The End of the Gospel of Mark

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The Gospel of Mark Background

The Gospel according to Mark is the shortest gospel and in presentation the most dense one. Mark does not so much describe the teachings but more the actions of the Lord Jesus.

Very often Mark uses the present time in his accounts instead of the past time. The word “and” (Greek: euthys) is very striking and appears more than forty times. Neither the genealogy nor the birth of Jesus are mentioned.

In the very first chapter Mark starts his account of the Lord Jesus’ ministry.

The Gospel of Mark presents Christ as God’s servant. He was not only the promised king of Israel as in Matthew’s gospel but also the true servant of the Lord (compare Is. 42:1-9; 49:1-6; 52:13-15; Zechariah 3:8).

According to his own words he has not come to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many (Mark 10:45).

But the Lord Jesus is also presented as the true prophet in the Gospel of Mark (compare Deuteronomy 18:15).

As such He announced the good tidings of God, the gospel. This key word appears eight times in Mark, four times in Matthew and not at all in Luke (except for the Greek verb “evangelize”) and neither in John.

In Mark 1:38 the Lord Jesus explains with authority what His ministry was: announcing the Word of God as prophet: “Let us go into the next towns that I may preach there also: for therefore came I forth.”

God’s servant is also the suffering servant. The report of the Lord’s suffering and death occupies a relatively large place in respect to the length of the gospel.

Four times the Lord Jesus announces His coming sufferings to his disciples: Mark 8:31; Mark 9:12; Mark 9:31; Mark 10:32-34.

Mark, in contrast to the two other synoptic gospels, tends to report events in chronological order.

The Person of Mark

Mark was an unfaithful servant during his youth. And yet the Lord gave him the task to write on his life as the faithful Servant of God.

It is Mark only who tells us of the young man who followed the Lord Jesus when He was arrested and who fled naked from them when they laid hold on him (chap. 14:51-52). Based on an old tradition it is assumed that this young man was Mark himself.

The End of the Gospel of Mark

Much has been written concerning the last verses of the gospel (chap. 16:9-20), the reason being that they are missing in some of the old Greek manuscripts of the New Testament (Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus).

Other manuscripts, again, contain a shorter version. The editors of the scientific edition of the Greek NT (Nestle-Aland) do list verses 9 to 20 but they list the verses in double brackets, which means that they are very old but not considered to be original by the editors.

As these verses are contained in most of the Greek manuscripts and old translations there is little doubt that the paragraph predates the manuscripts which omit or question it.

The various scientists who do not consider the paragraph as original try to defend this opinion by advancing arguments to do with the style and contents of this passage.

In my view, however, these have been contradicted sufficiently in the 19th century, amongst others, by H. Olshausen, J.P. Lange, J.W. Burgon, C.F. Keil and W. Kelly and in more recent times by W.R. Farmer and J. van Bruggen.

The Christian student has no need whatever to be concerned with allegations to the contrary, none of which are founded on anything except subjective conclusions of scholars, many of whom are obviously influenced more by bias against the content of the chapter than by any objective evidence favoring its exclusion.

Even J. R. Dummelow, while admitting that the external evidence against the last twelve verses “is certainly not enough to justify their rejection,” nevertheless decided to reject them on grounds of form, vocabulary and style.

However, of all the evidences bearing on questions of this kind, nothing could be of less weight than arguments from style and vocabulary.

Mark is said to have used words in this chapter which he used nowhere else in the gospel; but that is incapable of proving that the words were not in his vocabulary.

The conceit that Mark used every word that he knew in the first fifteen chapters is untenable!

Furthermore, the sudden change to singular pronouns in Mark 16:15-16 was a part of the essential design to make clear who would be empowered to do the “signs” of Mark 16:17-20; and the alleged awkwardness of the re-introduction of Mary Magdalene in Mark 16:9 disappears completely when Mark’s purpose of mentioning the sevenfold exorcism is discerned.

That purpose was not to identify Mary Magdalene, already mentioned twice, but to explain the “hardness of heart” on the part of the eleven (Mark 16:14). It is such a failure to read what the gospel is saying that results in misjudgments based upon style.

So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God.

Mark 16:19 RSV

In the year 177 A.D., Irenaeus quoted this verse and another from the beginning of this gospel, thus proving that this passage was received as a part of God’s word at that early date, long before the Sinaiticus or Vaticanus manuscripts were written, and indicating the rightful place of this portion of Mark in the sacred canon, independently of these manuscripts. See the introduction.

Here Mark did not state exactly where the ascension occurred; and the alleged contradictions regarding this event as having occurred in Galilee, or in Bethany, are of no weight at all.

There is every likelihood, if not certainty, that the actual ascension to God was unseen by human eyes, just as the resurrection was not actually seen; and there could have been more than one (there certainly were) instance of Jesus’ “going up” in the presence of his disciples, just as he disappeared in the interview with the disciples at Emmaus, or later with the eleven.

Our flesh, in the person of Jesus, is upon the throne of God, henceforth called the “throne of God and of the Lamb,” and herein is the basis for the uttermost of human hopes and aspirations.