Комментарии к Библии

CHAPTER 16

Mark 16:2. τῆς μιᾶς] Lachm. has μιᾷ τῶν, following B 1. From John 20:1, as is also τῇ μιᾷ τῶν in L Δ א, Eus. Tisch.

Mark 16:8. After ἐξελθ. Elz. has ταχύ, in opposition to decisive evidence, from Matthew 28:8.

Mark 16:9. ἀφʼ ἧς] Lachm. has παρʼ ἧς, following C D L 33. Rightly; ἀφʼ is from Luke 8:2.

Mark 16:14. After ἐγηγερμ. A C* X Δ, min. Syr. p. Ar. p. Erp. Arm. have ἐκ νεκρῶν, which Lachm. has adopted. A mechanical addition.

Mark 16:17-18. The omission of καιναῖς, as well as the addition of καὶ ἐν ταῖς χερσίν before ὄφεις, is too feebly attested. The latter is an exegetical addition, which, when adopted, absorbed the preceding καιναῖς.

Instead of βλάψῃ Elz. has βλάψει, in opposition to decisive evidence.

Mark 16:19. After κύριος read, with Lachm. and Tisch., Ἰησοῦς, which is found in C* K L Δ, min. most of the vss. and Ir. As an addition in the way of gloss, there would be absolutely no motive for it. On the other hand, possibly on occasion of the abbreviation ΚΣ., ΙΣ., it dropped out the more easily, as the expression ὁ κύριος Ἰησοῦς is infrequent in the Gospels.

The entire section from Mark 16:9-20 is a non-genuine conclusion of the Gospel, not composed by Mark. The external grounds for this view are: (1) The section is wanting in B א, Arm. mss. Ar. vat. and in cod. K of the It. (in Tisch.), which has another short apocryphal conclusion (comp. subsequently the passage in L), and is designated in 137, 138 with an asterisk. (2) Euseb. ad Marin, qu. 1 (in Mai, Script, vet. nov. coll. I. p. 61 f.), declares that σχεδὸν ἐν ἅπασι τοῖς ἀντιγράφοις the Gospel closes with ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ. Comp. qu. 3, p. 72, where he names the manuscripts which contain the section only τινα τῶν ἀντιγράφων. The same authority in Victor Ant. ed. Matth. II. p. 208, states that Mark has not related any appearance of the risen Lord that occurred to the disciples. (3) Jerome, ad Hedib. qu. 3; Gregor. Nyss. orat. 2 de resurr. Chr.; Vict. Ant. ed. Matth. II. p. 120; Sever. Ant. in Montfauc. Bibl. Coisl. p. 74, and the Scholia in several codd. in Scholz and Tisch., attest that the passage was wanting in very many manuscripts (Jerome: “omnibus Graeciae libris paene”). (4) According to Syr. Philox. in the margin, and according to L, several codd. had an entirely different ending[179] of the Gospel. (5) Justin Martyr and Clem. Al. do not indicate any use made by them of the section (how precarious is the resemblance of Justin, Apol. I. 45 with Mark 16:20!); and Eusebius has his Canons only as far as Mark 16:8, as, indeed, also in codd. A U and many min, the numbers really reach only thus far,[180] while certainly in C E H K M V they are carried on to the very end. These external reasons are the less to be rejected, seeing that it is not a question of a single word or of a single passage of the context, but of an entire section so essential and important, the omission of which, moreover, deprives the whole Gospel of completeness; and seeing that the way in which the passage gradually passed over into the greater part of the codd. is sufficiently explained from Euseb. ad Marin. qu. 1, p. 62 (ἄλλος δέ τις οὐδʼ ὁτιοῦν τολμῶν ἀθετεῖν τῶν ὁπωσοῦν ἐν τῇ τῶν εὐαγγελίων γραφῇ φερομένων, διπλῆν εἶναί φησι τὴν ἀνάγνωσιν, ὡς καὶ ἐν ἑτέροις πολλοῖς, ἑκατέραν τε παραδεκτέαν ὑπάρχειν, τῷ μὴ μᾶλλον ταύτην ἐκείνης, ἢ ἐκείνην ταύτης, παρὰ τοῖς πιστοῖς καὶ εὐλαβέσιν ἐγκρίνεσθαι). See Credner, Einl. I. p. 107. And when Euthymius Zigabenus, II. p. 183, designates those who condemn the section as τινὲς τῶν ἐξηγητῶν, not, however, himself contradicting them, the less importance is to be attached to this after the far older testimonies of Eusebius, and others, from which is apparent not the exegetical, but the critical point of view of the condemnation. Moreover, this external evidence against the genuineness finds in the section itself an internal confirmation, since with Mark 16:9 there suddenly sets in a process of excerpt-making in contrast with the previous character of the narration, while the entire section in general contains none of Mark’s peculiarities (no εὐθέως, no ΠΆΛΙΝ, etc.,—and what a brevity, devoid of vividness and clearness on the part of the compiler!); in individual expressions it is quite at variance with the sharply defned manner throughout of Mark (see the notes on the passages in detail, and Zeller in the theol. Jahrb. 1843, p. 450); it does not, moreover, presuppose what has been previously related (see especially Mark 16:9 : ἀφʼ ἧς ἐκβεβλ. ἑπτὰ δαιμ., and the want of any account of the meeting in Galilee that was promised at Mark 16:7), and has even apocryphal disfigurements (Mark 16:18 : ὄφεις … βλάψῃ).

