Mark 16 Footnotes

16:8 Manuscript evidence indicates that this Gospel probably did not originally include any of vv. 9-20. Either Mark ended his Gospel here, he never wrote an intended ending, or his original ending has been lost. The Greek syntax of v. 8 and the fact that all the other Gospels include the announcement to the apostles and subsequent resurrection appearances lead some scholars to conclude that Mark’s original ending has been lost.

If the Gospel ended with v. 8, Mark intended his readers to assume the women did as they were told. Their fearful silence did not imply their failure to deliver the angel’s words to the disciples. The reading provides the mental image of the resurrected Jesus heading for Galilee and the women and disciples doing the same, their minds full of the inescapable and wonderful conclusion, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” (15:39). Many times before, the response to Jesus’s work was fear and faith (4:41; 5:15,33; 6:50; 9:6,32; 10:32). Furthermore, the abruptness of such a conclusion matches the abruptness of Mark’s beginning as compared with the other Gospels.