἐφοβήθησαν. ¹⁶καὶ διηγήσαντο αὐτοῖς οἱ ἰδόντες πῶς ἐγένετο τῷ δαιμονιζομένῳ καὶ περὶ τῶν χοίρων. ¹⁷καὶ ἤρξαντο παρακαλεῖν αὐτὸν ἀπελθεῖν ἀπὸ τῶν ὁρίων αὐτῶν.

¹⁸Καὶ ἐμβαίνοντος αὐτοῦ εἰς τὸ πλοῖον παρεκάλει αὐτὸν ὁ δαιμονισθεὶς ἵνα μετ' αὐτοῦ ᾖ. ¹⁹καὶ οὐκ ἀφῆκεν αὐτόν, ἀλλὰ λέγει αὐτῷ· ὕπαγε εἰς τὸν οἶκόν σου πρὸς τοὺς σοὺς καὶ ἀπάγγειλον αὐτοῖς ὅσα ὁ κύριός σοι πεποίηκεν καὶ ἠλέησέν σε. ²⁰καὶ ἀπῆλθεν καὶ ἤρξατο κηρύσσειν ἐν τῇ Δεκαπόλει ὅσα ἐποίησεν αὐτῷ ὁ Ἰησοῦς, καὶ πάντες ἐθαύμαζον.

²¹Καὶ διαπεράσαντος τοῦ Ἰησοῦ [ἐν τῷ πλοίῳ] πάλιν εἰς τὸ πέραν συνήχθη ὄχλος πολὺς ἐπ' αὐτόν, καὶ ἦν παρὰ τὴν θάλασσαν.  (NA28)

Translation Notes and Comments

The other side: (vv1) This parallels verse 21 where Jesus crosses the sea again. Mark is highlighting Jesus choosing to go to a place where a perceived difference is an issue.

Which city? (vv1) Mark is concerned with symbolism here, not geography. Gerasa was 37 miles south east of the Sea of Galilee. This is probably why Matthew 8:28 has substituted Gadara which was only five miles from the lake.  But the Hebrew root of  Gerasēnōn is "to banish" and is the language of exorcism."^[48]  This suggests Mark chooses the region of the Gerasenes for symbolic purposes.

And immediately… (kai... euthus)  (vv2) Mark's signature phrase is easy to miss because of the intervening words.  The kai... euthus is important to notice because, in Mark 1:23, when Jesus first goes to a synagogue it says, "and immediately^[49] there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit."    Here, there is immediately a man in an unclean spirit; the Greek words for in an unclean spirit are exactly the same in both stories. (en pneumati akathartō) We should not read the immediacy of the man's approach when Jesus had stepped out of the boat as a suggestion that life in the ploion is any guarantee of holiness; life in the boat is still rent with conflict.^[50]

In an unclean spirit (en pneumati akathartō) (vv2) Marcus  says  "en should be taken … literally: the man has been swallowed up by his possessing spirit."^[51]

Uncleanliness is not about hygiene. Unclean is a state of separation from God.^[52] At the time, many would consider everything about this man separated him from God. He lived in the impure tombs of the dead. He was upon the mountains (see below) and he was "in an unclean spirit." Added to this, verse 15 implies that before he was healed he was naked. (Luke 8:27 makes this implication explicit when he retells this story.) Akathartos  is also used in verse 8, 12, and 13, as a rhetorical repetitive, as are the the tombs and the begging.

Note that while the geographic location may suggest he is Gentile, the text does not say this. He is neither a "Samaritan woman^[53]" nor a "a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin^[54]." The imagery of his impurity is that which Jewish people used of themselves. 

A man out of the tombs… in the tombs: (vv2,3,5) The tombs are mentioned three times in a deliberate emphasis; we might call the man "the living dead." NRSVa speaks of him living  among the tombs, (vv3,5) but the Greek en also means in. The description suggests he was  sheltering in the tombs.^[55] With the same reasoning, I have understand that ἐκ τοῦ πλοίου … ἐκ τῶν μνημείων is well translated as from (ek) out of the boat and out of the tombs. (vv2) On the mountains in verse 5 is a similar locator to in the tombs and is the same Greek en.  Note that there is a threefold structure of predicament or enslavement: en the tombs, en the chains, and en the mountains stoning himself. This structure is replicated in the story of the woman and the girl. (Mark 4:26, 5:38-39)

No one could bind him:  (vv4) The event reminds us of Jesus' parable of binding the strong man.  In Mark 3:27, Jesus speaks of binding (dēsē) a strong man.  Here in 5:3 no one can bind (dēsai) this man. NRSVa's restrain hides this connection. The two stories also have the word for strength in common. In 5:4, no one had the strength (ischuen) to subdue the man. The word is cognate with 3:27's ischuron, the strong man. Byrne notes that here in Chapter 5 Jesus is the "stronger one" even though no one (oudeis) else can bind the man.^[56] In 3:27 no one (oudeis) can plunder the house of the strong man unless they can bind him.

Had been torn apart: (vv4) In verse 4 the chains and shackles had been wrenched apart and broken in pieces, even though NRSVa uses the active voice. Marcus says the use of the passive voice in the Greek is unusual, and mimics the divine passive with a "demonic passive" as a way of indicating the violence being done to the man by the Legion.^[57] (Geek note: Mark uses an antimetabole here:  we have shackles and chains, and then chains and shackles in verse 4.)

On the mountains (vv5) The mountains are an allusion to false Gods; for example, "they set up for themselves pillars and sacred poles on every high hill and under every green tree." (2 Kings 17:10) Being in the tombs or on the mountains are comparable states of separation from God.

Screaming (vv5,7) (krazōn, kraxas) The root meaning here is to cry out, but with a sense of inarticulate desperation. The krazōn of verse 5 means a situation where "one utters loud cries, but no words capable of being understood."^[58] The spirit that would roll the boy into the fire screams/kraxas as it is ejected by Jesus in Mark 9:26.  The word kraxas is also used  in a variant reading (Textus Receptus)^[59] in Mark 15:39, suggesting the connections between the events in the land of the Gerasenes and at the crucifixion were seen very early in the tradition. 

Bruising himself with stones (vv5) (katakoptōn) Katakoptōn can mean to cut or gash, or to bruise. The fact that the man is such an obvious scapegoat, driven out yet held close to the city, suggests we should use the translation bruise.  He is self-stoning, accepting and internalising the arbitrary judgement of the city upon him. That said, cutting offers a poignant connection to the self-harming frequent today.

Bowed down… I adjure you (vv6,7) Although this is a recognition of Jesus' superiority, it is not an act of worship. The demon is seeking to negotiate with Jesus, even to limit Jesus' actions by adjuring him in the name of God.  Adjure is not to implore^[60] but to command. Mark's ironic narration here shows  the demon thinks Jesus is a part of the same system/kingdom as itself. It does not understand that the Son of the Most High God is someone quite other than itself. (Compare its actions to those of Jairus and the woman later in the chapter ^[61] and even the demons referenced in Mark 3:11, who all fall rather than bow.)

Also present in this confrontation is the understanding that to know someone's name was to have power over them.   The spirit knows who Jesus is and seeks to use the knowledge of his name to control him, even though in its implacable opposition to God, it is forced to bow.  Jesus appears not know its name which, in the drama of the tale, at first makes him look the weaker one, yet when he simply asks for its name, the demon must tell him. Jesus' power is plain.

The use of adjure (horkizō) rather than implore or beg contrasts with the repetitive use of the word to beg (parekalein) in 10, 17, and 18.

