Exegesis:

episuntrechei ochlos ‘a crowd was coming together’; perhaps, ‘a mob was gathering’ (cf. Berkeley).

episuntrechō (only here in the N.T.; cf. prostrechō 9.15) ‘come together,’ ‘run together’: there may be an indication of mob action of one sort or another (cf. Manson ‘the crowd closing in upon them’; cf. Black who suggests the verb may mean ‘attack,’ the boy being the object of the crowd’s hostile mood).

The other words in this verse have already been dealt with; for epitimaō ‘rebuke’ cf. 1.25; to pneuma to akatharton ‘the unclean spirit’ cf. 1.23; alalon ‘dumb’ cf. 7.37; kōphon ‘deaf’ cf. 7.32; epitassō ‘command’ cf. 1.27.

Translation:

A crowd refers to a still larger group of people, or at least additional persons, not merely the ones identified in verse 14.

Rebuked should here be translated in the sense of ‘scold’ or ‘speak very sternly to.’

For unclean spirit see 1.26.

Dumb and deaf spirit, on the analogy of dumb spirit (verse 17), may be translated as ‘spirit (or ‘demon’) which causes a person not to be able to speak or hear.’

For expressions equivalent to come out and enter, see 1.23, 34.

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 .

Exegesis:

aganaktein (cf. 10.14) ‘to be indignant,’ ‘to be angry’: the preposition peri ‘about’ indicates the object of the indignation – ‘to be angry at.’

Translation:

The ten is often translatable as ‘the ten other disciples,’ since in many instances a numeral cannot be used as a substantive, and ‘other’ must contrast the two sets of disciples: the ten versus the two.

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 .

Exegesis:

anamnēstheis (14.72) ‘being reminded,’ ‘recalling,’ ‘remembering.’

rabbi (cf. 9.5) ‘Master,’ ‘Teacher.’

katērasō (only here in Mark; elsewhere in N.T., Mt. 25.41, Lk. 6.28, Rom. 12.14, Jas. 3.9) ‘you cursed.’

Translation:

In languages in which ‘remembered’ is a transitive verb, one may translate as ‘remembered what had happened.’

Him may require substitution by ‘Jesus,’ depending upon the receptor language usage.

In most languages there is a technical term meaning ‘to curse,’ but many translators have hesitated to employ this term because it usually implies the use of black magic and the motivation would be almost inevitably a case of jealousy. In Inupiaqfor example, rather than use the technical term a substitute is found in the expression ‘punished with his words.’ In Navajo a rather generic expression ‘to speak against’ has been employed.

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 .

Text:

After the words heis estin ‘he is one,’ Textus Receptus adds theos ‘God,’ which is omitted by all modern editions of the Greek text.

Exegesis:

kalōs ‘well,’ ‘rightly’: here used absolutely, as an exclamation. ‘Quite right’; ‘That is true’; ‘Well said’ (cf. Taylor, Translator’s New Testament).

didaskale (cf. 4.38) ‘teacher.’

ep’ alētheias (cf. 12.14) ‘truly,’ ‘in accordance with truth.’

heis estin kai ouk estin allos plēn autou ‘he is one and there is no other except him’: this statement represents two O.T. passages, Deut. 6.4 (quoted in v. 29) and Deut. 4.35. This may be taken to represent an interpretation of the saying ‘The Lord (i.e. Yahweh) is One’ as meaning that only he is God, and no other.

plēn (only here in Mark) is an adverb ‘only,’ ‘except that’: used as an “improper” preposition with the genitive, as here, it means ‘except.’

Translation:

For scribe see 1.22.

Because of other third person referents it may be necessary to employ ‘Jesus’ rather than ‘him’ as the object of ‘said.’

For Teacher see 2.13, but compare the usage of 12.19.

He is one may be difficult to translate in this form, primarily because of the indefinite third person reference, in which case one may need to translate as ‘God is one.’ However, the use of ‘one’ in the predicate may provide little or no meaning, and hence one may be forced to adjust this to a more equivalent expression ‘there is only one God,’ which is the essential meaning of the passage.

No other but he is equivalent in some languages to saying ‘and no other god exists.’

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 .

Exegesis:

ei mē ekolobōsen kurios tas hēmeras ‘if the Lord had not shortened the days,’ ‘unless the Lord had cut short those days.’

koloboō (only here in Mark) ‘amputate,’ ‘curtail,’ ‘shorten’: the phrase ‘shorten the days,’ means, of course, to reduce the number of days (of the ‘tribulation’ referred to in the previous verse). It is to be noticed that the whole verse speaks of the matter as though it were past, in conformance with Hebrew prophetic style.

kurios (cf. 1.3) ‘the Lord’: here, of course, God.

tas hēmeras ‘those days’ better fits the context than ‘the days.’

ouk an esōthē pasa sarx literally ‘all flesh would not have been saved’: the Hebrew idiom loʾ … kol (Greek ouk … pas) ‘not all’ means ‘none,’ ‘not one,’ so that the clause means, ‘no flesh would have been saved.’

sōzō (cf. 3.4) ‘save’: here with the meaning ‘escape,’ ‘survive,’ ‘live (through it)’ (of the translations, The Modern Speech New Testament, Goodspeed, and Montgomery have ‘escape’; Moffatt ‘be saved alive’; Berkeley ‘survive’). Lagrange and Taylor, however, understand the word in its eschatological sense, ‘to be saved,’ as in v. 13. This depends, of course, upon the interpretation given the events described in the context. Other considerations aside, the plain meaning of the events in vv. 14-23 connected with the ‘tribulation’ (thlipsis, v. 19) is that they are of a temporal and temporary nature which none would survive unless the Lord had ‘shortened the days’: it seems difficult, therefore, to understand the verb sōzō in the theological sense of “salvation unto eternal life.”

pasa sarx ‘all flesh’: here with the meaning ‘every human being,’ ‘every man’ (for this meaning of the Hebrew basar ‘flesh’).

tous eklektous hous exelexato ‘the chosen ones whom he chose,’ ‘the elect whom he elected.’

eklektos (13.22, 27) ‘chosen one,’ ‘elected one’: in the context the word refers to the Christians, the followers of Jesus.

eklegomai (only here in Mark) ‘choose,’ ‘select,’ ‘prefer’: the verb, in accordance with Jewish theology, indicates the predestinating activity of God.

