Exegesis:

opheis (not in Mark) ‘snakes,’ ‘serpents.’

thanasimon ti piōsin ‘something deadly they may drink’: the adjective thanasimos ‘deadly’ (not used elsewhere in the N.T.) probably stands here for ‘deadly poison.’

ou mē autous blapsē ‘it will in no way harm them’: the double negative is emphatic.

blaptō (not in Mark) ‘harm,’ ‘injure,’ ‘hurt.’

epi arrōstous cheiras epithēsousin ‘upon sick people they will lay hands.’ For arrōstos ‘sick,’ ‘feeble’ cf. Mk. 6.5; for epitithenai cheiras ‘lay hands upon’ cf. Mk. 5.23.

kalōs hexousin (not elsewhere in the N.T.; cf. kakōs echein Mk. 1.32) ‘they will get well,’ ‘they will recover.’

Translation:

The lack of symmetry and parallelism in the two initial clauses of this verse may cause some trouble, for the first is a statement of actual experience they will pick up serpents and the second is a condition if they drink any deadly thing. The first clause of this verse may be interpreted merely as a future statement, but it is also possible to relate it to the following clauses in such a way as to understand the passage as a kind of conditional statement, namely, ‘if they pick up…, they will not be hurt.’ This requires, however, the interpretation of the third clause as the apodosis of two different ‘if’ clauses: (1) ‘picking up serpents’ and (2) ‘drinking any deadly thing.’ The last two clauses of this verse are similarly related as condition and result, for the first of these two clauses is essentially the condition, ‘if they lay their hands on the sick,’ while the last clause is the result, e.g. ‘they will recover.’ In languages in which the paratactically related conditional clauses must be more closely attached to the result, one may translate as ‘if they pick up serpents and if they drink any deadly thing, they will not suffer harm from these; if they lay their hands on the sick people, these will recover.’

In some languages there are quite different words for serpents, depending upon whether or not they are poisonous. Naturally, the poisonous type is implied in this context.

Deadly thing may be rendered as ‘a liquid which would kill them’ or ‘a drink which kills people.’ It is important not to refer exclusively to a kind of poison cup used only in ordeals by which innocence can be proved (a common practice in Africa).

They will lay their hands on the sick and they will recover may be grammatically confusing in languages in which the same subject is understood in two such coordinate clauses unless there is some mark to the contrary. After all, it is not the ones who lay their hands on the sick, but the sick themselves, who recover. Hence, one may be required to recast this sentence as ‘they will lay their hands on the sick people, and these people will get well again’ of ‘if they lay their hands on the sick people, these will get well.’

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 .