Markus 1:7

1:7 He proclaimed, ¹  “One more powerful than I am is coming after me; I am not worthy ²  to bend down and untie the strap ³  of his sandals.

Markus 2:9

2:9 Which is easier, ⁴  to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up, take your stretcher, and walk’?

Markus 2:21

2:21 No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; otherwise, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and the tear becomes worse.

Markus 3:27

3:27 But no one is able to enter a strong man’s ⁵  house and steal his property unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can thoroughly plunder his house. ⁶ 

Markus 4:24

4:24 And he said to them, “Take care about what you hear. The measure you use will be the measure you receive, ⁷  and more will be added to you.

Markus 4:31-32

4:31 It is like a mustard seed ⁸  that when sown in the ground, even though it is the smallest of all the seeds in the ground – 4:32 when it is sown, it grows up, ⁹  becomes the greatest of all garden plants, and grows large branches so that the wild birds ¹⁰  can nest in its shade.” ¹¹ 

Markus 6:33

6:33 But many saw them leaving and recognized them, and they hurried on foot ¹²  from all the towns ¹³  and arrived there ahead of them. ¹⁴ 

Markus 7:2

7:2 And they saw that some of Jesus’ disciples ate their bread with unclean hands, that is, unwashed.

Markus 7:27

7:27 He said to her, “Let the children be satisfied first, for it is not right to take the children’s bread and to throw it to the dogs.” ¹⁵ 

Markus 7:36

7:36 Jesus ordered them not to tell anything. But as much as he ordered them not to do this, they proclaimed it all the more. ¹⁶ 

Markus 9:11-12

9:11 Then ¹⁷  they asked him, ¹⁸  “Why do the experts in the law ¹⁹  say that Elijah must come first?” 9:12 He said to them, “Elijah does indeed come first, and restores all things. And why is it written that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be despised?

Markus 9:42-43

9:42 “If anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a huge millstone ²⁰  tied around his neck and to be thrown into the sea. 9:43 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off! It is better for you to enter into life crippled than to have ²¹  two hands and go into hell, ²²  to the unquenchable fire.

Markus 9:45

9:45 If your foot causes you to sin, cut it off! It is better to enter life lame than to have ²³  two feet and be thrown into hell.

Markus 9:47

9:47 If your eye causes you to sin, tear it out! ²⁴  It is better to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than to have ²⁵  two eyes and be thrown into hell,

Markus 10:25

10:25 It is easier for a camel ²⁶  to go through the eye of a needle ²⁷  than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.”

Markus 10:48

10:48 Many scolded ²⁸  him to get him to be quiet, but he shouted all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Markus 12:31

12:31 The second is: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ²⁹  There is no other commandment greater than these.”

Markus 12:33

12:33 And to love him with all your heart, with all your mind, and with all your strength ³⁰  and to love your neighbor as yourself ³¹  is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

Markus 12:40

12:40 They ³²  devour widows’ property, ³³  and as a show make long prayers. These men will receive a more severe punishment.”

Markus 12:43

12:43 He called his disciples and said to them, “I tell you the truth, ³⁴  this poor widow has put more into the offering box ³⁵  than all the others. ³⁶ 

Markus 13:23

13:23 Be careful! I have told you everything ahead of time.

Markus 14:5

14:5 It ³⁷  could have been sold for more than three hundred silver coins ³⁸  and the money ³⁹  given to the poor!” So ⁴⁰  they spoke angrily to her.

Markus 14:8

14:8 She did what she could. She anointed my body beforehand for burial.

Markus 14:21

14:21 For the Son of Man will go as it is written about him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would be better for him if he had never been born.”

Markus 14:31

14:31 But Peter ⁴¹  insisted emphatically, ⁴²  “Even if I must die with you, I will never deny you.” And all of them said the same thing.

Markus 14:35

14:35 Going a little farther, he threw himself to the ground and prayed that if it were possible the hour would pass from him.

[1:7]  ¹ tn Grk “proclaimed, saying.” The participle λέγων (legwn) is redundant in contemporary English and has not been translated.

