What Does Mark 1:34 Mean?
And he healed many who were sick with various sicknesses, and threw out many demons. He did not let the demons speak, because they knew him.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And he healed many that were sick of divers diseases, and cast out many devils; and suffered not the devils to speak, because they knew him.THE KEY
The verse separates recognition from authority: even a voice that knows Jesus is not thereby permitted to speak.
THE MEANING
You encounter a Jesus whose care reaches many kinds of sickness and whose authority drives out devils. Knowing him does not grant a voice permission to speak; even recognition remains under his authority.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A voice does not become authorized simply because it recognizes Jesus correctly.
THE ROOT
θεραπεύω
therapeuō
GROWS FROM
θεραπευ-
therapeu-
To attend to, care for, or heal.
The verb carries both attending and healing, so “healed” holds the texture of care as well as a changed condition. The verse describes restoration as care directed toward people suffering in many ways.
ALSO GROWS
therapeia: Care, attendance, or healing.
θεραπεία
This related word keeps care and healing within the same word family.
therapeutēs: An attendant or healer.
θεραπευτής
The related noun names one who attends to another, echoing the care within the healing verb.
ἐκβάλλω
ekballō
GROWS FROM
βάλλω (ballō) + ἐκ- (ek-, out)
To throw; with ἐκ-, to throw out or drive out.
“threw out” in this verse is ekballō. The Greek compound gives expulsion a clear direction: something is driven out. Set beside the verb for healing, it shows restoration as both attentive care and the removal of what is expelled.
ALSO GROWS
ballō: To throw or cast.
βάλλω
This base verb supplies the forceful action within “cast out.”
ekbolē: A casting out, ejection, or discharge.
ἐκβολή
This related noun makes the outward movement of expulsion explicit.
THE PATTERN
Deliverance joins care for the suffering with authority over what harms and the voices attached to it.
He sends his word and heals them, and slips them free from their pits.When evening had come, they brought to him many held by demons; and he cast out the breaths with a word, and healed all who were sick.And demons also came out of many, crying out and saying, You are the Anointed One, the Son of God. And he rebuked them and would not let them speak, for they knew that he was the Anointed One.THE THREAD
When evening had come, they brought to him many held by demons; and he cast out the breaths with a word, and healed all who were sick.Matthew uses the same Greek verbs Mark uses for “cast out” (ἐκβάλλω, ekballō, drive out) and “healed” (θεραπεύω, therapeuō, attend to or heal). Their pairing shows the two movements together; Mark also makes Jesus’ authority over the spirits’ speech explicit.
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