Mark 3:24-26

3:24 If ¹  a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom will not be able to stand. 3:25 If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand. 3:26 And if Satan rises against himself and is divided, he is not able to stand and his end has come.

Mark 9:36

9:36 He took a little child and had him stand among them. Taking him in his arms, he said to them,

Mark 11:5

11:5 Some people standing there said to them, “What are you doing, untying that colt?”

Mark 10:49

10:49 Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.” So ²  they called the blind man and said to him, “Have courage! Get up! He is calling you.”

Mark 13:9

Persecution of Disciples

13:9 “You must watch out for yourselves. You will be handed over ³  to councils ⁴  and beaten in the synagogues. ⁵  You will stand before governors and kings ⁶  because of me, as a witness to them.

Mark 9:1

9:1 And he said to them, “I tell you the truth, ⁷  there are some standing here who will not ⁸  experience ⁹  death before they see the kingdom of God come with power.” ¹⁰ 

Mark 13:14

The Abomination of Desolation

13:14 “But when you see the abomination of desolation ¹¹  standing where it should not be (let the reader understand), then those in Judea must flee ¹²  to the mountains.

[3:24]  ¹ sn The three conditional statements in vv. 24-26 express the logical result of the assumption that Jesus heals by Satan’s power, expressed by the religious leaders. The point is clear: If the leaders are correct, then Satan’s kingdom will not stand, so the suggestion makes no sense. Satan would not seek to heal.

[10:49]  ² tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “so” to indicate the implied result of previous action(s) in the narrative.

[13:9]  ³ tn Grk “They will hand you over.” “They” is an indefinite plural, referring to people in general. The parallel in Matt 10:17 makes this explicit.

[13:9]  ⁴ sn Councils in this context refers to local judicial bodies attached to the Jewish synagogue. This group would be responsible for meting out justice and discipline within the Jewish community.

[13:9]  ⁵ sn See the note on synagogue in 1:21.

[13:9]  ⁶ sn These statements look at persecution both from a Jewish context as the mention of councils and synagogues suggests, and from a Gentile one as the reference to governors and kings suggests. Some fulfillment of Jewish persecution can be seen in Acts.

[9:1]  ⁴ tn Grk “Truly (ἀμήν, amhn), I say to you.”

[9:1]  ⁵ tn The Greek negative here (οὐ μή, ou mh) is the strongest possible.

[9:1]  ⁶ tn Grk “will not taste.” Here the Greek verb does not mean “sample a small amount” (as a typical English reader might infer from the word “taste”), but “experience something cognitively or emotionally; come to know something” (cf. BDAG 195 s.v. γεύομαι 2).

[9:1]  ⁷ sn Several suggestions have been made as to the referent for the phrase the kingdom of God come with power: (1) the transfiguration itself, which immediately follows in the narrative; (2) Jesus’ resurrection and ascension; (3) the coming of the Spirit; (4) Jesus’ second coming and the establishment of the kingdom. The reference to after six days in 9:2 seems to indicate that Mark had the transfiguration in mind insofar as it was a substantial prefiguring of the consummation of the kingdom (although this interpretation is not without its problems). As such, the transfiguration was a tremendous confirmation to the disciples that even though Jesus had just finished speaking of his death (8:31; 9:31; 10:33), he was nonetheless the promised Messiah and things were proceeding according to God’s plan.

[13:14]  ⁵ sn The reference to the abomination of desolation is an allusion to Dan 9:27. Though some have seen the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy in the actions of Antiochus IV (or a representative of his) in 167 b.c., the words of Jesus seem to indicate that Antiochus was not the final fulfillment, but that there was (from Jesus’ perspective) still another fulfillment yet to come. Some argue that this was realized in a.d. 70, while others claim that it refers specifically to Antichrist and will not be fully realized until the period of the great tribulation at the end of the age (cf. Mark 13:19, 24; Matt 24:21; Rev 3:10).

[13:14]  ⁶ sn Fleeing to the mountains is a key OT image: Gen 19:17; Judg 6:2; Isa 15:5; Jer 16:16; Zech 14:5.