In today's Gospel reading there is one small but rather difficult point, namely the words: and He wanted to pass them by. They are so hard to understand that in the parallel, later text of Matthew's Gospel they are omitted. Why did He want to pass them by, if...
In today's Gospel reading there is one small but rather difficult point, namely the words: and He wanted to pass them by. They are so hard to understand that in the parallel, later text of Matthew's Gospel they are omitted. Why did He want to pass them by, if it says that He saw them distressed in rowing, because the wind was against them? That is, He saw this and went to help them; why, then, did He want to pass them by?
The simplest thing in such difficult cases is simply not to notice the words that are unclear, as if they were not there. But not everyone will find such an approach acceptable. The author of the new translation "Good News," Valentina Kuznetsova, offers us one way to solve this problem: it looked as though He wanted to pass by them. That is, everything is very simple: it only appeared so to them.
It is hard for people untrained in philology to judge, but they can analyze different translations into modern languages, comparing the work of different translators. And nowhere else were we able to find the word "appeared." But how can it be that many different translators all omitted the same word in the same way?
Yet we are not at all frightened even by the degree of paradox present in the text without the word "appeared." Do we have the right to judge the Lord's intention? No. Therefore let us not try to solve what He actually wanted to do. There was some meaning in His actions, one now unknown to us. Let us look at the disciples' testimony: He wanted to pass by. Let us look, without any mental labor of our own, at the testimony in all its simplicity (especially since this is, after all, the Gospel according to Mark), and turn to our own life: does it not happen with us that we are in extremely harsh conditions, praying to the Lord for help, yet see only how help passes by us? It does not appear so to us; rather, we simply see with our own eyes that help is coming toward us, but we cannot make use of it.
Yet in the end the disciples were saved. As we too will be saved. Adding the word "appeared," however, shifts everything onto the unstable ground of unclear sensations whose relation to reality is unknown; and one gets the impression, precisely an impression, that such an approach is rather dangerous.
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4:8 Indeed then when ye knew not God, ye served them that by nature - That is, in reality. Are no gods - And so were under a far worse bondage than even that ofthe Jews. For they did serve the true God, though in a low, slavish manner.
4:9 But now being known of God - As his beloved children. How turn ye back to the weak and poor elements - Weak, utterly unable to purge your conscience from guilt, orto give that filial confidence in God. Poor - incapable of enriching the soul with such holiness and happiness as ye are heirs to. Ye desire to be again in bondage - Though of another kind; now to these elements, as before to those idols.
4:10 Ye observe days - Jewish sabbaths. And months - New moons. And times - As that of the passover, pentecost, and the feast of tabernacles. And years - Annual solemnities.it does not mean sabbatic years. These were not to be observed out of the land of Canaan.
4:11 The apostle here, dropping the argument, applies to the affections, Gal 4:11-20, and humbles himself to the Galatians, with an inexpressible tenderness.
4:12 Brethren, I beseech you, be as I am - Meet me in mutual love. For I am as ye were - I still love you as affectionately as ye once loved me. Why should I not? Ye have not injured me at all - I have received no personal injury from you.
4:13 I preached to you, notwithstanding infirmity of the flesh - That is, notwithstanding bodily weakness, and under great disadvantage from the despicableness of my outward appearance.
4:14 And ye did not slight my temptation - That is, ye did not slight or disdain me for my temptation, my "thorn in the flesh."
4:15 What was then the blessedness ye spake of - On which ye so congratulated one another.
4:17 They - The judaizing teachers who are come among you. Zealously affect you - Express an extraordinary regard for you. But not well - Their zeal is not according to knowledge; neither have they a single eye to your spiritual advantage. Yea, they would exclude you - From me and from the blessings of the gospel. That ye might affect - Love and esteem them.
4:18 In a good thing - In what is really worthy our zeal.True zeal is only fervent love.
4:19 My little children - He speaks as a parent, both with authority, and the most tender sympathy, toward weak and sickly children. Of whom I travail in birth again - As I did before, Gal 4:13, in vehement pain, sorrow, desire, prayer.Till Christ be formed in you - Till there be in you all the mind that was in him.
4:20 I could wish to be present with you now - Particularly in this exigence. And to change - Variously to attemper.My voice - He writes with much softness; but he would speak with more. The voice may more easily be varied according to the occasion than a letter can. For I stand in doubt of you - So that I am at a loss how to speak at this distance.
4:21 Do ye not hear the law - Regard what it says.