Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Mark 6:21

γενομένης ἡμέρας εὐκαίρου. Mk has the deadly enmity of Herodias in mind. She was always on the watch, and at last found an opportune day. Cf. Hebrews 4:16.

τοῖς γενεσίοις αὐτοῦ. On his birthday. This meaning is firmly established, although in Attic Grk we should have τὰ γενέθλια or ἡ γενέθλιος ἡμέρα (2Ma 6:7). Hdt. iv. 26 shows that τὰ γενέσια meant a festival in commemoration of a dead person. But in late Grk the distinction was not strictly observed. Joseph. Ant. XII. iv. 7 we have ἑορτάζοντες τὴν γενέσιον ἡμέραν τοῦ παιδίον, at the birth of a son to Ptolemy Epiphanes. On the other hand, Plutarch uses γενέθλια of commemoration of the dead. In papyri, γενέσια seems always to mean “birth-day fête.” Christianity tended to obliterate the distinction between the two words by regarding the death of the faithful as their birthday into eternal life (Mart. Pol. 18; Tert. De Coron. 3, Scorp. 15). Seneca (Ep. cii. 24) has the same thought; Dies iste, quem tanquam extremum reformidas, aeterni natalis est. On the proposal to make τὰ γενέσια the anniversary of Herod’s accession see Schürer, Jewish People I. ii. p. 26 note. Origen and Jerome condemn the keeping of birthdays; no good man in Scripture keeps them, but only Pharaoh and Herod.

δεῖπνον ἐποίησεν. At Machaerus; there is no ground for thinking that Mk places the banquet at Tiberias; see Schürer, loc. cit.

τοῖς μεγιστᾶσιν κ.τ.λ. The three classes are civil magistrates, military officers, and leading men. The chiliarchs are his own officers, not Roman tribunes. Elsewhere we have πρῶτοι τοῦ λαοῦ (Luke 19:47), τῆς πόλεως, τῶν Ἰουδαίων, τῆς νήσου (Acts 13:50; Acts 25:2; Acts 28:7; Acts 28:17). In the later books of O.T. μεγιστᾶνες is freq., and Vulg. varies greatly in translation; principes, magnates, fortes, optimates, magnifici, etc.

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Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Mark 6:21

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