The Ending of Mark

Mark 16:9–20 is the first famous hard case in this course. The passage contains resurrection appearances, the commission to preach, Baptism, signs accompanying believers, and the ascension. Luther cites Mark 16:16 in the Small Catechism. Many Christians have heard these words at church, learned them by heart, or leaned on them in grief.

That history deserves pastoral care. It cannot decide what Mark wrote.

The evidence leads most textual scholars to conclude with high confidence that the Gospel’s earliest recoverable ending is Mark 16:8. The harder question is what that conclusion means. The answer is not that the resurrection, the Great Commission, Baptism’s promise, or the ascension has been taken from the church. None of those truths rests on this passage alone.

1. Begin with your own Bible

Look immediately after Mark 16:8. You may find:

• verses 9–20 printed without a note;
• verses 9–20 within double brackets;
• a heading or note saying that some early manuscripts end at verse 8;
• a “shorter ending,” either in the text or a note;
• notes that mention more than one form of the ending.

Modern translations generally preserve the longer ending on the page while telling readers about the evidence. Brackets and footnotes are not a quiet deletion. They are an invitation to see the textual history.

2. Mark has more than two endings

The evidence is not simply “verses present” against “verses absent.” At least four forms survive.

Multiple endings are evidence in their own right. Copyists do not normally invent several conclusions to a book whose close has never caused difficulty. These forms show that early readers experienced the ending at verse 8 as abrupt and tried more than one way to supply what they felt was missing.

3. External evidence: old, widespread, and divided

If the decision were made by counting medieval Greek manuscripts, the longer ending would prevail. It became the church’s dominant form and is genuinely ancient. Irenaeus explicitly knows Mark 16:19 around the late second century, and other second-century evidence may reflect the longer ending. The question is not whether Christians read it early. They did. The question is whether Mark wrote it.

Evidence for ending at verse 8

• Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus, two fourth-century Greek Bibles, end Mark at 16:8.
• Vaticanus leaves unusual blank space after Mark, enough to show that its scribe knew the ending presented a textual problem, even though the scribe did not copy verses 9–20.
• Codex Bobbiensis, an Old Latin manuscript often designated k, has the shorter ending rather than verses 9–20.
• The Sinaitic Syriac ends at verse 8.
• Some Coptic, Armenian, and Georgian evidence omits or marks the longer ending.
• Eusebius and Jerome report that many or most of the Greek copies known to them did not contain it.

Evidence for the longer ending

• Codex Alexandrinus, Codex Bezae, and Codex Washingtonianus contain it, though Washingtonianus also contains the Freer logion.
• The passage stands in the great majority of later Greek manuscripts.
• It entered the Vulgate and the English Bible tradition that runs through Wycliffe, Tyndale, Geneva, and the King James.
• Irenaeus’s citation proves that the longer ending was attached to Mark by the late second century.

The evidence therefore needs a careful sentence: the longer ending is not a medieval invention, but the earliest and most diverse evidence indicates that it was not the ending copied in some important early forms of Mark.

4. Internal evidence: the seam is visible

Several features distinguish Mark 16:9–20 from the Gospel immediately before it.

It reads like a compact Gospel harmony

Within twelve verses, the passage recalls Mary Magdalene’s appearance tradition, the two travelers, an appearance to the eleven, a worldwide commission, signs associated with apostolic mission, and the ascension. These themes are true and biblical. Their compressed arrangement resembles a summary assembled from traditions also known in Matthew, Luke, John, and Acts.

The vocabulary and usage shift

The ending contains an unusual concentration of words and expressions not otherwise characteristic of Mark. Vocabulary counts can be overstated in a short passage, so they should not carry the decision alone. Alongside the external evidence and the narrative seam, however, the change matters.

Verse 8 is startling; verse 9 begins again

In Greek, verse 8 ends with gar, “for,” an exceptionally abrupt way to close a book. Verse 9 then starts with a construction unlike Mark’s usual resurrection language.

The abruptness of verse 8 helps explain why later readers wanted a fuller close. It does not by itself prove that Mark could not end there. Ancient writers could end forcefully, and modern scholars divide over whether Mark’s original last leaf was lost or whether the startling close was deliberate.

Mary Magdalene is reintroduced

Mary has already appeared in Mark 15:40, 15:47, and 16:1. Yet verse 9 identifies her anew as the woman from whom Jesus cast out seven demons. That sounds more like the beginning of a separate resurrection summary than the continuation of the scene eight verses into the chapter.

5. Ask the master question

The first history explains more evidence with fewer special assumptions. For that reason, modern critical editions treat 16:8 as the end of Mark’s text and translations commonly mark 16:9–20.