In a great voice (v7) (phōnē megalē) Jesus utters a great voice (phōnēn megalēn) as he dies in Mark 15:37. Mark means us to note the parallel with 5:7 (although both NRSVa and Scholar's Bible say at the top of his voice.) I understand the text to mean something like with all his being; these are moments of desperation. In the present text, the man in an unclean spirit cries in a great voice and there is a great herd of pigs, which are also unclean; there is a parallelism in the use of the word megalē. (Remember the threefold megalē of Mark 4:35-41.)

Do not torment me… (vv7) Is the spirit blind to the torment that it has been inflicting on the man, or does it fear that Jesus will repay like for like?

My name is Legion: (vv9) I suspect our current use of the word legion as a simile for the word many arises from this text; I can find no indication that the same was happening in Latin and Greek at the time. A legion was the enslaving tool of empire, a dreaded military force of thousands. The symbolism is unsubtle: There just happens to be an huge herd of two thousand pigs^[62] nearby, an unlikely scenario in a peasant economy, and the legion stationed in Palestine at the time Mark writes had a wild boar on its standards.^[63] Given the opening verse of Mark's gospel, which co-opts the language and titles of Caesar, and of the empire, the name Legion indicates the man is afflicted with the spirit of empire. (See Mark 1:1 and the comments following.)

"…for we are polloi." He begged him polla (vv9,10) The many of the legion and the many times (contra NRSVa's^[64] earnestly are a deliberate pun by Mark. This continues across the Chapter, as we see in verse 10, below:

He begged him much (vv10) NRSVa's begged him repeatedly is correct, except that it obscures a repetitive pun across Chapter 5 which cannot be translated consistently in English. So I have tried to restrict the word great as a translation of megalē; there is, for example, a megalē herd of pigs feeding in verse 11.  But with respect to the word polus in this chapter, which is variously translated as great, many, and repeatedly, I have tried to use the word much, even though it is not a common English usage. Polus sits along side the begging of the Gerasene man, (the Gerasene crowd also beg), the leader of the synagogue and the woman who is bleeding—all this is a sound effect that subliminally registers with the listener.^[65] (See vv4 (pollakis), 9, 10, 21, 23, 24, 26 (twice), 38, 43)

Not to send them out of the land: (vv10) tēs chōras can be a country or region, or mean the land as opposed to the sea, or distinguish country from city.^[66] Clearly, the spirits beg not to be sent out of the region. But, when one reads this scapegoating story with a Girardian sensibility, it is clear they wish also not to be sent away from the dry land; the sea is the chaos and violence of which the scapegoating Legion/many is a symptom.

Near the mountain (orei) (vv11) NRSVa's hillside hides the fact that a mountain of idol worship (see the comment on verse 5, above) has a herd of pigs upon it! Uncleanliness upon uncleanliness.

A great herd of swine (vv11) The word for herd comes from the root ἄγω  which is to be led or brought. It makes clear that these are not wild pigs, but are deliberately cultivated; those feeding them^[67] also makes this clear. The implication is that the place in some way deliberately cultivates uncleanness; ie separation from God. The herd is mentioned twice, and the pigs four times.

And entered the swine (vv13) The herd is a symbol for the Legio X Fretensis^[68] which, in Mark's time, was occupying Jerusalem, ostensibly keeping the peace. If so, then when the unclean spirit is sent into the pigs it re-enters them, and the faux-civility and order of  Rome and its legion is shown for what it is, and it rushes back into the place where it belongs.

 Over the cliff into the  sea… (kata tou krēmnou) (vv13) NRSVa and others say down the steep bank, but the reference to mountains, and the setting of the story in a long act of scapegoating, suggests a cliff is intended. The possible translation of  krēmnou is acknowledged by Bratcher,^[69] and the LXX rendition of the massacre of ten thousand prisoners by Judah^[70] uses krēmnoui to describe throwing people off a cliff.  Such places are sometimes used for the killing of the scapegoat; eg the Tarpeian Rock^[71] in Rome. In Luke 4:29, the mob tries to cast Jesus over the cliff. The word there is  katakrēmnisai which means to cast off a cliff or cast headlong. It comes from krēmnos.  

Drowned in the sea… (vv13) The sea (not NRSVa's lake) is deliberately mentioned twice. In the Exodus, Pharaoh's army was drowned in the sea. Here, a Legion is drowned in the sea. Less obvious to our contemporary eyes than the parallels of our story to that of Jonah, there are a number of similarities between the vocabulary of Mark 5 and the journey through the Red Sea as it is translated in the LXX.^[72] Mark is not thinking only of Roman domination as that which opposes the culture of God, but is speaking of any empire.

A moment of reflection…

I characterised the storm in Mark 4:35-41 as a "pre-emptive strike" against Jesus. What we have seen so far in Chapter 5, now centred around the Legion, are the same forces of chaos and violence again being defeated. In an attempt to survive, Legion begs to be allowed to go to its real home, which is the herd, or crowd. In this last ditch bargaining, which it thinks will enable it to remain in the land of the Gerasenes, it unwittingly undercuts its own existence, for the spirits return from where they came, the individual fears of  the crowd. They are then carried back into the chaos of the sea, and the man is free of them.

We often call a herd a mob in Australia, and the spirits are indeed a mob. Girard notes a reversal in this story. Typically, in an act of lynching

the crowd should remain on top of the cliff and the victim fall over; instead, in this case, the crowd plunges and the victim is saved. The miracle of Gerasa reverses the universal schema of violence fundamental to all societies of the world.^[73]

In all this it is key to remember that the herd of pigs is the crowd, and the crowd is us.

Returning to the text…

In the city and in the country… (vv14) The story is told everywhere, implying that those who come to see also come from everywhere in the region. (The word agrous /country) is in fact plural.)

Demon-possessed man… (vv15) As an English speaker one wants to "correct" this description to the man who had been demon possessed. But this would lose the literary contrast between his now being clothed and in his right mind, and the fear of the Gerasene crowd^[74] who are now possessed!

Sitting clothed and in his right mind: (vv15)  The verse implies that the man had been naked. (Luke 8:27 makes this explicit.) His nakedness emphasises his shame and desolation. Saying that he is sitting implies not only that he is no longer running and ranting, but that he is sitting at Jesus' feet, an image of discipleship.  Luke again (8:35) makes this implication explicit by saying he was sitting at the feet of Jesus. The man is now calm, mirroring the calmness of the sea earlier in the story. Byrne^[75] also says he is the "image of humanity regained," but that does not mean the man was somehow different from me, or that his affliction was somehow of a different quality to all the storms and raging within me; under empire, all our illness is the qualitative same.

And they were afraid… (vv15) Ephobēthēsan is exactly the same word as the fear of the disciples after the calming of the storm earlier in the story. As we will see, the response of each group is different:

Those who had seen what happened… (vv16) There is repetitive evangelism in this story: the herders ran off and told the story, it is repeated here, and then (vv20) the healed man will tell the story with a different interpretation.^[76] To whose story will we listen?

Began to beg him… (vv17) The legion begged, so too do the crowd and the healed man. Parakalein is used in each case, but the motivations of the three are contrasting.

Preach… to your own people… (vv19) The word sous (own) has a wider meaning than the more local friends of NRSVa.^[77] The herdsmen report (appangeilon)  what has happened, and Jesus also instructs the one healed to report (apangeilon) to their people. But the Greek listener immediately heard that the healed one did not report, but began to preach, which is kērussein. The word is also used in Mark 1:45, 3:14, and could also be translated as proclaim. I use preach here because it contrasts with mere reporting; it is a Basileia word.

