CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES
Mark 16:19-20. Mark the antithesis. The Lord, for His part, was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God—the seat of power; and they, for their part, went forth into the world to do as He had bidden them, and, doing it, they were sustained and reinforced by His almighty aid.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Mark 16:19-20
(PARALLELS: Luke 24:50-51; Acts 1:9.)
Christ’s ascension and co-operation.—The words “after the Lord had spoken unto them” may refer primarily to the commission which He had just given to His disciples to “go into all the world and to preach the gospel to every creature,” and to the various instructions and promises with which that commission was accompanied. But the words probably refer also to all that Christ had spoken to His disciples after His resurrection from the dead; for we are told in His history that after His crucifixion “He shewed Himself alive by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.” Eighteen hundred years have passed away since these events occurred, and we never saw either the Saviour or the apostles to whom they refer. But we believe the record that relates them to us, we make them the subject of devout and delightful contemplation, and we feel that we have an interest in them which will never cease to influence our hearts through time or through eternity.
I. Let us contemplate these apostles witnessing the ascension of their Lord.—
1. The place from which He ascended was the Mount of Olives—that part of it which was situated in the district of Bethany (Luke 24:50). It was the place to which He had been accustomed to resort after the labours and fatigues of the day, and where He had often spent whole nights in meditation and in prayer; and now He Himself ascends from the same place whence His nightly supplications had so often ascended to His Father and to our Father, to His God and to our God. It was the place over which He passed as He made His last entry into Jerusalem, where He was crowned with thorns; and from which He now passes to the heavenly Jerusalem, to be crowned with glory and honour. It was the place to which He repaired with His disciples, after they had partaken of the Last Supper; for when they had sung a hymn they went into the Mount of Olives. There His disciples forsook Him and fled, and there He was afterwards parted from them, and a cloud received Him out of their sight.
2. The manner in which He ascended is minutely recorded (Luke 24:51). His ascension was visible, and His disciples were eye-witnesses of His majesty, as He rose higher and higher from the mountain, till the cloud covered Him and concealed Him from their sight. But the most interesting fact connected with His ascension is that it took place whilst He was in the act of blessing His disciples. When the high priest among the Jews began to bless the congregation, he lifted up his hands and exclaimed, “The Lord bless thee and keep thee; the Lord cause His face to shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee; the Lord lift upon thee the light of His countenance, and give thee peace.” And in like manner our Great High Priest lifted up His hands—those hands which had so often given bread to the hungry, health to the sick, life to the dead, salvation to the lost—those hands which had so lately bled upon the Cross, and in which the print of the nails was yet visible—those bountiful and wounded hands He lifted up, and then He began to bless His disciples. “And it came to pass, while He blessed them” (after His blessing was begun, but before it was concluded)—“it came to pass, while He blessed them” (for how often does it happen that a blessing precedes a bereavement!)—“He was parted from them”; and He rose from the mountain, with His hands still lifted up, and with the blessing still dropping from His lips, and brightening as He took His flight.
3. Having thus left the earth, our text declares that “He was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.” As He had descended to earth in the likeness of men, and in order, through sufferings and death, to become the Mediator, He now, having procured eternal redemption for us, ascends in His mediatorial capacity, and rises “far above all principality,” etc. And what, think you, must have been the rapturous joy that thrilled through heaven, when the expectant and listening silence of its inhabitants was broken by the shout, “Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of Glory shall come in”! And having thus entered, He was received by the Everlasting Father, who declared, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” “Let all the angels of God worship Him!”
4. Such an ascension into heaven, and such a reception there, is in beautiful harmony with the dignity of the Saviour’s person, and with the glory which He had acquired as the Author of man’s redemption; and it was also a pledge and a preparation for the triumphant spread of His gospel in the world.
II. Contemplate the apostles going forth to preach His gospel.—The ministry of the gospel is represented by the apostle as one of the first gifts which the Ascended Saviour acquired and bestowed upon the world (Ephesians 4:11-12). We therefore find that immediately after the ascension of their Lord these disciples “went forth, and preached everywhere.”
