Mark 16 : 18

Greek employs a prepositional phrase construction (ἐν ταῖς χερσὶν ὄφεις ἀροῦσιν, 'in [their] hands serpents they will take up'), placing the object before the verb. Syriac and Latin both front the object (ܘܚܘܘܬܐ ܢܫܩܠܘܢ / serpentes tollent, 'serpents they will take up'), omitting the explicit prepositional phrase 'in [their] hands,' which is understood contextually.

Greek uses the crasis κἂν (καὶ ἐάν, 'and if'), a single contracted form. Syriac employs ܘܐܢ (w-ʾen, 'and if'), a simple conjunction plus conditional particle. Latin expands to et si ('and if'), two separate words—all semantically equivalent but reflecting each tradition's syntactic preferences.

Greek places the adjective before the indefinite pronoun (θανάσιμόν τι, 'deadly anything'), while Syriac uses a construct chain (ܣܡܐ ܕܡܘܬܐ, 'poison of death') and Latin reverses the order (mortiferum quid, 'deadly something'). All three convey 'deadly poison' but employ distinct syntactic strategies.

Greek employs the emphatic double negative οὐ μὴ with future indicative (βλάψει), a construction expressing strong negation. Syriac uses simple negation ܠܐ ܢܗܪ ('not it will harm'), and Latin non eis nocebit ('not them it will harm'). The Vulgate adds a colon after biberint, creating a punctuation break absent in Greek and Syriac manuscripts.

Greek fronts the prepositional phrase (ἐπὶ ἀρρώστους χεῖρας ἐπιθήσουσιν, 'upon [the] sick hands they will lay'). Syriac places the possessive pronoun first (ܘܐܝܕܝܗܘܢ ܢܣܝܡܘܢ ܥܠ ܟܪܝܗܐ, 'and their hands they will place upon [the] sick'). Latin mirrors Greek order (super ægros manus imponent) but again inserts a colon after nocebit, segmenting the discourse.