The Fallible Study Bible

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Mark16:1–8

The Resurrection

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Mark 16:1–8 — The Resurrection. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.

1

When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so they could go and anoint the body of Jesus.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

Kai tou sabbatou diagenomenou Maria hē Magdalēnē kai Maria hē tou Iakōbou kai Salōmē ēgorasan arōmata hina elthousai aleipsōsin auton

Word by word20 · parsed
ΚαὶKaiWhenG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
τοῦtoutheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Singular
σαββάτουsabbatouSabbathG4521
√ σάββατον — the Sabbath (iNounGenitive Neuter Singular
διαγενομένουdiagenomenouwas overG1230
√ διαγίνομαι — to elapse meanwhileVerbAorist Participle MiddleGenitive Neuter Singular
diaginomai: to elapse meanwhile A rare verb (three verses in the New Testament; the Verifier finds its only other occurrences at Acts 25:13 and Acts 27:9, both marking a stretch of waiting time that has run its course). Mark uses it for the one interval in the Gospel that no disciple could shorten: the Sabbath in which the Lord of the Sabbath lay dead. The genitive absolute makes the ended Sabbath the hinge on which the whole scene turns.
ΜαρίαMariaMaryG3137
√ Μαρία — Maria or Mariam (iNounNominative Feminine Singular
ἡhēG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Feminine Singular
ΜαγδαληνὴMagdalēnēMagdaleneG3094
√ Μαγδαληνή — a female Magdalene, iNounNominative Feminine Singular
καὶkaiG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ΜαρίαMariaMaryG3137
√ Μαρία — Maria or Mariam (iNounNominative Feminine Singular
ἡhēthe [mother]G3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Feminine Singular
τοῦtouG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Masculine Singular
ἸακώβουIakōbouof JamesG2385
√ Ἰάκωβος — Jacobus, the name of three IsraelitesNounGenitive Masculine Singular
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ΣαλώμηSalōmēSalomeG4539
√ Σαλώμη — Salome (iNounNominative Feminine Singular
ἠγόρασανēgorasanboughtG59
√ ἀγοράζω — properly, to go to market, iVerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
agorazō: to buy in the market The commercial verb, aorist. Gill records that Jerusalem had a market quarter given over to spices, and that buying and anointing were forbidden on the Sabbath, which is why the purchase waits. The detail is the opposite of pious legend: it is the cost and errand of women who expect to find a corpse.
ἀρώματαarōmataspicesG759
√ ἄρωμα — an aromaticNounAccusative Neuter Plural
arōma: an aromatic Rare in the New Testament (four verses). The Verifier ties this verse to Luke 23:56 and John 19:40, where the same word covers the hurried Friday embalming by Joseph and Nicodemus. Pulpit reconstructs that first stage from John 19:39, myrrh and aloes wrapped in the linen bands, and reads this verse as "a further stage in the embalming." The spices are evidence of unbelief in the best sense: love doing what love can for the dead.
ἵναhinasoG2443
√ ἵνα — compare G3588 (ὁ))Conjunction
ἐλθοῦσαιelthousaithey could goG2064
√ ἔρχομαι — to come or go (in a great variety of applications, literally and figuratively)VerbAorist Participle ActiveNominative Feminine Plural
ἀλείψωσινaleipsōsin[and] anointG218
√ ἀλείφω — to oil (with perfume)VerbAorist Subjunctive Active3rd Person Plural
aleiphō: to oil with perfume Aorist subjunctive after hina. Not chriō, the verb behind "Christ," but the ordinary word for oiling a body. Barnes draws the evidential conclusion the text itself will not let us avoid: the errand "is proof that they did not suppose he would rise again," and their lack of expectation strengthens rather than weakens the testimony that follows.
αὐτόνauton[the body of Jesus]G846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounAccusative Masculine 3rd Person Singular
Bare pronoun; BSB supplies the antecedent.
2

Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they went to the tomb.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

kai lian prōi tē mia tōn sabbatōn tou hēliou anateilantos erchontai epi to mnēmeion

Word by word14 · parsed
καὶkaiG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
λίανlianVeryG3029
√ λίαν — much (adverbially)Adverb
Intensifying adverb, "exceedingly."
πρωῒprōiearlyG4404
√ πρωΐ — at dawnAdverb
prōi: at dawn The word for the last watch of the night. Maclaren's reading of the pair of time notes is worth more than a harmonizing scheme: "Sorrow wakes early, and love is impatient to bring its tribute," and the very vagueness of the notes, he argues, tells for the story rather than against it.
τῇtēon theG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleDative Feminine Singular
μιᾷmiafirst [day]G1520
√ εἷς — oneAdjectiveDative Feminine Singular
τῶνtōnof theG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Plural
σαββάτωνsabbatōnweekG4521
√ σάββατον — the Sabbath (iNounGenitive Neuter Plural
sabbaton: the Sabbath, hence the week The same lexeme that ended the previous verse now names the new week. Mark's clock has turned: the day that shut the women in has become the measure of the day that lets them out. The Verifier links this word to Luke 24:1, Luke 23:56 and John 20:1, the other Gospel accounts of the same morning.
τοῦtouG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Masculine Singular
ἡλίουhēlioujust after sunriseG2246
√ ἥλιος — perhaps akin to the alternate of G138 (αἱρέομαι))NounGenitive Masculine Singular
ἀνατείλαντοςanateilantos. . .G393
√ ἀνατέλλω — to (cause to) ariseVerbAorist Participle ActiveGenitive Masculine Singular
anatellō: to cause to arise, to rise The ordinary verb for sunrise. Gill preserves an older reading that hears more in it, citing Mede that the women came at the rising "of the sun of righteousness," though Gill himself prefers "the natural sun." We follow Gill's own preference; the figural hearing is noted, not asserted.
ἔρχονταιerchontaithey wentG2064
√ ἔρχομαι — to come or go (in a great variety of applications, literally and figuratively)VerbPresent Indicative Middle or Passive3rd Person Plural
ἐπὶepitoG1909
√ ἐπί — properly, meaning superimposition (of time, place, order, etcPreposition
τὸtotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Neuter Singular
μνημεῖονmnēmeiontombG3419
√ μνημεῖον — a remembrance, iNounAccusative Neuter Singular
mnēmeion: a remembrance, a tomb Literally a memorial, a thing built to keep a dead man remembered. Mark will use the word four times in these eight verses (vv. 2, 3, 5, 8), and each time it is the destination or the thing fled from. The whole unit is the story of a memorial that failed at its one job.
3

They were asking one another, “Who will roll away the stone from the entrance of the tomb?”