The legion is not only polloi but a symbol which is poly-valent. As much as we may be oppressed by an external force, the final reality of the demonic (the things of Satan) is the way we behave as a group toward others. When the great herd of pigs is gone,  the Gerasenes have to face themselves. Effectively, in the healing of the man, the crowd has had its demons returned to it,^[78] and each person is now now free to face the truth about themselves. Faced with freedom, they reject it: They beg Jesus to leave. They choose empire instead of the Basileia. We are confronted again by the mystery of the seeds, which this time, are sown with the man's healing. We see that "Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown." (Mark 4:15)

The person who has been healed naturally and properly wishes to get into the ploion with Jesus, and is refused. There is a call here to those of us who feel imprisoned with those who have been, and may still be, our oppressors. It is with them that we proclaim what the Lord has done.

The Defeat of the Legion

Chapter 4:35-5:21 is a description of the human predicament. From the heights of empire down to the very personal, the dynamics of human experience are similar: We live within empire which bears down upon us, and yet, in our living, we act out the smaller inhumanities which are the building blocks of that empire. We cannot be free of the one without attending to the other.

I begin by contrasting some events from Mark with the same events as described by John.  In John, "Jesus, knowing that all things had been accomplished said, 'It has been completed,'^[79]  and bowing his head gave up his spirit."^[80] In John, Jesus is calm, fully in control, finishing the task.

But in Mark's crucifixion narrative, Jesus "cried out in a loud voice (phonē megalē) "Eloi, Eloi,  lema sabacthani" which is translated, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'" This is the great cry of human dereliction. It is the moment of utter loss and abandonment where we face the terror that we may become… not. True, Mark hints that there is a way through; Jesus is, after all, quoting Psalm 22, where finally there is rescue and hope. But despite this, "Jesus uttered a loud cry (phonē megalē) and breathed his last, and the veil of the temple was torn into two..." 

John's drama would demand we read Mark's Alēthōs houtos ho anthrōpos  huios theou ēn as an awestruck Truly, this man was a Son of God,^[81] but in Mark Jesus dying words give an awful credibility to Kotrosit's reading of the scene, where  the Centurion is mocking both Jesus and the Basileia: Really!?? This man is Son of God!?"^[82]

In the defeat of the legion, the man cried out in an inarticulate (kraxis) loud voice (phonē megalē), a scream.  The torturing demon seizes him completely at that moment and speaks for itself.

Menendez-Artuna says when the body gives up, language is no longer possible. She reports the common use by the survivors of torture of the ripping of textiles as a metaphor. "The survivor...considers the contemporary self as totally other, as a textile that has been torn apart and can no longer be stitched together."^[83] 

Crucifixion was not first of all, a method of execution; it was, and is, a method of torture, the degradation of a human being, the prolonging of the pleasure and release we gain when we transfer our own torment onto another. Crucifixion is the final defining act of empire, however much we seek to hide it, or even prevent it. In the defeat of the legion, Mark tears Jesus' death away from any hint of triumphalism and pulls it back into the life and experience of the survivors of the destruction of Jerusalem. For to say Legion is to condense a great sea-storm of torture, massacre, and displacement, into a single traumatising word.

By the sea, the legion whose savage destruction of Jerusalem seems to have won the war, becomes the legion which killed the Messiah in an act of needless torture, and yet has won nothing because his resurrection declares that death has no ultimate consequence. It is death which is defeated in the defeat of the legion.

Here again is the mystery of the Basileia, an invitation to a counter-intuitive perception that brute force empowered by death is no power at all.^[84] Basileia is at once healing and rescue from empire, yet also disconcerting and terrifying in its invitation to step beyond the apparent safety of reason, so that our longing "for a goodness never in our lives had"^[85] may be fulfilled.

The rending of the curtain in the Temple is of course, also symbolic of a removal of the curtain between us and God. God tears it from top to bottom. But if we will not suffer our own rending, if we refuse that rending and beg Jesus to "leave our region," we are no different to the people of the region of the Gerasenes. We will live in a kind of banishment like the one who lived in the tombs, never able to flee, always in a captivity.

Our human predicament is that "invaders don't just colonise your land, they colonise your heart and mind in horribly, destructive ways, in demonic ways."^[86] The empire of our time colonises our minds, saying the only ultimate reality is death, and that power is death postponed by deflecting it upon others—not that this reality is spoken aloud. So we wish to keep our scapegoats, and to keep them close. It suits us to have them "in the shadows"^[87] on the edges of our community, for there they can be pulled into the centre of the mob again whenever we wish to vent more of our violence upon them. But to "have them returned to us"^[88] as the man in Gerasa was returned would be "too close," for it would be to accept that they are people who are the same as us, and that the issues which trouble us are the problem and the responsibility of all of us, and cannot be blamed on the innocent^[89] ones we are scapegoating. This humanising of the scapegoat rends us. It confronts us with the agony that we are not innocent, that we are among the crucifiers, and this agony is payment of our guilt.

This means that coming to Jesus like the man of the Gerasenes, (and the woman we will shortly meet on the other side of the sea in Mark 5:21-43) is an act of courage. It is to step out of a kind of safety, a terrible but settled place, and to become more visible, and even more at risk. Often it will seem easier to accept society's verdict and take part in our own scapegoating, bruising ourselves with the same stones first used to drive us out. Then the chains and shackles, which keep us close for the moments society needs us, are barely required.

Stepping out of the crowd at last, the man who is now in his right mind, naturally desires to go with Jesus. Here Mark teaches us another terrifying truth: The geometry of crowds is that there is that there is no peran,  no "outside" pr other side. We are always social; there is no other existence. To "step out" is also to step into the centre, into the space around which mobs gather. It is either to step  out of our invisibility in the crowd and become a candidate for scapegoating, or to step out of the settled and known place of the current scapegoat, and become a disruptor and destabiliser. We sometimes speak of disruptor tech companies, but they are merely "shuffling the cards," redistributing power within empire. In calling us to step out of empire, Jesus invites us into a Basileia which empire cannot tolerate, for its disruption is that it is the antithesis of empire.

Now Jesus crosses (again) to the other (peran) side. Peran is used in each of the crossings (4:35, 5:1, 21) places. Any reading of the chapter which sees Jesus crossing to other people, must see that Jewish Galilee is also other.

Mark 5:21 – 43 God Enlightens Jairus and Others

Translation Notes and Comments

²¹When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a much^[90] crowd (ὄχλος πολὺς) gathered round him; and he was by the sea. ²² Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named Jairus comes and, when he saw him, falls at his feet ²³ and begs him much^[91], 'My little daughter is about to die. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be saved, and live.' ²⁴ So he went with him.

And a  crowd much^[92] (ὄχλος πολὺς) followed him and jostled him. ²⁵ Now there was a woman suffering in a flow of blood^[93] for twelve years. ²⁶ She had endured much under much^[94] physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. ²⁷ She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, ²⁸for she was saying, 'If I touch even his clothes, I will be made well.' ²⁹ And immediately her bleeding  stopped^[95]; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction. ³⁰ Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, 'Who touched my clothes?' ³¹ And his disciples were saying to him, 'You see the crowd jostling you; how can you say, "Who touched me?"' ³² He looked all round to see she who had done it. ³³ But the woman, having been fear-filled and trembling, knowing what had been done to her, came and fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. ³⁴ He said to her, 'Daughter, your trust has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your affliction.'

