Mar 8:3 And if I send them away fasting
Mar 8:3 And if I send them away fasting to their own houses, they will faint by the way: for divers of them came from far.
Alternative: And if I set them free [while] starving to their own people they will relax (be set free) in philosophy because some of them have reach this point from a great distance.
This is a great example of Christ's wordplay in Greek. As you can see, the entire phrase has a double meaning. This double meaning goes back to Christ's first statement in the Gospels, that we do not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from God. Christ is concerned both about their physical hunger, but about their philosophical hunger as well and this statement is constructed to capture exactly this idea.
Though there are a lot of double meanings in this phrase: send away/set free,starving for food/hungry for knowledge, a house/a family, faint/set free, roadway/philosophy, came here/reached this point, from great physical distance/from a great philosophical distance.
one particularly interesting contrast of two words are those translated in KJV as "send them away" and "fainting." In Greek, both terms have the specific meaning of "to be set free." Christ clearly sees freedom as a double-edge sword. He wants to set people free, but not while they are starving for understanding because freedom in philosophy is dangerous, especially when the right philosophy is very distant from the thinking with which you have grown up.
Since most of these plays on words only work in Greek (with the exception of "way," which works in Aramaic as meaning both roadway/way of life), we have choose to believe either if this cleverness comes from those translating Christ's words from Aramaic or from Christ himself. For example, I can find no words in Aramaic that mean both "send away" and "set free" or both "faint" and "free," but interestingly, there is a word in Aramaic that means "starving" and "free."
"Send them away" is from apoluô (apolyo), which means "to loose from" and "to set free."
"Fasting" is from nêstis (nestis), which means "not eating," "fasting," "causing hunger," and "starving."
"Houses" is from oikos, which means "house," "dwelling place," "room," and "home." Any dwelling place but not exclusively a separate house. This home wasn't just a "house", which is a slightly different word oikia (oikia), but also the family and your personal relationships.
"Faint" is from ekluô (eklyo), which also means "to set free," "to unloose," and "to relax."
"The way" is from hodos (hodos), which means literally "the way" or "the road" but which is used symbolically to mean "a way of doing things" or "a philosophy of life." It is interesting that a term joining a path with philosophy exists in many languages from the west to the east.
"Divers of them" comes from tis (tis) which means "any one," "any thing," "someone," "something," "any," and "some."
"Come" is from hêkô, (heko), which means "to have come," "to be present," "to have reached a point," "to have come back," and "to return."
"Afar" is from makrothen (makrothen), which means "from afar" (space) and "from a long since" (time).