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

kai elegon pros heautas Tis apokylisei ton lithon hēmin ek tēs thyras tou mnēmeiou

Word by word14 · parsed
καὶkaiG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἔλεγονelegonThey were askingG2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbImperfect Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
legō/epō: to say Imperfect, the tense of a worry repeated. JFB catches the pastoral point without allegorizing it away: they were asking "as they were approaching the sacred spot," and the difficulty they rehearsed the whole way had already been removed before they arrived.
πρὸςprosG4314
√ πρός — a preposition of directionPreposition
ἑαυτάςheautasone anotherG1438
√ ἑαυτοῦ — him- (her-, it-, them-, also (in conjunction with the personal pronoun of the other persons) my-, thy-, our-, your-) self (selves), etcReflexive PronounAccusative Feminine 3rd Person Plural
ΤίςTisWhoG5101
√ τίς — an interrogative pronoun, who, which or what (in direct or indirect questions)Interrogative / Indefinite PronounNominative Masculine Singular
ἀποκυλίσειapokyliseiwill roll awayG617
√ ἀποκυλίω — to roll awayVerbFuture Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
apokyliō: to roll away A rare compound (four verses in the New Testament). The future indicative here is answered by the perfect passive in v. 4: what they ask who will do has already been done, and by no one they can name. The Verifier ties this lexeme to Matthew 28:2 and Luke 24:2, the two other tellings of the same morning.
τὸνtontheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Masculine Singular
λίθονlithonstoneG3037
√ λίθος — a stone (literally or figuratively)NounAccusative Masculine Singular
lithos: a stone The obstacle the women can measure. Gill adds a second anxiety the English cannot carry: by the traditions recorded in the Mishnah tractate Oholot, touching such a stone would defile them, so the question may be not only who is strong enough but who may lawfully touch it.
ἡμῖνhēminG1473
√ ἐγώ — I, mePersonal / Possessive PronounDative 1st Person Plural
ἐκekfromG1537
√ ἐκ — literal or figurativePreposition
τῆςtēstheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Feminine Singular
θύραςthyrasentranceG2374
√ θύρα — a portal or entrance (the opening or the closure, literally or figuratively)NounGenitive Feminine Singular
thyra: a portal, the opening or the closure The lexicon holds both senses at once, and the scene needs both: the door is the way in and the thing blocking the way in. Mark's only other use of this word near here is Mark 15:46, where Joseph rolled the stone to the door, which the Verifier records as a shared lexeme link.
τοῦtouof theG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Singular
μνημείουmnēmeioutombG3419
√ μνημεῖον — a remembrance, iNounGenitive Neuter Singular
4

But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away, even though it was extremely large.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

kai anablepsasai theōrousin hoti ho lithos apokekylistai gar ēn sphodra megas

Word by word11 · parsed
καὶkaiButG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἀναβλέψασαιanablepsasaiwhen they looked upG308
√ ἀναβλέπω — to look upVerbAorist Participle ActiveNominative Feminine Plural
anablepō: to look up The same verb Mark uses elsewhere for the recovery of sight. Here it is literal, but the placement is exact: the women's eyes go up, and what they see is the one thing they had agreed was impossible for them.
θεωροῦσινtheōrousinthey sawG2334
√ θεωρέω — to be a spectator of, iVerbPresent Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
theōreō: to be a spectator of The verb of sustained looking, from which our "theatre." It recurs at Mark 16:5 in the sister verb eidon. Mark is building the evidence by degrees: first they gaze at an opened door, then they see who is sitting inside.
ὅτιhotithatG3754
√ ὅτι — demonstrative, that (sometimes redundant)Conjunction
ὁhotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
λίθοςlithosstoneG3037
√ λίθος — a stone (literally or figuratively)NounNominative Masculine Singular
ἀποκεκύλισταιapokekylistaihad been rolled awayG617
√ ἀποκυλίω — to roll awayVerbPerfect Indicative Middle or Passive3rd Person Singular
apokyliō: to roll away (perfect) The theological weight of the verse sits in this tense and voice. The question of v. 3 was future and active, "who will roll?"; the answer is perfect and passive, "it stands rolled away." No human agent appears anywhere in the unit. Greek grammar here does what the angel's word will do in v. 6: it removes the deed from human hands without yet naming the hand that did it.
γὰρgareven thoughG1063
√ γάρ — properly, assigning a reason (used in argument, explanation or intensificationConjunction
ἦνēnit wasG1510
√ εἰμί — I exist (used only when emphatic)VerbImperfect Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
σφόδραsphodraextremelyG4970
√ σφόδρα — of uncertain derivation) as adverbAdverb
Intensifying adverb with megas: "exceedingly."
μέγαςmegaslargeG3173
√ μέγας — big (literally or figuratively, in a very wide application)AdjectiveNominative Masculine Singular
megas: big, great Mark's last measurement of the obstacle. Cambridge notes that the size is itself part of the evidence, since a stone that large could be seen to be out of place from a distance and "about this fact there could be no doubt." The greatness that made the problem insoluble is what makes the solution unmistakable.
5

When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

Kai eiselthousai eis to mnēmeion eidon neaniskon peribeblēmenon leukēn stolēn kathēmenon en tois dexiois kai exethambēthēsan

Word by word16 · parsed
ΚαὶKaiWhenG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
εἰσελθοῦσαιeiselthousaithey enteredG1525
√ εἰσέρχομαι — to enter (literally or figuratively)VerbAorist Participle ActiveNominative Feminine Plural
eiserchomai: to enter Gill devotes an unusual amount of space to proving from the Mishnah tractate Bava Bathra that Jewish rock tombs were built with a court and cave large enough to walk into, precisely so that this verb can be taken literally. The women went inside.
εἰςeis. . .G1519
√ εἰς — to or into (indicating the point reached or entered), of place, time, or (figuratively) purpose (result, etcPreposition
τὸtotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Neuter Singular
μνημεῖονmnēmeiontombG3419
√ μνημεῖον — a remembrance, iNounAccusative Neuter Singular
εἶδονeidonthey sawG3708
√ ὁράω — by extension, to attend toVerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
νεανίσκονneaniskona young manG3495
√ νεανίσκος — a youth (under forty)NounAccusative Masculine Singular
neaniskos: a youth (under forty) Mark's restraint is the point: he describes what the eye saw. JFB reads the youth as real information about the messenger, "in the bloom of a life that knows no decay," and Maclaren builds a whole sermon on it, that immortal youth belongs to those beings Scripture shows as our elder brethren. The figure is described in terms that recall Daniel 10:5-6; Mark does not quote Daniel, so we record resemblance, not citation.
περιβεβλημένονperibeblēmenondressed inG4016
√ περιβάλλω — to throw all around, iVerbPerfect Participle Middle or PassiveAccusative Masculine Singular
periballō: to throw all around, to clothe Perfect participle. The passive form leaves the clothier unnamed, as the perfect in v. 4 left the stone-roller unnamed. The messenger did not dress himself for this errand any more than he rolled the stone for it.
λευκήνleukēna whiteG3022
√ λευκός — whiteAdjectiveAccusative Feminine Singular
στολὴνstolēnrobeG4749
√ στολή — equipment, iNounAccusative Feminine Singular
stolē: a full-length robe Rare in the New Testament (nine verses). Taken together with leukos (white) and periballō, this is the exact vocabulary the Verifier finds at Revelation 7:9 and 7:13, where the robed multitude are those who come out of the great tribulation. The tomb holds the first of the white robes.
καθήμενονkathēmenonsittingG2521
√ κάθημαι — and (to sitVerbPresent Participle Middle or PassiveAccusative Masculine Singular
ἐνenonG1722
√ ἐν — "in," at, (up-)on, by, etcPreposition
τοῖςtoistheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleDative Neuter Plural
δεξιοῖςdexioisright sideG1188
√ δεξιός — the right side or (feminine) hand (as that which usually takes)AdjectiveDative Neuter Plural
dexios: the right side JFB notes that this detail is peculiar to Mark and reads it as oriented to where the body had lain; Gill draws the same inference in reverse, that the detail tells us which side of the door Christ had been laid on. A dative plural of place, and the one piece of eyewitness furniture in the account.
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἐξεθαμβήθησανexethambēthēsanthey were alarmedG1568
√ ἐκθαμβέω — to astonish utterlyVerbAorist Indicative Passive3rd Person Plural
ekthambeō: to astonish utterly (aorist passive) One of Mark's own words: of its four New Testament verses, three are his, and the Verifier links this verse to Mark 9:15 (the crowd astonished at Jesus coming down from the mountain) and Mark 14:33 (Jesus himself began to be greatly astonished in Gethsemane). The same word covers the Lord's horror in the garden and the women's shock at the empty grave. Cambridge points the reader to Mark 9:15 for its force; Henry gives the pastoral reading, that "many times that which should be matter of comfort to us, through our own mistake, proves a terror to us."
6

But he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here! See the place where they put Him.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

de ho legei autais Mē ekthambeisthe zēteite Iēsoun ton Nazarēnon ton estaurōmenon ēgerthē estin ouk hōde ide ho topos hopou ethēkan auton

Word by word22 · parsed
δὲdeButG1161
√ δέ — but, and, etcConjunction
ὁhoG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
λέγειlegeihe saidG3004
√ λέγω — properly, to "lay" forth, iVerbPresent Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
αὐταῖςautaisto themG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounDative Feminine 3rd Person Plural
ΜὴMē{Do} notG3361
√ μή — (adverb) not, (conjunction) lestAdverb
ἐκθαμβεῖσθεekthambeisthebe alarmedG1568
√ ἐκθαμβέω — to astonish utterlyVerbPresent Imperative Middle or Passive2nd Person Plural
ekthambeō: to astonish utterly The messenger's first word answers their condition, not their question. Present imperative with the negative: not "never be amazed" but "stop." Mark will nonetheless end the unit in v. 8 with the women still shaking, which is one of the reasons his resurrection account reads so unlike a legend.
ζητεῖτεzēteiteYou are looking forG2212
√ ζητέω — to seek (literally or figuratively)VerbPresent Indicative Active2nd Person Plural
zēteō: to seek Present indicative, and the object stands first for emphasis: Jesus is whom you are seeking. The seeking is ongoing, right in its object and wrong in its address; they want the true person in an impossible condition and at a vacated address. Luke's telling of the same exchange sharpens it into a question about seeking the living among the dead (Luke 24:5). Mark simply lets the next two titles do the correcting.
ἸησοῦνIēsounJesusG2424
√ Ἰησοῦς — Jesus (iNounAccusative Masculine Singular
τὸνtontheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Masculine Singular
ΝαζαρηνὸνNazarēnonNazareneG3479
√ Ναζαρηνός — a Nazarene, iNounAccusative Masculine Singular
Nazarēnos: a Nazarene The village name, the humblest identification available, and it is the one kept at the moment of glory. The messenger does not say "the Lord" or "the Son of God"; he hands the women back the man from Nazareth they had followed and buried. It is the title the unclean spirit used at Mark 1:24 and the title the servant girl used against Peter in the courtyard at Mark 14:67, the last time anyone in this Gospel said it aloud. The word that convicted Peter is now inside the message sent to him.
τὸνtonwhoG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Masculine Singular
ἐσταυρωμένονestaurōmenonwas crucifiedG4717
√ σταυρόω — to impale on the crossVerbPerfect Participle Middle or PassiveAccusative Masculine Singular
stauroō: to impale on a cross (perfect participle) The perfect tense makes crucifixion a permanent attribute of the risen one, not a stage he has passed through. Henry states the resulting paradox in six words: "He was crucified, but he is glorified." The marks do not get argued away.
ἠγέρθηēgerthēHe has risenG1453
√ ἐγείρω — to waken (transitively or intransitively), iVerbAorist Indicative Passive3rd Person Singular
egeirō: to waken, to raise (aorist passive) The hinge of the unit and of the Gospel. A divine passive: the one who was acted upon at the cross is acted upon again, this time by God. Cambridge is honest about the limit of the evidence, "When exactly He had risen no man knoweth, for no man saw," and equally firm that the fact "did not admit of doubt." Note what the sentence does not say: not that he escaped death, but that he was raised out of it.
ἔστινestinHe isG1510
√ εἰμί — I exist (used only when emphatic)VerbPresent Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
οὐκouknotG3756
√ οὐ — the absolute negative (compare G3361 (μή)) adverbAdverb
ὧδεhōdehereG5602
√ ὧδε — in this same spot, iAdverb
ἴδεideSeeG2400
√ ἰδού — used as imperative lo!VerbAorist Imperative Active2nd Person Singular
idou/ide: behold! A fossilized imperative used as a pointer. The messenger's evidence is an absence, and he makes the women look at it.
ὁhotheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleNominative Masculine Singular
τόποςtoposplaceG5117
√ τόπος — a spot (general in space, but limited by occupancyNounNominative Masculine Singular
topos: a spot, a place Nominative after ide. The last thing Mark's tomb contains is a location. Cambridge: the place "did not contain Him now." Pulpit presses the evidential force: "Who does not see here how irrefragable is the evidence of his resurrection?"
ὅπουhopouwhereG3699
√ ὅπου — what(-ever) where, iAdverb
ἔθηκανethēkanthey putG5087
√ τίθημι — to place (in the widest application, literally and figurativelyVerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
tithēmi: to place, to lay Aorist active, third person plural, with an unnamed "they": the burial party of Mark 15:46. Human hands laid him; no human hand raised him.
αὐτόνautonHimG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounAccusative Masculine 3rd Person Singular
7

But go, tell His disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see Him, just as He told you.’”

