Philip Schaff's Popular Commentary (4 vols)

Mark 3:5

Mark 3:5. And he looked round about on them. So Luke, who adds ‘all,' implying that He took a formal survey of those in the synagogue.

With anger. A holy indignation, mentioned by Mark alone, and no doubt expressed in His look.

Being grieved for the hardening of their hearts. The original implies a compassionate sympathy for their spiritual insensibility. These two feelings, usually excluding each other, are here combined. In this, Christ manifests the character of God as Holy Love, His anger was the result of holiness, His compassion of love. This character is revealed in the Bible alone. Of themselves men discover either God's anger, forgetting His love, or His mercy, forgetting His holiness. So, too, they are usually angry without compassion, or compassionate without being just. ‘Hardening' is preferable to ‘hardness,' since the original suggests a process as well as a result. This process was going on as the effect of their opposition to Him, and as a punishment for this sin against privilege. For it man is responsible, and it can put men beyond the reach of the Saviour's compassion. Not that anything is too hard for Him, but He never saves us against our will. On the cure, see Matthew 12:13.

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Philip Schaff's Popular Commentary (4 vols)

Mark 3:5

Old Testament

New Testament