Bible Commentaries

Nothing; nothing at all sufficient.

Divers of them; several of them.

Dalmanutha; a town whose location is now not known.

The miracles which Jesus had hitherto performed had related to the private wants and sufferings of human life; the Pharisees now asked him for some great prodigy, something visibly affecting the course of nature,--a sign from heaven.

Unto this generation; that is, men of this captious and cavilling spirit. The people of that day, who were disposed candidly to consider his doings, had a sign abundantly sufficient to satisfy their minds.

It seems that Jesus had adopted the plan of a regular system of arrangements for the supply of food for himself and his disciples while travelling; although, when he sent his apostles forth, for reasons applicable particularly to that case, he required them to depend upon the hospitality of their friends.

The leaven; that is, the spirit.

Mark 8:22-26. This is one of the very few accounts which Mark only has given. Nearly the whole of his Gospel, with some variations of phraseology, may be found in those of Matthew and Luke.--Bethsaida; a town south of Capernaum, the birthplace of Philip, Andrew, and Peter.

Out of the town. On account of the increasing hostility of the scribes and Pharisees, Jesus seems to have thought it best to be more and more cautious in his movements, and in the performance of his miracles. There seem to have been some circumstances in this case to require that the cure should be entirely private. It appears from Mark 8:26, that the man did not live within the town; and he therefore took him out beyond its limits, and cured him, and then directed him to go immediately home. We are left entirely uninformed in regard to the reasons for the ceremonies, and the successive steps by which this cure was performed.

Forms indistinct,--men appearing like trees, except that they were moving.

Cesarea Philippi; a city now desolate, situated in the extreme north of Palestine.

Hitherto Jesus seems never to have claimed, or even openly admitted, that he was the Messiah. The disciples had been left to form their own judgment in respect to his person and character.

To avoid producing public commotions. For all idea of the excitability of the public mind on this subject see John 6:15, where they were going to take him by force to make him king.

He explained these things that they might not now, upon his tacit acknowledgment of his Messiahship, begin to form expectations of worldly power and grandeur.--After three days; on the third day.

Get thee behind me, Satan; a strong expression of disapproval.

The people. The foregoing conversation had been a confidential one between Jesus and the disciples alone. We notice how naturally the course of remark which he addressed to the people at large, flowed from the subject of the private conversation which had held with his immediate followers. The doctrine of the passage Mark 8:34-38 is, that whoever becomes the follower of Jesus Christ, must expect, not worldly prosperity and honor, but self-denial, trial, and suffering. He must be prepared to put life, and all that is dear in life, at hazard; but then he will, in the end, secure what is of inconceivably greater value,--the salvation of the soul.