If, in accordance with all this, the section before us is decidedly to be declared spurious, it is at the same time evident that the Gospel is without any conclusion: for the announcement of Mark 16:7, and the last words ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ themselves, decisively show that Mark did not intend to conclude his treatise with these words. But whether Mark himself left the Gospel unfinished, or whether the conclusion has been lost, cannot be ascertained, and all conjectures on this subject are arbitrary. In the latter case the lost concluding section may have been similar to the concluding section of Matthew (namely, Matthew 28:9-10, and Matthew 28:16-20), but must, nevertheless, after Mark 16:8 have contained some incident, by means of which the angelic announcement of Mark 16:6 f. was still, even in spite of the women’s silence in Mark 16:8, conveyed to the disciples. Just as little with reference to the apocryphal fragment[181] itself, Mark 16:9-20,—which already in very early times (although not by Mark himself, in opposition to Michaelis, Hug, Guericke, Ebrard, and others) was incorporated with the Gospel as a conclusion (even Syr. has it; and Iren. Haer. iii. 10. 6 quotes Mark 16:19, and Hippol. Mark 16:17-18),—is there anything more definite to be established than that it was composed independently of our Gospel, in which case the point remains withal undecided whether the author was a Jewish or a Gentile Christian (Credner), as indeed at least πρώτῃ σαββάτων, Mark 16:9 (in opposition to Credner), might be used by one who had been a Jew and had become conversant with Hellenic life.

Against the genuineness the following have declared themselves: Michaelis (Auferstehungsgesch. p. 179 ff.; Einl. p. 1059 f.), Thies, Bolten, Griesbach, Gratz, Bertholdt, Rosenmüller, Schulthess in Tzschirner’s Anal. III. 3; Schulz, Fritzsche, Schott (Isag. p. 94 ff., contrary to his Opusc. II. p. 129 ff.), Paulus (exeget. Handb.), Credner, Wieseler (Commentat. num. loci Marc. xvi. 9–20 et Joh. xxi. genuini sint, etc., Gott. 1839), Neudecker, Tischendorf, Ritschl, Ewald, Reuss, Anger, Zeller, Hitzig (who, however, regards Luke as the author), Schenkel, Weiss, Holtzmann, Keim, and various others, including Hofmann (Schriftbew. II. 2, p. 4). In favour of the genuineness: Richard Simon (hist. crit. p. 114 f.), Mill, Wolf, Bengel, Matthaei, Eichhorn, Storr, Kuinoel, Hug, Feilmoser, Vater, Saunier, Scholz, Rinck (Lucubr. crit. p. 311 ff.), de Wette, Schwarz, Guericke, Olshausen, Ebrard, Lange, Bleek, Bisping, Schleiermacher also, and various others.[182] Lachmann, too, has adopted the section, as according to his critical principles it was necessary to do, since it is found in most of the uncials (only B א have it not), Vulg. It. Syr., etc. We may add that he did not regard it as genuine (see Stud. u. Krit. 1830, p. 843).

