Bratcher, Robert and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark. Leiden: Brill, UBS, 1961.
Text:
This verse is omitted by Tischendorf, Nestle, Westcott and Hort, Souter, and Kilpatrick; American Standard Version, Revised Standard Version. It is included by Textus Receptus, Soden, Vogels, Merk, Lagrange, Taylor; King James Version, Moffatt.
See 4.23 for Exegesis and Translation.
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:
epelathonto (only here in Mark; cf. lanthanō 7.24) ‘they forgot’: the context requires that this aorist be understood as a past perfect, i.e. ‘they had forgotten (when they set out on the crossing).’
kai ei mē hena arton ouch eichon meth’ heautōn en tō ploiō literally ‘and except for one loaf they didn’t have (anything) with them in the boat.’
Translation:
It is frequently necessary to translate they by ‘disciples’ since the immediately preceding ‘they’ must refer to the Pharisees who were left standing there by Jesus.
Had forgotten usually presents no special difficulties, for the concept of forgetting is common enough in all languages. However, some of the idioms used are of interest, e.g. ‘to lose from the heart’ (Tzeltal), ‘to lose from the liver’ (Miskito), and ‘his insides died’ (Laka).
A literal translation may imply a contradiction. This is treated in some instances as ‘forgotten to bring enough bread; they had only one loaf’ or ‘they had forgotten to bring bread, except for the one loaf which they had with them in the boat.’ However, any minor discrepancy in wording is immediately evident in the following clause, which does not essentially contradict the preceding. The meaning is that they had not procured bread especially for the trip, but they happened to have a loaf with them in the boat.
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:
Instead of ei mē ‘except’ of Westcott and Hort, Souter, Nestle, Lagrange, and Taylor, alla ‘but’ is read by Textus Receptus, Tischendorf, Soden, Vogels, Kilpatrick, and Merk.
Instead of ei mē (or alla) ton Iēsoun monon meth’ heautōn ‘except (or, but) Jesus alone with them’ of Nestle, Souter, Textus Receptus, Tischendorf, Soden, Vogels, and Merk, the order of words is changed to meth’ heautōn ei mē ton Iēsoun monon ‘with them except Jesus alone’ in Westcott and Hort, Lagrange, Taylor (cf. Kilpatrick).
Exegesis:
exapina (only here in the N.T.) ‘suddenly,’ ‘unexpectedly,’ ‘abruptly.’
periblepsamenoi (cf. 3.5) ‘looking around.’
monon ‘only,’ ‘alone’: an adjective, modifying Iēsoun ‘Jesus,’ not an adverb modifying eidon ‘they saw.’
Translation:
They must be translated to refer to the disciples.
In some languages, the dependent participial construction suddenly looking around must be made into an independent or at least coordinate phrase, for it is obviously a more important aspect of the process than the negative statement which follows. Accordingly, one may translate ‘they suddenly looked around and could no longer see any one….’
But Jesus only may be translated as ‘no one except Jesus; there was no one else.’
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:
kata with the genitive meaning ‘against’ (3.6; 11.25; 14.55, 56, 57).
huper (14.24) with the genitive ‘for,’ ‘in behalf of.’
Translation:
Against us … for us would seem to be simple enough, but prepositions such as ‘against’ and ‘for’ do not exist in some languages, and the entire concept must be shifted into verb constructions, e.g. ‘the man who does not fight against us is on our side,’ ‘the man who does not work against us is helping us,’ ‘for he goes with us, who is not against us’ (Batak Toba), or ‘he who does not look mean at us is ours’ (Kekchi).
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:
periblepsamenos (cf. 3.5) ‘looking around.’
duskolōs (10.24) ‘with difficulty’; pōs duskolōs ‘with what difficulty!’
chrēmata (only here in Mark) ‘wealth,’ ‘property,’ ‘riches.’
eiseleusontai ‘they shall enter’: the Kingdom of God is here referred to in eschatological terms.
Translation:
Looked around implies ‘looked around at the people.’
How hard introduces an exclamatory expression, which in some languages can only be stated as ‘very hard’ or ‘exceedingly difficult,’ e.g. ‘those who have riches will have a very difficult time to enter….’
Have riches may be either ‘have much property’ or ‘are very rich.’
For problems involved in expressions for the kingdom of God see 1.15, 4.11, and 10.15.
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:
pros thuran ‘at the door.’
exō epi tou amphodou ‘outside in the street’: so most commentators and translations.
amphodon (only here in the N.T.) ‘a city quarter’ (cf. Moulton & Milligan): by extension of meaning ‘the street (or, road) around (the quarter).’
kai luousin auton ‘and they loose it,’ i.e. ‘and they untie it.’
Translation:
Found a colt tied at the door out in the open street may require a division into two or possibly three paratactically combined sentences, because of the change in subject, e.g. ‘they found the young donkey; it was tied by the door; it was standing out in the street.’ Where the passive it was tied must be changed to active one may say ‘men had tied it.’