1. The subject of their preaching was the gospel of Jesus Christ, or “the Word,” as it is emphatically called in our text. And after what they had seen and heard and experienced themselves, on what other subject could they preach and what other name could they declare? It was not merely as an important fact that they contemplated His death, but as having essentially connected with it a moral meaning and design, as the only and the all-sufficient means of redemption to a ruined world. He was wounded; but it was for our transgressions. He was bruised; but it was for our iniquities. He suffered; but He suffered, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God. He bled; but in His blood there is redemption, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace. He died; but through death He destroyed him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and delivered them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. In preaching this doctrine the apostles warned sinners, as we warn you, to beware of rejecting Christ by trusting for salvation to your own works; and they exhorted sinners, as we exhort you, to go at once to Christ, and to go to Him laden with the full weight of all your guilt and condemnation, because “He came into the world to seek and to save that which was lost.”
2. They communicated this gospel to mankind by preaching. Nothing can equal the impressiveness of a living address from man to man, where numbers are assembled, where the place which they occupy is sacred, where the gospel is the theme, where the whole soul of the preacher feels and speaks, and where all are reminded that they are in the presence of God. Attention is awakened; emotions are excited; conscience is aroused; and the stream of sympathy flows from soul to soul, mingled with all those hallowed influences which render the gospel the power of God to our salvation.
3. The extent to which they preached this gospel was universal. They preached Christ first in the very place where He had lived, and died, and risen, and ascended. They preached His miracles to the very men who had witnessed them and experienced them. They preached His sufferings in the garden of Gethsemane and on the hill of Calvary where they had been endured. They preached His resurrection at the mouth of His deserted sepulchre. They preached His ascension on the very mount where He had been parted from them. But while Jerusalem was the centre of their operations the world was their circumference; and they went forth and preached everywhere, till they could say to the Colossians, “The gospel is come unto you, as it is in all the world.”
III. Contemplate the apostles experiencing their Lord’s co-operation with them in their labours.—Wherever His disciples worked as instruments He worked also as the efficient agent; for His power is omnipotent. And by this presence and this power He graciously fulfilled His own declaration (Mark 16:17-18).
1. These Divine influences qualified the preachers of the gospel. The change which took place in the sentiments and conduct of the apostles, after the reception of Christ into heaven, was most manifest and remarkable. To that same Divine Redeemer let every minister of the gospel look for the knowledge, and the holiness, and the energy, and the pathos, and the patient perseverance, and for every qualification which is necessary to render him a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth, and instant in season and out of season, watching for souls as one who must give an account.
2. These Divine influences confirmed the truth of the gospel. As He sat at the right hand of God, He baptised them with His miraculous influences and power to such an extent that they could heal the sick and raise the dead whenever they invoked the name of Jesus. These miraculous influences are now indeed withdrawn. But as we can prove that these miraculous powers then existed, we can appeal to them as a standing evidence in our day that the gospel of our salvation is the Word of God. But though the miraculous influences are withdrawn, the spiritual and sanctifying influences are still continued.
3. These Divine influences ensured the success of the gospel. Though its original ministers were only the twelve fishermen of Galilee—men without learning, without worldly wealth, and without worldly power—yet they became so mighty through God that heathen philosophers were confounded, heathen oracles were struck dumb, heathen temples were deserted, and so mightily grew the Word of God and prevailed that in about thirty years after the ascension of Christ the whole Roman world was conquered by the Cross. And it was a glorious conquest; for it was a triumph over mind and heart. And, thanks be unto God, the same Divine influences ensure the success of the gospel in every age; and many of you, my brethren, are living witnesses of its effectual working in the hearts of them that believe; “for our gospel has come to you not in word only, but in power, and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance.” And believing as we do that the Ascended Redeemer possesses all power both in heaven and earth, we are sure that His moral government of the world will be productive of the purity and joy and universality of the Church, and that the time foretold by prophecy shall come, when to Him every knee shall bow and every tongue confess.—J. A. Alexander, D.D.
OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Mark 16:19. The significance of Christ’s Ascension.—
1. It was the end of the work of redemption.
2. It was the final triumph of goodness.
3. It was the exaltation of humanity.
4. It told of the continuity of life.
5. It inaugurated the reign of blessing. Let us realise that all gifts, both spiritual and temporal, come from Him, and so live that His benediction may be able to rest on all that we do.—A. G. Mortimer, D.D.
“Received up into heaven.”—There is something remarkable in these words. We habitually speak of Christ as ascending, but Scripture more frequently declares that He was the subject of the action of Another, and was taken up. See Luke 24:51; Acts 1:2; Acts 1:9. Physical interference is not implied; no angels bore Him aloft; and the narratives make it clear that His glorious body, obedient to its new mysterious nature, arose unaided. But the decision to depart and the choice of a time came not from Him: He did not go, but was taken.—Dean Chadwick.
