6:48a

He could see that the disciples: According to 6:46b, Jesus went up on the mountain to pray. Here the context implies that Jesus paused in his praying and looked out toward the lake to see how the disciples were doing. (Even though it was night, there was probably enough moonlight for Jesus to see the disciples on the lake. Only a few commentators think that this was a “supernatural seeing from afar.” (Clarke quoted in Mark: A Portrait of the Servant by Hiebert, page 165.)) In some languages it may be necessary to make explicit some of this information.

In some languages there are also specific words for “look downward” and “look from a distance.” If your language uses specific words like these, it may be appropriate to use one of them here. For example:

When Jesus looked down at the disciples, he saw that they were straining…

straining to row: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as straining to row is more literally “distressed while rowing.” It indicates that the disciples were working/straining very hard to try to move the boat forward.

Here are some other ways to translate this:

having trouble rowing the boat
-or-
struggling hard to row the boat (New Century Version)

6:48b

the wind was against them: The phrase the wind was against them indicates that the wind was blowing against the front of the boat. The wind was so strong that the disciples were not able to move the boat across the lake.

Here are some other ways to translate this phrase:

the wind was blowing towards them
-or-
the wind was meeting them
-or-
they were going against the wind (God’s Word)

General Comment on 6:48a–b

In some languages it may be natural to put the information that the disciples were rowing in 6:48b. For example, the Contemporary English Version says:

48aHe could see that the disciples were struggling hard, 48bbecause they were rowing against the wind.

General Comment on 6:48a–b

In this verse, 6:48b expresses the reason for the result in 6:48a. In some languages, it may be more natural to change the order of these clauses. For example:

48bThe wind was blowing against them; 48athat is why they were straining at the oars. Jesus saw all this.

6:48c

About the fourth watch of the night: The fourth watch of the night was the period between 3:00 and 6:00 in the morning. At that time, people considered night to be from 6:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. The Romans divided the night into four periods of time. Each period was three hours long. Soldiers took turns guarding (watching) for one period. So the fourth watch was the three-hour period before dawn.

Here are some other ways to translate this:

Not long before morning (Contemporary English Version)
-or-
between three and six o’clock in the morning (Good News Bible)
-or-
As the night was ending (NET Bible)
-or-
Before dawn/daybreak

If your language has a specific expression or idiom for this time of day, consider using it here.

6:48d

Jesus went out to them: Jesus had been up on the mountain. Before he could walk out to the disciples, he first had to walk downhill to the shore. In some languages it may be necessary to make some of this information explicit. For example:

he walked/went down the mountain and went out to them

walking on the sea: The Greek clause that the Berean Standard Bible translates as walking on the sea indicates that Jesus was walking on top of the water. This was a miracle.

In some languages, verbs such as walking are also used to mean “swimming,” and prepositions such as on can also mean “in.” If this is true in your language, you will need to clarify what Jesus was doing. For example:

walking on the surface of the water

6:48e

He intended to pass by them: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as He intended to pass by them is literally “He wanted to go past them.” Jesus was walking as though he intended to walk past the boat without stopping. (A note on 6:48 in the NET Bible says, “The statement ‘he wanted to pass by them’ is somewhat difficult to understand. There are at least two common interpretations: (1) it refers to the perspective of the disciples, that is, from their point of view it seemed that Jesus wanted to pass by them; or (2) it refers to a theophany and uses the language of the Greek Old Testament (LXX) when God “passed by” Moses at Sinai (cf. Exod 33.19, 22). According to the latter alternative, Jesus is “passing by” the disciples during their struggle, in order to assure them of his presence with them. See W. L. Lane, Mark (NICNT), 236.”)

Here are some other ways to translate this phrase:

He intended to pass by them (New American Standard Bible)
-or-
He was going to pass by them (Revised English Bible)
-or-
He would have passed by them

© 2008 by SIL International®

Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0

All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.