Some translations have taken amphodon in the sense of ‘cross-roads,’ e.g. ‘where roads come together’ or ‘where roads separate,’ but this is not the meaning of the Greek. This term has reference to the larger streets which encircled smaller quarters of a town, through which led only small passageways, often completely covered over.
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:
edeiran (12.5; 13.9) ‘they beat,’ ‘they flogged,’ ‘they whipped.’
kenon (only here in Mark) ‘empty,’ ‘empty-handed.’
Translation:
Empty-handed may be translated in some languages simply as ‘without anything.’ In one instance it is idiomatically rendered as ‘holding his own hands,’ i.e. without anything in them.
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:
hupokatō ‘under’ is read by Westcott and Hort, Lagrange, Nestle, Kilpatrick, and Taylor, while hupopodion ‘footstool’ is read by Textus Receptus, Tischendorf, Soden, Vogels, Souter, and Merk. The genuine reading in the O.T. passage quoted (Ps. 110.1) is hupopodion (the Septuagint translation of hadom ‘footstool’): this fact, besides the manuscript evidence, makes it probable that the genuine reading here is hupokatō ‘under’ (as well as in the parallel Mt. 22.44; in Lk. 20.43, however, the true reading is hupopodion ‘footstool’).
Exegesis:
autos Dauid ‘David himself’: in accordance with normal Greek usage the pronoun is emphatic (cf. Lagrange); Black, however, sees Semitic influence and translates ‘He, David.’
en tō pneumati tō hagiō ‘in the Holy Spirit,’ ‘under the influence of the Holy Spirit.’
to pneuma to hagion (cf. 1.8) ‘the Holy Spirit.’
The passage quoted (Ps. 110.1) is the O.T. passage most often quoted in the New Testament. It is here reproduced exactly as the Septuagint translates the Hebrew, with the single exception of the omission of the definite article ho before kurios ‘Lord.’ This does not, however, affect the meaning of the passage.
eipen kurios tō kuriō mou ‘the Lord said to my Lord’: the Greek is a translation of the Hebrew neʾem YHWH laʾdoni ‘said Yahweh to my Lord.’ As quoted here Kurios (YHWH) is God, while the second kurios mou (ʾadoni) ‘my Lord,’ is the Messiah. If language allows, the translation should be equivalent to the Greek, ‘the Lord said to my Lord.’ If, however, ambiguity arises from this double use of ‘Lord,’ the meaning may be conveyed by ‘The Lord (or, God) said to my Messiah,’ or, ‘God said to my Lord.’ By no means, however, should a translation read ‘God said to Christ,’ in which ‘Christ’ is a proper name: such a translation would altogether mar the allusiveness of the quotation on the lips of Jesus.
kathou ek dexiōn mou ‘sit at my right hand’: the ‘right hand’ is the place of authority and power.
kathēmai (cf. 2.6) ‘to sit.’
ek dexiōn mou (cf. 10.37) ‘at my right.’
heōs an ‘until’: this phrase may mean ‘until that time – and no longer’ (as it does in 6.10; cf. also heōs alone in 6.45 and 14.32), but not necessarily so. It is the context which determines the particular force of the phrase, and here, as well as in 9.1, it is not to be inferred that the action of the verb (‘sit’) is to last only until the point indicated by the heōs an clause (‘until I put your enemies under your feet’), and is then terminated. Cf. 9.1 for a similar instance of this usage.
hupokatō tōn podōn sou ‘underneath your feet’: as indicated in Text (above), the Septuagint, a passage also often quoted in the N.T. The figure is that of subjection of enemies, in which the victors placed their feet upon the necks of their defeated enemies (cf. Joshua 10.24).
Translation:
Inspired by the Holy Spirit is an Revised Standard Version rendering of the secondary agency, indicated in Greek by the use of the preposition en ‘in’ or ‘by’ and the dative case of the following noun phrase ‘the Holy Spirit.’ In some languages one can use a preposition such as ‘by’ or ‘through,’ but in other languages one must employ a kind of paratactic construction, e.g. ‘David said; the Holy Spirit caused him to say it’ (Sayula Popoluca).
The Lord must often be adapted to the requirements of possession, since ‘Lord’ cannot occur in some languages without some possessive, e.g. ‘our Lord.’ In Tzeltal, for example, ‘our Lord’ is commonly used of God, and hence in the passage ‘our Lord said to my Lord’ the meaning is relatively clear, despite the generally allusive character of the passage.
At my right hand (cf. usage in 10.37) may require a marginal note in some languages in order to indicate that this is the preferred or honored position, since in some cultures the right hand is regarded as the place of less honor than the left.
Put should not be rendered in a grossly literal manner. The meaning is better conveyed in some languages by a causative, e.g. ‘cause your enemies to be.’
Since a position ‘under the feet’ is generally regarded as one of inferiority or defeat, such an idiom is almost always quite acceptable and does not require any marginal explanation.
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 .