Mark 6:45–8:26

Jesus Walks on the Water

⁴⁵At once Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and go ahead of him to Bethsaida, on the other side of the lake, while he sent the crowd away. ⁴⁶After saying goodbye to the people he went away to a hill to pray. ⁴⁷When evening came, the boat was in the middle of the lake, while Jesus was alone on land. ⁴⁸He saw that his disciples were straining at the oars, because they were rowing against the wind; so some time between three and six o’clock in the morning he came to them, walking on the water. He was going to pass them by,^{k 49}but they saw him walking on the water. “It’s a ghost!” they thought, and screamed. ⁵⁰They were all terrified when they saw him.

Jesus spoke to them at once, “Courage!” he said. “It is I. Don’t be afraid!” ⁵¹Then he got into the boat with them, and the wind died down. The disciples were completely amazed, ⁵²because they had not understood the real meaning of the feeding of the 5,000; their minds could not grasp it.

Jesus Heals the Sick in Gennesaret

⁵³They crossed the lake and came to land at Gennesaret, where they tied up the boat. ⁵⁴As they left the boat, people recognized Jesus at once. ⁵⁵So they ran throughout the whole region; and wherever they heard he was, they brought to him sick people lying on their mats. ⁵⁶And everywhere Jesus went, to villages, towns, or farms, people would take those who were ill to the market places and beg him to let them at least touch the edge of his cloak; and all who touched it were made well.

The Teaching of the Ancestors

7Some Pharisees and teachers of the Law who had come from Jerusalem gathered round Jesus. ²They noticed that some of his disciples were eating their food with hands that were ritually unclean—that is, they had not washed them in the way the Pharisees said people should.

³(For the Pharisees, as well as the rest of the Jews, follow the teaching they received from their ancestors: they do not eat unless they wash their hands in the proper way; ⁴nor do they eat anything that comes from the market unless they wash it first.^l And they follow many other rules which they have received, such as the proper way to wash cups, pots, copper bowls, and beds.^m )

⁵So the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law asked Jesus, “Why is it that your disciples do not follow the teaching handed down by our ancestors, but instead eat with ritually unclean hands?”

^6*Jesus answered them, “How right Isaiah was when he prophesied about you! You are hypocrites, just as he wrote:

‘These people, says God, honour me with their words,

but their heart is really far away from me.

^7*It is no use for them to worship me,

because they teach human rules

as though they were God’s laws!’

⁸“You put aside God’s command and obey human teachings.”

⁹And Jesus continued, “You have a clever way of rejecting God’s law in order to uphold your own teaching. ^10*For Moses commanded, ‘Respect your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever curses his father or his mother is to be put to death.’ ¹¹But you teach that if a person has something he could use to help his father or mother, but says, ‘This is Corban’ (which means, it belongs to God), ¹²he is excused from helping his father or mother. ¹³In this way the teaching you pass on to others cancels out the word of God. And there are many other things like this that you do.”

The Things That Make a Person Unclean

¹⁴Then Jesus called the crowd to him once more and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand. ¹⁵There is nothing that goes into a person from the outside which can make him ritually unclean. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that makes him unclean.”ⁿ

¹⁷When he left the crowd and went into the house, his disciples asked him to explain this saying. ¹⁸“You are no more intelligent than the others,” Jesus said to them. “Don’t you understand? Nothing that goes into a person from the outside can really make him unclean, ¹⁹because it does not go into his heart but into his stomach and then goes on out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared that all foods are fit to be eaten.)

²⁰And he went on to say, “It is what comes out of a person that makes him unclean. ²¹For from the inside, from a person’s heart, come the evil ideas which lead him to do immoral things, to rob, kill, ²²commit adultery, be greedy, and do all sorts of evil things; deceit, indecency, jealousy, slander, pride, and folly- ²³all these evil things come from inside a person and make him unclean.”

