---
title: Mark 16:17
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/mark-16-17/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/mark-16-17.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Mark 16:17
testament: NT
section: Gospels
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Mark 16:17

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> And these signs will accompany those who believe: In My name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues;

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "Furthermore, these signs will accompany those believing: By the use of my name they will expel demons, they will speak with tongues,"

## JW Usage

The Watchtower treats Mark 16:9-20 as textually disputed and brackets it accordingly in the NWT — and Mark 16:17 along with it. JW publications use the textual question to dismiss any charismatic or continuationist reading of the verse, then pivot to Acts 8 / Acts 19 to argue tongues ceased with apostolic laying-on-of-hands. The cessation argument is structured to avoid having Mark 16:17 do any apologetic work at all.

## Protestant Usage

Protestants are divided on Mark 16:9-20 (the longer ending) on textual grounds, and that intramural debate is not relevant to the JW conversation. What matters is that the Watchtower's wider cessationist case rests on a self-contradicting structure: the rs book rejects the standard cessationist reading of 1 Corinthians 13:10 (treating "the perfect" as still future) yet stakes cessation on a mechanism (apostolic laying-on-of-hands) that Acts 10:44-48 falsifies — the Spirit fell on the Gentiles at Cornelius's house before any apostolic prayer or laying on of hands. Mark 16:17 is a side-issue. The decisive text is Acts 10 in the Witness's own NWT, where Peter himself reports what happened.

## NWT Issue

The NWT brackets Mark 16:9-20 as textually disputed and renders v. 17 as "By the use of my name they will expel demons, they will speak with tongues" — inserting "by the use of" (where the Greek has simply en tō onomati mou, "in my name") and dropping "new" from "new tongues" (kainais glōssais). The dropping of "new" is a small change that nudges away from the apostolic-era glossolalia category and toward a more generic "tongues" reference. The bracketing serves the cessationist apologetic in the rs book — the longer ending is treated as non-canonical whenever it would otherwise authorise sign gifts in the post-apostolic church.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Tongues — The Watchtower Case Breaks on Acts 10](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/tongues-cessationism-rebuttal.md) — Acts 10:44-48 / 1 Corinthians 14:39 / 14:2 [Practice]