³⁵ While still he is speaking, some people come from (the house^[96]) of the leader of the synagogue saying, 'Your daughter is dead. Why still trouble the teacher?' ³⁶ But ignoring what they said, Jesus says to the leader of the synagogue, 'Do not fear, only trust.' ³⁷ He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. ³⁸ When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing much.^{[97] 39}When he had entered, he said to them, 'Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping.' ⁴⁰ And they mocked  him. Then he drove them all outside, and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was. ⁴¹ He took her by the hand and said to her, 'Talitha cum', which means, 'Little girl, rise up!' ⁴² And immediately the girl arose and began to walk about (she was twelve years of age). At this they were amazed with a great amazement. ⁴³ He much^[98] (strictly?) ordered them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat. (NRSVa alt)

21Καὶ διαπεράσαντος τοῦ Ἰησοῦ [ἐν τῷ πλοίῳ] πάλιν εἰς τὸ πέραν συνήχθη ὄχλος πολὺς ἐπ' αὐτόν, καὶ ἦν παρὰ τὴν θάλασσαν. 22Καὶ ἔρχεται εἷς τῶν ἀρχισυναγώγων, ὀνόματι Ἰάϊρος, καὶ ἰδὼν αὐτὸν πίπτει πρὸς τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ 23καὶ παρακαλεῖ αὐτὸν πολλὰ λέγων ὅτι τὸ θυγάτριόν μου ἐσχάτως ἔχει, ἵνα ἐλθὼν ἐπιθῇς τὰς χεῖρας αὐτῇ ἵνα σωθῇ καὶ ζήσῃ. 24καὶ ἀπῆλθεν μετ' αὐτοῦ. καὶ ἠκολούθει αὐτῷ ὄχλος πολὺς καὶ συνέθλιβον αὐτόν.

25Καὶ γυνὴ οὖσα ἐν ῥύσει αἵματος δώδεκα ἔτη 26καὶ πολλὰ παθοῦσα ὑπὸ πολλῶν ἰατρῶν καὶ δαπανήσασα τὰ παρ' αὐτῆς πάντα καὶ μηδὲν ὠφεληθεῖσα ἀλλὰ μᾶλλον εἰς τὸ χεῖρον ἐλθοῦσα, 27ἀκούσασα περὶ τοῦ Ἰησοῦ, ἐλθοῦσα ἐν τῷ ὄχλῳ ὄπισθεν ἥψατο τοῦ ἱματίου αὐτοῦ· 28ἔλεγεν γὰρ ὅτι ἐὰν ἅψωμαι κἂν τῶν ἱματίων αὐτοῦ σωθήσομαι. 29καὶ εὐθὺς ἐξηράνθη ἡ πηγὴ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτῆς καὶ ἔγνω τῷ σώματι ὅτι ἴαται ἀπὸ τῆς μάστιγος. 30καὶ εὐθὺς ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐπιγνοὺς ἐν ἑαυτῷ τὴν ἐξ αὐτοῦ δύναμιν ἐξελθοῦσαν ἐπιστραφεὶς ἐν τῷ ὄχλῳ ἔλεγεν· τίς μου ἥψατο τῶν ἱματίων; 31καὶ ἔλεγον αὐτῷ οἱ μαθηταὶ αὐτοῦ· βλέπεις τὸν ὄχλον συνθλίβοντά σε καὶ λέγεις· τίς μου ἥψατο; 32καὶ περιεβλέπετο ἰδεῖν τὴν τοῦτο ποιήσασαν. 33ἡ δὲ γυνὴ φοβηθεῖσα καὶ τρέμουσα, εἰδυῖα ὃ γέγονεν αὐτῇ, ἦλθεν καὶ προσέπεσεν αὐτῷ καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ πᾶσαν τὴν ἀλήθειαν. 34ὁ δὲ εἶπεν αὐτῇ· θυγάτηρ, ἡ πίστις σου σέσωκέν σε· ὕπαγε εἰς εἰρήνην καὶ ἴσθι ὑγιὴς ἀπὸ τῆς μάστιγός σου.

35Ἔτι αὐτοῦ λαλοῦντος ἔρχονται ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀρχισυναγώγου λέγοντες ὅτι ἡ θυγάτηρ σου ἀπέθανεν· τί ἔτι σκύλλεις τὸν διδάσκαλον; 36ὁ δὲ Ἰησοῦς παρακούσας τὸν λόγον λαλούμενον λέγει τῷ ἀρχισυναγώγῳ· μὴ φοβοῦ, μόνον πίστευε. 37καὶ οὐκ ἀφῆκεν οὐδένα μετ' αὐτοῦ συνακολουθῆσαι εἰ μὴ τὸν Πέτρον καὶ Ἰάκωβον καὶ Ἰωάννην τὸν ἀδελφὸν Ἰακώβου. 38καὶ ἔρχονται εἰς τὸν οἶκον τοῦ ἀρχισυναγώγου, καὶ θεωρεῖ θόρυβον καὶ κλαίοντας καὶ ἀλαλάζοντας πολλά, 39καὶ εἰσελθὼν λέγει αὐτοῖς· τί θορυβεῖσθε καὶ κλαίετε; τὸ παιδίον οὐκ ἀπέθανεν ἀλλὰ καθεύδει. 40καὶ κατεγέλων αὐτοῦ. αὐτὸς δὲ ἐκβαλὼν πάντας παραλαμβάνει τὸν πατέρα τοῦ παιδίου καὶ τὴν μητέρα καὶ τοὺς μετ' αὐτοῦ καὶ εἰσπορεύεται ὅπου ἦν τὸ παιδίον. 41καὶ κρατήσας τῆς χειρὸς τοῦ παιδίου λέγει αὐτῇ· ταλιθα κουμ, ὅ ἐστιν μεθερμηνευόμενον· τὸ κοράσιον, σοὶ λέγω, ἔγειρε. 42καὶ εὐθὺς ἀνέστη τὸ κοράσιον καὶ περιεπάτει· ἦν γὰρ ἐτῶν δώδεκα. καὶ ἐξέστησαν [εὐθὺς] ἐκστάσει μεγάλῃ. 43καὶ διεστείλατο αὐτοῖς πολλὰ ἵνα μηδεὶς γνοῖ τοῦτο, καὶ εἶπεν δοθῆναι αὐτῇ φαγεῖν. (NA28)

And he was by the sea (vv21) The phrasing of this sentence emphasises his being by the sea; it is not an incidental statement. Literally, the verse says was gathered a crowd great to him and he was beside the sea. How far do the connections go in this part of Mark? From the great mystery of the Basileia tou Theou in 4:10 where he had began to teach beside the sea, that symbol of chaos and evil, (4:1) the action is beside the sea. Let us go across to the other side, he says at the end of the parables. And immediately he gets out of the boat, by the sea which has just tried to destroy him, he is confronted by the Legion. Now, having come back across the sea, the action continues by the sea. In the current location, the phrase he was by the sea is not necessary to the story at all… unless Mark is making a point about the sea.

A much^[99] crowd (ochlos polus) (vv21) It is the much crowd that locates him by the sea—he is yet to do anything! (Note that there is an extended use of the word polus. See the comments on vv9-10 above.)

Jairus… when he saw him (vv22) In Jesus' healings only two people are named in Mark; Jairus and Bartimaeus. This suggests the names themselves carry a Markan message. Jairus has two possible meanings, gleaned from Greek transliteration of the Hebrew. One is "he sees" and the other is "he awakens."^[100]  Jairus comes to the crowd and then sees Jesus and responds in a way that loosely echoes the bowing of the demon on the other side, and contrasts with the response of the people of the Gerasenes; he asks Jesus to come to his house. Seeing seems Mark's more likely intention, but then Jesus awakens Jairus' daughter. I wonder if Mark intends the ambiguity—Jairus himself has had something awakened within him!

