“And they came over unto the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes.”
They went across the lake to the region of the Gerasenes — the crossing that terrified the disciples in the storm brings them to Gentile territory. The Decapolis (ten cities) region is inhabited predominantly by Gentiles; the pigs of verse 11 confirm the non-Jewish context. Jesus has crossed not merely a body of water but a cultural and ethnic boundary: the kingdom that began in Jewish Galilee is about to demonstrate its reach into Gentile territory. The first miracle on the other side will be the most dramatic exorcism in the Gospels — and it will be performed for the benefit of a single Gentile man.
Church Fathers on Mark 5:1
Those who were in the ship enquired among themselves, 'What manner of man is this?' and now it is made known Who He is by the testimony of His enemies. For the demoniac came up confessing that He was the Son of God. Proceeding to which circumstance the Evangelist says, 'And they came over unto the other side, &c.'
Geraza is a noted town of Arabia, across the Jordan, near mount Galaad, which the tribe of Manasseh held, not far from the lake of Tiberias, into which the swine were precipitated.
Though Matthew says that there were two, Mark and Luke mention one, that you may understand that one of them was a more illustrious person, concerning whose state that country was much afflicted.
Read all 23 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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