Matthew 28
The women see the empty tomb and run. While the guards are paid to invent a story, the last commission is given on a mountain in Galilee.
As it was dawning — Mark 16:2 says the sun had risen; John 20:1 says it was still dark. The books are left as they stand.
A great earthquake — only this book has one here, as at 27:51. Sat on it — the stone is moved not to let him out but to show the tomb empty.
Like lightning — the same word as at 24:27.
Became like dead men — the guards of 27:65 are undone in one line.
Do not be afraid, you — the Greek marks “you” emphatically, setting the women against the guards.
He was raised stands in the passive — the text does not say who raised him.
He goes before you uses the shepherd-verb of John 10:4, taking up 26:32.
With fear and great joy — this book has both at once; Mark 16:8 has only fear.
Why this rendering
Matt.28.8 Observation
Syntactic observation
What follows the women's leaving the tomb runs opposite ways in the two books. Mark 16:8 closes with ἔφυγον … εἶχεν γὰρ αὐτὰς τρόμος καὶ ἔκστασις· καὶ οὐδενὶ οὐδὲν εἶπαν, ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ — they fled, for trembling and astonishment had hold of them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. Matthew 28:8 has μετὰ φόβου καὶ χαρᾶς μεγάλης ἔδραμον ἀπαγγεῖλαι, with fear and great joy they ran to tell. Fear is in both; in Mark it stops the speech, in Matthew it runs alongside joy. Luke 24:9 is a third path — ἀπήγγειλαν ταῦτα πάντα τοῖς ἕνδεκα καὶ πᾶσιν τοῖς λοιποῖς, they reported all this to the eleven and to all the rest; the women do speak, but at 24:11 the words appeared ὡσεὶ λῆρος, like nonsense, and ἠπίστουν αὐταῖς, they did not believe them. λῆρος is unique in the four Gospels. So Mark cannot tell, Matthew runs to tell, and Luke tells and is not believed. Matthew also has what Mark lacks before this — the σεισμός, earthquake, of v.2 and the angel rolling the stone away. At Mark 16:4 the stone is already rolled back when the women arrive and no rolling is described. σεισμός occurs four times in Matthew (8:24, 24:7, 27:54, 28:2), once in Mark (13:8) and once in Luke (21:11). The χιών, snow, of v.3 is unique in the four Gospels; ἀστραπή, lightning, is one of Matthew's two and one of Luke's three — Matthew's other is 24:27 and Luke's 17:24 is the same saying, both books likening the coming of the Son of Man to lightning. But Luke uses the root at the tomb as well: the ἐν ἐσθῆτι ἀστραπτούσῃ of 24:4, in clothing that flashed, is the verb ἀστράπτω, which stands at two places in Luke (17:24, 24:4) and nowhere else. Matthew's noun likens the figure; Luke's verb describes the clothing. The one at the tomb differs in all four books — Matthew ἄγγελος κυρίου, one; Mark 16:5 νεανίσκος, one young man; Luke 24:4 ἄνδρες δύο, two men; John 20:12 δύο ἀγγέλους, two angels.
Rendering options · 2
Basis The Greek binds the two nouns under one preposition and it is kept; the pairing that looks odd is what shows when set beside Mark.
Basis Makes the clash of the two easier to read.
Rejected There is no concessive word in the text; the two nouns simply stand together, and resolving the clash is left to the reader.
Greetings renders χαίρετε (chairete), the everyday greeting whose plain sense is “rejoice”. Did obeisance is the worship-word of 2:2 and 4:9.
My brothers — used of the disciples, as at John 20:17.
Custodia — the Latin guard-word of 27:65, kept as sound.
Why this rendering
Matt.28.11 Observation
Syntactic observation
The three places of κουστωδία are complete here — 27:65, 66, and 28:11, all in Matthew. This paragraph (vv.11-15) is Matthew's alone. And the vocabulary that went to Judas in ch. 27 comes back: ἀργύρια, silver, after 27:3, 5, 6, 9, returns at 28:12, 15 — here with ἱκανά, a sufficient amount, and no number. To Judas it was counted, τριάκοντα, thirty; to the soldiers it is not counted. ἱκανός stands at three places in Matthew (3:11, 8:8, 28:12), and the first two speak of insufficiency — John is not ἱκανός to carry his sandals, the officer not ἱκανός for him to come under his roof. Only at the third does the word say that something is enough, and what is enough is the money that buys silence. But one word here carries both a person's fitness and a quantity of money, and no locale holds it in a single rendering — 3:11 and 8:8 read fit, 28:12 sufficient. The διαφημίζω of v.15, to spread abroad, occurs twice in Matthew (9:31, 28:15) and once in Mark (1:45), and 9:31 is where the two blind men spread the word against the charge not to — so once the healed and once the bribed spread a word in the same verb. And at v.15 Matthew writes μέχρι τῆς σήμερον ἡμέρας, to this day, as he did at 27:8, ἕως τῆς σήμερον — both times saying that the story stands to the author's own time.
Rendering options · 2
Basis Keeps the transliteration fixed at 27:65 and does not turn ἱκανά into a figure; that it is uncounted stands against the thirty of 27:3.
Basis Gives the reader a sense of the amount.
Rejected ἱκανός is sufficient, not large; and rendering it as money severs the word from the silver of ch. 27 and the thread to the Judas story.
Sufficient silver — the Greek says “enough silver”, and does not count it, as 26:15 did.
While we were sleeping — the story tells the soldiers to confess a capital offence, and the writer lets that stand.
Keep you out of trouble renders a Greek idiom, “make you free from care”.
