Jesus said to them, “Aren’t you mistaken, because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God?
Parallel translations
- WEB Jesus answered them, “Isn’t this because you are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God?
- KJV And Jesus answering said unto them, Do ye not therefore err, because ye know not the scriptures, neither the power of God?
- NKJV Jesus answered and said to them, “Are you not therefore mistaken, because you do not know the Scriptures nor the power of God?
- NASB Jesus said to them, “Is this not the reason you are mistaken, that you do not understand the Scriptures nor the power of God?
- NLT Jesus replied, “Your mistake is that you don’t know the Scriptures, and you don’t know the power of God.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Jesus says they are mistaken because they know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God.
Overview
Jesus diagnoses two roots of their error: ignorance of Scripture and of God's power. They wrongly assume resurrection life merely extends present marriage, and they doubt God's ability to raise the dead. His rebuke calls all readers to know God's Word rightly and to trust His mighty power.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 23
- 2 Tim 3:15–17From infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
- John 20:9For they still did not understand from the Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.
- Matt 22:29Jesus answered, “You are mistaken because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God.
- Eph 1:19and the surpassing greatness of His power to us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of His mighty strength,
- Isa 25:8He will swallow up death forever. The Lord GOD will wipe away the tears from every face and remove the disgrace of His people from the whole earth. For the LORD has spoken.
- Hos 6:2After two days He will revive us; on the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His presence.
- Jer 32:17“Oh, Lord GOD! You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and outstretched arm. Nothing is too difficult for You!
- Acts 17:11Now the Bereans were more noble-minded than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if these teachings were true.
- Rom 15:4For everything that was written in the past was written for our instruction, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures, we might have hope.
- Phil 3:21who, by the power that enables Him to subject all things to Himself, will transform our lowly bodies to be like His glorious body.
- Mark 10:27Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God.”
- Hos 6:6For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.
- Hos 13:14I will ransom them from the power of Sheol; I will redeem them from Death. Where, O Death, are your plagues? Where, O Sheol, is your sting? Compassion is hidden from My eyes.
- Isa 26:19Your dead will live; their bodies will rise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in the dust! For your dew is like the dew of the morning, and the earth will bring forth her dead.
- John 5:39You pore over the Scriptures because you presume that by them you possess eternal life. These are the very words that testify about Me,
- Luke 1:37For no word from God will ever fail.”
- Jer 8:7–9Even the stork in the sky knows her appointed seasons. The turtledove, the swift, and the thrush keep their time of migration, but My people do not know the requirements of the LORD.
- Job 19:25–27But I know that my Redeemer lives, and in the end He will stand upon the earth.
- Dan 12:2And many who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some to everlasting life, but others to shame and everlasting contempt.
- Isa 8:20To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn.
- Ezek 37:1–14The hand of the LORD was upon me, and He brought me out by His Spirit and set me down in the middle of the valley, and it was full of bones.
- Gen 18:14Is anything too difficult for the LORD? At the appointed time I will return to you—in about a year—and Sarah will have a son.”
- Hos 8:12Though I wrote for them the great things of My law, they regarded them as something strange.
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Christ at the center
Mark drives urgently to the cross, showing Jesus the Son of God as the suffering Servant who 'came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.'
How Mark 12:24 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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