Why such slight mention of Christ’s Ascension?—It may seem remarkable that so great an occurrence should be so little noticed by the sacred writers; for it is mentioned by two only, St. Mark and St. Luke, and these two who were not witnesses of it. And yet we need not wonder at this, nor that it should have held a less prominent place in the minds of the apostles than the Resurrection; for, indeed, that He who had risen from the grave, who had laid aside His earthly body and put on the heavenly, that He should go up to heaven, that He who had so clearly shewn that He came down from God should return to God—this was but natural, and could not but appear natural to the enlightened minds of the apostles. What else could happen to Him who had risen from the grave, and clothed Himself with His “house that was from heaven”?—A. Grant, D.C.L.
Ascension joy.—Truly if we could ever live in this day all were joy; for the Ascension is the crown of all joys, the rapture of all creation, the wonder of the blessed angels, the union of all being, the finishing of the earthly course of the Son of God, His entrance into glory!—E. B. Pusey, D.D.
We ascend with Christ.—The Ascension of Christ is the great pledge and proof of our eternal state; our nature is for ever identified with His, so that as long as He is man we must be happy as one with Him. The great value of this transcendent fact is not merely that it is an example of our future ascension, but that it is our ascension begun—we in Him having risen to heaven—we in Him being at this time present before God—we in Him being united with the eternal plans and procedures of heaven, so that we are for ever blended with Christ—His property—His purchased possession—the very members of His body.—Prof. W. A. Butler.
Thou hast raised our human nature
in the clouds to God’s right hand,
There we sit in heavenly places, there
with Thee in glory stand;
Jesus reigns, adored by angels; man
with God is on the throne;
Mighty Lord, in Thine Ascension we
by faith behold our own!
Bishop Chris. Wordsworth.
Christ on the right hand of God as our Intercessor.—The Epistle to the Hebrews over and over again reiterates that thought that we have a Priest that has passed into the heavens, there to appear in the presence of God for us. And the apostle Paul, in that great linked climax in the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans, has it, “Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.” There are deep mysteries connected with that thought of the intercession of Christ. It does not mean that the Divine heart needs to be won to love and pity. It does not mean that in any mere outward and formal fashion He pleads with God, and softens and placates the infinite and eternal love of the Father in the heavens. It at least plainly means this, that He, our Saviour and Sacrifice, is for ever in the presence of God, presenting His own blood as an element in the Divine dealing with us, modifying the incidence of the Divine law, and securing through His own merits and intercession the outflow of blessings upon our heads and hearts. It is not a complete statement of Christ’s work for us that He died for us. He died that He might have somewhat to offer. He lives that He may be our Advocate as well as our propitiation with the Father. And just as the high priest once a year passed within the curtain, and there in the solemn silence and solitude of the holy place sprinkled the blood that he bore thither, not without trembling, and but for a moment permitted to stay in the awful Presence, thus, but in reality and for ever, with the joyful gladness of a Son in His “own calm home, His habitation from eternity,” Christ abides in the holy place, and at the right hand of the Majesty of the heavens lifts up that prayer, so strangely compact of authority and submission: “Father, I will that these whom Thou hast given Me be with Me where I am.” The Son of Man at the right hand of God is our Intercessor with the Father. “Seeing, then, that we have a Great High Priest that is passed through the heavens, let us come boldly to the throne of grace.”—A. Maclaren, D.D.
Mark 16:20. The spread of Christ’s influence.—As the ages pass the influence of the love of Christ is conquering the selfishness of mankind. Even the statute-books of civilisation attest His growing power. The regeneration of a world is a slow process, but the healing rays from His glorified presence at the right hand of the Father—calling forth the verdure and fruitage of an ever wider imitation of His life—have in them the pledge of a future in which their influence will extend over all lands.—C. Geikie, D.D.
Christ with His Church throughout the ages.—He has been with His Church, keeping her from fainting, from decay, declension, so that she has gone on conquering and to conquer; so that the hundred and twenty became three thousand at Pentecost; and before the end of the century the three thousand had become probably (Lange) half a million; by the eighth century the half-million had become thirty millions; by the Reformation one hundred millions. And to-day four hundred and forty millions of men give Jesus the Name which is above every name; multitudes that none can number doing so, not with lips only, but from the heart. He is with us still. A hundred years ago Carey reckoned up the population of the world with great accuracy, and found Christendom was only one-fifth of the whole; now it is nearly one-third. What another century of missions may make it will probably exceed the hope and prayers of the most daring believer. We must remember He is most richly with us when we are “going into the world to preach the gospel,” i.e. when we are on the move of mercy. Let us, for our personal consolation, remember He will be with us to the end of life and work and need. Let us remember that, in all work done for Him, He still is with us, and is ever making the foolishness of preaching and teaching omnipotent to bring men into His fold.—R. Glover.