Falls at his feet (vv23) Piptei is related to the prosepesen of the woman in verse 33, and the unclean spirits of Mark 3:11. It contrasts with the attempt by Legion to bargain with (or defeat) Jesus in vv6-7 above.

Daughters (vv 23, 35) A thugatrion (vv23) is a little daughter, and this is the word used by Jairus. Thugatēr (vv34, 35) seems simply to mean daughter. Mark links the two women by describing them both as daughter, in addition to using the number 12 in their stories.

When Jesus called the woman Daughter in verse 34, it did not imply that she was related to him, or that she was younger than he was. It was a respectful and affectionate way of speaking to a woman at the time^[101], and similar to his addressing the paralysed man as Son.^[102] For Mark's original readers, and for us, it also recalls the new family of 3:34-35. In verse 35, not using the tender diminutive thugatrion seems to make the pronouncement of the little daughter's death all the more stark.

Be saved (vv23) Sōthē could mean be made well or could mean be saved. The fine distinction can be seen in NRSVa which has the girl may be made well in this verse, but has translated the identical phrase hina sōthē in in John 3:17 as in order that the world might be saved. I have chosen be saved here in verse 23 because of the echo of resurrection later in the story, when she is raised up. (Mark 5:41) 

Jostled him (vv24, 31) synethlibon. We can see the relationship to thlibōsin in Mark 3:9, where I have used the translation so that they would not mob him.  This is an already hostile crowd with Jesus at its centre, he is already the subject of some violence, hence my use of the Scholars Bible's jostle.  Not only will the woman's touch be noticed by Jesus, but it is a contrast to the barely restrained violence of the crowd.

Those who have been in a large and close, but irenic crowd, know that even close together, space and person are respected. Synethlibon is that situation where things are destabilised, and on the edge of violence. Note that Jesus hasn't done anything yet! In a sense, this crowd is a continuation of the one on the other side. He is already not welcome; people intuit that he is a disruption.

Now there was a woman… (vv25) Now Mark hands us a sandwich. The story of this woman explicates the story of the little daughter who herself helps us understand the woman's story. The commonality of the number 12 and the naming of the woman as "Daughter" emphasise this. (Note also the "man then woman" flow of Chapter 5; it mirrors that of Mark 1:21-29.)

In a flow of blood… (vv25) I make this very literal translation because like the Gerasene man who is en pneumati akathartō, she is en rusei  haimatos; it consumes her, as the unclean spirit consumed him. (cf Mark 5:2 commentary.) The rusei haimatos was almost certainly vaginal bleeding, given that the same word is used in the proscriptions of Leviticus 15:19, 25.^[103] Men argue about what kind of impurity would be implied by the bleeding, whether it was lawful for the woman to be in the crowd, and what her touching of Jesus meant for his ritual purity. Less is said about the effects of such bleeding; the likely low iron levels can be devastating for mental and physical health. Even less is said about suffering the misogynistic shame which is poured upon women because they bleed. Like the Gerasene man she is one of those of us who are "living dead." And like the little daughter, she is at the point of death; things are getting worse. (cf vv26)

Twelve years (vv25) (cf vv42) The number 12 links the two women, one from a house of privilege, the other poor and likely stigmatised. Twelve is often the age when menstrual bleeding begins. Twelve is also the number of Israel; is a healing of Israel being suggested here? If so, the healing of Israel lies in the healing of its women!

Had endured much under much physicians (vv26) The pun aimed at the physicians is obvious in the Greek. (polla…pollōn)

She had heard vv27 Jairus saw, she heard.

Touch (vv27, 28, 30, 31) (Cf Mark 6:56, Acts 19:12) The healing nature of touching a holy man's clothes was a common understanding.  But note that the jostling crowd is touching him, too! Yet it is her touching in faith and hope that he feels. I deal with the purity implications of her touch in the more detailed comments below.

Affliction (vv29, 34) The Greek word here is mastigos which could be translated as scourge. Although some translations say Jesus was scourged in Mark 15:15 (eg; NAS KJV) the Greek there is phragellōsas, or flogged. Affliction matches the translation of mastigas in Mark 3:10 (In Acts 22:24 Paul was to be "examined by scourging." mastixin.)

Who touched my clothes/me? (vv31, 32) The two references to touch make Mark's message clear: To touch his clothes is to touch him.

If we were work-shopping a dramatic presentation of Mark, how would we read the disciples' question? Are they incredulous, or uncomprehending, or beginning to panic in the jostling crowd, or even beginning to scorn him like the crowd at Jairus' house?  In destabilised jostling crowd, scorn would easily grow from the disciples' fear, and subtly move them away from Jesus' side over to the crowd. Reading their question in a scornful panicking voice anticipates Peter's later denial of Jesus.

She who (vv32)  The who touched me of verses 30 and 31 is masculine, but here who is feminine. Jesus knows who she is.^[104]

But the woman, having been fear-filled and trembling, knowing what had been done to her, came and fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. (vv33) This is a key verse. No longer indicated merely by the pronoun of the previous verses, the woman who has been acted upon and seen, worships him; the action is more vivid than that of Jairus who has seen him, and it is the lead up to Jesus telling Jairus not to fear, only believe. Telling the whole truth is a term of juridical witness.^[105]  She is bearing witness to her healing by Jesus the Christ the Son of God. (cf Mark 1:1) In the context of Chapter 13:9-11, hauled before councils and goveners, what did telling the whole truth mean for Mark's church?

I have used fear-filled, firstly because the tense is passive; she has been made fearful, and also because using frightened may obscure the fact that fear has multiple occurrences in this part of Mark. See the comments at Do not fear (vv36).

The dative autē can translate as to her or for her. In the context of the physical healing it seems to her^[106] is appropriate.

Daughter (vv34) is a culturally affectionate and respectful term of address (albeit with paternal overtones) but given the witness she has made in verse 33, it also implies that she is a member of his family of faith. (cf Mark 3:31-35)

Your trust (vv34) hē  pistis sou lit. The faith of you. Metzger notes that some languages cannot talk about faith unless it is a verb.^[107]  In English we see faith having a cognitive "non-active" component; that is, "I believe in these propositions." But faith also requires us to "put our actions where our mouth is." Fundamentalist expressions of the Faith sometimes disconnect assent to doctrinal propositions from faithful behaviour. The woman not only assented to the proposition that she would be healed, but also acted upon it; she faithed. As a reminder of this conundrum, I have used trust, which I think implies more action. It allows me to use only trust (pisteue)  in vv36, whereas some translations use faith here in vv34 and believe in vv36 for what is the same Greek word.^[108]

While they were talking… Daughter (v35) The hopelessness of the messengers' statement is a deliberate contrast with the previous verse. The bald statement Hē thugatēr sou also contrasts with Jairus' gentle ton thugatrion mou (my little daughter) of verse 23. Black calls it "callous and utterly witless." The messengers interrupt Jesus' conversation with the woman. The scene makes clear that stopping to heal the woman means the little daughter has died.^[109]

Ignoring (v36) parakousas The meaning of the word can be overhearing or ignoring what the messengers have said. In the dramatic context overhearing is too weak. Jesus hears what the messengers have said and ignores it.^[110]

Do not fear, only trust (vv36) Jesus does not speak to the messengers, but only to the one who has seen (cf vv 22); that is, the leader of the synagogue. Phobou is the same root word for the fear caused by Jesus' actions in Chapters 4 and 5; whether the disciples in the boat, the people of the Gerasenes, or the fear of the woman who was healed. (Mark 4:41, 5:15, 5:33, 5:36) Here, Jesus calls Jairus not to be afraid of death but to trust in him.

