Exegesis:
hora (8.15, 24; 9.4; 13.26; 14.62; 16.7) ‘see to it!’: the command enforces the prohibition ‘say nothing to any one.’
hupage (15 times in Mark) ‘depart,’ ‘go,’ ‘away with you.’
seauton deixon tō hierei kai prosenegke ‘show yourself to the priest and make (the) offering’: cf. Lev. 14.2-32 where Levitical laws concerning purification rites are set forth.
tō hierei (2.26) ‘to the priest’: that is, the serving priest, the officiating priest. There is division of opinion whether this means the priest in Jerusalem or a local priest, but the majority of commentators seem to agree that Jerusalem is implied (cf. Rawlinson).
eis marturion autois (6.11; 13.9) ‘for a testimony to them.’ There is general agreement that marturion here means ‘proof,’ ‘evidence’ (cf. Manson, Moffatt, Abbott-Smith). There is no agreement, however, concerning autois ‘to them.’ Who is meant? “People” in general is the opinion of some (Revised Standard Version, Lagrange, Creed, Moffatt). Lagrange conjectures that when the rites had been completed the priest certified in writing that the man had been pronounced clean, and this document would serve as proof for one and all. Others, however, think that “priests” is meant, i.e. those upon whom would devolve the task of officiating at the purification rites (Swete, Turner, Taylor). For translation purposes, if language allows, it is probably better to retain the ambiguity of the Greek and say simply ‘to them.’
Translation:
See must, of course, not be taken in the literal sense, as it has been in some translations. It is equivalent to ‘beware lest you’ or ‘be sure that you do not….’
In contrast with the prophet, who spoke to the people on behalf of God, the priest represents the people before God. However, in many instances the small, growing Christian community is so strongly opposed to the ways of the religious practices of the paganism around them that they cannot readily accept a word for priest which is even neutral in its connotation. For example, in one area a translator insisted on using a word for priest which carried a very bad connotation whenever the Scriptures spoke of Jewish priests (especially those whom Jesus condemned). In this way the translator thought he could indirectly undermine the influence of the local pagan priests. However, when Jesus is called “our high priest” in Hebrews, this same translator wanted to use an entirely different term. At the same time the problem is complicated by the fact that the priest had many functions: sacrificing of animals, burning of incense, pouring of libations, offering of prayers, and participation in processions. An additional difficulty is that in many areas there are two levels of priesthood. For example, among the Huichol in Mexico there are (1) the local priests (shamans) of the indigenous religion and (2) the Roman Catholic priests, whom the people respect, but of whose ministry they understood very little. In such instances should one use the indigenous term which would imply a shaman-like person or borrow the Spanish term, which would seem to imply that the priests of the Bible were similar to Roman Catholic priests?
However, rather than borrow local names for priests, some of which have unwanted connotations, a number of translations have employed descriptive phrases based on certain functions: (1) those describing a ceremonial activity: Pamona uses tadu, the priestess who recites the litanies in which she describes her journey to the upper or under-world to fetch life-spirit for sick people, animals or plants; Batak Toba uses the Arabic malim, ‘Muslim religious teacher’; ‘one who presents man’s sacrifice to God’ (Bambara, Maninka), ‘one who presents sacrifices’ (Baoulé, Navajo), ‘one who takes the name of the sacrifice’ (Kpelle), and ‘to make a sacrifice go out’ (Toro So Dogon); (2) those describing an intermediary function: ‘one who speaks to God’ (Shipibo-Conibo) and ‘spokesman of the people before God’ (Tabasco Chontal). (See also Bible Translating, pp. 113, 139, 235.)
Offer for your cleansing may be translated in this context as ‘make an offering, seeing that now you have been healed’ (or ‘cleansed’), or ‘… because you have been healed.’ Because of the temporal sequence involved, the Greek preposition peri, which normally would mean ‘about,’ ‘concerning,’ must here imply ‘with regard to the fact that…’ or ‘because of…’ (Union Version of Chinese).
What Moses commanded may be expanded, because of its elliptical form, to read ‘what Moses commanded you to offer.’ In some translations this entire expression reads, ‘now that you have been healed, offer what Moses commanded you to offer.’
For a proof to the people may be rendered as ‘this will show the people that you are healed’ (Southern Bobo Madaré) or ‘to show the people that you have been cleansed’ (Southern Subanen). If, of course, one understands the priests as implied in the expression for a proof to them, such an interpretation may be suggested by the rendering ‘in order to show the priests that you are healed.’
Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of Mark. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1961. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .