Charles Ellicott Commentary Mark 9:26

"And having cried out, and torn him much, he came out: and [the boy] became as one dead; insomuch that the more part said, He is dead." — Mark 9:26 (ASV)

Rent him sore.—The verb is the same as the “tare him” of Mark 9:20, and implies a spasm, as of horror, convulsing the whole frame. The corpse-like falling as one dead, and the cry of many (better, “the many”—that is, “the greater part, most of them”) that he was dead, and our Lord’s taking the boy by the hand, and the question of the disciples, are all peculiar to Mark.