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

alla hypagete eipate autou tois mathētais kai tō Petrō hoti Proagei hymas eis tēn Galilaian ekei opsesthe auton kathōs eipen hymin

Word by word21 · parsed
ἀλλὰallaButG235
√ ἀλλά — properly, other things, iConjunction
ὑπάγετεhypagetegoG5217
√ ὑπάγω — to lead (oneself) under, iVerbPresent Imperative Active2nd Person Plural
hypagō: to lead oneself under, to go away Present imperative. The women are the first commissioned messengers of the resurrection, sent by word before any of the Eleven have heard it.
εἴπατεeipatetellG2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbAorist Imperative Active2nd Person Plural
epō: to say Aorist imperative. The content of the errand is speech, not service: the spices they bought in v. 1 are never opened, and the commission replaces the errand they came on. This is also the sharpest tension in the unit, since v. 8 reports that the women said nothing to no one. Mark hands them a command to speak and then closes on their silence, and he does not smooth the two together.
αὐτοῦautouHisG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounGenitive Masculine 3rd Person Singular
τοῖςtoisG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleDative Masculine Plural
μαθηταῖςmathētaisdisciplesG3101
√ μαθητής — a learner, iNounDative Masculine Plural
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
τῷtōG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleDative Masculine Singular
ΠέτρῳPetrōPeterG4074
√ Πέτρος — a (piece of) rock (larger than G3037 (λίθος))NounDative Masculine Singular
Petros: a rock (larger than lithos) Two words peculiar to Mark. Barnes states the pastoral logic: it would have been just for the Lord to cast Peter off after the denial, and instead "he sent him this special message." Pulpit quotes Gregory the Great: "If the angel had not named Peter, he would not have dared to come amongst the disciples." Maclaren adds that this was the first of a series ending in a private interview attested at Luke 24:34 and 1 Corinthians 15:5.
ὅτιhotiG3754
√ ὅτι — demonstrative, that (sometimes redundant)Conjunction
ΠροάγειProageiHe is going ahead ofG4254
√ προάγω — to lead forward (magisterially)VerbPresent Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
proagō: to lead forward Present indicative. Cambridge traces the same verb through Mark's Gospel: used by Jesus himself on the night of the betrayal (Mark 14:28), used of the star going before the Magi, and used of Jesus walking ahead of the Twelve on the road to Jerusalem at Mark 10:32. The shepherd who was struck and whose sheep were scattered (Mark 14:27, quoting Zechariah 13:7) is now out in front of the flock again.
ὑμᾶςhymasyouG4771
√ σύ — thouPersonal / Possessive PronounAccusative 2nd Person Plural
εἰςeisintoG1519
√ εἰς — to or into (indicating the point reached or entered), of place, time, or (figuratively) purpose (result, etcPreposition
τὴνtēnG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleAccusative Feminine Singular
ΓαλιλαίανGalilaianGalileeG1056
√ Γαλιλαία — Galilæa (iNounAccusative Feminine Singular
Galilaia: Galilee Not Jerusalem, the city of the cross and the temple, but the northern province where the Gospel began at Mark 1:14. The risen Lord sends the disciples back to the beginning. Pulpit: he would honour again the country he had honoured before his resurrection.
ἐκεῖekeiThereG1563
√ ἐκεῖ — thereAdverb
ὄψεσθεopsestheyou will seeG3708
√ ὁράω — by extension, to attend toVerbFuture Indicative Middle2nd Person Plural
horaō: to see, to attend to Future middle, a promise.
αὐτὸνautonHimG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounAccusative Masculine 3rd Person Singular
καθὼςkathōsjust asG2531
√ καθώς — just (or inasmuch) as, thatAdverb
kathōs: just as The word that makes the message a fulfilment rather than an announcement. Gill and Cambridge both refer it back to Mark 14:28. The messenger's authority rests not on his appearance but on the fact that the risen one had already said this.
εἶπενeipenHe toldG2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
ὑμῖνhyminyouG4771
√ σύ — thouPersonal / Possessive PronounDative 2nd Person Plural
8

So the women left the tomb and ran away, trembling and bewildered. And in their fear they did not say a word to anyone.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Greek — tap a word ↓

Kai exelthousai apo tou mnēmeiou ephygon gar eichen tromos autas kai ekstasis kai gar ephobounto eipan ouden oudeni

Word by word18 · parsed
ΚαὶKaiSoG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἐξελθοῦσαιexelthousai[the women] leftG1831
√ ἐξέρχομαι — to issue (literally or figuratively)VerbAorist Participle ActiveNominative Feminine Plural
ἀπὸapo. . .G575
√ ἀπό — "off," iPreposition
τοῦtoutheG3588
√ ὁ — the (sometimes to be supplied, at others omitted, in English idiom)ArticleGenitive Neuter Singular
μνημείουmnēmeioutombG3419
√ μνημεῖον — a remembrance, iNounGenitive Neuter Singular
ἔφυγονephygonand ran awayG5343
√ φεύγω — to run away (literally or figuratively)VerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
pheugō: to run away Aorist. The same thing the disciples did at the arrest (Mark 14:50). Mark's Gospel has now recorded flight from the garden and flight from the grave.
γὰρgarG1063
√ γάρ — properly, assigning a reason (used in argument, explanation or intensificationConjunction
εἶχενeichenvvvG2192
√ ἔχω — to hold (used in very various applications, literally or figuratively, direct or remoteVerbImperfect Indicative Active3rd Person Singular
echō: to hold Imperfect singular with a compound subject. The grammar is the theology of the verse: the women are not feeling emotions, the emotions are holding them.
τρόμοςtromostremblingG5156
√ τρόμος — a "trembling", iNounNominative Masculine Singular
tromos: a trembling Rare (five verses in the New Testament). Cambridge notes it "occurs nowhere else in the Four Gospels." The Verifier links it to Philippians 2:12, where Paul tells the Philippians to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling. Mark's is involuntary terror at a fact; Paul's is a posture before a work of God. The lexeme is the same, the register is not.
αὐτὰςautasG846
√ αὐτός — the reflexive pronoun self, used (alone or in the comparative G1438 (ἑαυτοῦ)) of the third person , and (with the proper personal pronoun) of the other personsPersonal / Possessive PronounAccusative Feminine 3rd Person Plural
καὶkaiandG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
ἔκστασιςekstasisbewilderedG1611
√ ἔκστασις — a displacement of the mind, iNounNominative Feminine Singular
ekstasis: a displacement of the mind The word from which "ecstasy" comes, and it will not be reduced to either fear or joy. Gill, following Matthew 28:8, holds that the dread was mixed with joy at the news; Cambridge calls it "a tumult of rapture and alarm." Mark himself declines to sort it out.
καὶkaiAndG2532
√ καί — and, also, even, so then, too, etcConjunction
γάρgarvvvG1063
√ γάρ — properly, assigning a reason (used in argument, explanation or intensificationConjunction
ἐφοβοῦντοephobountoin their fearG5399
√ φοβέω — to frighten, iVerbImperfect Indicative Middle or Passive3rd Person Plural
phobeō: to frighten, to fear Imperfect. Two readings of the silence stand side by side in the sources, and both are guesses. Gill and Pulpit make it fear of the Jews, lest the women be charged with stealing the body; Cambridge makes it the simple speechlessness of people who have seen something unheard of. The text gives the fear and withholds its object.
εἶπανeipanthey did not sayG2036
√ ἔπω — to speak or say (by word or writing)VerbAorist Indicative Active3rd Person Plural
οὐδὲνouden. . .G3762
√ οὐδείς — not even one (man, woman or thing), iAdjectiveAccusative Neuter Singular
οὐδενὶoudeni[a word to anyone]G3762
√ οὐδείς — not even one (man, woman or thing), iAdjectiveDative Masculine Singular
oudeis: not even one Doubled for emphasis. Cambridge limits the silence sensibly: "on their way to the Holy City they did not open their lips to any passers by they chanced to meet," since v. 7 had commissioned them to speak to the disciples, and Matthew 28:8 records that they did.

