9. I tell you indeed, he went on to declare, that there are some of those standing here who shall not taste of death until they see the kingdom of God appearing with power. And six days later, Jesus took Peter, James, and John, and went with him privately by themselves into a high mountain, and he was transformed in their presence, when his garments became sparkling bright, exceedingly white as snow, such as no bleacher on earth could whiten them. Elijah and Moses then appeared to them, and they conversed with Jesus. Then Peter said to Jesus, How delightful it is to be here! Let us make three tents, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah! For he knew not what he should say, being as they were exceedingly terrified. A cloud also came, overshadowing them, and a voice came out of the cloud. This is my son, my beloved, listen to him! And suddenly, looking round, they saw no one except Jesus alone with themselves, and while they were coming down from the mountain, he specially instructed them that they should disclose to no one what they had seen, until the son of man had risen from the dead. They however retained the event in their memory, puzzling themselves about this rising from the dead. They also asked him, Why do the professors say that Elijah must come first? Elijah, certainly coming first, will restore all, he replied, and how is it written about the son of man, that he must suffer much, and be treated with contempt? I tell you, however, that Elijah has indeed come, and they have done to him whatever they liked, as it was written about him. Coming then to his disciples, he observed a great mob around them, and the professors engaged in discussion with them, but as soon as they saw him, all the crowd were much astonished, and rushing forward they saluted him. He then inquired of the professors, What are you arguing against them? Teacher, one of them answered, I brought to you my son, who has a speechless spirit in possession of him, and whenever it seizes him, it throws him down, when he foams and grinds his teeth, and he wastes away. I accordingly asked your disciples to expel it, but they have not the power. What a skeptical race, he exclaimed in reply, Until when must I remain with you? Until when must I be burdened with you? Telling him to me, they accordingly brought him to him, and on seeing him, the spirit at once convulsed him painfully, and falling upon the ground, he wallowed, foaming. He then asked his father, What length of time is it since this came to him? From childhood, he replied, and it often throws him into the fire, and into the water, so that it may put an end to him. If however anything is possible, have pity on us, and help us. That depends upon yourself, said Jesus to him, If you only believe, all is possible to the believer. I do believe, exclaimed the father at once, Sucker me in my unbelief. Seeing however that the crowd rushed together, Jesus rebuked the foul spirit, saying to him, Use speechless and deaf spirit, I command you to go out of him and never enter him again. Then shrieking and convulsing him, it took its departure, and he became as if dead, so that many said, He is dead! But Jesus took his hand, lifting him, and he stood up. And having entered a house, his disciples asked him privately, Why were we powerless to cast him out? This sort can only be expelled by means of prayer and fasting. He told them in reply, Then going away from there, they traveled through Galilee, and he did not wish anyone to know it, because he was teaching his disciples and repeating to them that The Son of Man will be betrayed into the hands of men, and they will murder him. But having been murdered, he will rise again after three days. They did not however comprehend this statement, and they were afraid to ask him. When they had come to Capernaum, and had entered the house, he asked them, What were you discussing among yourselves on the road? But they kept silent, because upon the journey they had been arguing as to who was the greatest. Then sitting down, he called the twelve, and said to them, If anyone wishes to be first, let him be the last and the attendant upon all. And taking a little child, he placed it in the midst of them, and caressing it, he said to them, If anyone shall accept one child such as this for my namesake, he accepts me, and if anyone accepts me, he accepts not myself only, but my sender. John said to him, Teacher, we saw a man casting out demons by means of your name, and we forbade him, because he was not one of our followers. Jesus however said, Do not forbid him, for no one who works a miracle in my name can easily speak ill of me, because he who is not against us is upon our side. And whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of the Messiah, I tell you indeed, that he shall by no means go unrewarded. And on the other hand, whoever causes one of the weakest believers in me to fall, it would be much better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and be flung into the sea. If even your hand should cause you to fall, cut it off, it will be better for you to enter into life maimed than possessing both hands to go into Gehenna into the inextinguishable fire, where their worm never ends and the fire is not quenched.  And if your eye makes you fall, throw it away, it will be better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with but one eye than possessing both eyes to be thrown into the fire of Gehenna where their worm never ends and the fire is not quenched. For everyone shall be salted by fire, as every sacrifice is salted with salt. Salt is useful, but if the salt rock should become saltless, how can itself be seasoned? Have salt in yourselves, and live at peace together. CHAPTER X Arising from there, he then proceeded to the borders of Judea by way of the farther side of the Jordan, and a crowd again rushed together about him, and, as was his custom, he again taught them. The Pharisees also approached him with the inquiry. Is it legal for a man to repudiate his wife, thus testing him? What did Moses order you, he asked them in reply? Moses, they answered, gave permission to secure a divorce and to send her away. Because of your brutality he wrote you that order, said Jesus to them, but God made them male and female from the beginning of creation. On account of this a man must leave his father and his mother and cling to his wife, and the two shall be as one body so that they are no more two, but a single body. What therefore God has yoked together, let man not separate. While in the house his disciples again asked him about this statement, and he answered them. Whoever may repudiate his wife and marry another commits adultery against her, and if a woman should repudiate her husband and marry another, she commits adultery. And when they were bringing children to him in order that he might touch them, his disciples repelled those who brought them, but Jesus, seeing it, became indignant and said to them, Allow the little children to come to me and do not prevent them, for of such is the kingdom of God. I tell you indeed that whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a little child, he can never by any means enter it. Then having caressed them, placing his hands upon them, he blessed them. And as he was going out into the road, one ran up to him, and kneeling to him asked him, Perfect teacher, what shall I do to inherit everlasting life? Why do you call me perfect? Asked Jesus in reply, None but one is perfect, God alone.  Teacher, he replied, All these I have observed from my youth. Jesus then, gazing at him, admired him and said, One thing is missing in you. Go away, sell whatever you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then follow me, carrying the cross. But he became crestfallen at that idea and went away grieving, for he possessed many estates. Jesus then, looking round, remarked to his disciples, With what difficulty can those who possess wealth enter the kingdom of God? His disciples, however, were amazed at his language, but Jesus, speaking to them again, said, Children, how hard it is for those who rely upon their wealth to enter the kingdom of God. It is easier for a camel to pass through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. They were then still more astonished than before, saying to one another, Who then can be saved? Jesus gazing at them replied, By human power it is impossible, but not with the help of God, for with God everything is possible. Peter then began to say to him, Why, we have abandoned all and followed you. I tell you indeed, said Jesus in reply, That no one who has abandoned home, or brothers or sisters, or father or mother, or wife or children or lands, on account of me and the good news, but will receive a hundredfold in the present time, with homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and lands, together with persecutions, and in the world to come eternal life. But many first will be last, and the last first. They were now on the road going up to Jerusalem, and Jesus was going in advance of them. And they were astonished and followed him in terror. Then calling the twelve to him, he again began to tell them what would befall him in the future. Now said he, We are going up to Jerusalem, and the son of man will be betrayed to the chief priests and professors. And they will condemn him to death, and hand him over to the heathen.  Yet at the close of three days he will rise again. James and John, the two sons of Zebedee, then approached him, saying, Teacher, we would like you to do for us whatever we may ask you. What do you wish me to do for you? He asked them. Grant us, they replied, that in your majesty we may be seated, the one upon your right hand, and the other upon your left. You know not what you ask, said Jesus to them. Are you able to drink the cup of which I drink, or to be baptized in the baptism in which I shall be baptized? We are able, was their reply. Jesus however said to them, You shall certainly drink of the cup of which I drink, and you shall be baptized with a baptism in which I shall be baptized. But to sit upon my right hand, or upon my left, is not mine to give, except to those for whom it is prepared. And when the ten heard it, they were very indignant concerning James and John. But Jesus, calling them to him, said to them, You know that those chosen to govern the heathen lorded over them, and their nobles also dominere over them. But it must not be so among you. On the contrary, if anyone wishes to take rank among you, let him become your servant, and whoever among you wishes to be exalted to a leadership, let him be slave for all. For indeed the son of man came not to be served, but on the contrary, to serve, and to sacrifice his life a ransom for many. Then they arrived at Jericho, and as he was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a great crowd, Bar Timaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus, sat by the roadside, begging.   Jesus then, standing still, said, call him. So hailing the blind man, they said to him, take heart, get up, he calls you. Throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came toward Jesus. What do you wish that I should do for you? Jesus asked him. Great master, the blind man answered him, that I may see again. Go away, said Jesus in reply to him. Your faith has saved you. And he saw again immediately and followed Jesus along the road. CHAPTER XI. And when they drew near to Jerusalem, to Bethphage and Bethany towards the Mount of Olives, he sent forward two of his disciples, instructing them, go into the village opposite you, and as soon as you enter it you will find a cult upon which no man has ever been seated. Unfassin' it and bring it. And should anyone ask you, why are you doing this? Reply, because the master has need of it, and he will at once send it. They accordingly went and found a cult tied up against the door outside in the open street, and they unfassin' it, and some of those who were standing about asked them, what are you doing untieing that cult? They answered just as Jesus had instructed them, they then allowed them, and they took the cult to Jesus and throwing their cloaks over it, he took his seat upon it. Then many spread their cloaks upon the road, while others cut off foliage from the trees and scattered them upon the pathway, and those in advance and those in the rear shouted, exclaiming, HOZANA! BELESSED IS THE ONE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD! BELESSED BE THE APPROACHING KINGDOM OF OUR FATHER DAVEN! HOZANA! IN THE HIGHEST! Then entering Jerusalem and the temple he examined everything, but it being now late he returned again to Bethany together with the twelve, and on the morning following when leaving Bethany he was hungry, and seeing at a distance a fig tree with leaves he went to see if he could find anything upon it. On coming to it however he found nothing but leaves, for it was not a good fig here.  And his disciples heard him. They then arrived at Jerusalem, and Jesus entering the temple began to expel the buyers and sellers from the temple, overturning the tables of the moneybrokers as well as the stands of the pigeon dealers. While he would not allow anyone to carry an article through the temple he also taught, saying to them, IS IT NOT RITTEN?  When the chief priests and professors heard it, however, they planned how they could murder him, for they were afraid of him, because all the masses were struck with admiration at his teaching, but when evening came he went out of the city. When returning in the early morning they observed the fig tree withered from the root, and Peter, remembering, said to him, RAP I LUCK!  JESUS ADDRESSING THEM THEN SAID, HAVE FAITH IN GOD!  