The episode begins with Jairus, a leader of the synagogue, begging Jesus to come and lay his hands on his daughter who was sick unto death. Jesus went, followed by a large crowd, and a woman who had been hemorrhaging for twelve years touched his clothes and was made well. Jesus was told Jairus’ daughter was dead, but he took her by the hand, and she was well. The events are intertwined, and we are not told why, yet the common factor is ritual uncleanliness. As usual in Mark, there is an escalation.82 It is the hemorrhaging woman who makes Jesus unclean (Leviticus .ff., especially.) and then only until nightfall; by touching the dead girl it is Jesus who makes himself unclean and that is for seven days (Numbers .ff.). The uncleanliness links the two stories, and, significantly, Jesus’ indifference to becoming ritually unclean is not mentioned. But to return to the Gesarene/Gadarene episode. Uncleanliness, as such, is never mentioned. The demoniac about to be cured is of necessity unclean. He lives in or among the tombs: I prefer to translate εµ as “in” but the precise translation does not matter.83 To overshadow a corpse made one unclean. Clearly, whether the unhappy lunatic lived in or among the tombs he had overshadowed many bodies. The spirit that inhabited him is expressly unclean (Mark .,). There was a large herd of pigs, of necessity a cause of uncleanliness, on the hillside. The unclean spirits begged Jesus to be put into the unclean swine. Swineherds, also necessarily unclean, are brought into the story. Uncleanliness is stressed. 82 See in general Watson, Jesus and the Law. 83 In Roman law the edict on violation of a tomb applied to someone who wrongfully lived in a tomb: see Otto Lenel, Das Edictum Perpetuum, 3d ed. (Leipzig, 1927), pp. 228f. V
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