Translation commentary on Mark 5:6 – 5:7

Exegesis:

apo makrothen (8.3; 11.13; 14.54; 15.40) ‘from afar,’ ‘from a distance.’

ed ramen kai prosekunēsen auton ‘he ran and prostrated himself before him.’

trechō (15.36) ‘run.’

proskuneō (15.19) ‘do reverence,’ ‘make obeisance,’ ‘bow down to,’ ‘worship’: not in the technical Christian sense of worshiping Jesus, but in the general sense of paying him reverence (cf. 3.11 prosepipton autō ‘they fell down before him’; cf. the parallel Lk. 8.28 prosepesen autō ‘he fell down before him’) Most English translations have “knelt before him.”

ti emoi kai soi (cf. 1.24) ‘why do you bother me?’

huie tou theou tou hupsistou ‘son of the Most High God.’

hupsistos (11.10) ‘(the) Most High’: title of the God of the Jews. The word is the superlative form of the adverb hupsi ‘on high.’

horkizō se ton theon ‘I implore you by God’: the accusative ton theon ‘God’ denotes the thing (or, name) by which one swears (cf. Acts 19.13 ton Iēsoun ‘by Jesus’).

horkizō (only here in Mark) ‘put on oath’ (horkos ‘oath’), ‘cause to swear,’ ‘adjure,’ ‘entreat earnestly,’ ‘implore.’

basanisēs (6.48) ‘torment,’ ‘torture’: here probably with the idea of temporal punishment (Mt. 8.29 and Lk. 8.28, 31 interpret it of eschatological punishment).

Translation:

Worshiped is most generally rendered as ‘knelt down before’ or ‘fell down before in reverence.’

Crying with a loud voice is equivalent to ‘shouted out strong’ or ‘yelled.’

For a discussion of some of the problems in the idiom “What have you to do with me”, see 1.24. In this context Tzotzil has ‘what does it serve you to me’ and Loma (Liberia) has ‘what is your palaver on me.’

The superlative Most High cannot always be translated literally. In some instances, even though a superlative form does not exist, some relatively satisfactory equivalent may be used, e.g. ‘extremely high above’ (Kekchi). In other cases, one must substitute location, e.g. ‘high in heaven’ (Huichol), for an expression meaning ‘highest’ would refer only to physical size. In still other languages, one must substitute general size for height, as an expression of distinction, e.g. ‘really great’ (Conob).

Adjure is variously translated, e.g. ‘tell you before God’ (Copainalá Zoque), ‘ask in front of God’ (Huautla Mazatec), ‘ask you by God’ (Eastern Highland Otomi), ‘ask you in God’s presence’ (Southern Subanen), ‘I swear, calling on the name of God, requesting you’ (Toraja-Sa’dan), ‘I want your oath by God’ (Indonesian), ‘will assure me by using a curse on yourself calling on the name of God’ (Pamona), and ‘ask you; God has seen it’ (Tzotzil). The concept of adjure involves two relationships: (1) the asking of the person and (2) the witness or participation of the deity called to witness or validate the request. Such actions, though rather unfamiliar to people in our Western culture, are common enough in most societies.

Torment may be rendered as ‘cause to suffer.’

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1961. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

SIL Translator's Notes on Mark 5:6

Paragraph 5:6–10

In this paragraph, it is not always clear whether the text refers to the unclean spirit that controlled the man or to the man himself. Languages have different ways of referring to the actions and speech of people who are controlled by unclean spirits. Some languages use different pronouns or other forms to refer to people and spirits. Use natural ways in your language to refer to the unclean spirit and the man in each context.

5:6a

In this verse, Mark told the next event in the story. In 5:3–5, Mark gave background information about the man with the unclean spirit. In 5:2, Mark mentioned that the man came out of the tombs to meet Jesus. In 5:6, Mark told again about this meeting. He said that the man ran to meet Jesus.

Languages have different ways to begin the action of a story again after giving background information. Use a natural way in your language to do that here. In some languages, you may need to give the information in a different order. See the General Comment on 5:2–6 after 5:6b for a suggestion on how to reorder the verses.

When the man saw Jesus from a distance: When the man saw Jesus, the man was in or near the tombs that were in the hills. He could probably see the lake and the shore from where he was standing.

5:6b

fell on his knees before Him: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as fell on his knees means to kneel, bow, or lie flat in front of someone in order to show respect. In this context, the man was under the control of an unclean spirit. He kneeled before Jesus because the unclean spirit knew that Jesus’ power was greater than his.

If people do not bow or kneel to show respect in your culture, you may need to make the meaning of this action clear. For example:

he bowed/kneeled in front of Jesus to show respect

See how you translated the same expression at 3:11b.

General Comment on 5:2–6

In many languages, it is more natural to follow chronological order or to give background information first. In these languages, it may be necessary to reorder the information in these verses. Here is one example:

On that side of the lake 2bthere lived a man who had an evil spirit. 3aHe lived among tombs 5ain the hills and there continually day and night 5bhe was screaming and cutting himself with stones. 4aPeople had often tried to restrain him by binding him with chains on his wrists and iron shackles on his ankles, 4bbut he had always managed to snap the chains and break the shackles to get loose. 3bSo no one was able any longer to keep him bound 4cfor no one had enough strength to control him. 2aAs Jesus was getting out of the boat, 6athis man saw Jesus from a long way off 6band ran 2cfrom the tombs up to him 6band knelt before him.

© 2008 by SIL International®

Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0

All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.