A Woman’s Faith

²⁴Then Jesus left and went away to the territory near the city of Tyre. He went into a house and did not want anyone to know he was there, but he could not stay hidden. ²⁵A woman, whose daughter had an evil spirit in her, heard about Jesus and came to him at once and fell at his feet. ²⁶The woman was a Gentile, born in the region of Phoenicia in Syria. She begged Jesus to drive the demon out of her daughter. ²⁷But Jesus answered, “Let us first feed the children. It isn’t right to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”

²⁸“Sir,” she answered, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s leftovers!”

²⁹So Jesus said to her, “Because of that answer, go back home, where you will find that the demon has gone out of your daughter!”

³⁰She went home and found her child lying on the bed; the demon had indeed gone out of her.

Jesus Heals a Deaf-Mute

³¹Jesus then left the neighbourhood of Tyre and went on through Sidon to Lake Galilee, going by way of the territory of the Ten Towns. ³²Some people brought him a man who was deaf and could hardly speak, and they begged Jesus to place his hands on him. ³³So Jesus took him off alone, away from the crowd, put his fingers in the man’s ears, spat, and touched the man’s tongue. ³⁴Then Jesus looked up to heaven, gave a deep groan, and said to the man, “Ephphatha,” which means, “Open up!”

³⁵At once the man was able to hear, his speech impediment was removed, and he began to talk without any trouble. ³⁶Then Jesus ordered the people not to speak of it to anyone; but the more he ordered them not to, the more they spoke. ³⁷And all who heard were completely amazed. “How well he does everything!” they exclaimed. “He even causes the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak!”

Jesus Feeds Four Thousand People

8Not long afterwards another large crowd came together. When the people had nothing left to eat, Jesus called the disciples to him and said, ²“I feel sorry for these people, because they have been with me for three days and now have nothing to eat. ³If I send them home without feeding them, they will faint as they go, because some of them have come a long way.”

⁴His disciples asked him, “Where in this desert can anyone find enough food to feed all these people?”

⁵“How much bread have you got?” Jesus asked.

“Seven loaves,” they answered.

⁶He ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then he took the seven loaves, gave thanks to God, broke them, and gave them to his disciples to distribute to the crowd; and the disciples did so. ⁷They also had a few small fish. Jesus gave thanks for these and told the disciples to distribute them too. ^8–9Everybody ate and had enough—there were about 4,000 people. Then the disciples took up seven baskets full of pieces left over. Jesus sent the people away ¹⁰and at once got into a boat with his disciples and went to the district of Dalmanutha.

The Pharisees Ask for a Miracle

^11*Some Pharisees came to Jesus and started to argue with him. They wanted to trap him, so they asked him to perform a miracle to show that God approved of him. ^12*But Jesus gave a deep groan and said, “Why do the people of this day ask for a miracle? No, I tell you! No such proof will be given to these people!”

¹³He left them, got back into the boat, and started across to the other side of the lake.

The Yeast of the Pharisees and of Herod

¹⁴The disciples had forgotten to bring enough bread and had only one loaf with them in the boat. ^15*“Take care,” Jesus warned them, “and be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.”

¹⁶They started discussing among themselves: “He says this because we haven’t any bread.”

¹⁷Jesus knew what they were saying, so he asked them, “Why are you discussing about not having any bread? Don’t you know or understand yet? Are your minds so dull? ^18*You have eyes—can’t you see? You have ears—can’t you hear? Don’t you remember ¹⁹when I broke the five loaves for the five thousand people? How many baskets full of leftover pieces did you take up?”

“Twelve,” they answered.

²⁰“And when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand people,” asked Jesus, “how many baskets full of leftover pieces did you take up?”

“Seven,” they answered.

²¹“And you still don’t understand?” he asked them.

Jesus Heals a Blind Man at Bethsaida

²²They came to Bethsaida, where some people brought a blind man to Jesus and begged him to touch him. ²³Jesus took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. After spitting on the man’s eyes, Jesus placed his hands on him and asked him, “Can you see anything?”

²⁴The man looked up and said, “Yes, I can see people, but they look like trees walking about.”

²⁵Jesus again placed his hands on the man’s eyes. This time the man looked intently, his eyesight returned, and he saw everything clearly. ²⁶Jesus then sent him home with the order, “Don’t go back into the village.”