[1:7]  ² tn Grk “of whom I am not worthy.”

[1:7]  sn The humility of John is evident in the statement I am not worthy. This was considered one of the least worthy tasks of a slave, and John did not consider himself worthy to do even that for the one to come, despite the fact he himself was a prophet.

[1:7]  ³ tn The term refers to the leather strap or thong used to bind a sandal. This is often viewed as a collective singular and translated as a plural, “the straps of his sandals,” but it may be more emphatic to retain the singular here.

[2:9]  ⁴ sn Which is easier is a reflective kind of question. On the one hand to declare sins are forgiven is easier, since one does not need to see it, unlike telling a paralyzed person to walk. On the other hand, it is harder, because for it to be true one must possess the authority to forgive the sin.

[3:27]  ⁵ sn The strong man here pictures Satan.

[3:27]  ⁶ sn Some see the imagery here as similar to Eph 4:7-10, although no opponents are explicitly named in that passage. Jesus has the victory over Satan. Jesus’ acts of healing mean that the war is being won and the kingdom is coming.

[4:24]  ⁷ tn Grk “by [the measure] with which you measure it will be measured to you.”

[4:31]  ⁸ sn Mustard seeds are known for their tiny size.

[4:32]  ⁹ tn Mark 4:31-32 is fairly awkward in Greek. Literally the sentence reads as follows: “As a mustard seed, which when sown in the earth, being the smallest of all the seeds in the earth, and when it is sown, it grows up…” The structure has been rendered in more idiomatic English, although some of the awkward structure has been retained for rhetorical effect.

[4:32]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “the birds of the sky” or “the birds of the heaven”; the Greek word οὐρανός (ouranos) may be translated either “sky” or “heaven,” depending on the context. The idiomatic expression “birds of the sky” refers to wild birds as opposed to domesticated fowl (cf. BDAG 809 s.v. πετεινόν).

[4:32]  ¹¹ sn The point of the parable seems to be that while the kingdom of God may appear to have insignificant and unnoticeable beginnings (i.e., in the ministry of Jesus), it will someday (i.e., at the second advent) be great and quite expansive. The kingdom, however, is not to be equated with the church, but rather the church is an expression of the kingdom. Also, there is important OT background in the image of the mustard seed that grew and became a tree: Ezek 17:22-24 pictures the reemergence of the Davidic house where people can find calm and shelter. Like the mustard seed, it would start out small but grow to significant size.

[6:33]  ¹² tn Grk “ran together on foot.” The idea of συντρέχω (suntrecw) is “to come together quickly to form a crowd” (L&N 15.133).

[6:33]  ¹³ tn Or “cities.”

[6:33]  ¹⁴ tc The translation here follows the reading προῆλθον (prohlqon, “they preceded”), found in א B [phone] pc lat co. Some mss (D 28 33 700 pc) read συνῆλθον (sunhlqon, “arrived there with them”), while the majority of mss, most of them late (Ì^84vid [A ˹³] Ï sy^h), conflate the two readings (προῆλθον αὐτοὺς καὶ συνῆλθον πρὸς αὐτόν, “they preceded them and came together to him”). The reading adopted here thus has better external credentials than the variants. As well, it is the harder reading internally, being changed “by copyists who thought it unlikely that the crowd on the land could have outstripped the boat” (TCGNT 78).

[7:27]  ¹⁵ tn Or “lap dogs, house dogs,” as opposed to dogs on the street. The diminutive form originally referred to puppies or little dogs, then to house pets. In some Hellenistic uses κυνάριον (kunarion) simply means “dog.”

[7:27]  sn The term dogs does not refer to wild dogs (scavenging animals roaming around the countryside) in this context, but to small dogs taken in as house pets. It is thus not a derogatory term per se, but is instead intended by Jesus to indicate the privileged position of the Jews (especially his disciples) as the initial recipients of Jesus’ ministry. The woman’s response of faith and her willingness to accept whatever Jesus would offer pleased him to such an extent that he granted her request. This is the only miracle mentioned in Mark that Jesus performed at a distance without ever having seen the afflicted person, or issuing some sort of audible command.