APPENDIX
[For this interesting review of the evidence for and against the Last Twelve Verses of St. Mark, I am indebted to my friend the Rev. F. W. Christie, M.A., Rector of St Mary’s. Aberdeen.]
NOTE ON ST. Mark 16:9-20
THE great majority of modern scholars are agreed that with the eighth verse of this chapter the genuine work of St. Mark comes abruptly to an end, and that the twelve verses which follow are an addition by another hand in the earliest sub-apostolic age. Westcott and Hort insert these verses within double brackets, as an interpolation, “probably Western in origin, containing important matter apparently derived from extraneous sources”;[1] and Lightfoot ascribes them, together with the account of the woman taken in adultery (John 7:53 to John 8:11), “to that knot of early disciples who gathered about St. John in Asia Minor, and must have preserved more than one true tradition of the Lord’s life and of the earliest days of the Church, of which some at least had themselves been eye-witnesses.”[2] And so most scholars. On the other hand, such eminent critics as Dr. Scrivener, Dean Burgon, Prof. Salmon, Bishop John Wordsworth, and others, maintain, on grounds of external and internal evidence, that these verses are the genuine work of St. Mark. Dean Burgon’s elaborate monograph (The Last Twelve Verses of the Gospel according to St. Mark vindicated: Oxford, 1871) won the admiration of Lagarde,[3] and is acknowledged to have proved “that the external evidence against the passage has been greatly overstated … and that the patristic evidence resolves itself into that (perhaps ultimately of Origen, but immediately) of Eusebius.”[4] Without presuming to settle so difficult a controversy, it will be useful to review the evidence on which the decision depends.
[1] New Test., smaller edition, p. 583.
[2] On Revision of N. T.
[3] Expositor, September 1894, p. 226.
[4] W. H. Simcox, Writers of N. T., p. 11.
External evidence.—The verses are wanting in the two oldest MSS., the great uncial Bibles of the fourth century, Codex Vaticanus (B) and Sinaiticus (א). Tischendorf has, however, pointed out that these MSS. are here not independent witnesses, as in א the last leaf of St. Mark has been written by the scribe of B.[5] In B there is a blank column—the only one in the whole MS.—after Mark 16:8; and in א the letters of the last page of St. Mark, which might easily have been written in one column, are spread out so as to carry over a few lines to the second column, as if to avoid leaving it quite blank. Dr. Salmon infers from these facts that both MSS. had, as first copied, contained the disputed verses, and that the leaves were then cancelled and rewritten by the original scribe of B. The scribe was evidently aware of the twelve verses, and rejected them. Eusebius (Bishop of Cæsarea 315 A. D., died 340 A. D.) says of these verses:[6] “He that rejects Mark’s section as spurious will say that it is not current in all the copies. The accurate copies at least end with ‘afraid.’ For this is the end in nearly all the copies.” Eusebius himself, the great critic of that century, seems to have rejected this section, for the so-called Eusebian Canons were not carried beyond Mark 16:8. The words of Eusebius just quoted are almost verbally repeated by Jerome (circ. 400 A. D.),[7] Hesychius of Jerusalem (circ. 400 A. D.), and Severus of Antioch (circ. 500 A. D.). Doubts about the genuineness of this section were therefore familiar to them. The evidence of the important Armenian Version made in the fifth century is specially interesting. All MSS. prior to 1100 A. D. omit the verses. Later MSS. containing them have “Here ends Mark’s Gospel” after “afraid,” and then after a pause continue with Mark 16:9-20. There is, however, one old MS. in the Patriarchal Library at Etchmiadzin which not only gives the verses, but seems to throw light upon their origin. This MS. was examined by Mr. F. C. Conybeare in 1891, and in the Expositor for October 1893 he describes it and gives his conclusions. The MS. is an Evangeliarium written about 986 A. D., and purporting to have been copied from a true and accurate Armenian exemplar. St. Mark is written out to Mark 16:8. Then there is a space of two lines, after which in the