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Mark 1:33

in Mark 1

and the whole town gathered at the door.

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

And all the city was gathered together at the door.

KJV

And all the city was gathered together at the door.

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This verse in Mark 1

Commentary

8 notes on this verse
These verses begin the long list of miracles which Mark's Gospel contains. They tell us how our Lord cast out devils in Capernaum, and healed Peter's wife's mother of a fever. We learn, in the first place, from these verses, the uselessness of a mere intellectual knowledge of religion . Twice we are specially told that the unclean spirits know our Lord. In one place it says, "they knew Him." to another, the devil cries out, "I know you who you are, the Holy One of God."

This site's exposition

at even, when the sun did set

on Mark 1:32-34

The crowd waits for sunset because the sabbath legally ends then, and all the city gathered at the door is Mark's characteristic scale, the whole town converging on one house in one evening. He healed many and cast out many devils, the numbers left unspecified but the scope plain, and suffered not the devils to speak, because they knew him repeats the messianic secret from verse 25, the demons' correct testimony refused a public platform. The bench reads the refusal as consistent policy rather than inconsistency, since a confession from an unclean source, however true its content, was never the way Jesus chose to be known.

The record, by era

The Medieval Church1 voice

But the door of the kingdom, morally, is repentance and faith, which works health for various diseases; for divers are the vices, with which the city of this world is sick.

The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice

And all the city was gathered together at the door. That is, the inhabitants of the city of Capernaum, a very great number of them at least, who having either heard of, or seen the dispossession of the unclean spirit in the synagogue in the daytime; and being willing to see what miraculous cures might be wrought by Christ upon the diseased and possessed that were brought to him, got together in great crowds about the door of the house of Simon and Andrew where Jesus now was.

The Nineteenth Century3 voices

WE SEE BEFORE US small beginnings and grand endings. One man is called by the voice of Jesus, and then another; the house wherein they dwell is consecrated by the Lord's presence, and by-and-by the whole city is stirred from end to end with the name and fame of the Great Teacher.

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

And all the city was gathered together at the door--of Peter's house; that is, the sick and those who brought them, and the wondering spectators. This bespeaks the presence of an eye-witness, and is one of those lively examples of word-painting so frequent in this Gospel.
These verses begin the long list of miracles which Mark's Gospel contains. They tell us how our Lord cast out devils in Capernaum, and healed Peter's wife's mother of a fever. We learn, in the first place, from these verses, the uselessness of a mere intellectual knowledge of religion . Twice we are specially told that the unclean spirits know our Lord. In one place it says, "they knew Him." to another, the devil cries out, "I know you who you are, the Holy One of God." They knew Christ, when Scribes were ignorant of Him, and Pharisees would not acknowledge Him. And yet their knowledge was not unto salvation. The mere belief of the facts and doctrines of Christianity will never save our souls. Such belief is no better than the belief of devils. They all believe and know that Jesus is the Christ. They believe that he will one day judge the world, and cast them down to endless torment in hell. It is a solemn and sorrowful thought, that on these points some professing Christians have even less faith than the devil. There are some who doubt the reality of hell and the eternity of punishment. Such doubts as these find no place except in the hearts of self-willed men and women. There is no infidelity among devils. "They believe and tremble." (James 2:19.) Let us take heed that our faith be a faith of the heart as well as of the head. Let us see that our knowledge has a sanctifying influence on our affections and our lives. Let us not only know Christ but love Him, from a sense of actual benefit received from Him. Let us not only believe that he is the Son of God and the Savior of the world, but rejoice in Him, and cleave to Him with purpose of heart. Let us not only be acquainted with Him by the hearing of the ear, but by daily personal application to Him for mercy and grace. "The life of Christianity," says Luther, "consists in possessive pronouns."
1 more voice on this verse

The Nineteenth Century1 voice

WE SEE BEFORE US small beginnings and grand endings. One man is called by the voice of Jesus, and then another; the house wherein they dwell is consecrated by the Lord's presence, and by-and-by the whole city is stirred from end to end with the name and fame of the Great Teacher. We are often wishing that God would do some great thing in the world, and we look abroad for instruments which we think would be peculiarly fit, and think of places where the work might suitably begin: it might be quite as well if we asked the Lord to make use of us, and if we were believingly to hope that even our feeble instrumentality might produce great results by his power, and that our abode might become the central point from which streams of blessing should flow forth to refresh the neighborhood. Peter's house was by no means the most notable building in the town of Capernaum. It was probably not the poorest dwelling in the place, for Peter had a boat of his own, or perhaps a half share in a boat with his brother Andrew, or possibly he and Andrew and James and John were proprietors of some two or three fishing boats, for they were partners, and they appear to have employed hired servants. (Mark 1:20.) Still Peter was not rich nor famous, he was neither a ruler of the synagogue, nor an eminent scribe, and his house was not at all remarkable among the habitations which made up the little fishing suburb down by the sea-shore. Yet to this house did Jesus go. He had foreknown and chosen it of old, and had resolved to make it renowned by his presence and miraculous power. There hung the fisherman's nets outside the door—the sole escutcheon and hatchment of one who was ordained to sit upon a throne and judge with his fellow apostles the twelve tribes of Israel. Beneath that lowly roof Immanuel deigned to unveil himself: God-with-us showed himself. God with Simon.

The words behind it

9 Greek words

Every Greek word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

Related verses

3 in all, six open

The walk

8 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    Mark 1:5

    People went out to him from all of Jerusalem and the countryside of Judea. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.

    it leads to

    • Acts 19:18

      Many who had believed now came forward, confessing and disclosing their deeds.

    • Leviticus 26:40–42

      But if they will confess their iniquity and that of their fathers in the unfaithfulness that they practiced against Me, by which they have also walked in hostility toward Me—

    • Acts 2:38

      Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

    • Matthew 3:5–6

      People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region around the Jordan.

    • Joshua 7:19

      So Joshua said to Achan, “My son, give glory to the LORD, the God of Israel, and make a confession to Him. I urge you to tell me what you have done; do not…

  • Through

    Acts 13:44

    On the following Sabbath, nearly the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord.

    it leads to

    • Isaiah 60:8

      Who are these who fly like clouds, like doves to their shelters?

    • Isaiah 11:10

      On that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples. The nations will seek Him, and His place of rest will be glorious.

    • Psalms 110:3

      Your people shall be willing on Your day of battle. Arrayed in holy splendor, from the womb of the dawn, to You belongs the dew of Your youth.

Where this verse is studied

About Mark

John the Baptist Baptizes Jesus — Gustave Doré (engraving), public domain
John the Baptist Baptizes Jesus — Gustave Doré (engraving), public domain
Mark: the study guide →Read Mark 1 →

This page draws on Charles Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1236: “The Best House-visitation” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition); J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Mark (lightly modernized text, Grace Gems edition); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the New Testament (1746-1748); Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Pseudo-Jerome, Catena Aurea by Aquinas.

Read on in Mark 1 →