Mark 11 : 32

The Greek adversative ἀλλά ('but') opens the clause, marking a contrast with the previously rejected option ('from heaven'). Neither the Peshitta (which begins with the simple waw-prefixed verb ܘܕܢܐܡܪ) nor the Vulgate (Si) renders this strong adversative, treating the conditional as the discourse hinge instead.

Greek expresses the protasis analytically with conditional particle ἐάν plus aorist subjunctive εἴπωμεν; the Peshitta compresses both into the single prefixed verbal form ܘܕܢܐܡܪ ('and that we should say'), while the Vulgate uses Si with the future-perfect dixerimus — three distinct grammatical realisations of one conditional clause.

Greek ἀνθρώπων ('of men') and Latin hominibus are simple genitive/ablative plurals; the Peshitta renders the same sense with the Semitic construct idiom ܒܢܝ ܐܢܫܐ ('sons of men'), the characteristic Aramaic periphrasis for human beings.

The Greek finite imperfect ἐφοβοῦντο ('they were fearing') is narrated in the third person past; the Peshitta recasts it as a nominal/predicative construction ܕܚܠܬܐ ܗܝ ('there is fear', lit. 'it is a fearing'), and the Vulgate uniquely reads the present tense timemus ('we fear'), shifting from indirect narration into the direct speech of the interlocutors.

Greek uses the simple imperfect εἶχον ('they were holding/regarding') with the article τὸν; the Peshitta employs the periphrastic participle-plus-auxiliary ܐܚܝܕܝܢ ܗܘܘ with the resumptive object pronoun ܠܗ ('they were holding him'), a standard Syriac durative construction. The Vulgate habebant matches the Greek imperfect aspect without the resumptive pronoun.

The adverb ὄντως ('truly') stands before the conjunction ὅτι in Greek, modifying the clause from outside; the Peshitta merges adverb and complementiser into the prefixed form ܕܫܪܝܪܐܝܬ ('that truly'), and the Vulgate places vere after quia — the same modal emphasis distributed differently across the syntax.