I therefore tell you that whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you will receive it, and it shall come to you. And when you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive it, so that your Father who is in Heaven may forgive you your own trespasses. But if you will not forgive, your Father who is in Heaven will not forgive your trespasses. When they returned to Jerusalem, and while he was walking in the temple, the chief priests, professors, and elders approached and asked him, By what authority do you do this? And who gave you that authority so that you should do it? I will myself ask you one question, said Jesus in reply to them, and on answering me, I will in return give you my authority for acting as I do. Was the baptism of John from Heaven or from men? Can you answer me? They accordingly consulted privately among themselves, saying, If we answer from Heaven, he will ask, Why then did you not believe him? But should we say from men? They dreaded the people, because all believed that John was really a prophet. In reply they therefore said to Jesus, We do not know! And Jesus answering said to them, Neither do I tell you by what authority I act in this way. CHAPTER 12 He now began to speak to them in parables. A man, he said, planted a vineyard, surrounded it with a fence, dug out a wine vat, built a watchtower, let it out to cultivators, and took his departure. And at the right time he sent a messenger to the tenants in order that he might receive from the tenants the rent of the vineyard. But seizing him, they lashed him and sent him away without anything. Again he sent another messenger to them, but at him they threw stones, injured his head, and maltreated him most disgracefully. Then he sent still another, and they murdered him. And of many others some were lashed and some murdered. Having still a very dearly loved son, he even sent him to them at the last, thinking, They will surely respect my son. But the cultivators said to one another, Since this fellow is the heir, come on, let us murder him and the estate will be our own. Then seizing him, they murdered him and flung him outside the vineyard. What therefore will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and put an end to these tenants and hand the vineyard over to others. Was there reply? Then did you never read the scripture? A stone which the builders rejected. That same one was made the chief keystone. It was done by the Lord and is wonderful in our eyes. And they longed to arrest him, but they dreaded the crowd, for they perceived that he had spoken the parable against themselves. So leaving him alone, they took their departure. They then sent to him some of the Pharisees, and of the Herodians, so that they might ensnare him in discussion. And when they came, they said to him, Teacher, we know that you are to be trusted and that you are partial to none, for you do not study a man's face, but on the contrary, truthfully teach the way of God. Is it right to pay tribute to Caesar or not? Shall we pay, or ought we not to pay? He however, knowing their deception, replied, Why do you tempt me? Bring me a denarius, so that I may see it. And on their producing one he asked them, Who is this portrait and inscription? Caesar's, was their reply. Jesus then answered them, Give back to Caesar, Caesar's own, and to God what belongs to God. And they were very much surprised at him. The Sadducees, who hold that there is no resurrection, afterwards came to him with a question, Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if anyone dies, leaving a wife childless, then his brother must take his widow and rear children to his brother. There were seven brothers, and the first took a wife and died without leaving offspring. And the second married her and died, leaving no children behind him. So also the third. Indeed, the whole seven married her and left no children. Last of all, the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, when they will all rise, of which one of them will she be the wife? For all the seven married that woman? Are you not in deep error respecting this, said Jesus in reply to them, on account of your ignorance of the scriptures and the power of God? Because when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as angels in heaven. But with respect to the dead, that they are raised, have you not read in the Book of Moses how God spoke to him at the bush, saying, I, the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not the God of dead, but of living men. You are consequently greatly mistaken. One of the professors, hearing their discussion and finding that he had answered them well, now asked him, what is the most important of all the commands? The first, answered Jesus, is Israel, listen.  That is the first command, and the second is like it.  No other commands are greater than these. The professor then said to him, Teacher, you have spoken the truth admirably, for when he is, and apart from him there is no other, and to love him with all the heart, and with all the intellect, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is better than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices. Jesus, seeing that he answered intelligently, said to him, Ha ha ha, you are not far from the kingdom of God. After that, none dared again to question him. Now while teaching in the temple, Jesus inquired, how can the professor say that the Messiah is a son of David? David himself, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, said, the Lord said to my Lord, be seated on my right hand until I place your enemies beneath your feet. David himself calls him his Lord. In what way is he then his son? And the many listened to him with the greatest of pleasure. In the course of his teaching he told them, be on your guard against the professors who delight to walk about in flowing robes, to be addressed in the markets who secure the front seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They desolate the homes of widows and then gabble long prayers by way of extinuation. Their punishment, however, will be all the more severe. While seated opposite the treasury, Jesus observed how the crowd threw money into the treasure chest, and much was thrown into it by the rich people. A poor widow coming up, however, put in two lepta, which make a codrantes. Then calling his disciples, he said to them, I tell you indeed that this same poor woman has put more into the treasury than all the others, for they all gave but a part of their superfluity, while she in her poverty threw in all she possessed, the whole of her living. The end of chapters 9 through 12, recording by Mark Penfold. CHAPTERS 13 THROUGH 16 OF THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MARK, FROM THE NEW TESTIMENT IN MODERN INGLISH, TRANSLATED BY FERRAR FENTON. THIS LIBRAVOX RECORDING IS IN THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. CHAPTER XIII And as he was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, Teacher, just see these large stones and magnificent buildings! Do you see these great buildings? remarked Jesus in reply to him, there will not be one stone left upon another except in ruins. And