same uncial hand, only in red—a distinction otherwise reserved for the titles of the four Gospels themselves—is written “Ariston Eritzou,” which means “Of the Presbyter Ariston.” This title occupies one whole line (the book is written in double columns), and then follow the last twelve verses, still in the same hand. This discovery of Mr, Conybeare’s is an important one. The heading no doubt embodies a very ancient tradition, and may meet with-verification elsewhere. Mr. Conybeare identifies this Ariston the Presbyter with the Ariston mentioned by Papias (Euseb., Hist. Eccl., iii. 39) as one of the elders who were disciples of the Lord. Dr. Resch[8] thinks he was Ariston of Pella, a Jewish Christian who wrote about 140 A. D., and who—Dr. Resch thinks after this discovery—also arranged the Canon of the Gospels. There are also MSS. which exhibit a duplicate ending. The uncial Codex L, eighth century, in the National Library at Paris, noted for its frequent agreement with א and B, breaks off after Mark 16:8, and then continues:[9] “The following also is current: ‘And they briefly brought word of all the things that were commanded them to Peter and his company: but after these things Jesus Himself also sent forth by them from the east even unto the west the holy and incorruptible preaching of the eternal salvation.’ But then is also current the following after ‘for they were afraid,’ ‘But when He was risen again,’ etc.” The same duplicate ending is also found in a fifth-century MS. of the old Latin, the Codex Bobiensis. The alternative ending is added in the margin of the Harklean Syriac (616 A. D.), and is found in various MSS. of the Memphitic and Æthiopic versions. In the recently discovered Sinai Palimpsest of the Old Syriac, allied to the Curetonian, the text of St. Mark ends with Mark 16:8, as in א, B (see Guardian, October 31st, 1894). On the other hand, the twelve verses are found in the other two great uncial MSS., the Codex Bezæ (D) and the Codex Ephremi (C), both of the fifth century; in all the other uncial MSS.; in MSS. of the old Latin (including the important Codex Colbertinus); in the Vulgate; in three Syriac versions (Curetonian, Peschito, Jerusalem); in the Gothic and various Memphitic and Æthiopic MSS. Irenœus (circ. 185 A. D.) quotes Mark 16:19 as St. Mark’s (Adv. Hœr., III. x. 6). Justin Martyr[10] seems to cite these verses; but “decision seems impossible.”[11] They are found in Tatian’s Diatessaron (160–170 A. D.). Victor of Antioch (400–450 A. D.) wrote a commentary on St. Mark which had a wide repute (see list of MSS, in Burgon). The last words of his commentary are these: “Notwithstanding that in very many copies of the present Gospel the passage beginning, ‘Now when [Jesus] was risen early the first day of the week,’ be not found (certain individuals having supposed it to be spurious), yet we at all events, inasmuch as in very many we have discovered it to exist, have out of accurate copies subjoined also the account of the Lord’s ascension (following the words ‘for they were afraid’) in conformity with the Palæstinian exemplar of Mark which exhibits the Gospel verity: that is to say, from the words ‘Now when [Jesus] was risen early the first day of the week,’ etc., down to ‘with signs following. Amen.’ ”
[5] Salmon, Introd. to N. T., p. 161.
[6] Quœst. ad Marinum, iv. 957, ed. Migne.
[7] Ep. 120, ad Hedibiam.
[8] See Thinker, October 1894, pp. 291, 292.
[9] McClellan, New Test., p. 681
[10] See Dr. Taylor’s article, Expositor, July 1893.
[11] Westcott and Hort.
Internal evidence.—Against the genuineness it is urged:
1. There is a want of connexion between this section and the foregoing. St. Mark would never have written consecutively ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ. Ἀναστὰς δὲ πρωΐ, κ.τ.λ. Also Mary Magdalene is introduced in Mark 16:9 as if she had not been mentioned before in Mark 16:1.
2. The usual relation between St. Mark and St. Matthew fails in this section. Mark 16:1-8 is parallel with Matthew 28:1-8, but there the connexion ceases. From Mark 8:7 we might have expected a mention in the sequel of this appearance in Galilee, such as we find in St. Matthew. The twelve verses contain no mention of it, and must therefore be from another hand.