[179] Namely: πάντα δὲ τὰ παρηγγελμένα τοῖς περὶ τὸν Πέτρον συντόμως ἐξήγγειλαν· μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα καὶ αὐτὸς ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἀπὸ ἀνατολῆς καὶ ἄχρι δύσεως ἐξαπέστειλε διʼ αὐτῶν τὸ ἱερὸν καὶ ἄφθαρτον κἡρυγμα τῆς αἰωνίου σωτηρίας. After that L goes on: ἔστην δὲ καὶ ταῦτα φερόμενα μετὰ τὸ ἐφοβοῦντο γὰρ· ἀναστάς δὲ κ.τ.λ.

[180] Vv. 15–18 occur in the Evang. Nicod. 14, in Thilo, p. 618; Tischendorf, p. 242 f. They might therefore have already appeared in the Acts of Pilate, which composition, as is well known, is worked up in the Gospel of Nicodemus. Ritschl, in the theol. Jahrb. 1851, p. 527, would infer this from Tertullian, Apol. 21. But scarcely with warrant, for Tertullian, l.c., where there is contained an excerpt from the Acts of Pilate, is founded upon the tradition in the Acts of the Apostles, foreign to the Synoptics, regarding the forty days.

[181] That it is a fragment, which originally stood in connection with matter preceding, is plain from the fact that in ver. 9 the subject, ὁ Ἰησοῦς, is not named.

[182] Köstlin, p. 378 ff., ascribes the section to the alleged second manipulator of the Gospel. Lange conjectures (see his L. J. I. p. 166) that an incomplete work of Mark reached the Christian public earlier than that which was subsequently completed. According to Hilgenfeld, the section is not without a genuine groundwork, but the primitive form can no longer be ascertained; the evangelist appears “to have become unfaithful to his chief guide Matthew, in order to finish well by means of an older representation.”

Mark 16:1-8. See on Matthew 28:1-8. Comp. Luke 24:1-11.

διαγενομ. τοῦ σαββ.] i.e. on Saturday after sunset. See Mark 16:2. A difference from Luke 23:56, which is neither to be got rid of, with Ebrard and Lange, by a distortion of the clear narrative of Luke; nor, with Beza, Er. Schmid, Grotius, Wolf, Rosenmüller, and others, by taking ἠγόρασαν as a pluperfect. For examples of διαγίνεσθαι used of the lapse of an intervening time (Dem. 541. 10, 833. 14; Acts 25:13; Acts 27:9), see Raphel, Polyb. p. 157; Wetstein in loc.

They bought aromatic herbs (ἀρώματα, Xen. Anab. i. 5. 1; Polyb. xiii. 9. 5) to mingle them with ointment, and so to anoint the dead body therewith (ἀλείψ.). This is no contradiction of John 19:40. See on Matthew 27:59.

Mark 16:2 f. πρωΐ] with the genitive. Comp. Herod. ix. 101, and see generally, Krüger, § 47. 10. 4.

τῆς μιᾶς σαββ.] on the Sunday. See on Matthew 28:1.

