Mark 7:16 — “if anyone has ears to hear, let him hear”
Modern Bibles may omit Mark 7:16 because Reading A moves from verse 15 to verse 17, while Reading B includes the refrain. The apparatus places the addition after Mark 7:15.
What the APB prints.
Every witness, on the record.
What a blind committee did here.
The APB's translation committee works blind: it is never told it is translating the Bible, never given a book name or a verse number, and it never sees the witnesses above. Whatever it did at this verse, it did on the language alone — and its record is public.
“Included from the Faithlife/SBLGNT apparatus at Mark 7:15 as a traditional verse addition. Witnesses: Treg, RP.”
The blind committee record labels the item “Textual supplement: Mark 7:16”. It says, “Included from the Faithlife/SBLGNT apparatus at Mark 7:15 as a traditional verse addition. Witnesses: Treg, RP.” The audit verdict for the pericope is recorded as clean.
The case for each reading.
If the refrain echoed in
Reading A treats Mark 7:15 as continuing directly to verse 17, without a separate refrain. Westcott-Hort reads ἄνθρωπον and is described as joining verse 15 directly to verse 17. The apparatus likewise places ἄνθρωπον with WH and NA28, while the alternative adds a numbered verse and the refrain. On this reading, the teaching in the pericope proceeds from the statement about what comes out from the human to the next verse without the intervening call to hear. The issue is therefore not a different wording within the saying of verse 15, but whether an additional sentence stands after it.
If Mark wrote it here
Reading B prints a complete refrain after Mark 7:15: Εἴ τις ἔχει ὦτα ἀκούειν ἀκουέτω. Robinson-Pierpont presents it as verse 16, and its witness row says that Tregelles and the Byzantine text include it. The apparatus records the same addition after ἄνθρωπον, assigning it to Treg and RP. On this reading, the statement about what profanes the human is followed by an explicit appeal for anyone with ears to hear. The wording is a distinct sentence, so its presence gives the passage an added pause and summons before the following material.
The supplied evidence identifies a division: WH and NA28 lack the refrain, while Treg and RP include it. It does not provide a fuller account of how or when the two forms arose. Whether the sentence is printed changes the presence of a call to hear after Mark 7:15; it does not settle doctrine. Doctrines rest on many passages, not on this variant alone.
More places where the manuscripts argue.
Witness readings for critical editions are quoted from the SBLGNT apparatus (CC BY 4.0); Hebrew text from the Westminster Leningrad Codex (Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible). Readings of ancient manuscripts and versions are cited as published scholarly fact with their sources linked above. Nothing on this page declares a winner — the evidence is the point.
Weigh it yourself.
The registry doesn't tell you which reading is true. It puts every witness on one page, shows what a blind committee did with the same language, and leaves the verdict where it belongs — with the reader.