3. The diction is unlike St. Mark’s, πρώτῃ σαββάτου) is unique; in Mark 16:2 Mark had written the usual μιᾷ τῶν σαββάτων (cp. Genesis 1:5, R.V.). ἐκεῖνος is never used elsewhere in St. Mark without a substantive; here it occurs four times without a substantive. θανάσιμος, μορφή, θεᾶσθαι, βλάπτειν, πορεύεσθαι, ἀπιστεῖν, παρακολουθεῖν, ἐπακολουθεῖν, do not occur before in this Gospel. On the other hand, arguments for the genuineness of these verses based on internal evidence are not wanting. Dr. Salmon traces in the first fifteen verses of this Gospel a resemblance in style to the last twelve. These opening and closing sections are, he thinks, the framework in which St. Mark set the Petrine tradition. He also finds the characteristic ideas of the Gospel in these verses. Thrice does St. Mark alone of the Synoptics record the unbelief of men (Mark 3:5, Mark 6:6; Mark 6:52), and thrice in this last section (Mark 16:11; Mark 16:13-14) does this thought appear. Westcott also notices this correspondence (Introduction to Study of Gospels, p. 334). But nowhere has it been stated so fully as in a university sermon of the present Bishop of Salisbury.[12] St. Mark, he thinks, depicts Christ as the strong Son of God, Lord of spirits and men and nature, contending with and overcoming evil and unbelief. Hence miracles occupy so large a space in this Gospel. Especially does St. Mark dwell on the moral resistance offered to Christ by the hardness of the human heart. These being the general lessons of this Gospel, the last chapter fits on to the rest with a perfect and exact harmony. “What do we read, in fact, in the last chapter? It describes with greater fulness than any of the other Gospels, how hopeless and weak in faith the community of disciples was left by the Crucifixion,—how slow of perception and hard of heart they still remained, notwithstanding all that had been done for them,—how the women, going to anoint the body, found the tomb empty, and fled in trembling and astonishment and fear at the angel’s message,—how the disciples disbelieved Mary Magdalene, to whom the Risen Jesus first appeared,—how the two who met Him in another form, as they were going into the country, failed to convince the rest,—how, at last, He appeared to all Himself, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart; and then, finally, and after a long and gradual process, gained a conquest over their wills. Then it was that He addressed them, bidding them to go and preach the gospel to the whole creation, offering salvation to those that believe and are baptised, foretelling the condemnation of those who reject the message, and promising fourfold miraculous powers, like His own, to His faithful followers and messengers. Then, and not till then, when He reveals His full majesty by the transfer of these gifts, does He receive the title of ‘Lord’ from the Evangelist’s own lips. The word, though found not unfrequently in the reports of speeches in this Gospel, is used twice only in it as an historical title, and that in these last two verses. The Lord, it is said, after He had spoken with them, was received up to heaven, and sat on the right hand of God. And they, thus conquered by Him, are no longer faithless, but believing. Having gained them, He has gained the instrument which He came down to earth to fashion, the only instrument which in His wisdom He thinks fit to use in the conversion of the world—the instrument of personal faith begetting faith. And thus endowed they go forth and preach everywhere, not in their own strength, but His; for the Lord works ever with them. And as in His own ministry He has supported and illustrated His teaching with appropriate miracles and mighty works, so now He confirms their word with signs following.”
[12] Sermon II. in University Sermons on Gospel Subjects: Parker, 1878. See also Addendum by same author to commentary on St. Mark, in Bishop Chr. Wordsworth’s Greek Testament.
Whatever we may infer from the internal evidence as to the genuineness of these verses, one conclusion is forced upon us. These verses are certainly authentic. They have the ring of truth. “This section,” says Dr. Resch,[13] “is free from all affectation, and from all legendary colouring—such as, for example, we meet with in the pseudo-Petrine Gospel. It is rather characterised by a compendious abruptness, such as shews that the author of it says less than he knows.” Compare the vague generalities of the alternative ending with the fulness of independent knowledge shewn in these verses. Although the statements that the first appearance was to Mary Magdalene and that she bore the message to the apostles might conceivably be derived from St. John’s Gospel, and Mark 16:9; Mark 16:12 seem to reflect expressions in St. Luke (Luke 8:2; Luke 24:13), yet the section taken as a whole is plainly not the work of a compiler. It adds to our knowledge by explicit statement and vivid detail. Here only in the Gospels is it stated that our Lord rose again on the first day of the week (Mark 16:9); that the disciples mourned and wept (Mark 16:10); that they disbelieved the tidings of Mary Magdalene (Mark 16:11); that He appeared to the two in another form (Mark 16:12); that the disciples again disbelieved the testimony of the two (Mark 16:13); that the eleven were at meat when He appeared (observe the undesigned coincidence with Luke 24:41-43); and that He upbraided them (Mark 16:14). The apostolic commission in Mark 16:15-16, though resembling that in Matthew 28:19 in the two points universal mission and the injunction of baptism, is evidently independent. The promise of signs to follow believers as such is a new one. (cp. Matthew 10:8). And the majestic closing verses (19 and 20) stand alone in the Gospels in their assertion of the Lord’s sitting at the right hand of God and His continued working with the apostles.
