Mark 13:24

But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light,

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(24-31) But in those days.—See Notes on Matthew 24:29-35.

Benson Commentary

Mark 13:24-31. But in those days — Of vengeance; after that tribulation — Attending the siege and taking of Jerusalem; the sun shall be darkened, &c. — Our Lord having, in the preceding part of his discourse, given his disciples a particular account of the various circumstances which should precede and accompany the destruction of Jerusalem, proceeds now to describe the dissolution of the Jewish polity, and the abolition of the Mosiac economy, in all the pomp of language and imagery made use of by the ancient prophets, when they foretold the overthrow of cities and states. The expressions are highly figurative, and signify the passing away of all the glory, excellence, and prosperity of the nation: and the introduction of universal sadness, misery, and confusion; that the Jewish polity, both civil and religious, should be destroyed; that the Jews should be no more a people, united under a form of government administered by themselves, and possessing their own country. See notes on Matthew 24:29-35.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

13:24-27 The disciples had confounded the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the world. This mistake Christ set right, and showed that the day of Christ's coming, and the day of judgment, shall be after that tribulation. Here he foretells the final dissolution of the present frame and fabric of the world. Also, the visible appearance of the Lord Jesus coming in the clouds, and the gathering together of all the elect to him.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

On the house-top - See the notes at Matthew 9:1-8.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

24. But in those days, after that tribulation—"Immediately after the tribulation of those days" (Mt 24:29).

the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Ver. 24-27. The usage of these phrases, of the darkening the sun and the moon, and the falling of the stars, to signify the ruin of nations, and changes wrought in them; as in Isaiah 13:10, as to the destruction of Babylon, and Ezekiel 32:7, to express the change the providence of God made by the destruction of Egypt, as also to signify the change made in the world by setting up the gospel, to which purpose they are used by Joel, Joel 2:31; hath given interpreters a latitude to interpret these verses,

1. With relation to the destruction of the Jews, which made a great change as to the Jewish church and state.

2. And with reference to the change made by setting up the gospel church.

But Mark 13:26,27 incline me rather to interpret them of the end of the world. For though those other expressions are used to express great changes and mutations, yet it is not said of any of them,

Then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. And then shall he send his angels, & c. Which phrases do so agree with those other texts, where Christ’s second coming to judgment is expressed certainly, that I cannot but think our Saviour speaks here with reference to that. See Matthew 13:41 1 Corinthians 15:52 1 Thessalonians 4:16 Revelation 1:7.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

But in those days, after that tribulation,.... That is, after the destruction of the city and temple of Jerusalem, and the miseries and calamities attending it, in the times immediately following it; see Matthew 24:29;

the sun shall be darkened: so the Shekinah, or glory of the divine majesty was withdrawn, and all the symbols of the divine presence were gone, when the temple was destroyed:

and the moon shall not give her light; the ceremonial law, which though abolished by the death of Christ, was observed by the Jews as long as the temple stood; but now ceased, particularly that principal branch of it, the daily sacrifice; See Gill on Matthew 24:29.

Geneva Study Bible

But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light,

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

Mark 13:24-27. See on Matthew 24:29-31. Comp. Luke 21:25-28.

ἀλλʼ] breaking off and leading over to a new subject. Hartung, Partikell. II. p. 34 f.

ἐν ἐκείναις τ. ἡμέρ. μετὰ τ. θλίψ. ἐκ.] Thus in Mark also the Parousia is predicted as setting in immediately after the destruction of Jerusalem, since it is still to follow in those days[156] (comp. Mark 13:19-20). The εὐθέως of Matthew is not thereby avoided (de Wette, Bleek, and others), but this εὐθέως is only a still more express and more direct definition, which tradition has given to the saying. To refer ἐν ἐκ. τ. ἡμ., to the times of the church that are still continuing, is an exegetical impossibility. Even Baur and Hilgenfeld are in error in holding that Mark has conceived of the Parousia as at least not following so immediately close upon the destruction.

Mark 13:25. οἱ ἀστέρες τοῦ οὐρανοῦ κ.τ.λ.] the stars of heaven shall be, etc., which is more simple (comp. Revelation 6:13) than that which is likewise linguistically correct: the stars shall from heaven, etc. (Hom. Od. xiv. 31, II. xi. 179; Soph. Aj. 1156; Aesch. ii. 34; Galatians 5:4; 2 Peter 3:17).

