Mark 5:1-13 ▼

1 They came to the other side of the sea, to the country of the Gerasenes.

2 And when he had stepped out of the boat, immediately a man out of the tombs with an unclean spirit met him.

3 He lived among the tombs; and no one could restrain him any more, even with a chain;

4 for he had often been restrained with shackles and chains, but the chains he wrenched apart, and the shackles he broke in pieces; and no one had the strength to subdue him.

5 Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains he was always howling and bruising himself with stones.

6 When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed down before him;

7 and he shouted at the top of his voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.”

8 For he had said to him, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!”

9 Then Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” He replied, “My name is Legion; for we are many.”

10 He begged him earnestly not to send them out of the country.

11 Now there on the hillside a great herd of swine was feeding;

12 and the unclean spirits begged him, “Send us into the swine; let us enter them.”

13 So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the sea, and were drowned in the sea.