ἀνατειλαντ. τοῦ ἡλίου] after sunrise; not: when the sun rose (Ebrard, Hug, following Grotius, Heupel, Wolf, Heumann, Paulus, and others), or: was about to rise (so Krebs, Hitzig), or: had begun to rise (Lange), which would be ἀνατέλλοντος, as is actually the reading of D. A difference, from John 20:1, and also from Luke 24:1; nor will it suit well even with the πρωΐ strengthened by λίαν; we must conceive it so, that the sun had only just appeared above the horizon.

πρὸς ἑαυτούς] in communication with each other. But of a Roman watch they know nothing.

ἐκ τῆς θύρας] The stone was rolled into the entrance of the tomb, and so closed the tomb, John 20:1.

Mark 16:4. ἦν γὰρ μέγας σφόδρα] Wassenbergh in Valckenaer, Schol. II. p. 35, would transpose this back to Mark 16:3 after μνημείου, as has actually been done in D. Most expositors (including Fritzsche, de Wette, Bleek) proceed thus as respects the meaning; holding that γάρ brings in the reason for Mark 16:3. An arbitrary view; it refers to what immediately precedes. After they had looked up (their look was previously cast down) they beheld (“contemplabantur cum animi intentione,” see Tittmann, Synon. p. 120 f.) that the stone was rolled away; for (specification of the reason how it happened that this perception could not escape them after their looking up, but the fact of its having been rolled away must of necessity meet their eyes) it was very great. Let us conceive to ourselves the very large stone lying close by the door of the tomb. Its rolling away, however, had not occurred while they were beside it, as in Matthew, but previously; so also Luke 24:2; Luke 24:23; John 20:1. As to σφόδρα at the end, comp. on Matthew 2:10.

Mark 16:5. νεανίσκον] Mark and Luke (who, however, differ in the number: ἄνδρες δύο) relate the angelic appearance as it presented itself (κατὰ τὸ φαινόμενον); Matthew (who, however, places it not in the tomb, but upon the stone), as that which it actually was (ἄγγελος κυρίου). On the form of a young man assumed by the angel, comp. 2Ma 3:26; Joseph. Antt. v. 8. 2 f., and Genesis 19:5 f.

ἐν τ. δεξ] on the right hand in the tomb from the entrance, therefore to the left hand of the place where the body would lie.

Mark 16:6. Simple asyndeta in the lively eagerness of the discourse.

Mark 16:7. ἀλλʼ] breaking off, before the summons which suddenly intervened, Kühner, II. p. 439; Ellendt, Lex. Soph. I. p. 78 f.

καὶ τῷ Πέτρῳ] to His disciples and (among these especially) to Peter. Comp. Mark 1:5; Acts 1:14; and see Grotius. The special prominence of Peter is explained by the ascendancy and precedence, which by means of Jesus Himself (Matthew 16:18) he possessed as primus inter pares (“dux apostolici coetus,” Grotius; comp. also Mark 9:2; Mark 14:33), not by the denial of Peter, to whom the announcement is held to have given the assurance of forgiveness (Theophylact, Euthymius Zigabenus, Victor Antiochenus, Calovius, Heumann, Kuinoel, Lange, and others), which is assumed with all the greater arbitrariness without any indication in the text, seeing that possibly Peter might have concluded just the contrary.

ὅτι] recitative, so that ὑμᾶς and ὑμῖν apply to the disciples as in Matthew.

καθὼς εἶπεν ὑμῖν] Mark 14:28. It relates to the whole of what precedes: προάγει ὑμᾶς κ.τ.λ. and ἐκεῖ αὐτ. ὄψ. The latter was indirectly contained in Mark 14:28.

The circumstance that here preparation is made for a narrative of a meeting together in Galilee, but no such account subsequently follows, is an argument justly brought to bear against the genuineness of Mark 16:9 ff. That the women did not execute the angel’s charge (Mark 16:8), does not alter the course of the matter as it had been indicated by the angel; and to explain that inconsistency by the fact that the ascension does not well agree with the Galilean meeting, is inadmissible, because Mark, according to our passage and Mark 14:28, must of necessity have assumed such a meeting,[183] consequently there was nothing to hinder him from representing Jesus as journeying to Galilee, and then again returning to Judaea for the ascension (in opposition to de Wette).