The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.

⚙

Grand Commentary — the unit, read whole

synthesis · verify

AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.

i. Spices bought for a corpse: the unbelief that makes the witness good — Mark 16:1-2

⚙ Mark opens the resurrection with a shopping errand. ἠγόρασαν ἀρώματα (ēgorasan arōmata, G59 with G759) is market language: three named women spend money on burial aromatics the moment the Sabbath has run out (διαγενομένου, G1230, a verb used only three times in the New Testament, and elsewhere only of stretches of waiting time at Acts 25:13 and Acts 27:9). Barnes draws the evidential point without embellishment: the errand "is proof that they did not suppose he would rise again," and their lack of expectation "gives more strength to the evidence for his resurrection." Maclaren says the same thing from the inside, that the women's despair was as complete as their love was faithful, and that the waves of sorrow had washed the Lord's own predictions clean out of their minds. Pulpit, reading John 19:39 alongside, treats this purchase as the second stage of an embalming begun in haste on Friday by Joseph and Nicodemus. The sources disagree about the timing of the purchase (JFB argues from Luke 23:56 for a Friday evening buy, Pulpit insists on the plain aorist and a Saturday evening one), and we leave the disagreement standing. On the hour of arrival they disagree again: BSB's "just after sunrise" translates a genitive absolute, τοῦ ἡλίου ἀνατείλαντος, which Ellicott renders "when the sun had risen" and then softens with a morning haze to fit Matthew's "while it was yet dark," while JFB simply says the phrase means "at earliest dawn." Maclaren's comment on all of this is the wisest in the file: in the whirl of that morning, who was at leisure to note the exact minute, and are these discrepancies not worth more than a manufactured accord?

ii. The question in the future active, the answer in the perfect passive — Mark 16:3-4

⚙ The women's one anxiety is grammatically exact: Τίς ἀποκυλίσει ἡμῖν (Tis apokylisei hēmin), "Who will roll away for us?" Future tense, active voice, an agent wanted, and a dative of interest that BSB drops. Pulpit measures the obstacle from the archaeology of Palestinian rock tombs, a covering stone "probably not less than six feet in breadth and three in height"; Gill adds a second difficulty invisible in English, that by the tradition recorded in the Mishnah tractate Oholot such a stone would defile the one who touched it. Gill and Cambridge both note what the women did not know: the sealing and the guard of Matthew 27:62-66 were arranged on the Sabbath, while these women rested. Then v. 4 answers in the opposite grammar. ἀποκεκύλισται (apokekylistai) is perfect indicative middle or passive: it stands rolled away, the deed done, the doer unnamed. JFB supplies the inference the tense invites, "the stone already rolled away by an unseen hand," and then turns preacher, asking whether others advancing to duty in the face of appalling difficulties do not find their stone also rolled away. We mark that turn: the tense is textual, the application is homiletic. Ellicott contributes a small honest note on the γὰρ that follows: it may explain the women's anxiety (so Barnes and Gill) or it may be Mark's own explanation of why he wrote "rolled" rather than "taken" away. BSB chooses a third option, "even though," which the particle does not carry.

iii. A young man in a white robe, and a verb Mark reserves for dread — Mark 16:5

⚙ Mark does not write "angel" here. He writes νεανίσκον (neaniskon, G3495, a youth), and Ellicott states the difference exactly: "So St. Mark describes the form which St. Matthew simply calls an angel of the Lord." Mark reports what the eye took in; Matthew reports what the figure was. JFB reads the youth as genuine information, a messenger "in the bloom of a life that knows no decay," and Maclaren turns it into a meditation on immortal youth among our elder brethren. Cambridge preserves Wyclif's rendering of the robe, "hilid with a whit stoole," and Gill spends a page proving from Bava Bathra that a Jewish rock tomb had a court and cave a person could walk into, so that "entering" may be taken at face value. Poole, who does not pretend to have solved the differences among the four accounts, offers two possible harmonizations of one angel against two and lets both stand. And the women's reaction, ἐξεθαμβήθησαν (G1568, aorist passive), is a word peculiar to Mark: three of its four New Testament verses are his, and the Verifier links this one to Mark 9:15, the crowd astonished at Jesus descending the mountain, and Mark 14:33, where Jesus himself began to be greatly astonished in Gethsemane. Henry gives the pastoral reading: many times that which should be matter of comfort to us, through our own mistake, proves a terror to us.

iv. He was raised: a divine passive and a crucified name — Mark 16:6

⚙ The sentence on which the unit turns is three Greek words, and English versions including BSB soften two of them. ἠγέρθη (ēgerthē, G1453) is aorist passive: not "he has risen" but "he was raised," the act of another, done once and finished. And the one raised keeps a perfect participle for a name: τὸν ἐσταυρωμένον, the having-been-crucified one, which JFB renders as a title, "the Nazarene, the Crucified." Henry states the resulting paradox as tersely as it can be stated: "He was crucified, but he is glorified." Cambridge is scrupulous about what the text does and does not give: "When exactly He had risen no man knoweth, for no man saw," and yet the fact "did not admit of doubt," and the tomb, though it once held him by kindly hands, "did not contain Him now." Pulpit presses the evidence harder than we would, asking who does not see how irrefragable it is; we note that the narrative supplies an empty place and a messenger's word, and that weighing them is the reader's work. The one word of comfort comes first and is a command about a feeling: Μὴ ἐκθαμβεῖσθε, a present imperative, stop being astonished. JFB observes it is a stronger word than Matthew's "Fear not." It does not work: v. 8 will find them still shaking.

