Exegesis:

genomenēs hōras hektēs (cf. 6.35 hōras pollēs genomenēs) ‘when the sixth hour came,’ ‘at mid-day.’

skotos (only here in Mark; cf. skotizomai 13.24) ‘darkness.’

egeneto eph’ holēn tēn gēn ‘came upon the whole country,’ rather than Revised Standard Version ‘was.’

holē hē gē ‘the whole earth’ or ‘the whole land’: most commentators and translators prefer the second meaning.

heōs hōras enatēs ‘until the ninth hour,’ ‘lasting to 3.00 P.M.’

Translation:

In general the sixth hour is translated by some equivalent for noon, which, however, is expressed by a variety of idiomatic expressions, e.g. ‘middle day’ (Copainalá Zoque, Tzeltal), ‘sun reaches the top of my head’ (Maninka), ‘sun is in the middle of the head’ (Mende), and ‘sun in the stomach head’ (Uduk). The ninth hour is also usually translatable by indigenous means of reckoning time, e.g. ‘the sun has turned over on its side’ (Tzeltal) or ‘the sun is in the middle of the afternoon.’ In some languages, the three hour period may be expressed as ‘from noon until three hours later’ (Dan).

In many languages one cannot speak of an hour as ‘coming.’ The time may ‘arrive,’ ‘be at,’ or ‘sit,’ but ‘coming’ may be excluded as a possibility. If this is the case, one may translate this verse as ‘from noon until the middle of the afternoon there was darkness over the whole land.’

Darkness may be best rendered in some languages as ‘it did not shine’ or ‘there was no light.’

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 .