Text:
Before sēmeia ‘signs’ Tischendorf, Nestle, and Kilpatrick have poiēsousin ‘they will perform’; all other editions of the Greek text, however, have dōsousin ‘they will give’ (presumably Revised Standard Version ‘show’ translates dōsousin).
Exegesis:
egerthēsontai (cf. 1.31) ‘they will arise,’ i.e. ‘will appear,’ ‘will arrive on the scene.’
pseudochristoi (only here in Mark) ‘false Christs,’ ‘pseudo Messiahs.’
pseudoprophētai (only here in Mark) ‘false prophets’: the saying about false prophets and their signs and wonders recalls the language of Deut. 13.2.
dōsousin sēmeia kai terata ‘they will give signs and wonders,’ in the sense of ‘causing (signs and wonders) to appear.’
sēmeion (cf. 8.11) ‘sign.’
terata (only here in Mark) ‘wonders,’ ‘portents,’ ‘prodigies’: in the N.T. used only in the plural and always with sēmeia ‘signs.’
pros to apoplanan ‘for the purpose of deceiving,’ ‘with a view to leading astray.’
pros here means ‘with the purpose of,’ ‘in order to.’
apoplanaō (only here in Mark; cf. planaō 13.5) ‘deceive,’ ‘lead astray.’
ei dunaton (14.35) ‘if possible’: for dunatos ‘possible’ cf. 9.23.
Translation:
False is often translatable only by some verb phrase which describes the activity of the person in question, e.g. ‘those who pretend to be Christ’ (Amganad Ifugao, Copainalá Zoque), ‘deceiving christs’ (Tzeltal), ‘christs who really are not’ (Highland Puebla Nahuatl), ‘men who say they are Christ’ (San Mateo del Mar Huave), and ‘people will come, one will say, I am Christ; another will say, I am a prophet’ (Yaka). In Mitla Zapotec false prophet has to be completely recast because of the phrasal form of the expression for prophet e.g. ‘speak lies as if speaking for God.’ In all these expressions the concept of falseness, pretence, and deceit are clearly indicated, despite the rather radical syntactic and lexical divergencies from the Greek expression. Such adaptations are quite common in languages in which activities or behavior implied by Greek (and English) adjectives plus nouns are describable only by verbs, which require a full complement of subject and object components.
Will arise may be ‘will stand,’ ‘will come into existence,’ ‘will appear,’ or ‘will become.’ It is only rarely that arise can be translated literally.
For signs see 8.11.
Wonders are different from miracles in that they usually involve some unusual phenomena in nature which are a portent of dire woe or extraordinary blessing. In Huichol these are ‘awe-inspiring things.’ In Yucateco they are ‘things which show what is coming,’ but in Eastern Highland Otomi the expression must be cast into the form of a verb phrase ‘they will amaze the people.’
Lead astray is sometimes translated in such a way as to reflect this same English metaphor, but usually one must employ some other more generic term as ‘deceive’ or ‘cause to believe a lie.’
If possible may require some expansion because of the essentially elliptical form, e.g. ‘if they can do so’ or ‘if they are able.’
The elect are ‘the chosen ones’ or where an agent is required, ‘the ones God has chosen’ (see 13.20).
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 .
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