[13] Expositor, September 1894, p. 228.
Concluding summary.—After this review of the evidence, external and internal, it may be said by way of summary, that if these verses be from St. Mark’s pen and formed part of his Gospel from the first, it seems very difficult to account for the multiplication of copies without these verses in widely separate lands, for the obstinate doubts which clung to them (which Eusebius states and Jerome repeats), for the existence of an alternative ending, and lastly for the tradition which ascribes the twelve verses to the presbyter Ariston. To account for all that by an imagined accident which may have torn away from some MS. its last leaf, on which just these twelve verses were written, and so gave rise to a mutilated family of MSS., is to assign a very inadequate cause. But on the assumption, to which so much of the evidence points, that these verses are an appendage by another though still authoritative hand, in the earliest times, all the phenomena may be explained. St. Mark for some reason left his Gospel unfinished.[14] It may have been, as Godet thinks,[15] the breaking out of persecution and the death of St. Peter which caused the interruption. It was no wonder then that some early disciple should, it may be by request, complete the unfinished narrative with an account of the Ascension; so that this Gospel, as it began “from the baptism of John,” should extend to the “day that He was taken up,” and thus correspond to the requirement of the chief of the apostles (Acts 1:22).
[14] ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ might very well be the end of a sentence or paragraph. Cp. Plato Protagoras, p. 328, D, where a chapter ends with νέοι γάρ But Plato did not end a Dialogue with a particle, nor would St. Mark end his Gospel with one. The reference to Plato is due to Prof. Marcus Dods in Expository Times, March 1894.
[15] Studies on N. T., p. 38.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 16
Mark 16:19.—It was an ancient myth that the Milky Way was the bright track made by the flashing wheels of the car of Phaethon, driving through the skies; but the Man of Calvary, ascending from the Mount of Olives to His celestial throne, has left across the heavens a brighter and more glorious pathway than the pale light of far-off stars. He has brought life and immortality to light, and millions who believe in His name have in all ages seen and rejoiced in His light, and by it been guided to the realm of everlasting day.
Mark 16:20. “The Lord working with them.”—That is a sweet legend hanging about an old church in England, and it tells the great truth well,—how centuries ago, when the monks were rearing it, a new temple for the worship of their God, there came among the workers a strange monk, unasked, who always took on himself the heaviest tasks; and how at last, when a particularly gigantic beam was needed for a position as important as that of the keystone of an arch, and when, with sweating strain and united effort, it was lifted to its place, it was strangely found to be some feet too short. No device of the builders could remedy it; they had tried their best with it, they had used the most careful measurement they knew, but how sadly they had failed! There it was, too short, and their utmost skill could not find remedy. The night closed in upon the tired workers, and they went to their rest with sore hearts, leaving only this unknown monk, who would go working on. But when the morning came, and the workers came forth again, they saw the sunlight falling on the beam exactly in its place, lengthened to the precise dimensions needed, and resting accurately on its supports. But the unknown monk had disappeared. Yet the workers knew Him now, and were certain they could carry the temple onward to its topmost turret. For He who had been working with them and supplying their lack of perfect work, they came now to know, was none other than the Lord Himself. They were not unhelped toilers. Nor are we.
God working with man.—When Robert Morrison went out to China, he stopped for a little while in New York, and one of the American millionaires turned to him, and in a supercilious way said, “Mr. Morrison, do you expect to make any impression on China?” Robert Morrison, in the kingliness of a consecrated manhood, replied, “I do not, but I do expect that the Lord Almighty will.”
Power of the Word.—Cæsar Malan found himself on the diligence at Angoulême in the company of a sprightly young gentleman from Paris. He proved to be a materialist, who, when his companion drew out the New Testament, treated it as “a book of fables, good enough for children.” Though tempted to expose to him by argument the folly of infidelity, M. Malan thought it better to let the Word of God, as he said, speak for itself. So he read several passages. The young man shewed vexation, and his fellow-traveller, judging by this that his conscience was troubled, read still more. The infidel became very angry, then biting his lips he took refuge in silence. After travelling in this way for about half an hour, he suddenly exclaimed: “I should like to have a book like that, for I begin to believe that what it contains is true, and that I have been deceiving myself.” M. Malan gave the young man his Testament; and meeting him afterwards at Bordeaux, he found that he was attentively studying it, and that in every way he shewed it had made a profound impression upon him. “When I saw this fruit of the Word of God,” said M. Malan, “I rejoiced that I had not spoken of myself and of my own reasons.”