v. And Peter: two words no other Gospel has — Mark 16:7

⚙ καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ (kai tō Petrō) is Mark's alone; Matthew's version of the same message has only "tell his disciples." Maclaren says the added words "must have come like wine and oil to the bruised heart of the denier." Barnes reasons from the denial: it would have been right for the Lord to cast Peter off, and instead he sent him this special message. Pulpit quotes Gregory the Great, that had the angel not named Peter, he would not have dared to come among the disciples. Benson, quoting Whitby, reads the naming as consolation rather than primacy, an explicitly Protestant reading offered against a Roman one, and we flag it as controversy rather than grammar. JFB, Gill and Cambridge all connect the clause to the ancient tradition that this Gospel was drawn up under Peter's eye, and Cambridge asks who else would have treasured up this word, the pledge of possible forgiveness, after the hours he spent between Friday night and Sunday. The promise that follows is a shepherd's: Προάγει (Proagei, G4254, present indicative, "he is going before you"), which Cambridge glosses "as a true Shepherd before His sheep" and traces back to the same verb on the night of the betrayal at Mark 14:28. The flock scattered when the shepherd was struck (Mark 14:27, quoting Zechariah 13:7); the risen shepherd is already on the road north.

vi. Trembling and ecstasy held them — Mark 16:8

⚙ Mark ends the unit in the grammar of possession. εἶχεν is a third person singular imperfect governing a double subject, so that "trembling and ecstasy" act as one force upon the women: Ellicott, "trembling and amazement seized them"; JFB, "tremor and amazement seized them"; Cambridge, "trembling and amazement possessed them." BSB's adjectives ("trembling and bewildered") make the women the agents of their own state, which is precisely what the Greek denies. ἔκστασις (G1611) the lexicon glosses as "a displacement of the mind"; Pulpit renders the pair "agitation and ecstasy," Cambridge calls it "a tumult of rapture and alarm" and points back to Mark 5:42 for the same word at the raising of Jairus's daughter. τρόμος (G5156) Cambridge notes "occurs nowhere else in the Four Gospels." Gill and Pulpit read the silence as fear of the Jews and a possible charge of body-snatching, which is reconstruction; Cambridge limits the silence to the road, "they did not open their lips to any passers by they chanced to meet," which squares with Matthew 28:8. The clause that ends it, ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ, is imperfect and unfinished, and in the earliest manuscripts it is where Mark's Gospel stops.

Read under Sola Scriptura — this tool’s own fallible reading (⚙)

⚙ Under Sola Scriptura, offered to be tested and not to be believed on our account: read the eight verses for their grammar alone and the passage is about who acts. Every human verb in this unit is small and futile. The women buy (aorist), they come (present), they keep asking (imperfect), they look up, they see, they enter, they flee, they say nothing. They carry spices that are never opened. The one act that matters happens in a tense with no subject: ἀποκεκύλισται, it stands rolled away, and ἠγέρθη, he was raised. Mark never names the agent, and he never has to; a passive with no agent in this literature has one agent. The women asked who would roll the stone for them, and the answer given to them is not a stronger pair of hands but a finished deed and an errand. Notice too what is not removed. The risen one is still called the Nazarene and still called τὸν ἐσταυρωμένον, the crucified, in a perfect participle that will not let the cross become past tense. And notice who is named: not the eleven as a body first, but the one man in the group who had publicly denied him. The two words καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ are the only thing in this unit that could not be deduced from the empty tomb. An empty grave proves a power; a message addressed to a denier by name proves a disposition. That is the reading we offer and cannot prove, and the line set apart below is our own synthesis, not Scripture: test both against the text.

The stone was moved before the women arrived, and the denier was named before he asked.

⚙

Canonical Threads — out to the whole of Scripture

cross-refs · verify

AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.

The word Mark keeps for dread: Gethsemane, the mountain, the tomb verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ ἐξεθαμβήθησαν / ἐκθαμβεῖσθε (ekthambeō, G1568) is nearly Mark's private word: of its four New Testament verses, three are his, and both of the others are in this Gospel. At Mark 9:15 the crowd is utterly astonished as Jesus comes down from the mount of transfiguration; at Mark 14:33 the verb describes Jesus himself, who "began to be greatly astonished" in Gethsemane. Cambridge expressly sends the reader back to Mark 9:15 for the force of the word here. The same violent displacement of mind that seized the Lord facing the cup now seizes the women facing the empty shelf, and in v. 6 the messenger commands it to stop. The Verifier confirms the shared lexeme in each case.

Mark 9:15 · Mark 14:33

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G1568 ἐκθαμβέω, rare (in 4 verses total, three of them in Mark). Greek to Greek within one author, so the verbal link is a real lexical repetition; no quotation is claimed.

A rare verb for a stone: the three tellings of the same morning verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ ἀποκυλίω (apokyliō, G617, "to roll away") occurs in only four New Testament verses, and three of them are the three Synoptic accounts of this one hour. Mark uses it twice in two verses, first in the future active of the women's question (v. 3) and then in the perfect passive of the answer (v. 4). Matthew 28:2 uses it of the descending angel; Luke 24:2 uses it, as Mark does, of a stone found already moved. Ellicott notes that Mark's choice of "rolled away" over "taken away" is deliberate enough to need explaining, and Gill observes that the women saw from a distance that the stone lay away from the door. The Verifier records the shared lexeme with both parallels.

Matthew 28:2 · Luke 24:2

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G617 ἀποκυλίω, rare (in 4 verses). Luke 24:2 also shares G3419 μνημεῖον; Matthew 28:2 also shares G3037 λίθος and G3173 μέγας. All Greek to Greek; a lexical parallel between accounts, not a quotation of one by another.

The spices of the burial: Friday's haste and Sunday's errand verbal / quotation: confirmed

⚙ ἄρωμα (arōma, G759) appears in only four New Testament verses, and three of them belong to this burial. John 19:40 has Joseph and Nicodemus binding the body with the spices in haste before the Sabbath; Luke 23:56 has the women preparing spices and then resting according to the commandment; Mark 16:1 has them buying more once the rest has run out. Pulpit reads Mark's verse as "a further stage in the embalming" begun on Friday evening, and Cambridge says the women returned "in order that they might complete the embalming of the Body, which had necessarily been done in haste." Barnes insists the word carries no note of sweetness: these are the bitter aromatics of a corpse. The Verifier confirms the lexeme in each parallel.

Luke 23:56 · John 19:40

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G759 ἄρωμα, rare (in 4 verses); Luke 23:56 also shares G4521 σάββατον. Greek to Greek across independent accounts of the same burial; a lexical link, not a citation.

