Mark 4:38

But Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on the cushion. So they woke Him and said, “Teacher, don’t You care that we are perishing?”

Berean Standard Bible

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Study note

Setting — The disciples address Jesus as “Teacher” while He sleeps in the stern of a boat during a violent storm that is swamping them.

The words — The Greek πρὺμνῃ (prumnē) literally means “stern,” identifying the exact rear section of the vessel where Jesus rests.

The thread — The disciples’ fear of perishing runs parallel to the anxiety cast on God in 1 Peter 5:7, the sympathetic high priest in Hebrews 4:15, and the wounded spirit imagery of Isaiah 54:6.

Why it lands — The text states that Jesus remains present and asleep amid catastrophe before the disciples question His care, requiring the reader to acknowledge that divine silence does not equal divine absence.

Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.

The Greek words

King James Version

And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish?

Cross-references

1 Peter 5:7 Cast all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.
Hebrews 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who was tempted in every way that we are, yet was without sin.
Isaiah 54:6 For the LORD has called you back, like a wife deserted and wounded in spirit, like the rejected wife of one’s youth,” says your God.
Matthew 8:25 The disciples went and woke Him, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!”
Luke 8:24 The disciples went and woke Him, saying, “Master, Master, we are perishing!” Then Jesus got up and rebuked the wind and the raging waters, and they subsided, and all was calm.
1 Kings 18:27 At noon Elijah began to taunt them, saying, “Shout louder, for he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or occupied, or on a journey. Perhaps he is sleeping and must be awakened!”
Isaiah 40:27 Why do you say, O Jacob, and why do you assert, O Israel, “My way is hidden from the LORD, and my claim is ignored by my God”?
Isaiah 51:9 Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the LORD. Wake up as in days past, as in generations of old. Was it not You who cut Rahab to pieces, who pierced through the dragon?
Job 8:5 But if you would earnestly seek God and ask the Almighty for mercy,
Psalms 77:7 “Will the Lord spurn us forever and never show His favor again?