There remains a serious minority defense of the longer ending. William Farmer, Maurice Robinson, James Snapp Jr., and others give greater weight to its age and broad later attestation and dispute parts of the standard case. Their work should be read rather than caricatured. Acknowledging a responsible minority does not require pretending that the evidence is evenly balanced.

6. Did Mark intend to stop at verse 8?

The manuscript evidence can tell us that the longer ending probably did not come from Mark. It cannot tell us with equal confidence why the earliest recoverable text stops where it does.

Either way, Mark’s narrative is theologically complete at verse 8:

• Jesus has repeatedly foretold his death and resurrection.
• The tomb is empty.
• The young man announces, “He has been raised! He is not here.”
• The disciples are promised a meeting in Galilee.
• The women are commissioned to tell.

Their silence in verse 8 is not the final history of Christian proclamation. The very existence of Mark’s Gospel shows that the news was told.

7. What this conclusion does not take away

The longer ending gathers truths taught throughout undisputed New Testament text.

Textual criticism does not ask whether these teachings are welcome. It asks whether Mark wrote this particular summary of them.

8. The Small Catechism and Mark 16:16

Luther does cite “the last chapter of Mark” in the Small Catechism when he explains what Baptism gives. That fact should not be minimized or denied.

It also does not make Lutheran baptismal teaching depend on one disputed verse. Peter writes that Baptism now saves you (1 Peter 3:21). Paul calls salvation the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5). At Pentecost, Peter joins Baptism with forgiveness and the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38). Romans 6 joins the baptized to Christ’s death and resurrection.

Luther taught from the Bible available to him. He did not have access to the full evidence available now. The promise he confessed from Mark 16:16 is abundantly confessed elsewhere.

That is a model for handling a contested text: tell the truth about the passage, then show the church the wider apostolic ground beneath the doctrine.

9. How to read the longer ending

The conclusion need not be, “These verses are worthless.” They are an ancient Christian witness, were received by much of the church, and faithfully summarize teaching found elsewhere in Scripture. The historical judgment is narrower: they should not bear the same exegetical weight as words we have strong reason to assign to Mark himself.

Some details require special caution. Snake-handling or drinking poison should not be made into tests of faith or commands for worship. Narrative reports and signs associated with the apostolic mission do not authorize Christians to manufacture danger.

Read the passage with its textual label visible. Then follow every teaching back to the undisputed passages where the apostolic witness establishes it.

Practice

Open Mark 16:9–20 in Ad Fontes NT. The comparison shows selected printed editions, not the entire manuscript tradition.

1. Which editions include a note, heading, or brackets?
2. Read 16:1–8 and stop. What has Mark already told you?
3. Read 16:9–20 separately. Which episodes sound like Matthew, Luke, John, or Acts?
4. Make a two-column list: claims in the longer ending and undisputed passages teaching the same claim.
5. Write a three-sentence answer for someone worried that the resurrection has been removed from Mark.

Discussion

1. What do the multiple surviving endings tell us about early Christian readers?
2. Is an abrupt ending necessarily an incomplete ending?
3. How can we honor the use of Mark 16:16 in the Small Catechism while evaluating its textual history honestly?
4. What is gained—and what is emotionally lost—when we stop calling the longer ending Mark’s own words?
5. Why is doctrinal redundancy a strength rather than an embarrassment?

Working vocabulary

Longer ending. Mark 16:9–20.

Shorter ending. A brief alternative conclusion found in a small group of witnesses, sometimes before the longer ending.

Freer logion. An additional saying inserted into the longer ending after verse 14 in Codex Washingtonianus.

Codex Washingtonianus. An early Greek Gospel codex, commonly dated around the fourth or fifth century, now in Washington, D.C.

Codex Bobbiensis. An Old Latin Gospel manuscript, designated k, whose form of Mark has the shorter ending without verses 9–20.

Patristic evidence. Evidence from ancient Christian writers who quote, discuss, or report the wording of biblical manuscripts.

Before the next session

Read: Chapter 6, “The Pericope Adulterae.”

Do one thing: Read Mark 16:1–8 by itself. Then inspect John 7:53–8:11 in two translations and record the brackets, headings, and notes each uses.

Bring: Your Bible, your observations about John 8, and your vocabulary notes.

Think about: The women flee in fear, yet their news reaches us. What does the gap between verse 8 and the church’s proclamation ask the reader to do?

A closing word

Thanks be to God for the Gospel of Mark and its empty tomb. Thanks be to God that the risen Christ is proclaimed by many apostolic witnesses, so that the church’s faith does not hang from one contested paragraph. And thanks be to God that frightened silence did not have the last word. The news got out. We are hearing it still.

“He has been raised! He is not here.”

— Mark 16:6 (NET)

Scripture quotations in this session are from the NET Bible, with the KJV referenced where translations are compared. Confessional citations follow the Kolb-Wengert edition of the Book of Concord.