Divine energy of Christianity.—Voltaire well said to Lady Chesterfield that the English Parliament patronised Christianity because no better system of religion had yet been found. Read the chronicles of Buddhism, Brahminism, Parseeism, and other heathen philosophies. Their logical work has been to quench the happiness of their devotees. Hours might be spent in portraying the transfigurations wrought by Christianity. She has recently lighted her vestal fires in Australia, Madagascar, and Liberia, and to-day each is a pharos of civilisation, shedding its radiance far out on the surges of domestic, civil, and moral gloom. Few benedictions of civilisation can be named that she has not pioneered. Over no acre has she waved her wand where the wilderness has not blossomed as the rose. Prejudiced sceptics speak of modern nations as being little improved over classic Greece and Rome. Look back to that period when the law of might was the law of right, when childhood and womanhood were in degradation, and when iron-hearted cruelty was enthroned in the metropolis of paganism. Read of the extensive butcheries of men in the sports of the Colosseum under numerous imperial monsters. Read of the successive massacres of the early Christians, from the coronation of Nero to the death of Diocletian, whose slaughter of God’s saints was so general that on his commemorative medal was impressed, “The Christian religion is destroyed.” Even such infidel essayists as Bolingbroke and Gibbon are pre-eminently brilliant in their eulogies of Christianity in the Roman Empire. Rousseau and Bonaparte penned as eloquent tributes to the achievements of Christianity as did De Tocqueville, Pascal, or Bacon. Macaulay describes a gorgeous window made from rejected fragments of glass. So Christianity has taken depraved communities and converted them into moral populations. It is because Divine energy is essential to the mental, social, and spiritual uplifting of all lands, because at their gates Jesus knocks to-day more earnestly than Henry IV. knocked at the gates of Hildebrand, and because history attests the regenerative influence of Christianity, that the ascending Redeemer commissioned His disciples to see to it that His kingdom shall finally achieve universal ascendency.
Progress of Christianity.—Arnobius, a heathen philosopher, who became a Christian, speaking of the power which the Christian faith bad over the minds of men, says: “Who would not believe it, when he sees in how short a time it has conquered so great knowledge? Orators, grammarians, rhetoricians, lawyers, physicians, and philosophers have thrown up those opinions which but a little before they held, and have embraced the doctrines of the gospel!” “Though but of yesterday,” said Tertullian, “yet have we filled your cities, islands, castles, corporations, councils, your armies themselves, your tribes, companies, the palace, the senate, and courts of justice; only your temples have we left you free.”
Final triumph of Christianity.—Travellers tell us that in Arctic regions, when the six months of night are ending, and the long day of sunshine is about to begin, the inhabitants ascend the peaks and await the magnificent sunrise. When his ball of light has chased from the ice-fields the shadows, and he rests like a globe of flame on the rim of earth, ere he begins to climb the rounds of a ladder of glory more luminous than Jacob saw at Bethel, the people shed tears of joy, and, embracing each other, they cry, “The sun has come to us, and the long night is over.” So in fancy I see standing on the crests of all lands of heathenism the benighted races, looking for the appearance of the Sun of Righteousness to banish their long night of barbarism, idolatry, and cruelty, and usher in the unending day of Christ’s universal reign. I seem to stand to-day in this vast and solemn presence. In vision I see the countless millions, Caucasians, Mongolians, Africans, Malays, and Indians. They crowd the summits of all the mountains of pagan provinces in fearful vastness of multitude. From the standpoint of this commission, and with the telescope of this farewell pledge of the Ascended Redeemer, we can even now by faith see that splendid period in history when, from the tall tops of all mission provinces, the grand concerted acclaim shall ascend, “The Sun has come to us. and the long night is over.”—S. V. Leach, D.D.
Amen.—” My heart wishes it to be exactly so,” is the Chinese rendering of “Amen.” The value of this definition is that it is not a mere lip repetition of this blessed old Hebrew word, but a whole-souled, whole-hearted desire for the triumph of that which is good. Is there not danger that our “Amens” may become a mere head and lip endorsement of the truth, while the heart is not in it? Let us be sure that in everything excellent that is presented to us we can say of a verity, “Amen, my heart wishes it to be exactly so.”