Mark 6:9

9. It is difficult to decide between ἐνδύσασθε ([1136][1137] ἐνδύσασθαι ([1138]2[1139][1140]), and ἐνδύσησθε ([1141][1142][1143][1144][1145]). Perhaps the first would most easily have produced the other readings.

[1136] Codex Vaticanus. 4th cent., but perhaps a little later than א. In the Vatican Library almost since its foundation by Pope Nicolas V., and one of its greatest treasures. The whole Gospel, ending at Mark 16:8. Photographic facsimile, 1889.

[1137] asterisk denotes that the word is not found elsewhere in N.T., and such words are included in the index, even if there is no note on them in the commentary.
[1138] Codex Vaticanus. 4th cent., but perhaps a little later than א. In the Vatican Library almost since its foundation by Pope Nicolas V., and one of its greatest treasures. The whole Gospel, ending at Mark 16:8. Photographic facsimile, 1889.

[1139] Codex Vaticanus. 10th cent. Dated A.D. 949.
[1140] Codex Petropolitanus. 9th cent. Gospels almost complete. Mark 16:18-20 is in a later hand.

[1141] Codex Sinaiticus. 4th cent. Discovered by Tischendorf in 1859 at the Monastery of St Katharine on Mount Sinai. Now at St Petersburg. The whole Gospel, ending at Mark 16:8. Photographic facsimile, 1911.

[1142] Codex Alexandrinus. 5th cent. Brought by Cyril Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, from Alexandria, and afterwards presented by him to King Charles I. in 1628. In the British Museum. The whole Gospel. Photographic facsimile, 1879.
[1143] Codex Ephraemi. 5th cent. A palimpsest: the original writing has been partially rubbed out, and the works of Ephraem the Syrian have been written over it; but a great deal of the original writing has been recovered; of Mark we have Mark 1:17 to Mark 6:31; Mark 8:5 to Mark 12:29; Mark 13:19 to Mark 16:20. In the National Library at Paris.

[1144] Codex Bezae. 6th cent. Has a Latin translation (d) side by side with the Greek text, and the two do not quite always agree. Presented by Beza to the University Library of Cambridge in 1581. Remarkable for its frequent divergences from other texts. Contains Mark, except Mark 16:15-20, which has been added by a later hand. Photographic facsimile, 1899.

[1145] Codex Sangallensis. 9th or 10th cent. Contains the Gospels nearly complete, with an interlinear Latin translation. The text of Mark is specially good, agreeing often with CL. At St Gall.

9. ἀλλὰ ὑποδεδεμένους σανδάλια. A violent anacoluthon, illustrating Mk’s want of literary skill, and showing how completely ἵνα after verbs of exhorting has become equivalent to the acc. c. infin. Mk goes on here as if he had used the acc. c. infin., for εἶναι or πορεύεσθαι is understood here. The identity of σανδάλια (Acts 12:8) and ὑποδήματα (Mark 1:7; Matthew 10:10; etc.) is clear, for both are used to translate the same Hebrew, naal (Joshua 9:5; Isaiah 20:2 and Exodus 3:5; Exodus 12:11). Here and in Acts, σανδάλια may have been preferred in order to avoid the unpleasing repetition, ὑποδέομαι ὑποδήματα.

Μὴ ἐνδύσασθε. If this is the right reading, we have a change from or. obliqua to or. recta, as in Luke 5:14; Acts 23:22; Mark 11:32 is different. There is a similar change if we read ἐνδύσησθε (R.V.). We may take ἐνδύσασθαι as coordinate with the infin. understood with ὑποδεδεμένους, or as an infin. imperat. It is strange criticism to see in these broken constructions signs of clumsy copying from a document. They are signs of Mk writing just as he would talk. In Mt. the Twelve are forbidden to get two chitons, in Lk. to have two, in Mk to put on two. The χιτών was the less necessary garment, worn under the almost indispensable ἱμάτιον (Matthew 5:40; John 19:23); therefore a “shirt” rather than a “coat.” The Baptist told those who had two chitons to “give a share,” i.e. one of the two, to some one who had none (Luke 3:11). The high-priest rends “his chitons” (Mark 14:63), and two were sometimes worn in travelling (Joseph. Ant. XVII. Mark 6:7). We learn from Luke 22:35 that the Twelve found this very small outfit sufficient. Origen thinks that these regulations were not intended to be taken literally, and Bede interprets the prohibition of two chitons as an admonition non dupliciter sed simpliciter ambulare.