Text:

After mē katabatō ‘he is not to go down’ Textus Receptus, Soden, Vogels, and Taylor add eis tēn oikian ‘into the house,’ which is omitted by the majority of modern editions of the Greek text.

Exegesis:

ho epi tou dōmatos ‘he who is on the roof’: on the flat roofs the people spent much of their leisure time, especially in the cool of the evening, at the close of the day’s work, and here they would get the news, good or bad, passed from roof top to roof top. The roof was reached by outside steps (cf. 2.4).

dōma (only here in Mark) ‘housetop,’ ‘roof.’

me katabatō mēde eiselthatō ‘he is not to go down or enter’: as Lagrange points out, the two clauses do not prohibit two actions, as though they meant ‘he is neither to go down, nor is he to enter,’ but designate a single action, ‘he is not to go down and enter.’ In effect it is an order for the man to go down and flee at once to the hills, without taking the time to go into the house and get some of his belongings.

katabainō (cf. 1.10) ‘go down,’ ‘come down.’

Translation:

Not go down, as the result of literal translating, has implied in many instances that the person was instructed to remain on the housetop indefinitely. This problem, which is confronted in a number of translations, may be solved by shifting the negative in accordance with the requirements of the activity described, e.g. ‘when he comes down from the housetop, he should not enter the house to take anything’ (Tabasco Chontal). Compare also ‘the man on the housetop in going should not enter…’ (Southern Subanen).

In some parts of the world flat roofs are carefully distinguished from peaked ones. It is quite essential that as much of the meaning as can be conveyed in this passage be implied by the right choice of words. For example, not only should a word applicable to a flat roof be used, but the translation of ‘take anything away’ should imply, if possible, his own possessions. It should not, as in some instances, connote the stealing of someone else’s property which the thief has failed to obtain by trying to break through the roof and so proposes to take (as assumed by the reader) by entering boldly into the house.

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 .