Is it in the original Greek? Mark 16:9-20

Allegation: Mk 16:17 is not in the original Greek and therefore does not belong in our Bible.

Mk 16:17-18 "And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover."

This argument is based on the fact that Mark 16:9-20 are not in two of the oldest and best preserved complete manuscripts of the New Testament. These are Codex Sinaticus (Manuscript Aleph) and Codex Vaticanus (Manuscript B). Before we get into the evidence regarding these two manuscripts, however, we need to discuss how our Bible came to us.

Old Testament: Written in Hebrew and Aramaic. The Old Testament was painstakingly copied under strict conditions by a group of Levites known as scribes. Freeman says "so great was their care in copying that they counted and compared all the letters to be sure that none were left out that belonged to the text, or none admitted improperly."1 When a synagogue needed a new scroll of the Old Testament to replace their old one which was getting worn, they commissioned a scribe(s) to copy one. If, in the process of copying the slightest error was found, the entire manuscript was destroyed and they started over. When it was completed the old one was destroyed as the new one was considered more accurate in that it wasn't tattered, faded, or worn in any place and the letters were all clear. For this reason there are not any very old manuscripts of the Old Testament. In fact before the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls they oldest known manuscript of the Old Testament was from 895 A.D. In the 12th century a group of Jews known as the Massoretes produced a standard Hebrew text from the available Hebrew manuscripts that became know as the Masoretic text (M.T.). The Dead Sea Scrolls contained manuscripts from the Old and New Testament (although the New Testament is very fragmentary). They dated from as early as 50 A.D. The scrolls found confirmed the accuracy of the M.T.

New Testament: Written in Greek. Copied by Christians under persecution, with poor materials. The churches would share the Epistles among themselves. Col 4:16 "And when this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and that ye likewise read the epistle from Laodicea." The New Testament was copied and sent all over. They were copied on a variety of materials over the centuries. At first (1-4 A.D.) they were written on papyrus. It was cheap and readily available. The church was largely poor and after 100 A.D. under heavy persecution and didn't have access to more durable material. Because it is not a very durable material only 81 papyri manuscripts exist today. After Constantine issued the Edict of Toleration in 330 A.D. the persecution stopped. The church became more affluent and from the 4th century on parchment (or velum which was a high grade parchment) was used to make copies of the N.T. These are more durable and we have around 4800 of these today. These later manuscripts are divided into 2 groups, Uncials (all capitols and no punctuation) and Minuscules (or cursives, upper and lower case with punctuation. This occurred when the Greek language changed.). In order of importance the most major N.T. manuscripts are:

1. B (Codex Vaticanus). 350 A.D. missing Revelation, Heb 11:14 to the end of Heb and 1 & 2 Timothy. It has been in the Vatican library since 1481.
2. Aleph (Codex Sinaiticus) 375 A.D A complete N.T. This was found by Tischendorf at St. Catherine's Monastery on Mt. Sinai and is now in the Imperial Library at St. Petersburg. The story is that Tischendorf (a Bible archeologist) was exploring in the Mt. Sinai region and took refuge in St. Catherine's Monastery one night to get out of the rain. There he observed a monk starting a fire with pieces of parchment from a box. On closer inspection he found in the box a bound copy of the N.T. It looked very old to him and he asked if he could look at it. He spent all night reading it by candle light.
3. A (Codex Alexandrinus) 425 A.D. Lacks Matt 1:1 Matt 25:6, 2 chapters from John and 8 chapters in II Corinthians. Found in Alexandria Egypt. It was a gift to Charles I, king of England, in 1627 and in 1757 it was presented to the Royal Library and now is in the British Museum.
4. C (Ephraemi Rescriptus) 450 A.D. Originally it contained the entire N.T. but now about half of each book is missing. It contains 145 of 238 pages of the N.T. It came to Italy from the East in the 16th century. It came to France with Catherine de' Medici and now is in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris. A monk by the name of St. Ephraem needed something to write his sermons on. He had an old manuscript of the N.T. on velum. He scrapped the letters off the pages and wrote his sermons over the original. It was not until the invention of the x-ray machine that the original writing underneath could be clearly read.
5. D (Codex Bezae) 475- 550 A.D. This is a parallel manuscript. It is written in two languages: Greek and Latin. Currently it is in the University of Cambridge library. Theodore Beza was a French scholar associated with John Calvin while working on the Geneva Bible. From 1565 to 1604 A.D. Beza published nine editions of the Greek New Testament, all of which were based on the text of Staphanus. During this time he had in his possession this manuscript. He made very little use of it being ignorant of its age and value. It contains the Gospels and the book Acts.
6. 33 (a minuscule) 9th century. It is sometimes referred to as "the queen of the cursives" because by examining the text it is obvious to textural critics that it was copied from a very early manuscript. It is very close to MS B.
7. W (Codex Washingtonensis) 450 A.D. Is in the Smithsonian. Contains portions of the Gospels.

There are many other important manuscripts in Greek that contain various parts of the N.T.

Also found are manuscripts of the N.T. translated into other languages. These are known as versions. There earliest were in Latin. There are 8000 of these in Latin and 1000 in other languages.

