Translation commentary on Mark 4:35 – 4:36

Exegesis:

opsias genomenēs (1.32; 6.47; 14.17; 15.42) ‘when evening had come’: presumably at, or after sunset.

dielthōmen eis to peran ‘let us go to the other side.’

dierchomai (10.25) ‘go through’ literally; here ‘go,’ ‘go across.’

eis to peran ‘to the other side’: normally, as here, meaning Perea, the country east of the Lake of Galilee (cf. 5.1), or of the Jordan river (cf. 3.8; 10.1). In the literal sense ‘to the other side’ it is used in 5.21; 6.45; 8.13.

kai aphentes … paralambanousin ‘and leaving … they take’: the subject is ‘the disciples.’

aphiēmi (cf. 1.18; 2.5) ‘leave,’ ‘abandon’; some translate “dismiss”, which is not supported by Marcan usage (apoluō is ‘dismiss,’ ‘send away’: cf. 6.36, 45; 8.3, 9).

paralambanō (5.40; 7.4; 9.2; 10.32; 14.33) ‘take,’ ‘take with’ (or ‘along’): there is no idea of force implied (cf. Lagrange).

hōs ēn en tō ploiō ‘as he was in the boat’: hōs ‘as,’ denoting comparison, means that Jesus still was in the boat in which he had pushed off from shore to teach the crowd (4.1), without having gone ashore. Translator’s New Testament takes hōs as temporal ‘while’: the great majority of translations, however, assume the meaning ‘as.’

alla ploia ēn met’ autou ‘other boats were with him’: so the great majority of translations; Translator’s New Testament, however, has “it” (the boat).

Translation:

Because of possible confusion in rendering them, in view of the fact that for the most part the crowd has been referred to by such a third person plural pronoun, it may be advisable to translate ‘said to the disciples.’

Go across must be made quite specific in some languages. For example, in Aymara, a language spoken by about one million Indians around Lake Titicaca in the Andes between Bolivia and Peru, one must specify whether ‘going across’ denotes from one side of the lake to another or from one projection of land (into the lake) to another such projection. In this context, one would seem to be dealing with a passage across the main body of the lake to Perea.

To the other side must often be elaborated to mean ‘to the land on the other side of the lake’ (Kekchi).

One must be quite careful in translating took him, for in some languages the connotation is one of ‘forcible arrest’ or ‘manhandling.’ One may, however, say ‘go with him’ or ‘have him go with them.’

Just as he was does not refer to Jesus’ appearance, but his place, already in the boat. This meaning may be indicated by some paratactic constructions, e.g. ‘the disciples had him go with them in the boat; he was already there in the boat.’

For problems involving the size of the boat, see 1.19.

Were with him is equivalent in some languages to ‘went along at the same time.’ Note, however, that verbs used in speaking of boats ‘going’ may be entirely different from those used of motion by birds, animals, or persons.

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 .

SIL Translator's Notes on Mark 4:36

4:36a

In Greek, 4:36a begins with the common conjunction that is often translated as “And” (as in the Revised Standard Version). The Berean Standard Bible and some other English versions do not translate this conjunction here.

Luke used this conjunction to connect the command Jesus gave in 4:35b to the response of the disciples in 4:36. One way to do this is to follow the Good News Bible, which says:

So…

You should connect these verses in a way that is natural in your language.

After they had dismissed the crowd: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as After they had dismissed the crowd indicates that Jesus and his disciples went away together. They separated themselves from the other people there. In some languages it may be natural to translate this as a separate sentence. For example:

So they left the crowd

4:36b

they took Jesus with them, since He was already in the boat: Jesus was already in a boat. So the disciples got into that same boat and began to row or sail it across the lake. The phrase took Jesus with them indicates that the disciples brought Jesus with them. The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as since He was already in the boat is literally “just as he was, in the boat.” It indicates that Jesus remained in the boat while the disciples got in. So Jesus did not go ashore or make any preparations to leave.

Here are some other ways to translate this:

they took Jesus as he was and began to cross the lake in the boat
-or-
the disciples got into the boat in which Jesus was already sitting, and they took him with them (Good News Bible)
-or-
He was already in the boat, so they started out (New Living Translation, 1996 edition)

4:36c

And there were other boats with Him: It is implied that there were other people in these boats. It may be more natural in your language to mention the other people. For example:

Other people took other boats and accompanied him.
-or-
Other people also took boats and began to cross the lake with him.

with Him: Because the disciples were also in the boat with Jesus, it may be more natural in some languages to use the plural pronoun “them” rather than Him. For example:

There were also other boats that went with them.

© 2008 by SIL International®

Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0

All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.