ἔσονται ἐκπίπτ.] more graphic and vividly realizing than the simple πεσοῦνται (Matt.).

Mark 13:26. Mark has not the order of sequence of the event, as Matthew depicts it; he relates summarily.

Mark 13:27. ἀπʼ ἄκρου γῆς ἕως ἄκρου οὐρανοῦ] From the outmost border of the earth (conceived as a flat surface) shall the ἐπισυνάγειν begin, and be carried through even to the opposite end, where the outmost border of the heaven (κατὰ τὸ φαινόμενον of the horizon) sets limit to the earth. The expression is more poetical than in Matthew; it is the more arbitrary to think (with Bleek) in the case of γῆς of those still living, and in that of οὐρ. of those who sleep in bliss.

[156] It is, in fact, to impute great thoughtlessness and stupidity to Mark, if people can believe, with Baur, Markusev. p. 101, that Mark did not write till after Matthew and Luke, and yet did not allow himself to be deterred by all that had intervened between the composition of Matthew’s Gospel and his own, from speaking of the nearness of the Parousia in the same expressions as Matthew used. This course must certainly be followed, if the composition of Mark (comp. also Köstlin, p. 383) is brought down to so late a date.

Expositor's Greek Testament

Mark 13:24-31. The coming of the Son of Man (Matthew 24:29-35, Luke 21:25-33).

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

24–31. The Second Advent of the Lord

24. in those days] He, to Whom “a thousand years are as one day, and one day as a thousand years” (2 Peter 3:8), to Whom there is no past or future but one eternal Present, passes from one chapter to another in the history of the world with the ease of One, Who seeth all things clearly revealed.

the sun shall be darkened] Two of those then listening to the Lord, have themselves described the signs in the physical world which are to usher in the End; (a) St Peter, in his second Epistle, Mark 3:1-13, and (b) St John, in Revelation 20; Revelation 21

Bengel's Gnomen

Mark 13:24. Ἐν ἐκείναις ταῖς ἡμέραις μετὰ τὴν θλίψιν ἐκείνην, in those days after that tribulation) After that tribulation shall come those days. Therefore the ἐκείνην, that, refers to a different thing from ἐκείναις, those. That refers back to the whole preceding discourse; but those, looks forward to the last events of all, as in Mark 13:32. For the question of the disciples, to which the Lord replies, in Mark also, Mark 13:4 [as in Matthew], had reference by implication, to the end of the world.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 24. - But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light. St. Matthew (Matthew 24:29) has the word "immediately," before the words "after that tribulation." If this word "immediately" is to be understood literally, then the things spoken of subsequently must be understood in a figurative and spiritual sense. But it would seem more natural to understand "immediately" according to the reckoning of him with whom "a thousand years are as one day." Our Lord now passes away from the events connected with the overthrow of the Jewish polity, and proceeds to speak of things connected with the new dispensation. His mind is now turned to "the last time" - to the whole period between his first and his second advent. The things towards which he was now looking belonged, not to the end of the Jewish dispensation, but to the end of the present age and the present dispensation. Eighteen centuries have passed since the destruction of Jerusalem; and more years, it may be, will come and go before the end. Nevertheless, all this time, although it may seem long to us who are confined within the narrow limits of a short life, is nevertheless, when compared with the eternity of God, but as a moment. "The sun shall be darkened." The signs here enumerated are mentioned elsewhere as the signs that would appear before the second coming of Christ. (See Joel 2:31 and Luke 21:25, 26.) St. Augustine (Ep. 80, 'Ad Hesychium') says, "The light of truth shall be obscured; because in the great tribulation that shall come on the world, many will fall from the faith, who had seemed to be bright and firm, like the sun and the stars." "And the moon," that is, the Church, "shall not give her light." Mark 13:24

Vincent's Word Studies

Light (φέγγος)

The word is used in the New Testament wherever the light of the moon is referred to. Compare Matthew 24:29, the only other instance. It occurs also in Luke 11:33, but meaning the light of a lamp.