Also important are the writings of early Church fathers where they quote from Scripture.

In 1520 an English scholar named Erasmus collected all the manuscripts he could find (8 late date Miniscules) and compiled what became known (after a revision by Stephanus based on additional manuscripts) as the Textus Receptus. It was translated into English and became the source for the King James Bible.

Through the centuries scholars have repeated Erasmus work with more manuscripts available. Two scholars from Cambridge, Westcott & Hort, spent 26 years studying all the manuscripts and produced the Westcott and Hort Greek text in 1881. This was the source text for the New American Standard Bible, and others.

The argument that Mk 16:17 is not in the original Greek comes from the fact that it is missing from manuscripts Aleph and B. It is also missing from manuscript 304 from the 12th century.

It IS in manuscripts A,C,W,D, and MS 33 as well as many others. In all over 600 Greek MSS contain the passage. In fact of the over 600 Greek manuscripts that contain the 16th chapter of Mark only 3 do not have vv 9-20.

Mk. 16 in manuscript B The scribe of manuscript B finished Mark. 16:8 near the bottom of a column then left the next column entirely blank. It is the only blank column in the entire manuscript. This blank space may indicate that the copyist was reading from a torn or obliterated manuscript and left a space hoping to supply the ending later from another source. The empty column after verse 8 is large enough to contain the last 12 verses. This large blank space testifies loudly to the fact that the scribe of B knew that Mk 16 did not end at verse 8.2

Mk 16 in manuscript Aleph "The leaf containing the omission is one of 6 leaves in Aleph that were not done by the hand that produced the rest of the manuscript."3

Tischendorf, who discovered manuscript Aleph, was the first to notice this.4

A later corrector inserted these 6 leaves outright. Whatever the correctors reason might have been, the fact is that these replacement leaves renders it impossible to say that manuscript Aleph in the original hand did not contain Mark. 19:9-20.

The last section of Mark contains letters more spread out than else where in the manuscript. And the last column of Mk contains an elongated ornate design to fill a blank space before Luke starts. George Salmon says: "This (spread out printing) suggests that the page as originally written must have contained something of considerable length which was omitted in the substituted copy. Unless some precaution were taken, an omission of the kind would leave a tell-tale blank [as there is in manuscript B]. But by spreading out his writing the scribe was enabled to carry over 37 letters to a new column, the rest of which could be left blank without attracting notice, since it was the conclusion of a Gospel."5

The remainder of the column is filled with the design mentioned earlier. Salmon concludes; "I do not think these...phenomena can be reasonably explained in any other way than that the leaf, as originally copied, had contained the disputed verses; and that the corrector, regarding these as not a genuine part of the Gospel, canceled the leaf, recopying it in such a way as to cover the gap left by the erasure. It follows that the archetype of Aleph had contained the disputed verses."6 An archetype is the source manuscript that this one was copied from.

Other sources

Irenaeus in 180 A.D. quoted from Mark. 16:19 in his book Against Heresies. "Also towards the conclusion of his Gospel, Mark says; "So then, after the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sits on the right hand of God."

Tatian's Diatessaron, which is a harmony of the four Gospels written around 175 A.D. contains Mark. 16:9-20.

This shows that the passage existed at least 200 years before either Aleph or B were produced.

Internal evidence

Suppose Mark ended with ch 16:8. This would make the conclusion of Mark read; "And they went out quickly, and fled from the sepulcher; for they trembled and were amazed; neither said they any thing to any man; for they were afraid." Not a very inspiring ending!

Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown Commentary remarks; "That so carefully constructed a narrative as that of this Gospel terminated with the words, "for they were afraid"... is what one wonders that any can bring themselves to believe."

There are several theories as to why Mark 16 ends at verse 8.

1. Mark was pressured by his friends to publish his work before finishing it.
2. The last page of Mark was lost, or destroyed shortly after Mark wrote it.
3. Mark died just before completing the last half of the last chapter.

These are hardly worth taking time to answer. Lenski's commentary on Mark contains a lengthy discussion dealing with these three theories. Briefly, his answers to the above theories are in order:

1. Mark wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. He quit when the anointing lifted. All scripture is given by inspiration of God the Bible says.
2. Tradition says that Mark lived a number of years beyond the writing of his Gospel. If the last page was lost shortly after he wrote it, he could have supplied it again.
3. This makes God, who knows all things and knows when Mark would die, so inept that he didn't start anointing Mark early enough to that he would have time to finish the work before he died.

Conclusion

There is very strong evidence both internal and external that the last 12 verses of Mark 16 were in the original Greek and, therefore, are inspired.

Footnotes1 Manners and Customs of the Bible, James Freeman, p. 3412 See John Darby's translation of the New Testament, 3rd rev. ed. introductory notes, p. 33 A Historical Introduction to the Books of the New Testament, George Salmon. p. 1424 Handbook to the Textural Criticism of the New Testament, Frederic G. Kenyon, p. 665 A Historical Introduction to the Books of the New Testament, p 1476 Ibid., pp 147, 148