Mark 16:8. δέ] explicative, hence also γάρ has found its way into codd. and vss. (Lachmann, Tischendorf).

οὐδενὶ οὐδὲν εἶπον] The suggestion that we should, with Grotius, Heupel, Kuinoel, and many more, mentally supply: on the way, is devised for the sake of Luke 24:9; rather is it implied, that from fear and amazement they left the bidding of the angel at Mark 16:7 unfulfilled. It is otherwise in Matthew 28:8. That subsequently they told the commission given to them by the angel, is self-evident; but they did not execute it.

εἶχε δὲ αὐτὰς κ.τ.λ.] Hom Il. vi. 137; Herod. iv. 15; Soph. Phil. 681; also in the LXX.

[183] It is characteristic of Schenkel that he assumes the Gospel to have really closed with ver. 8, and that it is “mere unproved conjecture” (p. 319) that the conclusion is lost. Such a supposition doubtless lay in his interest as opposed to the bodily resurrection; but even ver. 7 and Mark 14:28 ought to have made him too prudent not to see (p. 333) in the absence of any appearances of the risen Lord in Mark the weightiest evidence in favour of the early composition of his Gospel, whereas he comes to the unhistorical conclusion that Peter did not touch on these appearances in his discourses. See Acts 10:40 f., and previously Acts 2:32, Acts 3:15.

Mark 16:9-10. Now begins the apocryphal fragment of some other evangelical treatise (doubtless written very much in the way of epitome), which has been added as a conclusion of our Gospel. In it, first of all, the appearance related at John 20:14-18 is given in a meagre abstract, in which the remark, which in Mark’s connection was here wholly inappropriate (at the most its place would have been Mark 15:40), πὰρ ἧς ἐκβεβλ. ἑπτὰ δαιμ., is to be explained by the fact, that this casting out of demons was related in the writing to which the portion had originally belonged (comp. Luke 8:2).

πρωῒ πρώτῃ σαββ.] is joined by Beza, Castalio, Heupel, Wolf, Rosenmüller, Paulus, Fritzsche, de Wette, Ewald, and others with ἀναστὰς δέ, but by Severus of Antioch, Gregory of Nyssa, Theophylact, Euthymius Zigabenus, Victor, Grotius, Mill, Bengel, Kuinoel, Schulthess, and others, with ἐφάνη. We cannot decide the point, since we do not know the connection with what went before, in which the fragment originally occurred. If it were an integral part of our Gospel, it would have to be connected with ἐφάνη, since Mark 16:2 already presupposes the time of the resurrection having taken place, and now in the progress of the narrative the question was not about this specification of time, but about the fact that Jesus on the very same morning made His first appearance.

As well πρώτῃ as the singular σαββάτου (comp. Luke 18:12) is surprising after Mark 16:2. Yet it is to be conceded that even Mark himself might so vary the expressions.

παρʼ ἧς] (see the critical remarks): away from whom (French: de chez). See Matthiae, p. 1378. The expression with ἐκβάλλειν is not elsewhere found in the N. T.

Mark 16:10. Foreign to Mark is here—(1) ἐκείνη, which never occurs (comp. Mark 4:11, Mark 7:15, Mark 12:4 f., Mark 14:21) in his Gospel so devoid of emphasis as in this case. As unemphatic stands κἀκεῖνοι in Mark 16:11, but not at ver 13, as also ἐκείνοις in Mark 16:13 and ἐκεῖνοι, at Mark 16:20 are emphatic. (2) πορευθεῖσα, which word Mark, often as he had occasion for it, never uses, while in this short section it occurs three times (Mark 16:12; Mark 16:15). Moreover, (3) the circumlocution τοῖς μετʼ αὐτοῦ γενομένοις, instead of τοῖς μαθηταῖς αὐτοῦ (the latter does not occur at all in the section), is foreign to the Gospels. The μαθηταί in the more extended sense are meant, the apostles and the rest of the companions of Jesus; the apostles alone are designated at Mark 16:14 by οἱ ἕνδεκα as at Luke 24:9; Luke 24:33; Acts 2:14.

