Text:

Instead of soi ‘with thee’ of all modern editions of the Greek text, Textus Receptus has hō ‘with whom.’

The construction is quite abrupt. Perhaps egeneto ‘came’ should be omitted, as is done by Turner, Tischendorf and Kilpatrick; Nestle and Westcott and Hort include it in brackets; other modern editions of the Greek text include it without any question.

Exegesis:

phōnē ek tōn ouranōn ‘a voice from the heavens’: the voice is God’s, addressing itself to Jesus. Lagrange: “the voice comes from heaven where God dwells.”

su ei ho huios mou ho agapētos ‘you are my beloved son’: the phrase is a compound of familiar O.T. phrases (Ps. 2.7; Isa. 42.1; cf. also Gen. 22.2; Isa. 44.2; 62.4), full of meaning.

su ei ‘you are’: a statement of fact, not a promise; it is either a revelation of a truth previously not known or confirmation of a truth already grasped (see Taylor, 162).

hō agapētos (9.7; 12.6) ‘the beloved’: used in the Septuagint (and classical Greek as well) of ‘favorite,’ ‘only.’ In the Septuagint agapētos seven times out of fifteen translates yachid ‘only one.’ Lagrange comments: “in the O.T. there is no great difference between ‘beloved’ and ‘only.’” Turner devotes a lengthy study to the phrase and concludes: “From Homer to Athanasius the history of the Greek language bears out, I venture to think, the argument of this paper that agapētos huios is rightly rendered ‘Only Son.’” The majority of translations, however, have ‘beloved’ rather than ‘only,’ which is in the nature of an interpretation (see Translator’s New Testament).

Grammatically ho agapētos may modify ho huios ‘the son’ and be translated ‘beloved Son’ (American Standard Version, Revised Standard Version, Lagrange, Knox, Zürcher Bibel, Le Nouveau Testament. Version Synodale, O Novo Testamento de Nosso Senhor Jesus Cristo. Revisdo Autorizada), or it may stand independently, as a title, ‘my Son, the Beloved (one)’ (Manson, Moffatt, The Modern Speech New Testament, Berkeley).

en soi eudokēsa ‘in thee I am well pleased.’ The force of the aorist eudokēsa has been studied, both from the viewpoint of the Greek and the possible Semitic perfect underlying it. There is agreement that the meaning is best represented in English by the present tense: “ ‘punctiliar’ present” (Moule), “present of general truth” (Black). Cf. Jerome: in te complacui.

eudokeō en ‘be well pleased,’ ‘take delight’ with or in someone: cf. in the Septuagint Mal. 2.17, Ps. 43.4, 2 Sam. 22.20; in the N.T. see 1 Co. 10.5, 2 Co. 12.10. The translations reflect the meaning in various ways: “be pleased” (King James Version, American Standard Version, Revised Standard Version, Translator’s New Testament); “delight” (Moffatt, The Modern Speech New Testament, Berkeley); “choice” (Manson).

Translation:

In some languages one cannot say ‘a voice came.’ One may, on the other hand, find that the use of some such expression as ‘words (or sounds) of a voice were heard coming…’ is fully satisfactory (so Indonesian ‘a voice was heard’). Though, of course, this is God’s voice (i.e. ‘God spoke from heaven’) it is best, wherever possible, to try to preserve the indefiniteness of the original form, despite its somewhat greater lack of clarity.

For a discussion of “heaven” see under verse 10.

Though there is justification for the translation of ‘only’ for Greek agapētos, generally rendered ‘beloved,’ it is probably more satisfactory to retain the translation used by the vast majority of translators, for undoubtedly even in the Greek expression there is something of the connotation of ‘love,’ despite what may be the more predominant denotation of ‘only.’

My beloved Son must be translated in a paratactic form, ‘… my Son; I love you,’ or ‘… my Son, the one I love’ (Copainalá Zoque).

With thee I am well pleased is a concept which is often translated in other languages by a wide variety of figurative expressions, e.g. ‘you are the heart of my eye’ (Huastec), ‘you arrive at my gall’ (Mossi , in which the gall is regarded as the seat of the emotions and intelligence), ‘I see you very well’ (Tzotzil), ‘you make me very happy’ (Sayula Popoluca), and ‘my bowels are sweet with you’ (Shilluk). One must not, however, assume that all languages will have such figurative expressions (in Inupiaqthe equivalent of this entire phrase is just a single word, with a strictly non-figurative meaning). Nevertheless, there are problems in the choice of an appropriate phrase, for it is entirely too easy to select inadvertently an expression which may refer primarily to satisfaction with food or pleasure in sensual entertainment.

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 .