[Photo by Bradley Dunn on Unsplash]
There is an incident recorded in Mark's Gospel which is not mentioned elsewhere in the New Testament. Jesus was being arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane and all the disciples decided that it was time to flee the scene. There is then a reference to one young man who is wearing nothing but a linen cloth over his naked body. A number of young fellows who may have been watching the arrest decided they would grab this young man. But he manages to escape - without the linen clothes. It has been suggested that this was John Mark himself. There might have been a good reason why this individual is not identified - it was a time of persecution when the Gospel was written and it was probably safer to remain anonymous. If it was Mark, he is in a hurry. In fact, the writer of the Second Gospel uses a word over and over again to imply that the subject of this Gospel was also in a hurry.
It is the word 'immediately ' which is the translation of the Greek word eutheos. Mark uses this same Greek word 34 times in his Gospel. Sometimes, it is not immediately obvious - if you pardon the pun - because the translator has used another word for the Greek word eutheos. If I could take one chapter to illustrate how frequently Mark uses this word.
Let's look at chapter 1 of Mark's Gospel.
Verse 10 - the King James Version uses 'straightway ' for eutheos.
Verse 12 - immediately
Verse 18 - straightway again
Verse 20 - straightway again
Verse 21 - straightway again
Verse 28 - immediately
Verse 29 - 'forthwith' - another word for immediately or Greek eutheos
Verse 30 - word 'anon' for immediately or Greek eutheos
Verse 31 - immediately
So the translators away back in 1611 were avoiding repetition of the same English word but I hope that it is clear that Mark is deliberately using a word repeatedly.
It is as if he is emphasing that there was no time lost in the events he is describing. As soon as Jesus came out of the water after his baptism, the heavens opened and the Holy Spirit came down on Him (verse 10). As soon as the voice from heaven makes the declaration that Jesus is God's beloved Son who pleased God so well, the Spirit drove him into the desert (verse 12). As soon as Jesus called the fishermen to come with him and 'become fishers of men,' they left their nets to follow Him (verse 18). This last example demonstrates the authority of Jesus in action. He is a wonder worker. He is the Son of God as Mark introduced Him in the first verse of his Gospel.
Was Mark's choice of this word deliberate? He was the young man who was not able to keep going as a servant to Paul and Barnabas and he left them and went back to Jerusalem. Is Mark contrasting himself with Jesus in His unwavering service for His Father? Is he so thrilled with the way that Jesus crammed so much into three years of public service? He is portraying Jesus as the man of action rather than words. Mark is less interested with Jesus' teaching than with his actions and service.
You might want to follow up other references to this word eutheos in your own private reading. Here are some references (I have already given the ones for chapter 1)
Mark 2:2; 2:8; 2:12; 3:6; 4:5; 4:14; 4:16; 4:17; 4:29; 5:2; 5:13; 5:29; 5:30; 5:42; 6:25; 6:27; 6:45; 6:50; 6:54; 7:35; 8:10; 9:15; 9:20; 9:24; 11:3; 14:43; 15:1.
His use of this word is probably an indication of how Peter would have recounted events to Mark. Imagine Peter dictating as Mark scribes. Peter would give the story and use varying phrases like 'just after', 'right then', 'and then', 'as soon as', '(at) once', 'not long after', 'as a result', 'because of', etc. These are ways any eye witness might order a narrative account of eye witness events - the way we might tell a spouse about our day, or recall an event to a reporter for example. Mark then keeps this sense of Peter's descriptive sequence but uses same word for unifying and style purposes.