Translation:

Shortened the days, if translated literally, may imply quite a wrong meaning, namely, reduce the length of each day. One may therefore have to speak of ‘reducing the time’ or ‘cutting off the days’ (Tzeltal) or ‘cutting the time’ (Cashibo-Cacataibo).

In some languages the problem of tense in this verse is extremely difficult, to the point of making the passage meaningless. For example, the reduction of time is spoken of as past, while the salvation is obviously future. This problem may be resolved in some instances by translating ‘if the Lord had not decided to cut off the days.’ That is to say, the decision is past (as determined in the counsel of God), but the actual event is still future.

No human being (‘no one,’ or ‘no person’) is a necessary translation of the Greek phrase which means literally ‘no flesh.’ Translated word-for-word in some languages, this phrase has meant nothing more than ‘no meat.’ On the basis of such a translation as ‘no flesh,’ the people in question concluded that this was in some way related to the tendency for carcasses to spoil after a period of time, and that for this reason the time was reduced.

Be saved is generally interpreted on the basis of (1) continued existence or life, e.g. ‘remain living’ (Tabasco Chontal), or (2) escape from destruction, e.g. ‘nobody would escape’ (Tzotzil).

The elect, whom he chose is a redundant expression which is frequently translated with only a single reference to the process of choosing, e.g. ‘those whom he chose’ or ‘the people whom he chose.’ The obvious reason for this is the fact that elect is translatable in many languages only as ‘those whom he chose,’ and to repeat ‘those whom he chose’ would be completely tautological.

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 .

Exegesis:

deixei (1.44) ‘he will show.’

anagaion (only here in Mark) ‘a room upstairs,’ ‘an upper room.’

estrōmenon (cf. 11.8) ‘strewn,’ ‘spread out’: by most commentators this is taken to mean ‘spread with carpets and couches,’ ready for the meal (Lagrange fournie de tapis et de divans). Though improbable, the word could mean ‘paved’ . Taylor is of the opinion that the participle is used in a general sense, meaning simply ‘prepared,’ and suggests it may have been simply “a bare attic.”

hetoimon (only here in Mark; cf. the verb hetoimazō in v. 12 and here) ‘ready,’ ‘prepared.’

Translation:

Upper room is not easy to translate in languages in which one-roomed huts are about the size of dwelling to which the people are accustomed. However, some such expression as ‘high room’ or ‘room high in the house’ will at least be descriptive of what the people may see in urban centers.

Furnished must be rendered in such a way as to make it meaningful, but not so detailed as to specify more than is included in the Greek term. Accordingly, ‘with what was needed’ or ‘having what they required’ may be adequate.

Prepare must often be translated with an object, e.g. ‘prepare the meal there for us’ or ‘there prepare the food for us.’

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 .

Exegesis:

heis … tis (cf. 5.22) ‘a certain one’: Lagrange thinks this indicates that this person was known to the author.

tōn parestēkoton (4.29) ‘of those standing by,’ ‘of those present’ (for this use of the perfect participle hoi parestēkotes ‘bystanders,’ cf. 14.69, 70; 15.35). The vague language does not identify the man as a disciple, and seems to exclude, perhaps purposely, such identification.

spasamenos (only here in Mark) ‘drawing (his sword)’: this does not necessarily mean, strictly, ‘drawing out of a scabbard.’ It may mean generally ‘pulling’ or ‘brandishing.’

epaisen (only here in Mark) ‘he struck,’ ‘he hit’: here with the resultant meaning ‘he wounded.’

ton doulon (cf. 10.44) ‘the slave.’

tou archiereōs (cf. 2.17) ‘of the high priest’: here, of course the high priest of the time (identified in the other Gospels as Caiaphas).

apheilen (only here in Mark) ‘he took away,’ ‘he cut off.’

ōtarion (only here in Mark; the diminutive of ous 4.9) ‘ear’: though the diminutive of ous, it is equal in meaning to it. Taylor suggests that the lobe of the ear may be intended by the word here.

Translation:

Drew his sword may be rendered as ‘pulled out his sword’ or ‘showed his sword.’ In some languages, of course, sword is merely ‘a huge knife’ or machete.

It is not necessary to make a distinction between the attributives employed in ‘chief priests’ and ‘high priest.’ (In Greek the terms are the same; the only difference is the plural and singular contrast.) In many languages therefore chief priests are merely ‘the big priests’ and high priest is ‘the big priest.’ In some instances, one may say ‘the biggest priest’ for ‘the high priest,’ since there was technically only one high priest at a time. Of course, instead of ‘big’ one may use an equivalent of ‘great,’ ‘important,’ ‘head,’ or ‘high.’

Many societies distinguish carefully between servants and slaves, but where this is not done, one may often employ certain descriptive terms, e.g. ‘one compelled to work without wages’ or ‘man who was owned by.’ In some languages the term used for the lowest grade of servants seems to be a fitting equivalent of slave.

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 .