[7:36]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “but as much as he ordered them, these rather so much more proclaimed.” Greek tends to omit direct objects when they are clear from the context, but these usually need to be supplied for the modern English reader. Here what Jesus ordered has been clarified (“ordered them not to do this”), and the pronoun “it” has been supplied after “proclaimed.”

[9:11]  ¹⁷ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the narrative.

[9:11]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “And they were asking him, saying.” The participle λέγοντες (legontes) is redundant and has not been translated.

[9:11]  ¹⁹ tn Or “Why do the scribes.” See the note on the phrase “experts in the law” in 1:22.

[9:42]  ²⁰ tn Grk “the millstone of a donkey.” This refers to a large flat stone turned by a donkey in the process of grinding grain (BDAG 661 s.v. μύλος 2; L&N 7.68-69). The same term is used in the parallel account in Matt 18:6.

[9:42]  sn The punishment of drowning with a heavy weight attached is extremely gruesome and reflects Jesus’ views concerning those who cause others who believe in him to sin.

[9:43]  ²¹ tn Grk “than having.”

[9:43]  ²² sn The word translated hell is “Gehenna” (γέεννα, geenna), a Greek transliteration of the Hebrew words ge hinnom (“Valley of Hinnom”). This was the valley along the south side of Jerusalem. In OT times it was used for human sacrifices to the pagan god Molech (cf. Jer 7:31; 19:5-6; 32:35), and it came to be used as a place where human excrement and rubbish were disposed of and burned. In the intertestamental period, it came to be used symbolically as the place of divine punishment (cf. 1 En. 27:2, 90:26; 4 Ezra 7:36). This Greek term also occurs in vv. 45, 47.

[9:45]  ²³ tn Grk “than having.”

[9:47]  ²⁴ tn Grk “throw it out.”

[9:47]  ²⁵ tn Grk “than having.”

[10:25]  ²⁶ tc A few witnesses (˹³ 28 579 pc) read κάμιλον (kamilon, “rope”) for κάμηλον (kamhlon, “camel”), either through accidental misreading of the text or intentionally so as to soften Jesus’ words.

[10:25]  ²⁷ sn The referent of the eye of a needle is a sewing needle. (The gate in Jerusalem known as “The Needle’s Eye” was built during the middle ages and was not in existence in Jesus’ day.) Jesus was speaking rhetorically to point out that apart from God’s intervention, salvation is impossible (v. 27).

[10:48]  ²⁸ tn Or “rebuked.” The crowd’s view was that surely Jesus would not be bothered with someone as unimportant as a blind beggar.

[12:31]  ²⁹ sn A quotation from Lev 19:18.

[12:33]  ³⁰ sn A quotation from Deut 6:5.

[12:33]  ³¹ sn A quotation from Lev 19:18.

[12:40]  ³² tn Grk “who,” continuing the sentence begun in v. 38.

[12:40]  ³³ tn Grk “houses,” “households”; however, the term can have the force of “property” or “possessions” as well (O. Michel, TDNT 5:131; BDAG 695 s.v. οἶκια 1.a).

[12:43]  ³⁴ tn Grk “Truly (ἀμήν, amhn), I say to you.”

[12:43]  ³⁵ tn See the note on the term “offering box” in v. 41.

[12:43]  ³⁶ sn Has put more into the offering box than all the others. With God, giving is weighed evaluatively, not counted. The widow was praised because she gave sincerely and at some considerable cost to herself.

[14:5]  ³⁷ tn Here γάρ (gar) has not been translated.

[14:5]  ³⁸ tn Grk “three hundred denarii.” One denarius was the standard day’s wage, so the value exceeded what a laborer could earn in a year (taking in to account Sabbaths and feast days when no work was done).

[14:5]  ³⁹ tn The words “the money” are not in the Greek text, but are implied (as the proceeds from the sale of the perfumed oil).

[14:5]  ⁴⁰ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate the implied result of previous action(s) in the narrative.

[14:31]  ⁴¹ tn Grk “he”; the referent (Peter) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[14:31]  ⁴² tn Grk “said emphatically.”