What Does Mark 5:13 Mean?
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.
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 forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea, (they were about two thousand;) and were choked in the sea.THE KEY
Mark uses the same Greek choking word for the herd’s drowning and for thorns that smother seed, so the physical disaster echoes the peril of a life with no room to bear fruit.
THE MEANING
You see a destructive presence leave one living being, enter another host, and drive an entire herd into a fatal plunge. Mark calls the herd’s end “choked”; the same Greek word family elsewhere describes seed and the word being choked before fruit appears. The verse holds a concrete death and an image of suffocation together without making one cancel the other.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The idea that a force is harmless once it leaves its first host is undone: its next movement ends in the herd’s death.
THE ROOT
ἐπνίγοντο
epnigonto
GROWS FROM
πνιγ-
pnig-
To choke, suffocate, or drown.
“choked” in this verse is epnigonto. The same Greek verb family describes this herd drowning and thorns choking seed and the word. Here the choking image reaches a bodily, terminal form; elsewhere it names what keeps growth from bearing fruit.
ALSO GROWS
sympnigousin: They choke or crowd and choke.
συμπνίγουσιν
Mark 4:19 uses this form for cares, riches, and desires choking the word.
sympnigontai: They are choked.
συμπνίγονται
Luke 8:14 uses this form for people choked by the cares and pleasures of life.
πνεύματα
pneumata
GROWS FROM
πνέω
pneō
To blow or breathe; πνεῦμα can mean breath, wind, or spirit.
“breaths” in this verse is pneumata. The KJV says “spirits,” but Greek uses pneuma, a word that also means breath and wind. The same word carries through the movement here: the unclean pneuma go out and enter another living host.
ALSO GROWS
pneō: To breathe or blow.
πνέω
This verb makes the breath and wind meanings part of the same word family.
pnoē: Breath or blowing.
πνοή
This related noun keeps the breath sense visible beneath the English distinction.
THE PATTERN
In the Greek choking word family, choking can describe what overwhelms a body or smothers growth before it bears fruit.
And other seed fell among the thorns, and the thorns climbed up and choked it, and it gave no fruit.And the one sown among thorns is the one who hears the word; and the care of this age and the deceit of riches choke the word, and he becomes without fruit.Those who fell among the thorns are the ones who hear, and as they go on their way, they are choked by cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to ripeness.THE THREAD
And the cares of this age, and the deceit of riches, and the hungers for other things, going in, choke the word, and it becomes fruitless.Mark uses the same Greek choking stem here for the herd’s drowning and for the cares, riches, and desires that choke the word. The physical ending makes the inward image harder to miss: choking leaves no room for fruit.
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