To this day — the writer speaks from a time after the events, as at 27:8.
The eleven — the number is given without comment on the twelfth. To the mountain — this book ends on a mountain, as it taught on one at 5:1.
Some doubted renders διστάζω (distazō) — the word used of Peter at 14:31. The book does not resolve it.
Why this rendering
Matt.28.17 Observation
Syntactic observation
διστάζω, to doubt or waver, stands at two places in all four Gospels and both are Matthew's — not in Mark, Luke or John. The other is 14:31 — where Peter, beginning to sink as he walked on the water, is asked, you of little faith, why did you doubt? So the word falls once on the water and once on the mountain. And the verse just before, 14:30, has καταποντίζομαι, to sink, which likewise stands at two places in the four Gospels, both Matthew's (14:30, 18:6) — several of Matthew's words stand at just two places and answer each other so. Verse 17 is short and its subject unclear: προσεκύνησαν, they did obeisance, is followed by οἱ δὲ ἐδίστασαν, but some doubted, and the Greek does not settle whether οἱ δέ are some of those who bowed or others besides. Since only the eleven are present (v.16), both readings stay open — a division within them, or bowing and doubting at once. That Matthew did not delete the clause is itself a datum. προσκυνέω occurs thirteen times in Matthew, eleven in John, three in Luke (4:7, 8, 24:52) and twice in Mark, and twice in this chapter, at vv.9 and 17. Luke too has it in his last chapter — but at Luke 24:52 no doubting comes with it.
Rendering options · 2
Basis One word at both places, held to one rendering so the link with the question on the water survives; the unclear subject is left as it is and recorded below.
Basis The subject at v.16 is the eleven, so it is read on.
Rejected οἱ δέ can also mark a division out of the preceding group, so fixing it as they closes what the text leaves open; some keeps both readings nearer.
Lost in translation
Whether these are some of those who bowed, others besides, or the same men bowing and doubting at once, the Greek does not settle; English has no room to hold the blur, and one reading must be chosen.
All authority — the word of 7:29 and 9:6, now given without limit.
Make disciples renders μαθητεύω (mathēteuō) as a command — the verb of 13:52. All the nations lifts the limit set at 10:5. Into the name keeps the Greek preposition rather than smoothing it to “in”.
Why this rendering
Matt.28.19 Observation
Syntactic observation
μαθητεύω is a verb, to make a disciple, and stands at three places in all four Gospels, all three in Matthew — 13:52 (a scribe schooled for the kingdom of the heavens), 27:57 (Joseph of Arimathea had become a disciple), 28:19. Neither Mark nor Luke nor John uses it. The noun μαθητής is common to all four books (78 in John, 73 in Matthew, 46 in Mark, 37 in Luke); only Matthew makes a verb of it. And βαπτίζω here is Matthew's seventh and last — the other six all in ch. 3, of John the Baptist — so Matthew places the word only at the book's beginning and end, never in the middle of the ministry. That 20:22 had the cup and no baptism belongs inside this distribution. The ὄνομα of εἰς τὸ ὄνομα is singular with three following it: the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, not the names. And each of the three carries its article (τοῦ πατρὸς καὶ τοῦ υἱοῦ καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος). πάντα τὰ ἔθνη, all the nations, is plural, where the ἔθνει of 21:43 was singular — the only singular in Matthew naming one particular body; here the plural returns.
Rendering options · 2
Basis μαθητεύω is a verb and is rendered as one; ὄνομα is singular and is not made plural; and the article on each of the three is kept.
Basis Easier for the reader to see what is commanded.
Rejected Teach stands separately at v.20 (διδάσκοντες); unfolding it here overlaps the two verses and blurs a verb Matthew uses at only three places.
Completion of the age (συντέλεια, synteleia) — this book's own word, from 13:39 and 24:3. I am with you takes up the Immanuel of 1:23, and the book closes where it opened.
Why this rendering
Matt.28.20 Observation
Syntactic observation
The book's last phrase is συντέλεια τοῦ αἰῶνος, the completion of the age. The word stands at five places in all four Gospels, all five Matthew's — 13:39, 40, 49 (the weeds and the net), 24:3 (the disciples' question), and here. So the book closes on the word with which the disciples asked at 24:3, what is the sign of your coming and of the completion of the age. Not question and answer, but the word of the question becoming the term of the last sentence: I am with you all the days until the completion of the age. Before it stands ἰδού, behold, which Matthew also uses at the book's opening, 1:20 and 23. And the sentence shifts person — vv.19-20a tell the disciples to teach them (αὐτούς), and v.20b returns to with you (μεθ’ ὑμῶν). ἐντέλλομαι, to command, is the last of Matthew's four (two in Mark, one in Luke, three in John); τηρέω, to keep, runs eighteen times in John, six in Matthew, once in Mark and not once in Luke — and two of Matthew's six stand about this chapter (28:4, the guards were shaken; 28:20, teaching them to keep). Set beside the end of Mark the texture differs — in the base text Mark's text stops at 16:8 in fear, and both a shorter ending and 16:9-20 follow under ⟦ ⟧ marks. Luke 24 is a third texture: within one chapter the base text omits 24:3 and 24:36, merely marks 24:12, and brackets 24:40, 51b and 52a, so that five grades of standing divide a single page. Matthew closes in a single sentence with no marks and no division.
Rendering options · 2
Basis One rendering across the five places lets the link between the question and the last sentence show; the decision at 24:3 is kept.
Basis The familiar phrasing gives the last sentence its weight.
Rejected There is no κόσμος in the text and αἰών is an age; and letting the rendering diverge from 24:3 would hide that question and closing are joined by one word.