while he was resting upon the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew came to him privately, asking, Tell us when this will be, and what is the sign of the accomplishment of these events? In reply Jesus began to say to them, Be on your guard, for fear anyone should lead you astray. Many will come in my name, declaring, I am, and will mislead many. But when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be afraid, for they must of necessity come. Though that is not the end. For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom. In many places there will be earthquakes, there will be famines and riots, these however are but the birth pangs. But you, take care of yourselves, for they will deliver you up to tribunals, you will be lashed in synagogues, and arraigned before governors and kings as evidence to them about me. The good news, however, must first be proclaimed among all the heathen, and when they arrest you and hand you over, do not get distracted with anxiety beforehand as to how you can defend yourselves, neither be distressed, but in that hour speak whatever may be then given to you. Because you are not the speakers, but the Holy Spirit. Brother shall then deliver brother to death and the father his child, while children will rise up against parents and bring them to death. And because of my name you will be hated above all men, but whoever holds out to the end shall be saved. When however you see the brutal desolator spoken of by the prophet Daniel standing where it ought not, let the reader comprehend. Then let those in Judea take flight to the hills, and let him who is upon the balcony not descend into the house, nor enter it to take anything from his own dwelling. And whoever is in the field, let him not turn round to pick up his cloak. But alas for those with child, and for the nursing women in those days, and pray especially that your flight may not take place during the winter, for in those days there will be affliction such as has never been known since the beginning of the creation which God created until now, and such as shall never be again. And unless the Lord had cut short those times none could be saved, yet for the sake of the elect whom he has chosen he has shortened those days. Then if any one should say to you, Look, the Messiah is here, or there he is, believe it not. For false messiahs and false prophets shall make their appearance and shall give out signs and wonders to lead astray if it were possible, even the elect. But you be on your guard, because I have foretold you all. In those days, however, after that affliction the sun will be darkened, the moon will cease to shine, the stars of the sky will be disappearing, and the powers of the heavens will be convulsed. And then they will see the Son of Man appearing in the clouds with transcendent power and majesty, and he will then send out his messengers to collect the chosen ones from the four winds from the extremity of the earth to the farthest bounds of heaven. Learn now from the fig tree this lesson. When its branch becomes soft and the leaves sprout, you recognize that the summer approaches, and so also when you see these events you will know that they are near to the doors. I tell you indeed that this generation shall not pass away until all this is accomplished. The heaven and the earth will pass away, but my declarations will remain. About that day or hour, however, none know, not even the angels in heaven, neither the sun, none but the Father. Be on your guard, watch and pray, because you do not know when the time is. Like a man traveling abroad, on leaving his house and giving instructions to his servants to each one his own task and ordering the porter that he should keep guard, be on the alert, for you do not know when the master of the house will come, whether in the evening or at midnight or at dawn or in the morning. Coming suddenly he may find you asleep, but what I say to you, I say to all, be on the alert. CHAPTER XIV It was now the Passover and the feast of unfermented bread had two days later, and the chief priests and professors planned how they might arrest him by treachery and murder him, for they said, Not during the festival, for fear a riot might break out among the mob. And while he was in Bethany reclining at food in the house of Simon the Lepper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very valuable perfume, and having opened the jar she poured it over his head, but there were some who grumbled among themselves, saying, To what purpose is all this waste of the perfume? Why this oil might have been sold for over three hundred denarii and given to the poor, and they grumbled at her. Jesus however said, Leave her alone, why do you grieve her? To me she has done a noble act, the poor you always have with you, and you can render them a service whenever you feel inclined, but me you have not always. She has done all she could, she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. Indeed I tell you that wherever this good news may be proclaimed throughout the whole world, what this woman has done shall be related in memory of her. Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went off to the chief priests in order that he might betray him to them, and when they learned it they were delighted and promised to reward him with money, he accordingly planned how he might conveniently hand him over. And on the first day of the unfermented bread, when the Passover is offered, his disciples said to him, Where do you desire us to go and prepare that you may eat the Passover? He accordingly sent two of his disciples, instructing them, Go into the city, and there a man will meet you carrying a jar of water, follow him. And wherever he may enter, say to the master of the house that our teacher says, Where is the dining-room where I can eat the Passover with my disciples, and he will himself show you a large upper room, ready furnished, get in readiness for us there? And his disciples departed and came into the city, and finding just as he had told them, they prepared for the Passover, and when the evening arrived he came with the twelve, and while they were reclining and eating, Jesus said to them, Indeed, I tell you, that one of you who is eating with me shall betray me, and they began to grieve and to say to him one by one, Never I! One of the twelve, he answered them, Who dips in the dish with me, for the son of man departs as it was written about him, but alas for that man by whose means the son of man shall be betrayed, better for him if that man had never been born. And while they were eating, Jesus took a loaf, and having offered a blessing, he broke it and handed to them, saying, Take it, eat it, this is my body. Then taking the cup and having blessed, he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. See note in Matthew chapter twenty-six, verse twenty-eight. He then said to them, This is my blood, that of the new settlement shed for many. I tell you indeed that I will not again drink of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it anew in the kingdom of God. And singing a hymn they went out to the Mount of Olives. Jesus then said to them, You will all be ashamed of me tonight, because it is written, I will strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered. After I am risen, however, I will go before you into Galilee.  