Mark 2:22

2:22 And no one pours new wine into old wineskins; 1  otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the skins will be destroyed. Instead new wine is poured into new wineskins.” 2 

Mark 5:19

5:19 But 3  Jesus 4  did not permit him to do so. Instead, he said to him, “Go to your home and to your people and tell them what the Lord has done for you, 5  that he had mercy on you.”

1 sn Wineskins were bags made of skin or leather, used for storing wine in NT times. As the new wine fermented and expanded, it would stretch the new wineskins. Putting new (unfermented) wine in old wineskins, which had already been stretched, would result in the bursting of the wineskins.

2 sn The meaning of the saying new wine is poured into new skins is that the presence and teaching of Jesus was something new and signaled the passing of the old. It could not be confined within the old religion of Judaism, but involved the inauguration and consummation of the kingdom of God.

3 tn Grk “And.” Here καί (kai) has been translated as “but” to indicate the contrast present in this context.

4 tn Grk “he”; the referent (Jesus) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

5 sn Jesus instructs the man to declare what the Lord has done for him, in contrast to the usual instructions (e.g., 1:44; 5:43) to remain silent. Here in Gentile territory Jesus allowed more open discussion of his ministry. D. L. Bock (Luke [BECNT], 1:781) suggests that with few Jewish religious representatives present, there would be less danger of misunderstanding Jesus’ ministry as political.