The white robe: the first of them is worn in a grave structural / thematic: confirmed

⚙ Three words in v. 5 travel together: περιβεβλημένον (periballō, G4016), λευκήν (leukos, G3022) and στολήν (stolē, G4749, rare, in nine verses). The Verifier finds the same cluster at Revelation 7:9 and 7:13, of the multitude clothed in white robes who have come out of the great tribulation. JFB reads the length of the garment through Isaiah 6:1 and its whiteness through Matthew 28:3; Cambridge keeps Wyclif's "whit stoole." The figure is also drawn in the terms Daniel uses at Daniel 10:5-6 for the man clothed in linen, though Mark quotes no line of Daniel and shares no lexeme with him. What the vocabulary does say, and all it says, is that the first white robe in Mark's Gospel is worn by someone sitting inside a tomb.

Revelation 7:9 · Revelation 7:13 · Daniel 10:5-6

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexemes G4016 περιβάλλω (in 23 vv), G4749 στολή (in 9 vv), G3022 λευκός (in 23 vv) with Revelation 7:9 and 7:13. Real lexical overlap within a shared motif of white-robed heavenly figures, but no quotation, so the tier is thematic rather than verbal. Daniel 10:5-6 is Hebrew and can share no Strong's number with Greek; it is listed for the shared imagery only.

Not abandoned to Hades, raised on the third day: the texts Mark does not quote typological

⚙ Psalm 16:10 ("You will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor let Your Holy One see decay") became the apostolic proof text for the empty tomb, and Hosea 6:2 speaks of being raised up on the third day. Mark quotes neither. His whole argument is a place and a passive verb: ἠγέρθη, he was raised. The women came with spices precisely to slow the decay that Psalm 16 says the Holy One would not see, which is why Barnes can treat their errand as evidence, and Cambridge reckons the interval by Jewish counting, Friday night, Saturday and Saturday night, "three days according to the Jewish reckoning." We read the connection as figural and record it as our own: the empty tomb answers those texts, but Mark does not cite them and no shared vocabulary links them.

Psalm 16:10 · Hosea 6:2

basis: Cross-Testament (Hebrew to Greek), so no shared Strong's number is possible and no verbal tier is available. Mark quotes neither text; the link is figural, resting on the apostolic use of Psalm 16:10 for the empty tomb and on Hosea's third-day language. Ancient and widely-held as a reading of the resurrection, but novel as a claim about Mark's own intent, and we do not press it.

The struck shepherd goes before the flock structural / thematic: confirmed

⚙ At Mark 14:27 Jesus quotes Zechariah 13:7, the shepherd struck and the sheep scattered, and in the next breath (Mark 14:28) promises that after he is raised he will go before them into Galilee. The messenger in v. 7 says exactly that, with the same verb, Προάγει (proagō, G4254), and adds καθὼς εἶπεν ὑμῖν, "just as he told you." Cambridge traces the verb through the Gospel and glosses this occurrence "as a true Shepherd before His sheep"; Gill and Pulpit both refer the clause back to Mark 14:28. The scattering of Zechariah 13:7 is undone in the same vocabulary in which it was announced.

Mark 14:27 · Mark 14:28 · Zechariah 13:7

basis: Mark 16:7 repeats the verb G4254 προάγω and the substance of Mark 14:28, and Mark 14:27 explicitly quotes Zechariah 13:7. Because the refs mix a Greek book with a Hebrew one, no verbal tier applies: the shepherd link to Zechariah runs through Mark's own citation at 14:27, not through shared Strong's numbers with 16:7.

Trembling: the same word, two registers structural / thematic: confirmed

⚙ τρόμος (tromos, G5156) appears in only five New Testament verses, and Cambridge notes that this one is its sole occurrence in the four Gospels. Paul uses it at Philippians 2:12 in the phrase that tells believers to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling. The lexeme is shared and the Verifier records it, but the register is not the same: Mark's women are held involuntarily by terror at an unexplained fact, Paul's readers are commanded to a posture before the God who works in them. We record the shared vocabulary and refuse the easy equation.

Philippians 2:12

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexeme G5156 τρόμος (in 5 vv), with G1438 ἑαυτοῦ and G2531 καθώς also shared. Greek to Greek and genuinely rare, but the two uses are different in sense (involuntary terror versus commanded reverence), so we downgrade from verbal to thematic rather than claim a quotation or a deliberate echo.

What comes after the fear: the disputed ending flagged: verify source

⚙ The Verifier lists Mark 16:9 as a candidate neighbour on shared vocabulary (the Sabbath, Mary, Magdalene), which is exactly what one would expect of a paragraph written to continue this one. But the verse stands on contested ground: Mark 16:9-20 is absent from the earliest Greek manuscripts, and its provenance has been disputed since antiquity. Maclaren, writing before the modern consensus hardened, still hedges in the middle of his own exposition, "If the latter part of this chapter be his." We record the lexical continuity the Verifier computed and flag the link rather than build on it. Nothing in this unit's reading depends on how the question is settled: Mark 16:8 ends with an imperfect verb and a conjunction, ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ, and that is where the earliest witnesses stop.

Mark 16:9

basis: Verifier: shared Greek lexemes G4521 σάββατον (in 62 vv), G3137 Μαρία (in 46 vv), G3094 Μαγδαληνή (in 12 vv). The lexical overlap is real, but the textual provenance of Mark 16:9-20 is disputed (absent from the earliest manuscripts), so the link is flagged rather than tiered, and no weight is placed on it.

Spices for a king, three days in the dark typological

⚙ Two older patterns stand behind the surface of vv. 1-2 without being quoted. At 2 Chronicles 16:14 Asa is laid in a bed filled with spices and various kinds of prepared perfumes, the royal burial rite the women were on their way to complete for Jesus. At Jonah 1:17 the prophet is three days and three nights in the belly of the fish, the sign Jesus himself invoked and which Cambridge counts out here as Friday night, Saturday and Saturday night, "three days according to the Jewish reckoning." Neither text is cited by Mark and neither can share a Strong's number with him. We offer both as figural readings, the first ancient and ordinary (a royal burial), the second ancient and widely held on the authority of Matthew 12:40 rather than of Mark.

2 Chronicles 16:14 · Jonah 1:17

basis: Cross-Testament (Hebrew to Greek): no shared Strong's lexeme is possible, and Mark quotes neither passage. The burial-spice link rests on shared practice, the three-days link on the sign of Jonah as applied elsewhere in the Gospels, not on anything in Mark 16:1-8. Figural, and marked as such.

⚙Christ in the Unittypology · verify

AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.