I tell you indeed, said Jesus to him, You yourself today on this very night before the bugle sounds twice will have thrice denied me.  And all the others said the same thing. They then arrived at a garden bearing the name of Gethsemane, and speaking to his disciples he said, Sit here, while I go forward to pray. Taking with him Peter, James and John, he began to be agitated and agonized, and he said to them, My soul is sick, even to death. You stay here and keep guard. Then going a little farther, he fell upon the ground and he prayed that if it were possible, that our might pass away from him. And he cried out, Abba, Father, all is possible to you. Take this cup away from me. Not however what I will, but what you will. Then returning, he found them sleeping and said to Peter, Simon, Are you asleep? Have you not strength to watch a single hour? Watch and pray that you may not fall into temptation. Your spirit is ready, but your flesh weak. And going away, he prayed, uttering the same words. Then returning, he again found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy, and they knew not what to answer him. Then returning the third time, he said to them, Sleep on now and refresh yourselves. It has passed, the hour comes. Now the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Arise, let us go forward. My betrayer is at hand. And immediately as he was speaking, Judas, one of the twelve, approached with a great crowd carrying swords and staves set by the chief priests, professors, and elders. Now his betrayer had given them a token, saying, The one I shall kiss, that is he, arrest him at once and lead him safely away. And approaching with all speed, he at once went to him, saluting him with rabbi, rabbi, and fervently kissed him. They accordingly arrested him and took him. But one of the bystanders, drawing his sword, struck the officer of the high priest, and cut off a part of his ear. Jesus addressing them, however, said, Have you come out as though against a robber with swords and staves to arrest me? I was daily with you, teaching in the temple, and you did not arrest me. But thus are the scriptures fulfilled. Then leaving him, they all fled. Yet one of them, a young man, followed him, with a shawl over him to hide his nakedness, and the lads caught hold of him. But leaving the shawl, he fled naked. They now conducted Jesus to the high priest, and there collected to him all the chief priests, the elders, and the professors. But Peter followed him at a distance, and even into the court of the high priest, and he took a seat with the officers, and warmed himself by the fire. Now the professors and the whole council sought out evidence against Jesus with the object of condemning him to death, but they found none. For although many false witnesses came forward, their evidence did not agree. Other liars then came forward, asserting that they heard him saying, I will demolish this handmaid temple, and in three days I will construct another without hand labor. But even in this their evidence did not agree. The high priest then standing up among them questioned Jesus, asking, Have you nothing to say in your defense? What is all this that they charge against you? But he continued silent, answering nothing. The high priest again questioned him, asking, Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed? I am, said Jesus in reply, and you shall see the Son of Man seated upon the right of that power and coming in the clouds of heaven. The high priest thereupon tore his robes, exclaiming, What need have we of further witnesses? You have hurt his blasphemy. How does it appear to you?  And while Peter was seated at the back of the court, one of the girls of the high priest came forward and noticing Peter warming himself, she gazed upon him and said, Why? You are with Jesus of Nazareth. But he denied saying, I neither know nor understand what you say. And he went out into the passage and the bugle sounded. But the same girl, seeing him again, began to say to the bystanders, This fellow belongs to them. But he again denied it. After a little, however, the bystanders said to Peter, You are certainly one of them, for you are a Galilean.  And again the bugle sounded. Peter then called to remembrance the prediction of Jesus when he told him, Before the bugle sounds twice, you will have denied me thrice. And rushing out, he wept. Chapter 15. And as soon as the morning arrived, the chief priests, elders, and professors, and the whole Senate held a conference and binding Jesus, they led him away and delivered him over to Pilate. Then Pilate inquired of him, Are you the king of the Jews?  The chief priests then brought many accusations against him, Pilate again asked him, Can you say nothing in defense? See how many charges they bring against you. But even then Jesus said nothing in reply so that Pilate was much astonished. Now at festival time it was customary for him to liberate for them one prisoner, whoever they might ask for. And there was one named Bar Abbas, imprisoned with the rebels who had committed murder in the rebellion. And the mob began to yell out, demanding him to do what he had been accustomed to do for them. Well, said Pilate in reply to them, Do you wish me to liberate for you the king of the Jews? For he perceived that it was through malice that the chief priests had arraigned him, but the chief priests incited the mob to ask that he might rather liberate Bar Abbas. Pilate however then said to them again, What then do you wish that I should do with him whom you call the king of the Jews? Crucify him, they shouted in reply, Why, what crime has he committed? Pilate asked them again. Crucify him, they yelled out more fiercely than before. Then Pilate deciding to satisfy the mob liberated Bar Abbas and after flogging Jesus handed him over to be crucified. And the soldiers led him into the courtyard known as the palace where they mustered all the troops and they arrayed him in a purple robe and crowned him with a crown of plated thorns and began to salute him with, Good health to the king of the Jews.   And they seized a passerby from the country, Simon the Cyrenian, the father of Alexander and Rufus to accompany them in order that he might carry the cross. And they took him on to Golgotha, which means Skoll field. And they offered him wine medicated with myrrh but he refused to drink it. They then crucified him and divided his clothing among them casting lots what each should take. It was about nine o'clock when they crucified him and the inscription of the indictment written over him was the king of the Judeans. And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left and thus was fulfilled the scripture which says he was cataloged with criminals. The passersby also railed at him shaking their heads and exclaiming, aha, you demolisher of the temple and rebuilder in three days, now save yourself and come down from the cross. The chief priests also sneered among themselves with the professors and remarked, he saved others, he cannot save himself. You messiah, you king of Israel, descend now from the cross so that we may see it and we will believe. And those crucified with him cursed him. And when 12 o'clock arrived, there was darkness over all the land until three o'clock and at three o'clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice. L-O-I, L-O-I, I must be back tonight. Which when translated means my God, my God, to what have you abandoned me? Then some of the spectators hearing it exclaimed, see, he calls Elijah. But one of them ran and filled a sponge with sour wine and placing it upon a cane, offered it to him to drink saying, let him alone. Let us see if Elijah will come to deliver him. Jesus having given utterance to a deep groan, yielded up his spirit. The veil of the temple was then torn in two from the top to the bottom. And when the captain on guard opposite to him saw that he thus expired, he exclaimed, this man was undoubtedly a son of a God. And there were also women looking on from a distance, among whom were Mary the Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the Little, and Josie's and Salome, who when he was in Galilee were his followers and ministered to him. And many other women also went up with him to Jerusalem. And evening having now arrived, following which was the preparation, that is the day preceding the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a much esteemed nobleman who was himself expecting the kingdom of God, came and went boldly to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. But Pilate wondered if he were yet dead and summoning the captain, he inquired if he were already dead. And ascertaining it from the captain, he presented the corpse to Joseph, who, having taken it down, wrapped it in a fine linen shroud which he had bought and placed it in a tomb which he had hewn out of a rock. And he rolled a large stone over the entrance to the tomb. And Mary the Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joseph took note of where it was placed. Chapter 16. Now when the Sabbath was over, Mary the Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Salome bought aromatic spices so that they might embalm him. And at very early dawn, following the Sabbaths, they came to the tomb as the sun was rising. And they were saying among themselves, who will roll away for us the stone from the entrance of the tomb? Looking about, however, they saw that the stone had been rolled back for it was very large. Then entering the tomb, they saw a youth seated upon the right, attired in a robe of light, and they were awestruck. Be not startled, he said to them. You search for Jesus, the Nazarene, the crucified. He is risen, he is not here. Look at the spot where they laid him. Go, however, tell his disciples and Peter that he will go before you into Galilee. You will see him there as he told you. Then hastening out, they ran from the tomb. For possessed as they were by trembling and ecstasy, they said nothing to anyone. They were afraid for, note, the following fourteen verses are omitted from the older manuscripts. They differ greatly in style and language from the rest of the book. And on this account it has been supposed that they were added by a later hand. Alford expresses the opinion that, quote, in all probability they formed no part of Mark's original gospel, close quote. See also Westcott and Horace, Greek Testament. I would suggest that these three so-called endings of St. Mark's gospel are simply notes of ancient copyists or editors. Farar Fenton. However, having risen at the dawn of the first day following the Sabbath, he first appeared to marry the Magdalene out of whom he had cast seven demons. She went and reported it to his companions as they were mourning and weeping. But they, when they heard that he lived and had been seen by her, disbelieved it. After this, however, when two of them were walking along, going out into the country, he was manifested in another form and they, turning back, reported it to the others. But neither did they believe them. At last he was manifested to the eleven themselves as they were seated together at a meal and he reproached them with their unbelieve and hard-heartedness because they did not believe those who had seen him after he was risen. And he said to them, go out into all parts of the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation. The one who believes and is baptized shall be saved, but the unbelieving shall be condemned, and to the believing these signs shall follow. They shall cast out demons in my name, they shall speak in new languages, they shall handle serpents, and if they were to drink poison, it would not in any way injure them.  Now, after the Lord Jesus had discoursed with them, he was taken up into heaven and took his seat at God's right hand and they went out and proclaimed it everywhere, the Lord energizing them and confirming the message by the signs which followed. But they reported all these events briefly to those about Peter. After that, however, Jesus himself sent out by them the holy and incorruptible proclamation of the everlasting salvation from the East to the West. Amen! And the end of the Gospel according to Mark. Recording by Mark Penfold.


All right, good afternoon, everyone. Just a few things here at the top. We'll get right to your questions. So upfront on behalf of Secretary Austin, the department wants to extend our congratulations to the more than 20 DoD senior leaders who were confirmed by the Senate this week to include Cara L. Abercrombie, whose nomination to be Assistant Secretary of Defense for Acquisitions was approved, and US Navy Admiral Samuel Papero to be the next commander of US Indo-Pacific Command. These confirmations are welcome news, and we're excited for what these leaders will bring to the important mission of the Department of Defense. In other news yesterday, performing the duties of Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Hemispheric Affairs, Ms. Rebecca Zimmerman, hosted Columbia's Minister of Defense, Mr. Vaughn Velasquez, and Minister of Justice and Law, Mr. Néstor Osana. The senior officials exchanged views on countering illicit drug trafficking and human security, stemming irregular migration and frameworks to enhance bilateral security cooperation. The meeting reaffirmed the United States and Department of Defense's strong partnership with Columbia as the two nations worked together to ensure a stable and secure hemisphere based on a foundation of respect for democracy and human rights. Today, acting undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Ms. Sasha Baker will host Kurdistan Regional Government Prime Minister Masruro Barzani and his senior delegation. The meeting will emphasize the United States' long-standing commitments to continued partnership with the people of Iraq, including the Kurdistan Regional Government for a secure and stable Iraqi Kurdistan region within sovereign Iraq. And tomorrow, Secretary Austin is scheduled to welcome Savaki as Minister of Defense and Deputy Prime Minister Robert Colinat to the Pentagon to discuss a range of regional and bilateral issues. Full readouts from the senior leader engagements will be available on the defense.gov website. Shifting gears to Africa, the 13th African Air Chief Symposium is taking place this week in Tunis, Tunisia, hosted by the Association of African Air Forces alongside the Tunisian Air Force and sponsored by U.S. Air Forces in Europe, Air Forces Africa and serves as a pivotal platform for addressing critical challenges, strengthening partner networks and fostering cooperation among African air chiefs. With a thematic focus on pan-African education and training opportunities, the symposium is strategically designed to nurture more effectively, excuse me, more effective military relationships among participating nations with approximately 40 African countries engaged in advancing regional air power solutions. Separately, Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks will depart on domestic travel this Sunday, March 3rd to visit Camp Pendleton in Fort Irwin, California. At Camp Pendleton, the Deputy Secretary will meet with service members to better understand the challenges and opportunities they experience as part of their military service. At both locations, she'll interact with warfighters to see combined joint all-domain command and control in action via the Project Convergence Capstone IV. Viewing this experimentation will enable Deputy Secretary Hicks to gain better insight into the challenges that impact JADC2 implementation across our joint force and the outcomes of experimentation exercises. And finally, Secretary Austin will go to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center tomorrow afternoon for a scheduled routine follow-up appointment with his doctors. He continues to recover well from his recent cancer treatment and you can expect that he'll be conducting these types of follow-on checkups from time to time. And we'll be sure to keep you updated regarding any significant developments as appropriate. And with that, I'd be glad to take your questions. We'll go to Associated Press First, Tarkap. Hi, General Ryder. Thanks for doing this. Today, Secretary Austin, in response to a question, said that as many as 25,000 women and children have been killed in Gaza. Could you elaborate further on this? Where did he start? How many women and children have been... How many Palestinian women and children have been killed by the Israelis since October 7th? And he replied, it's over 25,000. I know there's been a clarification to say those are the numbers he cited were from the Hamas-Ren Gaza Health Ministry. Why was he citing numbers? Personally, he didn't actually say they were from the Gaza Health Ministry. But why was he citing numbers from Gaza's Health Ministry? Yeah, again, to clarify, as you highlight, his answer was citing an estimate from the Hamas-controlled Health Ministry that more than 25,000 total Palestinians have been killed in Gaza. And as you know, and as you've heard us say, we can't independently verify that these numbers are accurate. We can't independently verify Gaza casualty figures. And so we've talked about this before, that we're dependent on open source information, like many of you. We're certain that thousands of people have been killed, but as for the specific numbers, again, we cannot verify those specific statistics. Is there some accuracy in those numbers? The fact that he's saying them out loud and not going with, for example, Israel's estimate? Again, I'm providing you with the context of the information that he provided and what he was citing. Thanks. Let me try Tara again. Hi. Thanks. Can you hear me now? I can hear you. Okay, good. I was going to ask the same question Idris did, the second question today. Senators King and Reid have asked President Biden to send one of the Navy hospital ships to Gaza to help support civilians there. Is this something that the Pentagon, is this a request the Pentagon has received and something you're looking at? Yeah, thanks Tara. I don't have anything to announce today in terms of any deployments of hospital ships into the region. Will. To follow up on Gaza aid, is the Pentagon considering any potential air drops or any other steps to get more aid into Gaza at this point? So I don't similarly don't have any announcements to make regarding any DOD air drops or plans to conduct air drops. As you've heard us say before, the U.S. does continue to work with our partners and expand and sustain levels of assistance, much needed humanitarian assistance in Gaza. This week, for example, you heard USAID announce that they will be providing an additional $53 million in humanitarian assistance for urgently needed food, shelter, and water for Palestinian civilians. But as for DOD activities right now, I don't have anything to pass along. Let me go to Laura and then Orrin. Thanks Pat. Secretary Austin testified this morning that his military aid transferred his authorities to his deputy to stay. So I just want to clarify the timeline. In between when he was transferred to the critical care unit on January 2nd and when he transferred power, that was the afternoon of January 2nd as it says in the 30-day review. How much time passed? What was going on and who was in charge? Yeah, thanks Laura. So I'm not going to provide a minute-by-minute TikTok as we talked about when the secretary was admitted into the critical care unit, it became clear that he would not have access to his secure communications. So following the procedures that his aides have followed in the past when he's not been able to access secure communications, the decision was made to initiate the transfer of authority to the deputy secretary and that process played itself out. There was no gaps in command and control as the secretary has highlighted as we've highlighted in the 30-day review. So if there were no gaps, why can't you break it down minute-by-minute? Because I don't have it here in front of me. And what we've provided you in the 30-day review is what I have to provide. The sentences goes from on January 2nd he was admitted to the critical care unit and then on the afternoon of January 2nd. So even if there's like a couple hour gap, that is a big deal. So I'm asking you to go ahead. Again, there were no gaps in the command and control of the DOD command and control. The secretary or the deputy secretary were in charge at all times. Let me go to Pat. He testified this afternoon that he was not aware when the staff was told that he was in the hospital. So he has communications at home. He's put in the ambulance. He gets to the hospital. Isn't that at least a gap in communications? Because he travels with a communicator at all times, right? He has access to those communications. But I mean, just to put this into context, do you carry your phone with you every single place you go, every moment of the day?  