Peter, James, and John (vv37) Moloney suggests that Jesus' consistent attempts to limit knowledge of what he has done is because our trust is not to be a response to wonders and works of power, but a response to the crucified and risen Son of God.^[111] The irony, is that faced with crucifixion, one of those who has already seen Jesus' power over death will still deny him.

The limiting of the audience may also be that some things are simply too holy for a general audience; the proverb about casting pearls before swine comes to mind.^[112]

Peter, James, and John are the restricted audience who are with Jesus during the Transfiguration (cf especially Mark 9:9) and in Gethsemane (14:32-42). Anderson^[113] also notes they are present (with Andrew) at Mark13:3. All this connects the resurrection of the little girl with Jesus' death and resurrection.

Commotion, weeping and wailing. (vv38) Mark details the behaviour of the "professional" mourners of death. It matches the threefold detailing of the failure of the physicians,^[114] and the threefold enslavement of the Gerasene man. The same descriptive much (polla) is used of the mourners as of the physicians in vv26. And as the disciples are incredulous or mocking in the crowd, so is the crowd of professional mourners.

The child is not dead but sleeping (vv39) To say someone was sleeping was a clear euphemism for death (See Ephesians 5:14, 1 Thessalonians 5:10) Jesus' statement is ironic; it means the dead are only sleeping, and it is this understanding that the crowd mocks as much as it mocks Jesus.

Drove them all outside (vv40) Ekbalōn is reminiscent of the language of exorcism. There was no polite asking people to leave here. The language suggests that the mocking of resurrection is part of the demonic of empire.

Little girl (vv41) Talitha is derived from the word for lamb.^[115] Calling her "little lamb" is an endearment which starkly contrasts Jesus with the physicians and the professional mourners. 

He took her by the hand… (41)  He touches her (as he touched Jesus mother-in-law.)

Rise up… (vv41) egeire is the same word used of Jesus in Mark 15:6: He is risen (ēgerthē) See also Mark 6:14, where Herod decides John has risen from the dead. (egēgertai).

Immediately arose…  (vv41) kai euthus anestē to korasion …  The language in the story is explicitly the language of resurrection: In the conversation of Mark 12:18-27,  when the Sadducees say in the resurrection when they arise, (ἐν tē anastasei hotan anastōsin) Jesus replies when the dead rise  (nekrōn anastōsin) and the dead that rise. (nekrōn hoti egeirontai)

Marcus wonders if there is a "half-pun" here: Anestē is related to, and sounds similar to the "standing outside of oneself" experience of the exestēsan euthus ekstasei  phrase^[116] of verse 42.

Began to walk about (vv42) She arose immediately, but the verse also accentuates the fact that she really is alive; she is walking around.

Twelve years of age (vv42) The linking of the two women by Mark's sandwich structure now becomes more explicit via the number 12. Twelve is a number for Israel. Twelve is a typical age for menarche.

Amazed with a great amazement. (vv42)  kai exestēsan euthus ekstasei megalē. The construction mirrors that at the defeat of the storm (Mark 4:41):  ephobēthēsan  phobon megan: afraid with a great fear. But here things go beyond fear. The crowd in Mark 2:12 was existasthai, and we said there that it was at flashpoint because its intelligence recognised it was in the presence of something... altering. It instinctively understood it had met an alterity, an "otherness," which can change everything. The same is implied here.

He much ordered them (vv43) NRSVa has strictly rather than much; we could also use repeatedly. The Greek word is polla, that constant "echo" mentioned in the translation note for verses 5:9, 10. The comments at Peter, James, and John (vv37) are equally relevant here.

Give her something to eat. (vv43) Ghosts don't eat.^[117] (cf Luke 24:41)  The statement may also beg the question of how one nourishes the children of faith, and may anticipate the feeding miracles later in the gospel.

Rehearsing the Faith…

Mark takes  stories of a storm, a man oppressed into derangement by a legion, a woman who is bleeding, a little daughter and her father, and weaves them into a multifaceted shape-shifting poem of the Basileia of God.

Outside of obvious errors of history or grammatical interpretation, the power of the text, what it means to us, is not ours to define. Nor do we control what it says to another person. The power of the text is somewhere in the nexus of historical facts, personal experience, the interpretive authority of the church, the spirit of Jesus and, finally, our willingness to let the text move us and so open us to the mystery that is the Basileia of the God who meets us where we are. The personal experience we bring to the story profoundly affects what we hear it say to us.

In this poem little pieces of puzzle slide into place for one listener. Another listener shudders at the word Legion and begins to weep. The walk to Jairus' house rouses the memory of an angry crowd for someone else, and for them, Jesus' path through the jostling crowd becomes the last walk to Jerusalem and Calvary; not as a foreshadowing, but  in some incalculable fashion… the same journey made by him and others.

The first listeners of Mark, and  those who soon afterwards heard or read the text, were unlikely to miss the connection between the legion of spirits and the legions of Rome, even if only because it would seem impossibly counter-factual. How could a compromised and terrified believer who has seen the destruction, the betrayals, (13:12), and the arrests, (13:9, 11) see the legions of Rome as defeated!? How could one endure to the end (13:13) while overshadowed by the ruins of Jerusalem? How can one ever see the Basileia of God in all that?

Yet in the next part of the story is one who trusts and who sees. (5:36, 22) This "Jairus believer" sees that life cannot remain the same, and that we cannot ask Jesus to go away and "leave our land." A Jairus must follow Jesus to the cross. In this story, the path to Jairus' house is the path to the cross through the jostling jeering crowd. And at the house, the beloved one is already dead; there is no hope. But she is raised from death because in the presence of Jesus death has no power over her.

But how can we trust that, risk that? How does one find that courage? Mark's answer is the woman who is at the centre of Mark 4:35-5:43. She is us—perhaps it is better to say we are invited to be her. She is the man from the tombs, the girl who is dying, and she is Jairus. The number twelve is the obvious link between the two women; it intends us to ask what the connection is between them. Her connection to the man in the tombs is visible in the three-fold descriptions of their desperate  predicaments which mean they are both living dead.

…a man out of the tombs in an unclean spirit met him…	…a woman suffering in a flow of blood…
3He lived in the tombs;	26 She had endured much under much[118] physicians,
and no one could bind him any more, even with a chain; 4for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but the chains had been torn apart by him, and the shackles had been broken in pieces; and no one had the strength  to subdue him.	and had spent all that she had;
5Night and day in the tombs and on the mountains he was always screaming and bruising himself with stones.	and she was no better, but rather grew worse.

Jairus saw Jesus, the woman had heard about him, one of them came to him from privilege and the other from poverty, but both trusted in him.

In her desperate hope she touches his cloak—hope is the mortar of the brickwork of our faith/trust. The three-fold pattern is repeated: If I touch…  her bleeding stopped… she felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction.

After the storm the disciples feared a great fear. Although the Greek tense is passive, as it is with the fearfulness of the woman, it has something external about it. In that place, the power acted upon the legion-sea. Here, the power has been done to her. Jesus' asks who touched my clothes, and his meaning is made clear by the disciples rephrasing the question as who touched me? His question suddenly orients us with the reality of the Basileia; if we see past its apparent absurdity we can hear his question is interrogative.  To be healed of our affliction is necessarily to understand and accept that the one who heals and saves is also our judge.^[119] The scene begs a question: Is Jesus merely confirming for the woman what she  has felt in her own body, or is it that she is only fully healed of her affliction when she accedes to him as judge, and tells him the whole truth?^[120]

Where does this healing occur? It happens on the way to the cross, in the place of fear, on the way to the place of death. This is the path which must pass before the interrogators of empire  Later, in Chapter 13, Jesus will say to us, "When they bring you to trial and hand you over, do not worry beforehand about what you are to say…" (13:11) What can I say but the whole truth, which is that something has been done to me. I have nothing else. As the gospel rotates around us at this centre point we see the contrast between this woman and Peter. She is the exemplary disciple, telling the whole truth before the Son of God. Peter, standing only before a servant girl, denies Jesus. And yet at the end, the women are told to tell his disciples and Peter. We are all forgiven, even in failure.

