What Does Mark 5:12 Mean?
And the demons pleaded with him, saying, "Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them."
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 all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them.THE KEY
The voices ask for relocation into a new host: “send us into the swine” names the destination, and “enter into them” names the purpose.
THE MEANING
The voices name their desired destination and purpose together: they ask to be sent into the swine so they may enter them. The verse makes the requested movement a transfer into another living body, not disappearance.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that being driven out means being annihilated is unsettled here: the voices ask to be transferred into another host.
THE ROOT
εἰσέλθωμεν
eiselthōmen
GROWS FROM
ἔρχομαι (erchomai), with εἰς (eis)
ἔρχομαι (erchomai) means come or go; εἰς (eis) means into, giving the compound the sense of going in or entering.
The verb’s stem carries movement, and the prefix fixes that movement across a boundary and into something. The sentence first names the swine as the destination, then repeats that inward direction in the verb “enter.”
ALSO GROWS
erchomai: come, go
ἔρχομαι
The base verb names movement before the prefix specifies its direction.
exerchomai: go out, come out
ἐξέρχομαι
It shares the movement-root ἔρχομαι (erchomai, come or go), while ἐκ (ek, out of) turns the direction outward.
παρεκάλεσαν
parekalesan
GROWS FROM
καλέω (kaleō), with παρά (para)
καλέω (kaleō) means call or invite; παρά (para) means beside or alongside. Together, παρακαλέω (parakaleō) carries the sense of appealing to or urging someone.
“pleaded” in this verse is parekalesan. “Besought” is an urging appeal, not a neutral exchange of words. The voices appeal directly to Jesus for the transfer they describe.
ALSO GROWS
kaleō: call, invite
καλέω
This is the call-root within παρακαλέω (parakaleō, appeal or urge).
paraklēsis: appeal, encouragement, consolation
παράκλησις
This related noun carries the appeal or urging sense into another form.
THE PATTERN
A presence entering a vessel takes up a particular place, and the text names what follows.
And he gave them leave. And the unclean breaths came out and entered into the swine, and the herd, about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the sea and were choked in the sea.Then the Adversary entered Judas, the one called Iscariot, who was counted among the twelve.Or how can someone enter a strong man's house and strip away his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? Then he will strip his house.THE THREAD
Then the Adversary entered Judas, the one called Iscariot, who was counted among the twelve.Luke uses the same Greek verb εἰσέρχομαι (eiserchomai, enter) as Mark’s “enter into them.” The shared root lets the language of entry connect the requested transfer into the swine with another named host.
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