πενθοῦαι κ. κλαίουσι] who were mourning and weeping. Comp. Luke 6:25, although to derive the words from this passage (Schulthess) is arbitrary.

Mark 16:11. Comp. Luke 24:10-11; John 20:18.

The fact that θεᾶσθαι apart from this section does not occur in Mark, forms, considering the frequency of the use of the word elsewhere, one of the signs of a strange hand. By ἐθεάθη is not merely indicated that He had been seen, but that He had been gazed upon. Comp. Mark 16:14, and see Tittmann, Synon. p. 120 f.

ἀπιστεῖν does not occur in Mark except here and at Mark 16:16, but is altogether of rare occurrence in the N. T. (even in Luke only in chap. 24)

Mark 16:12-13. A meagre statement of the contents of Luke 24:13-35, yet provided with a traditional explanation (ἐν ἑτέρᾳ μορφῇ), and presenting a variation (οὐδὲ ἐκείνοις ἐπίστευσαν) which betrays as its source[184] not Luke himself, but a divergent tradition.

μετὰ ταῦτα] (after what was narrated in Mark 16:9-11) does not occur at all in Mark, often as he might have written it: it is an expression foreign to him. How long after, does not appear. According to Luke, it was still on the same day.

ἐξ αὐτῶν] τῶν μετʼ αὐτοῦ γενομένων, Mark 16:10.

περιπατοῦσιν] euntibus, not while they stood or sat or lay, but as they walked. More precise information is then given in πορευομένοις εἰς ἀγρόν: while they went into the country.

ἑφανερώθη] Mark 16:14; John 21:1, He became visible to them, was brought to view. The expression does not directly point to a “ghostlike” appearance (in opposition to de Wette), since it does not of itself, although it does by ἐν ἑτέρᾳ μορφῇ, point to a supernatural element in the bodily mode of appearance of the risen Lord. This ἐν ἑτέρᾳ μορφῇ is not to be referred to other clothing and to an alleged disfigurement of the face by the sufferings borne on the cross (comp. Grotius, Heumann, Bolten, Paulus, Kuinoel, and others), but to the bodily form, that was different from what His previous form had been,—which the tradition here followed assumed in order to explain the circumstance that the disciples, Luke 24:16, did not recognise Jesus who walked and spoke with them.

Mark 16:13. κἀκεῖνοι] these also, as Mary had done, Mark 16:10.

τοῖς λοιποῖς] to the others γενομένοις μετʼ αὐτοῦ, Mark 16:10; Mark 16:12.

οὐδὲ ἐκείνοις ἐπίστ.] not even them did they believe. A difference of the tradition from that of Luke 24:34, not a confusion with Luke 24:41, which belongs to the following appearance (in opposition to Schulthess, Fritzsche, de Wette). It is boundless arbitrariness of harmonizing to assume, as do Augustine, de consens. evang. iii. 25, Theophylact, and others, including Kuinoel, that under λέγοντας in Luke 24:34, and also under the unbelievers in the passage before us, we are to think only of some, and those different at the two places; while Calvin makes the distribution in such a manner, that they had doubted at first, but had afterwards believed! Bengel gives it conversely. According to Lange, too, they had been believing, but by the message of the disciples of Emmaus they were led into new doubt. Where does this appear? According to the text, they believed neither the Magdalene nor even the disciples of Emmaus.

[184] De Wette wrongly thinks (following Storr, Kuinoel, and others) here and repeatedly, that an interpolator would not have allowed himself to extract so freely. Our author, in fact, wrote not as an interpolator of Mark (how unskilfully otherwise must he have gone to work!), but independently of Mark, for the purpose of completing whose Gospel, however, this fragment was subsequently used.