What is our affliction?

Women have a God-given co-creational ability to bear children. The woman was physically unwell because her God-given co-creational ability to bear children was for some reason malfunctioning, and had become life threatening; she was in the flow of blood. But men of my culture, and of many others, have made this ability to bear life, into something which separates a woman from God. Menstruation is treated with fear, revulsion or disgust, and hatred. God's gift is twisted into a tool of oppression. Little girls are taught to be ashamed of their bodies. In healing this affliction, "Jesus declared all women clean." ^[121] Women are not other; they are human.

But this is not a Jewish story.  All cultures have purity rules which codify disgust.^[122] It happens that the Bible has some Jewish purity rules codified within Leviticus and other places, but this is no reason to suggest that Jesus is some kind of "exemplary Jew"^[123] who stands out from a culture riddled with purity rules.  Such antisemitism^[124]  ignores our own purity rules; indeed, the lack of written rules in my own culture, allows us to remain quite unaware of how much we act under their influence.

We roll our eyes at Leviticus 15, but then laugh about the local authority which drained 38 million gallons from a reservoir—a thoroughly Levitical action—because CCTV showed a youth urinating in it.^[125] And, laughing at the reservoir management, we visit the upmarket bakery with its sumptuous goods on display in the street, open to flies and birds flying overhead, customers touching the bread and pastries, breathing all over them, and expect the staff nonetheless to use gloves and tongs to place our purchases in paper bags for hygiene reasons! The rules maybe unwritten, but the outrage when someone mentions blood or faeces in the wrong context is clear evidence that the rules still exist.

The same antisemitism which makes Jesus into an exemplary Jew risks being blind to the fact that purity is good. It has "numerous positive lessons from sanctification of the body to resistance to assimilation."^[126] We often forget purity is a Christian virtue^[127] and freedom:

Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.^[128] 

But purity—also known as sanctification—is only freedom and virtue if it creates space to be compassionate. If we do not live compassionately in that space then purity will become arbitrary rules which are an end in themselves and, ultimately a tool of empire in their othering of human beings.

Jesus is not an exemplary Jew, he is an exemplary human being. As such, his healing of the woman reverses the negative dominance^[129] of impurity—the idea that impurity, no matter how small, contaminates that which is pure—remember the reservoir. And he places the poorer and unclean person before the daughter of the upstanding synagogue leader. But this is a reversal of a universal human perception and behaviour not a distinctively Jewish behaviour. Indeed, any exposition of Leviticus that does not emphasise that Leviticus is typical, and which fails to point out that male fear and hatred of bleeding is still used—and by the church—to scapegoat women, enables that scapegoating. Such a reading is also deeply antisemitic; it places the burden of a universal sin upon the very people who have faithfully brought us our Faith.

Our affliction is that we are separated from God and from each other. We seek to find connection with each other by othering a few of us, such as those who are mentally ill, or who are bleeding, but the fear that we may become "the chosen one" subjects us to that living death which is constant fear of violence and death.

 

Andrea Prior 30/9/2025 Draft

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[1] I use the phrases "nature enables me," and "I am able to re-enter…" instead of my original phrase "nature forces me" because nature does not force us. We Australians increasingly go bush with satellite TV, iPads, and so many other accoutrements of consumerism, that we risk refusing the grace offered to us via the natural world.

[2] Reductive Materialism says poetry is meaningless.

[3] Quoted at https://experimentaltheology.blogspot.com/2023/01/poetry-as-language-of-actual.html

[4] See, for example Charles Taylor's A Secular Age, "The Bulwarks of Belief" Chapter One, Kindle Edition. (pp23?)

[5] Vincent Taylor wrote that Jesus was ‘wading through the surf near the hidden shore and this was interpreted as a triumphant progress across the waters.’ The quotation is referenced at , but I am not able to find a direct source.

[6] Richard Beck, working from Tolkien says, " Enchantment isn’t “seeing things as they are” but “seeing things as we are (or were) meant to see them.” Enchantment isn’t concerned with a scientific description of the world but with beholding the sacred meaning of the world. Enchantment is the daily work of “cleaning the dirty windows” of our perceptions so that the familiar surprises us again with joy, wonder, and gratitude. Suddenly, we are startled anew by the color green and feel a fresh surge of love gazing into the face of a loved one. The windows of our perception become dirty when we own, master, and possess the world… And the possessiveness here is fundamentally psychological in nature, assuming that we “know” this thing or person. This is how the detached, objective scientific gaze can become so diabolical." Hunting Sacred Eels, Chapter Six "The Good Catastrophe" eBook published by Broadleaf Books, Minneapolis 2021

[7] Kit Wilson uses "scientific image" in a similar fashion to "the scientific gaze." It is that view in which everything is reduced to its material components, and things that cannot be so reduced are said to have no meaning.

[8] Even if often unconsciously so.

[9] Mark 4:1-34, especially vv10-13.

[10] The fundamentalist view that if it did not happen as literally written is impoverished. It shackles both the power of the Spirit and the Inspiration of Scripture which it seeks to defend.

[11] Cf Mark 5:33

[12] Cf LXX Jonah 1:3

[13] Cf LXX Jonah 1:4

[14] Cf LXX Jonah 1:5

[15] Cf Jonah 1:6, 14, 3:9

[16] LXX Jonah 1:4, 9, 11, 15

[17] LXX Jonah 1:11, 12

[18] LXX Jonah 1:4, 9, 11, 15

[19] See below under Mark 4:35-41 - The storm, a pre-emptive strike: A First Reading

[20] cf John 21:1-3

[21] Cf Marcus pp332

[22] Cf Marcus 332-3

[23] Cf Ched Meyers, in Say to This Mountain, quoted at http://girardianlectionary.net/year_b/proper_7b.htm

[24] Mark 7:31

[25] sic

[26] Cf Marcus pp333

[27] Following Marcus' translation, Marcus, pp332

[28] In the LXX text.

[29] cf Jonah 1:6. Mark says Jesus was in the stern, asleep (καθεύδων) on the cushion… The boat carrying Jesus would likely have a stern platform for the tillerman, with a covered area underneath, and it is most likely here that he was asleep. Jonah is also on the lower deck. Cf Marcus pp333

[30] The same Greek words for great (megalē), sea (thalassa), perish (apollymetha) and sleep (katheudōn)are used in both narratives. The sea dies down in Mark (ekopasen), and when the sailors ask Jonah “What shall we do to you, that the sea may die down (kopasei)”and Jonah replies, “Cast me into the sea, and the sea shall die down (kopasei)” (1:11-12), both words are forms of the verb kopazō, abate, or die down.

[31] Many of these points are made by Marcus, pp337-338

[32] Gottleib Zornberg,  pp84-85

[33] A myth is not a made up untrue story. It is carries deep truths of who we are, and how we understand ourselves. To dismiss myth is to show our lack of personal and cultural insight.

[34] The quotations come from a summary by Caleb Miller now only available at the Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20200806124508/https://preachingpeace.org/the-pillars-of-culture-prohibition-ritual-and-myth/ (Retrieved 5/9/2025)

[35] Ibid

[36] Cf Mark 4:30-32

[37] Because the people there are herding pigs, and because it is the region of the Decapolis.

