Mark 4:1-20
IV. (1-20) HE BEGAN. — See Notes on Matthew 13:1.... [ Continue Reading ]
IV. (1-20) HE BEGAN. — See Notes on Matthew 13:1.... [ Continue Reading ]
IN HIS DOCTRINE. — Better, _in His teaching. _... [ Continue Reading ]
A SOWER. — Better, _the_ sower.... [ Continue Reading ]
SOME THIRTY ... — For the most part the parable is almost verbally identical with that in St. Matthew. Here, however, we note the difference, sufficient to establish a certain measure of independence, of an ascending instead of a descending scale.... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY THAT WERE ABOUT HIM. — In St. Matthew, simply, “the disciples.” Here the presence of others besides the Twelve is directly asserted.... [ Continue Reading ]
UNTO THEM THAT ARE WITHOUT. — The form of the phrase is peculiar to St. Mark; St. Matthew giving, “to them,” and St. Luke, “to the rest.”... [ Continue Reading ]
THAT SEEING THEY MAY SEE.... — St. Mark characteristically gives the words of Isaiah 6:9, but not as a quotation, and perhaps in a less accurate form, and omits the addition in Matthew, “Blessed are your ears...” The form in this instance, at first sight, suggests the thought that our Lord’s purpose... [ Continue Reading ]
HOW THEN WILL YE KNOW ALL PARABLES? — The question is peculiar to St. Mark, and suggests the thought of our Lord as contemplating for His disciples an ever-growing insight, not only into His own spoken parables, but into those of nature and of life. But if they were such slow scholars in this early... [ Continue Reading ]
IN THEIR HEARTS. — The better MSS. give simply, “in them.”... [ Continue Reading ]
IS A CANDLE BROUGHT TO BE PUT UNDER A BUSHEL? — See Note on Matthew 5:15. St. Mark, it will be noted, omits all the other parables that follow in St. Matthew, and connects with that of the Sower sayings more or less proverbial, which in St. Matthew appear in a different context. Looking at our Lord’... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR THERE IS NOTHING HID. — This also is found elsewhere (_e.g.,_ in Matthew 10:26). The Greek word here for “secret” is interesting as being the same as that which we find in our word “Apocrypha.” The term was, in the first instance, applied to books that were surrounded with the secrecy of a spuri... [ Continue Reading ]
WITH WHAT MEASURE YE METE. — See Note on Matthew 7:2. The proverb furnishes a good illustration of what has just been said as to our Lord’s method of presenting the same truth under different aspects. In the Sermon on the Mount it appears as the law of retribution, which brings pardon to those who p... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR HE THAT HATH. — See Note on Matthew 13:12.... [ Continue Reading ]
AS if A MAN SHOULD CAST SEED INTO THE GROUND. — What follows has the special interest of being the only parable peculiar to St. Mark, one therefore which had escaped the manifest eagerness of St. Matthew and St. Luke to gather up all that they could find of this form of our Lord’s teaching. It runs... [ Continue Reading ]
AND SHOULD SLEEP, AND RISE. — So it was in the world’s history. Men knew not the greatness of the new force that had been brought into action. Philosophers and statesmen ignored it. Even the very preachers of the new faith, the “sowers” of the parable, were hardly conscious of the enormous revolutio... [ Continue Reading ]
THE EARTH BRINGETH FORTH FRUIT OF HERSELF. — Stress is laid on the spontaneity of growth; and the lesson drawn from it is obviously one at once of patience and of faith. It is not well in the spiritual husbandry, either of the nations of the world or of individual souls, to be taking up the seeds to... [ Continue Reading ]
HE PUTTETH IN THE SICKLE. — From one point of view, here again, the harvest is the end of the world (Matthew 13:39), and the putting in the sickle is the coming of Christ to judge. (Comp. the use of the same image in Revelation 14:14.) From the other, the harvest is the end of each man’s life, and t... [ Continue Reading ]
WITH WHAT COMPARISON SHALL WE COMPARE IT? — Literally, _By what parable shall we set it forth?_ The question which introduces the parable is in St. Mark and St. Luke, but not in St. Matthew. It gives us the impression of a question asked, in order to put the minds of the hearers on the stretch, so t... [ Continue Reading ]
(31-32) IT IS LIKE A GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. — See Notes on Matthew 13:31. Slight variations in this report are (1) the “great branches,” and (2) the birds lodging “under the shadow” of the tree.... [ Continue Reading ]
(33-34) AND WITH MANY SUCH PARABLES. — See Notes on Matthew 13:34. St. Mark’s omission of the reference to Psalms 78:2, and his addition of “as they were able to hear it,” are, each of them, characteristic. It may be noted that the “many such parables” of St. Mark imply something like the series whi... [ Continue Reading ]
HE EXPOUNDED. — The word may be noted as being the verb from which is formed the noun “interpretation” in 2 Peter 1:20, and so takes its place in the coincidences of phraseology which connect that Epistle with this Gospel. (See _Introduction._)... [ Continue Reading ]
(35-41) AND THE SAME DAY. — Better, _in that day._ See Notes on Matthew 8:23. The connection of the events, as given by St. Mark, seems to be precise enough, but it differs widely from that in St. Matthew and St. Luke, and it must remain uncertain which was the actual order. THE OTHER SIDE. — The v... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY TOOK HIM EVEN AS HE WAS. — The phrase is peculiar to this Gospel, and seems to point to the impression made on the mind of St. Mark’s informant by the utter exhaustion that followed on the long day’s labours. St. John’s statement that our Lord, on His journey through Samaria, “being wearied...... [ Continue Reading ]
BEAT INTO THE SHIP, SO THAT IT WAS NOW FULL. — Better, _were beating upon the ship, so that it was filling._ Both verbs describe continuous action.... [ Continue Reading ]
ASLEEP ON A PILLOW. — Better, on _the_ pillow — the cushion commonly to be found in the boat’s stern. CAREST THOU NOT THAT WE PERISH? — St. Mark alone gives this touch of despairing expostulation, in which we trace the specific want of faith which was afterwards reproved.... [ Continue Reading ]
PEACE, BE STILL. — Literally, _be still, be silenced,_ The latter word is the same as that used of the man who had not on a wedding garment, and was “speechless” (Matthew 22:12). Note the vividness with which St. Mark gives the very words addressed to the raging sea, as though it were a hostile powe... [ Continue Reading ]