And these signs shall follow them that believe; in my name shall they cast out devils;
they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly
thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
Mark 16:17-18 (KJV)
You note Mark 16:17-18, as being the words of Jesus Christ, however, that is not the case. You
should do a little research on the passage from verse 9 through verse 20. As early as the 4th
century A.D., the church fathers Eusebius and Jerome noted that the earliest Greek manuscripts in
their possession did not contain verses 9-20. The earliest manuscripts of the gospel of Mark do
not contain those verses, so they are an interpolation, a later addition not original to the writing of
Mark and cannot be considered Scripture or claimed to be the words of Jesus Christ.
There are religious groups who have taken the words of the passage as truth, so they make the
handling of snakes and the drinking of poison a part of their worship service. But reality reveals
the difficulty, because every once in a while one of the members of those groups is bitten by a
snake or is afflicted by drinking poison and they become violently ill, and some even die. Their
belief is a logical conclusion of accepting the passage, because the passage states that all believers
will be immune to snake bites and the consumption of poison.
You have used the passage in order to support a belief and claim about the signs noted in
the verses; casting out devils, speaking in 'new' tongues, healing, immunity from snake bites and
poison. I must presume that you believe that every Christian has all of those abilities and gifts,
because verse 17 says, "them that believe," which is every believer. However, since you present
the verses as the words of Jesus Christ, in regards to all the elements mentioned (casting out
devils, new tongues, healing, immunity from snake bites and poison), then you must present it as
authoritative in relation to the statements about snakes and poison. Can you honestly say that you
could be bitten by the most poisonous of snakes and drink the most potent of poisons and suffer
no harm? If you cannot say that, then you have used the verses as a matter of convenience and
taken the verses which you claim to be authoritative Scripture, and used them to support what
you wish to be true, but have discarded the elements of those verses which you know are not true
and cannot be supported in the real world. What happens in the real world invalidates the claim
about immunity from snake bites and immunity from the most strong poison in existence. If,
on the other hand, you claim that you can be bitten by the most poisonous of snakes and drink
the most potent of poisons without harm, then are you willing to stake your life on that belief?
The Scripture cannot be true in one instance and false in another. Either Scripture is true or it is
not true, and you cannot choose which elements you accept and those that you reject.
Reality always seems to sneak into the equation, because no Christian since the time of the
apostles has expressed all of the signs that are noted in the verses. There is no Christian today
who can drink the most potent poison that exists in the world and survive. So, either there are no
Christians, and there have never been any since the apostles, or the Scripture is false in its claims,
or the passage is not Scripture.
My point is that the passage is not Scripture and it cannot be used in order to support
the position of the snake handlers and poison drinkers, as well as the other claims mentioned in
the verses. If you wish to claim those signs as being given to every Christian, then you must
support that claim from true Scripture and not from verses that have been added to the book of
Mark by someone other than the original author.
False doctrine may affect a person's health and even take their life, but believing a false salvation
message or worshipping a false God or false Jesus will forfeit one's soul, no matter how sincerer
or dedicated to their belief a person might be.
Jesus Christ gave the apostles power to heal and authority over demons in Luke 9:1-6, but never
mentioned immunity from snake bites and poison. The actual application, by Jesus Christ, of the
elements found in the verses, with the exception of drinking poison, is noted in Luke 10:17-20
where the gifts were given to the seventy disciples only. Luke speaks of the incident with the
apostle Paul, in Acts 28:3-6, in which he was bitten by a snake and suffered no harm, as a result of
his apostolic power and not as a result of a gift claimed to be given to all Christians.
There are additional problems in the passage that would indicate that the concepts expressed were
lifted from other Scriptures but then changed and applied in a different manner. The claim that a
person would not be harmed by poisonous snakes is found in Luke 10:19 and Acts 28:3-5.
However, in those passages, the protection was granted to the 70 disciples and the apostles, while
in Mark, although the passage speaks about the apostles, the protection is stated to be granted to
all those who have believed. The real world reveals that claim to be untrue and, with the
exception of those minor snake-charming splinter groups, the majority of those who claim that
Mark 16:9-20 is authoritative Scripture would reject the claim also. In addition, the passage
speaks about not being harmed by drinking any deadly poison, a claim which also fails in the real
world, and is not found in any of the other Scriptures.
The passage also claims that people will speak, not just in tongues, but will speak in "new
tongues," which many claim confirms the unique personal nature of the gift of tongues as a
heavenly language. The passage states that the gift of tongues is also for "them that believe,"
which is every Christian believer, however, the apostle Paul says that not all Christians have the
gift of tongues, as well as the gifts of apostleship, prophesy, teaching, miracles and healing,
1 Corinthians 12:30. None of the other passages in Scripture regarding tongues ever speak
of "new tongues," and the passage itself does not provide a definition of "new tongues," so the
claim by Charismatics that they are a heavenly language is an assumption made without a proper
biblical foundation. Verses 9-20 have other great difficulties and one cannot simply pick and
choose which doctrines are convenient in order to support a certain point of view and incorporate
them into a doctrinal system, and then reject the others, when the verses are not original to the
author, Mark.
For some reason, the original ending of the Gospel of Mark has been lost. The ending in the KJV
version is one that is used, but there are other variations. None of the proposed endings are
original to the author, so, although the endings may have been based on the original words of
Jesus Christ, those words have been altered to represent a particular viewpoint and do not
conform to the corresponding verses in other parts of the Scripture. The verses are later additions
to the Scripture and no not represent the direct words of Jesus Christ.
A person must be very careful when they claim that Jesus spoke certain words, when those words
that are claimed to have been spoken by Him are not original to the Scripture.
END OF ARTICLE
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