[38] "…the “otherside” of the Sea of Galilee is, in fact, a place characterized by a vast network of Jewish and non-Jewish, Roman, Greek, and Arab residents—hardly essentially attached to any Ethnicity." McLellan pp42

[39] ekollēthē heni tōn politōn

[40] Forgetting, in the process, that most of us are Gentiles!

[41] ¹⁰ When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it. ^4:1 But this was very displeasing to Jonah, and he became angry. ² He prayed to the Lord and said, ‘O Lord! Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country? That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing. ³ And now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.’ . Jonah 3:10-4:3 (NRSVa)

[42] The attempt at self-creation is another name for idolatry.

[43] Israel suffered a Roman savagery at the hands of Assyria.

[44] See the comments below on vv9 and vv10.

[45] Gk they

[46] Mercy. Gk. ēleēsen

[47] See the comments below on vv9 and vv10.

[48] Marcus pp342

[49] Mark 1:23, where NRSVa hides the kai euthus in the English by translating the kai euthys as just then.

[50] Cf Mark 9:33-37

[51] Marcus, pp342

[52] "Purity … enables proximity to holiness." Fredriksen (https://library.biblicalarchaeology.org/article/did-jesus-oppose-the-purity-laws/ Retrieved 26/11/2024)

[53] Cf John 4:7,

[54] Mark 7:26

[55] Cf Bratcher's discussion, pp157-8

[56] Byrne, pp96

[57] Marcus, pp343

[58] Marcus pp343

[59] Bratcher, pp494 Textus Receptus says: "ιδων δε ο κεντυριων ο παρεστηκως εξ εναντιας αυτου οτι ουτως κραξας εξεπνευσεν ειπεν αληθως ο ανθρωπος ουτος υιος ην θεου"

[60] Cf NASB

[61] Mark 5:23

[62] We have some sensitivity about the arbitrary death of 2,000 pigs. If this story troubles us—it should—then we would do well to consider our diets. Bacon involves the deliberate and industrialised deaths of countless thousands more.

[63] Marcus, pp351

[64] Scholars Bible says "begging him over and over."

[65] "Equally impressive is the skill with which the tropes and figures have been blended: they do not attract to themselves undue attentions; most would probably be missed by those who silently read the speech but did not have it recited aloud. At the time of the oration's performance, even its auditors would not have been entirely conscious of this panoply of ornament; at the subliminal level, however, the various techniques would register with persuasive effect." Black, Rhetoric, pp61

[66] Cf https://biblehub.com/greek/5561.htm

[67] οἱ βόσκοντες αὐτοὺς… NRSVa's swineherds is not present

[68] The Tenth Legion of the Strait

[69] Brastcher, pp164

[70] Cf 2 Chronicles 25:12

[71] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarpeian_Rock

[72] Marcus, pp348-9

[73] Girard, The Scapegoat pp179

[74] Man is understood; the demoniac is a literal translation.

[75] Byrne, pp97 is the source of the observation about mirroring the calm sea.

[76] See too vv 19

[77] Cf Bratcher 167, and Scholars Bible

[78] Cf  "A moment of reflection…" above

[79] Accomplished and completed are the same word telestai.

[80] John 19:30

[81] If not the son of God cf Bratcher pp494

[82] Kotrosits, pp11, 23 etc

[83] Menendez-Antuna, pp20

[84] "Strength is not measured by how many people you can blow up or how many children you can leave hungry,"  Australian Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke. See https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-08-20/australia-stands-firm-in-face-of-israeli-leaders-fury/105674790

[85] http://branemrys.blogspot.com/2025/07/dashed-off-xvii.html

[86] Nathan Nettleton, July 2025, https://southyarrabaptist.church/sermons/when-the-black-sheep-is-set-free/. He references Garry Worete Deverell at https://southyarrabaptist.church/sermons/jesus-the-exorcist/

[87] Hamerton-Kelly, pp93-4

[88] Ibid

[89] There is an important distinction here: an alleged peadophile may be guilty of a crime, but the mob who lynch him are adding their own shame and guilt for all sorts of things to the fire.

[90] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10, as well as vv21 below

[91] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[92] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[93] γυνὴ οὖσα ἐν ῥύσει αἵματος; lit. A woman being in a flow of blood

[94] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[95] καὶ εὐθὺς ἐξηράνθη ἡ πηγὴ τοῦ αἵματος αὐτῆς and immediately was dried up the flow of blood of her

[96] Understood in the Greek.

[97] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[98] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[99] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[100] Marcus, pp356. The Hebrew consonants are identical, only the diacritical pointing differs.

[101] Marcus, pp360 It is also gendered and hierarchical.

[102] Cf Mark 2:5

[103] Cf Marcus 357-359

[104] Cf Marcus pp 359

[105] Marcus pp360

[106] Likewise, NRSVa has "what had happened to her."

[107] Metzger, pp76

[108] Eg NRSVa

[109] Cf Black, Mark (eBook), See at: "Why Trouble the Teacher Any Further?" (5:35-43)

[110] Marcus, pp362 notes that all the LXX occurrences of parakousas, and the only other NT occurrence in Matthew 18.17, mean ignore.

[111] Moloney, pp128

[112] Marcus, pp371

[113] Anderson, pp154

[114] Cf Black, Mark (eBook), See at: "Why Trouble the Teacher Any Further?" (5:35-43)

[115] Black, Mark, (eBook), see at: See at: "Why Trouble the Teacher Any Further?" (5:35-43)

[116] Marcus, pp363

[117] I think this is more likely than any refutation of any incipient docetism such as in 2 John 1:7

[118] See the comments above on vv9 and vv10.

[119] Cf Mark 14:62, Dan 7:12-14

[120] Both Jesus and the woman know she is healed (ἀπὸ τῆς μάστιγος is repeated in each case), but use different words for healed.

[121] Rev Ann Butler, "doing midrash" on Mark 7:19 in sermon circa 1988.

[122] "…disgust is a boundary psychology. Disgust marks objects as exterior and alien." Beck Unclean, pp2

[123] "In the popular Christian imagination, Jesus still remains defined, incorrectly and unfortunately, as “against” the Law, or at least against how it was understood at the time; as “against” the Temple as an institution and not simply against its first-century leadership; as “against” the people Israel but in favor of the Gentiles. Jesus becomes the rebel who, unlike every other Jew, practices social justice. He is the only one to speak with women; he is the only one who teaches nonviolent responses to oppression; he is the only one who cares about the “poor and the marginalized” (that phrase has become a litany in some Christian circles)." Levine Misunderstood Jew, Chapter 1.

[124] See Levine, Misunderstood Jew, in Chapter 5 "With Friends Like These . . .  Section Heading: Misogynistic and Taboo-Ridden Judaism: The Global Version" fpr examples

[125] See https://www.onemansweb.org/just-one-more-healing-mark-14045.html which quotes https://time.com/66459/portland-reservoir-pee/ (retrieved 28/08/2025)

[126] Levine, Amy-Jill. “Matthew and Anti-Judaism.” Currents in Theology and Mission 34, (2007) pp412

[127] "Jesus lives, for us he died/then alone to Jesus living/pure in heart in him abide/glory to our saviour giving" Christian Furchtegott Gellert (1715-1769); Translated by Elizabeth Cox, and others

[128] Philippians 4:8. Note that I mean the entire verse is a statement about purity, not only the phrase "whatever is pure."

[129] Beck, Unclean pp27. Negative Dominance is one of Paul Rozin's four principles of contagion.