4:39a
Then Jesus got up: The Greek verb that the Berean Standard Bible translates as got up is literally “having been awoken.” This verb is passive. It means “having been awakened by the disciples.”
Some languages use repetition to connect events in a story. If this is true in your language, you may want to repeat from 4:38b the fact that the disciples had awakened Jesus. For example:
Being awake now
-or-
Having been awakened by the disciples
In other languages it may not be natural to repeat here a form of the verb wake. If that is true in your language, you may:
• Use a different word that is related to the action of waking up. For example:
Then he got up (God’s Word)
-or-
Jesus stood up (Good News Bible)
• Leave this phrase untranslated, since it is implied from 4:38b. Connect 4:38c directly to the phrase “rebuked the wind.” For example:
Then/So he rebuked the wind
rebuked the wind and the sea: The Greek phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as rebuked the wind and the sea here literally says “he rebuked the wind and said to the sea” (see the New International Version, 2011 edition). It means means that Jesus sternly commanded the wind to stop blowing. For example, the God’s Word says:
ordered the wind to stop
the sea: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible literally translates as sea refers to the water of Lake Galilee, which was tossing about in waves. You should refer to the water in whatever way is most natural in your language.
“Silence!”…“Be still!”: The Greek verbs that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Silence! and Be still! have similar meanings here. They are both commands for the water/waves to stop making sounds and stop moving violently. Jesus used the two verbs together for emphasis. In some language it may be natural to express this emphasis in a different way. For example:
Be silent right now!
-or-
Be still, absolutely still! (God’s Word)
In some languages, it will be more natural to translate this as indirect speech. For example:
Jesus told the waves to be quiet and still.
The Berean Standard Bible places the phrase He commanded in the middle of Jesus’ rebuke to the wind and water/waves. This is good English style, but there is no such verb in the Greek. In somes languages, it may be helpful to translate as the New International Version, 2011 edition does:
Quiet! Be still!
General Comment on 4:39a
In the Greek text, Mark describes Jesus as rebuking the wind and then speaking directly to the waves (see New International Version, 2011 edition). These were probably not two separate and different things that Jesus did. In some languages it may be natural to combine them, as in the Berean Standard Bible. For example:
ordered the wind and the waves to be quiet (Contemporary English Version)
-or-
commanded the wind and the waves, “Quiet! Be still!”
In other languages it may be more natural to use one command for the wind and another command for the waves. For example:
He commanded the wind, saying, “Stop.” He also said to the waves, “Be calm/quiet.”
General Comment on 4:39a
Jesus spoke directly to the wind and the waves, like speaking to a person. In the context of this miracle, it may be natural in your language for someone to speak directly to the wind and the waves. But if speaking directly to the wind and the waves is not natural in your language, you may want to use indirect commands. For example:
He got up and commanded, “May the wind and waves be quiet and stop making noise!”
4:39b
And the wind died down: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as died down here means “stopped blowing.” The Berean Standard Bible has used an English idiom. The Revised Standard Version has:
the wind ceased
and it was perfectly calm: The clause that the Berean Standard Bible translates as it was perfectly calm refers to the entire situation. Both the wind and the waves/lake became calm or still. The wind stopped blowing and the lake became smooth and quiet.
In the Berean Standard Bible the word calm is an adjective. In some languages it may be natural to translate it as a noun, as in the Greek. For example, the Good News Bible says:
there was a great calm
In other languages it may be natural to translate it as a verb:
it completely calmed down
-or-
everything calmed down
perfectly: The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as perfectly is literally “great.” Before there was a “great wind” (4:37a) and now there was “great calm.” You may be able to use the same word (such as “great”) in both places to show the contrast. But if the same word does not fit naturally in both places, you may indicate the emphasis in a different way, as the Berean Standard Bible has done.
© 2008 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.