Mark 16:14. Ύστερον] not found elsewhere in Mark, does not mean: at last (Vulgate, Luther, Beza, Schulthess, and many others), although, according to our text, this appearance was the last (comp. Matthew 21:37), but: afterwards, subsequently (Matthew 4:2; Matthew 21:29; John 13:36), which certainly is a very indefinite specification.

The narrative of this appearance confuses very different elements with one another. It is manifestly (see Mark 16:15) the appearance which according to Matthew 28:16 took place on the mountain in Galilee; but ἀνακειμένοις (as they reclined at table) introduces an altogether different scenery and locality, and perhaps arose from a confusion with the incident contained[185] in Luke 24:42 f., or Acts 1:4 (according to the view of συναλιζόμενος as convescens); while also the reproaching of the unbelief is here out of place, and appears to have been introduced from some confusion with the history of Thomas, John 20, and with the notice contained in Luke 24:25; for which the circumstance mentioned at the appearance on the mountain, Matthew 28:17 (οἱ δὲ ἐδίστασαν), furnished a certain basis.

ΑὐΤΟῖς ΤΟῖς ἝΝΔΕΚΑ] ipsis undecim. Observe the ascending gradation in the three appearances—(1) to Mary; (2) to two of His earlier companions; (3) to the eleven themselves. Of other appearances in the circle of the eleven our author knows nothing; to him this was the only one. See Mark 16:19.

ὅτι] equivalent to ΕἸς ἘΚΕῖΝΟ ὍΤΙ, Luke 16:3; John 2:18; John 9:17; John 11:51; John 16:9; 2 Corinthians 1:18; 2 Corinthians 11:10.

[185] Beza, Calovius, and others wrongly explain ἀνακειμ. as: una sedentibus. Comp. Mark 14:18.

Mark 16:15. Continuation of the same act of speaking.

πάσῃ τῇ κτίσει] to the whole creation, i.e. to all creatures, by which expression, however, in this place, as in Colossians 1:23, all men are designated, as those who are created κατʼ ἐξοχήν, as the Rabbinic הבריות is also used (see Lightfoot, p. 673, and Wetstein in loc) Not merely the Gentiles (who are called by the Rabbins contemptuously הבריות, see Lightfoot, l.c.) are meant, as Lightfoot, Hammond, Knatchbull, and others would have it. This would be in accordance neither with Mark 16:16 f., where the discourse is of all believers without distinction, nor with ἐκήρυξαν πανταχοῦ, Mark 16:20, wherein is included the entire missionary activity, not merely the preaching to the Gentiles. Comp. on πάντα τὰ ἔθνη Matthew 28:19. Nor yet is there a pointing in τῇ κτίσει at the glorification of the whole of nature (Lange, comp. Bengel) by means of the gospel (comp. Romans 8), which is wholly foreign to the conception, as plainly appears from what follows (ὁ … ὁ δέ). As in Col. l.c., so here also the designation of the universal scope of the apostolic destination by πάσῃ τῇ κτίσει has in it something of solemnity.

Mark 16:16. He who shall have become believing (see on Romans 13:11), and have been baptized, shall attain the Messianic salvation (on the establishment of the kingdom). The necessity of baptism—of baptism, namely, regarded as a necessary divinely ordained consequent of the having become believing, without, however (as Calvin has observed), being regarded as dimidia salutis causa—is here (comp. John 3:5) expressed for all new converts, but not for the children of Christians (see on 1 Corinthians 7:14).

ὁ δὲ ἀπιστήσας] That in the case of such baptism had not occurred, is obvious of itself; refusal of faith necessarily excluded baptism, since such persons despised the salvation offered in the preaching of faith. In the case of a baptism without faith, therefore, the necessary subjective causa salutis would be wanting.