What Does Mark 5:4-5 Mean?
For he had often been bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been pulled apart by him, and the fetters crushed to pieces; and no one had the strength to tame him. Always, night and day, he was in the mountains and in the tombs, crying out and gashing himself with stones.
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
Because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces: neither could any man tame him. And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones.THE KEY
The chains break, but the torment remains, now visible in the body turned against itself.
THE MEANING
A person can break every restraint placed around him and still be trapped in torment. Day and night have no break: he is isolated among mountains and tombs, crying and wounding his own body.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief this passage undoes is that someone who cannot be controlled must be free. His chains break, but his suffering persists.
THE ROOT
δεδέσθαι
dedesthai
GROWS FROM
δέω
deō
To bind or fasten.
“bound” in this verse is dedesthai. The passage describes repeated binding, then says the restraints themselves are broken. The verb keeps the focus on the binding that has failed; broken restraints do not mean the man is restored.
ALSO GROWS
desmos: bond, fetter
δεσμός
This related word names the bond itself, making the shared language of binding explicit.
desmios: prisoner, bound person
δέσμιος
This branch describes a person through the condition of being bound, echoing how the passage presents his repeated restraint.
κατακόπτων
katakoptōn
GROWS FROM
κόπτω
koptō
To strike, beat, or cut.
“cutting himself” in this verse is katakoptōn. The English describes a cut, while the Greek word-family also reaches striking and lament. That echo brings bodily injury and grief into the same sound-family without claiming what causes his wounds.
ALSO GROWS
ekkoptō: cut out, cut off
ἐκκόπτω
It shares the cutting root, showing how the same basic action can be applied to what is severed or removed.
kopetos: lamentation, mourning
κοπετός
This related word names mourning, an echo between bodily striking and grief that deepens the verse’s image without explaining the man’s motive.
THE PATTERN
Suffering can become visible in the body through wounds and peril.
And he took a potsherd to scrape himself with it, and he sat down among the ashes.And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lances, until the blood poured out upon them.And often it has thrown him into the fire and into the waters, to make him perish. But if you are able to do anything, be moved in your depths for us, and help us.THE THREAD
And they came to Jesus and saw the one held by a demon, the one who had the Legion, sitting and clothed and sound in his mind. And they were afraid.This verse reveals the difference between broken restraints and restoration: here the chains are shattered while the man’s torment continues; there he is sitting, clothed, and in his right mind. The person remains present across both scenes, while his condition changes.
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