Mark 5 Bible study: Only believe

Mark spends three verses on the man in the tombs. "Nobody could bind him any more, not even with chains" (5:3), "because he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been torn apart by him, and the fetters broken in pieces. Nobody had the strength to tame him" (5:4). "Always, night and day, in the tombs and in the mountains, he was crying out, and cutting himself with stones" (5:5). Then Jesus says, "Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!" (5:8). When the people come to see what had happened (5:14), they see "him who had been possessed by demons sitting, clothed, and in his right mind, even him who had the legion" (5:15) (tap right mind, Legion). And Mark adds, "they were afraid" (5:15). It is the same verb as the disciples' fear in the boat after the calm (4:41) (tap afraid). The chapter tells what happened in its own words, and these notes add no explanation of it.

Leviticus 15:25→leads toMark 5:34

The law speaks of a woman who "has a discharge of her blood many days": "She is unclean" (15:25), and "Whoever touches these things shall be unclean" (15:27). Mark tells of "A certain woman who had a discharge of blood for twelve years" (Mark 5:25), who "came up behind him in the crowd and touched his clothes" (Mark 5:27), and "Immediately the flow of her blood was dried up" (Mark 5:29). Jesus said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace, and be cured of your disease" (Mark 5:34). Luke and Matthew tell it too (Luke 8:43-48; Matthew 9:20-22). None of the Gospels names Leviticus or says she was unclean, so reading the two together is an interpretation: some see Jesus making well one whom the law counted unclean, because her condition is the one 15:25 describes; others read it as a healing account that doesn't turn on the law, because the Gospels don't mention it.

σώζωsozosay SODE-zo

Strong's: "to save, i.e. deliver or protect (literally or figuratively)". Thayer lists 5:34 under "to save a suffering one (from perishing), e. g. one suffering from disease, to make well, heal, restore to health". In this chapter the WEB's made healthy and made well are all this verb: Jairus begs "that she may be made healthy, and live" (5:23), the woman says, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be made well" (5:28), and Jesus says, "Daughter, your faith has made you well" (5:34). Mark has it 15 times (counted in RP2018, the Byzantine text the WEB translates), among them "For whoever wants to save his life will lose it" (8:35), and at the cross, "He saved others. He can’t save himself" (15:31).