Exegesis:

hotan auton etheōroun, prosepipton autō kai ekrazon ‘whenever they saw him, they fell before him and shouted.’

hotan ‘whenever,’ ‘at the time,’ ‘when’: with the three verbs in the imperfect tense, the action is portrayed as being repeated (cf. 11.19).

theōreō (5.15, 38; 12.41; 15.40, 47; 16.4) ‘look (upon),’ ‘gaze,’ ‘behold.’

prospiptō (5.33; 7.25) ‘fall before,’ ‘fall at the feet of.’

krazō (11 times in Mark) ‘call,’ ‘call out’: of evil spirits, ‘shriek,’ ‘scream.’

polla (cf. 1.45) used adverbially ‘strongly,’ ‘insistently’: it does not mean here ‘many times,’ ‘often’; cf. Vulgate vehementer, Lagrange enjoignant fortement, Translator’s New Testament ‘warned strongly.’

epetima (cf. 1.25) ‘he commanded,’ ‘he warned.’

hina ‘that’: as in v. 9 hina denotes here the content of the order, not purpose ‘in order that.’

phaneron poiēsōsin ‘they should make known,’ ‘they should reveal’ (cf. Mt. 12.16): the meaning is ‘reveal the identity of (someone),’ cf. 1.34.

Translation:

There is a tendency for translators to render this passage as ‘whenever people who had unclean spirits looked at Jesus, they fell…’ despite the fact that this may seem to make better sense, it is advisable not to depart from the original in this regard. Even though passages which speak of evil spirits seem to involve certain confusion between the action of the demonic spirits and the men in whom they dwelt, this very confusion is a highly significant factor (see 1.24).

For unclean spirits see 1.26, 32.

Not to make him known may be translated in some languages as ‘not to say who he was.’ If this must be adapted to the requirements of direct discourse the form would be ‘he strictly ordered them: You must not say: He is the Son of God’ (or as may be necessary in some instances ‘You are the Son of God,’ using the expression of verse 11). Such a series of included direct discourse is not uncommon.

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1961. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .