Mark 5:4, 19-20; Luke 8:29, 39

Luke 8:26-39 was the Gospel reading on the Worship Anew program for the Second Sunday of Pentecost last year (22 June).  I was following along in the Latin Vulgate and noticed a characteristic in verse 29 that (probably just coincidentally) matches the meaning.

praecipiebat enim spiritui inmundo ut exiret ab homine multis enim temporibus arripiebat illum et vinciebatur catenis et conpedibus custoditus et ruptis vinculis agebatur a daemonio in deserta

In the ESV, this is:

For he [Jesus] had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man.  (For many a time it had seized him.  He was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the desert.)

The phrase "catenis et conpedibus custoditus" ("with chains and with shackles held in custody") exhibits consonance in Latin.  That the successive words begin and end with the same sound lends a sense of stasis, illustrating the man's (temporary) immobility.

The account in Mark (5:1-20) exhibits the same feature (in verse 4), but the phrase is shorter (merely "conpedibus et catenis" - "with shackles and with chains"):

quoniam saepe conpedibus et catenis vinctus disrupisset catenas et conpedes comminuisset et nemo poterat eum domare

for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart, and he broke the shackles in pieces.  No one had the strength to subdue him.  [ESV]

---&---

I also noticed a sort of syllogism in Luke 8:39:  "'Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.'  And he went away, proclaiming throughout the whole city how much Jesus had done for him."  The similarity between "'how much God has done for you'" and "how much Jesus had done for him" implies that Jesus is God.  By recounting the event in this way, the man's statement also becomes a testimony to his faith in Jesus' divinity.

This, too, is in the Mark 5 account:  "19 And he did not permit him [to go with Jesus] but said to him, 'Go home to your friends and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you.'  20 And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marveled."