He was raised: the passive that names the Father without naming him ancient/widely-held

⚙ The Gospel's central claim is made in one aorist passive, ἠγέρθη (egeirō, G1453), and no agent is supplied, exactly as no agent was supplied for the stone that ἀποκεκύλισται, stands rolled away. Every active verb in the unit belongs to people who can do nothing: buying, walking, asking, looking, fleeing. The one thing that has been done was done to Jesus. Cambridge is careful about the evidence and unembarrassed about the fact: "When exactly He had risen no man knoweth, for no man saw," and yet the linen lay unrolled, the facecloth folded by itself, and "He had risen even as He had said." Barnes turns the women's unbelief into the strength of the testimony. Henry compresses the whole: "He was crucified, but he is glorified." That the Father raised the Son is the apostolic reading of this passive, and it is what Psalm 16:10 was used to establish; Mark supplies the grammar and leaves the naming to the rest of the canon.

Mark 16:6 · Psalm 16:10

The Crucified is the risen one: a perfect participle for a name ancient/widely-held

⚙ The messenger identifies the missing body twice over, and both titles are humiliations. He is τὸν Ναζαρηνόν, the man from the village, and he is τὸν ἐσταυρωμένον, a perfect passive participle: the having-been-crucified, a completed act with a standing result. JFB renders the pair as one name, "the Nazarene, the Crucified." The tense matters redemptively. Resurrection in Mark does not cancel the cross or leave it behind as a stage; the crucified one is the name the risen one carries out of the tomb, which is why Paul could later preach a Christ crucified and mean a living one. Henry's line holds both without collapsing either: crucified, and glorified.

Mark 16:6

And Peter: the shepherd goes back for the one who denied him ancient/widely-held

⚙ Two words in v. 7 are Mark's alone, καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ. Matthew's angel says only "tell his disciples." Maclaren: the addition "must have come like wine and oil to the bruised heart of the denier." Barnes reasons that it would have been just for the Lord to cast Peter off after the denial and instead he sent this special message. Pulpit records Gregory the Great's judgment that without the naming Peter would not have dared to come among the disciples. Cambridge asks who would have treasured the word up and told it afterwards if not Peter himself, since ancient tradition makes this Gospel Peter's; JFB and Gill say the same. Set beside Προάγει, the shepherd going before his flock into Galilee after Zechariah's shepherd was struck (Mark 14:27-28), the message reads as a deliberate regathering of the scattered, beginning with the worst of them. ⚙ Our own added claim, and the fallible one: an empty tomb demonstrates power, but a name spoken to a denier demonstrates disposition, and Mark gives us both in the same sentence.

Mark 16:7 · Mark 14:27 · Mark 14:28

Galilee: the risen Lord sends them back to where it began novel

⚙ The appointment is not in Jerusalem, the city of the temple and the trial, but in Galilee, where Mark's Gospel opened with the proclamation of the kingdom (Mark 1:14). Pulpit reads it as the honouring again of a country he had honoured before his resurrection; Cambridge notes the same verb προάγω used of the star that went before the Magi and of Jesus walking ahead of the Twelve towards Jerusalem at Mark 10:32. ⚙ Our reading, and it is ours: the risen one does not summon the disciples to a throne, he walks ahead of them back to the ordinary province where they first followed, so that the resurrection is presented as the resumption of a road rather than the end of one. We mark this as a novel framing of an old observation; the shepherd imagery behind it is ancient, the emphasis is our own.

Mark 16:7 · Mark 1:14 · Mark 10:32

Apparatus & Provenance

The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.

Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:

  • Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible (1834)
  • Alexander Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (c. 1905)
  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, — (1880s)
  • Charles Ellicott, Commentary for English Readers (1878)
  • Geneva Study Bible, Marginal Notes (1599)
  • Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory (1871)
  • John Gill, Exposition of the Entire Bible (1746–63)
  • Joseph Benson, Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1810s)
  • Matthew Henry, Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible (1706)
  • Matthew Poole, Annotations upon the Holy Bible (1685)
  • The Pulpit Commentary, Spence & Exell, eds. (1880s)

⚙ Text and scope. This unit covers Mark 16:1-8 only. The verses that follow in most English Bibles (Mark 16:9-20) are absent from the earliest Greek manuscripts and their authorship is disputed; nothing in this synthesis depends on them, and we take no position here beyond noting that the dispute exists. Maclaren himself writes with an explicit "If the latter part of this chapter be his," which shows the question was live in the sources we quote. Mark 16:8 ends in the Greek with ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ, an imperfect verb followed by a conjunction, and in the earliest manuscripts that is where the Gospel stops.

⚙ What is sourced and what is ours. All Greek surface forms, transliterations, glosses, Strong's numbers and parsings come from the Berean interlinear supplied in the brief; the English base text is the Berean Standard Bible; every ✦ quotation is a verbatim contiguous excerpt from public-domain commentary, resolved by anchor rather than retyped. Everything marked ⚙ is machine synthesis and fallible.

⚙ Unresolved in the sources. (1) The timing of the purchase: JFB argues from Luke 23:56 for Friday evening, Pulpit insists on the plain aorist and a Saturday evening buy, Gill allows both. We record the disagreement and do not settle it. (2) The hour of arrival: the genitive absolute says the sun had risen, Matthew says it was yet dark; Ellicott proposes a morning haze, JFB says the phrase means earliest dawn, Poole suggests two separate visits. All three are harmonizations, none is in Mark. (3) One messenger or two: Mark and Matthew have one, Luke and John two; Poole offers two possible reconciliations and commits to neither. (4) The reason for the women's silence: Gill and Pulpit reconstruct fear of a charge of body-snatching, Cambridge limits the silence to the road. Mark names the fear and withholds its object. (5) Cambridge imports Matthew's earthquake into v. 4; Mark records none.

⚙ Threads and tiers. Four threads rest on Verifier-computed shared Strong's lexemes between Greek texts (G1568 ἐκθαμβέω, G617 ἀποκυλίω, G759 ἄρωμα, G5156 τρόμος with G4016/G4749/G3022 for the robe). Three of these are tiered verbal because the lexemes are rare and the texts are Greek to Greek; the robe cluster and the τρόμος link are downgraded to thematic because the sense differs or no citation is in view. Every thread pairing this Gospel with a Hebrew text (Psalm 16:10, Hosea 6:2, Zechariah 13:7, 2 Chronicles 16:14, Jonah 1:17, Daniel 10:5-6) is tiered structural or typological, never verbal: cross-Testament links cannot share a Strong's number, and Mark quotes none of these passages in this unit. Psalm 16:10 and Hosea 6:2 in particular are figural here and marked so, however firmly the apostolic preaching later attached Psalm 16:10 to the empty tomb. We have deliberately not cited 2 Maccabees, which is outside the canon, in connection with the young man in white.

⚙ One further honesty note: Henry's entry in the sources is a single comment covering the whole of 16:1-8 rather than verse-level exposition, so his voice appears once, at the verse where his claim is sharpest.

✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)