Exegesis:

houtōs kai humeis asunetoi este; ‘Are you also thus without understanding?’ For similar questions and statements cf. 4.13 (not understanding the parable), 4.40 (being fearful), 6.52 (not understanding the miracle of the loaves), and 8.17 (again not understanding about the loaves). The charge, of course, is not that they do not have any sense, but that they are failing to use their senses.

asunetos (only here in Mark) ‘senseless,’ ‘foolish,’ ‘without understanding.’

ou noeite ‘do you not understand?’

noeō (8.17; 13.14) ‘perceive,’ ‘understand,’ ‘apprehend.’

Translation:

Without understanding may be rendered in various ways, e.g. ‘do you not understand,’ ‘do you not hear with your hearts’ or ‘do you not see clearly.’

See must often be translated as ‘understand,’ ‘realize,’ or ‘know,’ for this is not literal sight, but mental perception which is involved.

Goes into a man should be relatable to ‘eating’ (see 7.15), e.g. ‘enters into a man’s mouth’ (Yaka). For defile see 7.2, but in this particular verse Huautla Mazatec has ‘cannot dirty the heart,’ an expression which, by the use of ‘heart,’ implies moral contamination.

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 .