GERASENES.— The country of the Gera.senes (AVof Mt s-^Gergesenes; Mt 5' Lk 8-» Gadarenes; RV in Mt Oadarenes, in Mk and Lk Gerasuiics) is referred to in NT onlj- in connexion with the cast ingout of the legion of demons and their entry into the herd of swine. There are three distinct read- ings of the name of the jieople in the MSS — Gerge- senes, Gadarenes, Gerasenes — as the following table will show : —
5It _ Jlk Lk
A (xviintinj^) rao«^»«» Vaint/j-tSt
o r«8«^.i. (c» Ti^i^.) r«3«^.i» ri^««-r,.;. (C ri^i».)
D (wanting) Vif<xni>Mt ri/Mi«^>>»
Thus, asWH(App. p. ll)pointout, documentary evidence shows that TaJapjji'iJi' is the true reading in .Mt, Vepa<!Tifu.v in Mk and Lk.
The miracle took place 'on the other side' of the Lake of Gennesarct, which is 'over against Galilee' {i.e. on the eastern side of the lake) (Lk 8-" '■"'). And when Jesus ' wa.s come out of the boat, straightway there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling in the tombs' (Mk 5-). This clearly iiulicates that tile tombs were close to the shore of the lake, and from the following passages it appears that the tombs and city were in the pro.vimity : Lk S'" 'There met him a certain man out of the city who had devils . . . and abode not in any liou.se but in the tombs.' From the following it apjiears that the hills ran updirectly from the coast oi the lake : Lk S"'-' ' Now there was there a henl of miiiiy swine feeding on the mountains . . . and the held rushed down the steep into the lake, and were choked.'
Prom this it is certain that 'the country of the Gerasenes' cannot refer to the city of Gciasa in Gilciid (Jerttsfi), a.s Gcni-sa is an iidand town east of .lordan, near I'hibidclphia, towards .Arabia {li,/ III. iii. 3, 4), which has certainly been identi- lied with the ruins of Jen'ish. It also appears that Ciadara cannot be the city spoken of in the inciileiit, n-s it (now Vmm ^Vi*) is situatetl aUiut six or more miles south of the Laki; of ticniie.sarct on tlm
J
160
GEKGESENES
GERIZIM
iummit of a Iiigh hill ^rith the deep gorge of the river Hieromax (JarmHk) at its foot, cutting it off from the broad plain shelving down to the lake. There was, however, a district attached to tlie city of Gadara, and it is possible that a place on the lake called Gerasa (not the Gerasa of tlie pre- ceding art. ) lay within Gadarene territory. Gadara was but 6 mUes S.E. of the southern extremity of the lake, and Jos. ( Vita, 9, 10) mentions Gadarene villages close to the lake side. According to Joseplius, however {BJ IV. vii. 3), Gadara was the capital of Peroea, which did not extend nortli of the Hieromax. It is not improbable, hewever, that durintr the many vicissitudes of tlio administration recorded to Gadara its jurisdiction may have ex- tended up the eastern side of the Lake of Gen- nesaret at the time the miracle occurred.
The problem, then, is to find a site on the east side of the lake which satisfies the biblical description and shows traces of the city and tombs. This has been successfully accomplished by Thomson (The Land and the Book, ii. 35), through the identifica- tion of the ruins of Kersa or Gersa on tlie eastern side of the Lake of Gennesaret, nearly half-way down from the northern end, south of the Wady ,Sa»t«M(9ee further and especially Schumacher, The Jauldn, 179). Wilson sta,i&s(Recoverxj of Jerusalem, p. 368) that about a mUe south of this the hills, ■which everywhere else on the eastern side are recessed from half to three-tjuarters of a mUe from the water's edge, approach within 40 ft. of it. They do not terminate abruptly, but there is a steep even slope, which we would identify with the ' steep place ' down which the herd of swine ran violently into the sea. Macgregor (Rob Roy on the Jordan, p. 423) states, ' Between Wady Samakh and Wady Fik there are at least four distinct localities where every feature in the Scripture account of this incident may be found in com- bination ; above them are rocks with caves in them, very suitable for tombs.' Thomson states that there are ancient tombs in the high grounds about the ruins of Kersa. Gergesa and Gerasa may thus be variations of the same name which is now found under the form of Kersa, Chersa, or Gersa, which now exist close to Wady Samakh, subject to the various pronunciations according to whether the people are from the hill country, or the plain, or from the desert. The name Gergesenes appears to be similar to that of a Canaanitish tribe (GlR- GASHITES) which, according to Jos 24", would appear to have been located west of Jordan, but which Jerome (Comm. ad Gen. xv.) locates on the shore of the Sea of Tiberias. Origen also (0pp. iv. 140) alludes to the city Gergesa, which stood formerly on the eastern side of the lake, and to the precipitous descent to the water down whicli the swine rushed. A village, Gergesa, on a hill above the lake, is also mentioned by Eusebius and Jerome (0S» p. 256, 14; p. 162, 18).