Jesus said to them, “You faithless people! How long must I be with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring the boy to me.”
Parallel translations
- WEB He answered him, “Unbelieving generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to me.”
- KJV He answereth him, and saith, O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him unto me.
- BSB “O unbelieving generation!” Jesus replied. “How long must I remain with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring the boy to Me.”
- ESV And he answered them, “O faithless generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him to me.”
- NKJV He answered him and said, “O faithless generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to Me.”
- NASB And He answered them and *said, “O unbelieving generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring him to Me!”
Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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 laments the unbelieving generation and calls for the boy to be brought to him. He grieves their faithlessness yet acts to help.
Overview
Jesus' sorrowful question echoes God's frustration with faithless Israel in the wilderness. The rebuke addresses the disciples, the crowd, and the scribes alike, exposing a pervasive lack of faith. Yet his command to 'bring him to me' shows that the remedy is found in coming to Jesus himself.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 15
- Num 14:11Yahweh said to Moses, “How long will this people despise me? and how long will they not believe in me, for all the signs which I have worked among them?
- Ps 106:21–25They forgot God, their Savior, who had done great things in Egypt,
- Matt 17:17Jesus answered, “Faithless and perverse generation! How long will I be with you? How long will I bear with you? Bring him here to me.”
- Num 14:27“How long shall I bear with this evil congregation, that murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against me.
- Mark 16:14Afterward he was revealed to the eleven themselves as they sat at the table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they didn’t believe those who had seen him after he had risen.
- Luke 9:41Jesus answered, “Faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you and bear with you? Bring your son here.”
- Luke 24:25He said to them, “Foolish men, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!
- John 20:27Then he said to Thomas, “Reach here your finger, and see my hands. Reach here your hand, and put it into my side. Don’t be unbelieving, but believing.”
- Heb 3:10–12Therefore I was displeased with that generation, and said, ‘They always err in their heart, but they didn’t know my ways;’
- Ps 78:6–8that the generation to come might know, even the children who should be born; who should arise and tell their children,
- Num 32:13–14Yahweh’s anger burned against Israel, and he made them wander back and forth in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation, who had done evil in Yahweh’s sight, was consumed.
- Ps 78:22because they didn’t believe in God, and didn’t trust in his salvation.
- Deut 32:20He said, “I will hide my face from them. I will see what their end will be; for they are a very perverse generation, children in whom is no faithfulness.
- Num 14:22because all those men who have seen my glory, and my signs, which I worked in Egypt and in the wilderness, yet have tempted me these ten times, and have not listened to my voice;
- John 12:27“Now my soul is troubled. What shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this time?’ But for this cause I came to this time.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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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 9:19 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.