Legion means a large group or in another parlance it may mean "many". In the Bible, it was used to refer to the group of
demons, particularly those in two of three versions of the
exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac, an account in the
New Testament
The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chri ...
of an incident in which
Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...
performs an
exorcism
Exorcism () is the religious or spiritual practice of evicting demons, jinns, or other malevolent spiritual entities from a person, or an area, that is believed to be possessed. Depending on the spiritual beliefs of the exorcist, this may be ...
.
Development of the story
The earliest version of this story exists in the
Gospel of Mark, described as taking place in "the country of the
Gerasenes". Jesus encounters a
possessed man and calls on the demon to emerge, demanding to know its name – an important element of traditional exorcism practice. He finds the man is possessed by a multitude of demons who give the collective name of "Legion". Fearing that Jesus will drive them out of the world and into the abyss, they beg him instead to send them into a herd of pigs, which he does. The pigs then rush into the sea and are drowned ().
This story is also in the other two
Synoptic Gospels. The
Gospel of Luke
The Gospel of Luke), or simply Luke (which is also its most common form of abbreviation). tells of the origins, birth, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ. Together with the Acts of the Apostles, it makes up a two-vol ...
shortens the story but retains most of the details including the name (). The
Gospel of Matthew
The Gospel of Matthew), or simply Matthew. It is most commonly abbreviated as "Matt." is the first book of the New Testament of the Bible and one of the three synoptic Gospels. It tells how Israel's Messiah, Jesus, comes to his people and form ...
shortens it more dramatically, changes the possessed man to two men (a particular stylistic device of this writer) and changes the location to "the country of the
Gadarenes". This is probably because the author was aware that Gerasa is actually around 50 km away from the
Sea of Galilee (although Gadara is still 10 km distant). In this version, the demons are unnamed ().
Cultural background
According to Michael Willett Newheart, professor of New Testament Language and Literature at the
Howard University
Howard University (Howard) is a Private university, private, University charter#Federal, federally chartered historically black research university in Washington, D.C. It is Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, classifie ...
School of Divinity (2004), the author of the Gospel of Mark could well have expected readers to associate the name ''Legion'' with the Roman military formation, active in the area at the time (
around 70 AD). The intention may be to show that Jesus is stronger than the occupying force of the Romans.
The Biblical scholar
Seyoon Kim, however, points out that the Latin ''legio'' was commonly used as a loanword in Hebrew and Aramaic to indicate an unspecified but large quantity. In the New Testament text it is used as a proper name, which is "saturated with meaning". In this sense, it can mean both the size and power of the occupying Roman army ''as well as'' a multitude uncounted/ uncountable of demonic spirits. It is the latter sense that has become the common understanding of the term as an adjective in modern English (whereas when used as a noun it indicates the Roman military number, between 3,000 and 6,000 infantry with cavalry; cf. "we are legion" and "we are a legion").
References
Citations
Sources
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External links
EarlyChristianWritings.com Gospel of Mark see discussion at bottom of page
{{New Testament people
Demons in Christianity
Exorcisms of Jesus
New Testament Latin words and phrases
People in the canonical gospels