But he testified that he did not have a cell phone. He has access to a personal communicator who travels with him at all times. So again, if he needs to talk, secure comms, if he needs to conduct command and control activities or reach someone, again, there's literally someone like steps away that can hand him what he needs to conduct operations. So, Warren. I want to go back to Gaza for a second. A large number of Palestinians were killed near an aid truck. Is the Pentagon asking for any investigation or clarification into the incident from the Israeli military? And do you still believe that Israel is taking steps to avoid civilian casualties because some of the incidents we're seeing don't seem to support that? Yeah, thanks, Warren. We've seen the reports, obviously. They're certainly alarming. And what I would say is the situation highlights the tragic nature of this conflict. We're, of course, very saddened to hear about this loss of innocent lives. And we do acknowledge as I just said a moment ago that too many civilians have been killed in Israel's military operations. And we continue to reiterate that civilian lives must be protected. As you're likely aware, the White House has been in touch with the government of Israel to ask that they investigate immediately to learn about what happened. But this situation also does underscore the critical importance of ensuring that much needed humanitarian assistance can be delivered to the people of Gaza in a safe, secure and sustained manner. And that's something that the U.S. government is going to continue to work on closely with partners in the region. But it also underscores that in this situation the requirement for Israel to take into account civilian harm mitigation in planning and executing its operations, whether they're ongoing operations or whether they've completed operations against Tommas. And as we've talked about before, this is something that Secretary Austin communicates to his Israeli counterpart on a regular basis. At this stage, there is no, it's a White House request to the government. There's no mill to mill request for an investigation in any of this. I'm not tracking any specific request from DoD, but again, like I said, the White House has reached out. Carl. Can I say in the Middle East really quick, first, have there been any attacks on U.S. forces in the Middle East this week? Not that I'm aware of. If you're talking about Iraq, Syria, no. And then following on the Houthi situation Genoa reported that the Chinese was sending ships from the 46th Fleet to come and help escort ships in the Red Sea. Has the U.S. military seen these ships arrive and do any escorting? And has the Chinese reached out to help with the situation concerning the Houthis to help with some of the counterattacks? Yeah, I don't have a status on location for Chinese vessels. I'd refer you to them in terms of a Chinese role in countering these attacks or supporting freedom of navigation operations. You know, we've talked before about the fact that we would welcome a productive role for China to play. But to my knowledge, at this stage, they have not offered, nor are they conducting any type of operations to help safeguard their partners or international shipping. Joseph. Thanks. Just to follow up on the attacks in Iraq and Syria, it's been just shy. I think of a month since the last reported attacks. That could change at any time, God forbid. But do you assess that deterrence has been restored or had been restored for the past a couple weeks? Well, you know, look, I don't want to put myself in the future. I think we are obviously glad that we have not seen additional attacks primarily because, A, it's dangerous, but B, because our forces are there to focus on the defeat ISIS mission and they'll continue to stay focused on that. But if we are threatened or attacked as we've demonstrated attacked, as we've demonstrated, we will take appropriate measures to safeguard our forces. The second one. You've mentioned and the Secretary mentioned this morning that the Israelis need to do more to mitigate civilian casualties in Gaza. That comes up almost in all the readouts of the Secretary's calls with this Israeli counterpart. Have you guys outlined or put forth what the potential consequences are? What could happen if they don't? I mean, you guys have been calling for this for probably since the second or third week, since the military campaign started, yet we haven't seen much change, at least in terms of the number of casualties. I mean, again, at the end of the day, Israel is a sovereign nation that's going to conduct operations. So I'd refer you to them to talk about specifically what they're doing. But, again, we've highlighted that it is their inherent right to defend themselves. We understand that, but it's also important that they take civilian safety and mitigation into account as they're conducting their operations. I mean, Secretary Austin talked about this at Reagan in terms of don't allow tactical victory to be taken away by strategic defeat. And so, again, we're going to continue to consult closely with them. We're going to continue to expect that they abide by the law of armed conflict. Sorry, just to follow up on that. I mean, we've heard this now multiple times, but it seems to be falling on deaf ears. I mean, have you guys relayed to them any potential moves that you could make if they don't heed these calls? I don't have anything to pass along to you, Joseph, other than, again, you know, we expect Israel to operate as a professional military. And I would say also, Hamas could play a role in this too by putting down its arms, turning the hostages back over and saying, hey, we're done fighting and we're done embedding ourselves among the civilian population and putting everybody in this difficult situation. So, you know, I think that could play a role too, Nancy. I just want to follow up on something you said and then a point of clarification from the testimony this morning. Is it the U.S. assessment then that the Israeli military conducted itself professionally today? Again, as I highlighted, the White House has reached out to ask what actions are taking and ask them to investigate. And I know they've publicly said that they're reviewing. No, I appreciate that. But if I heard your answer, Joseph, correctly, you said one of the things is that the U.S. is of the assessment that the Israeli military is behaving professionally. I just want to know that it's not correct. So you expect the Israeli military to behave? Again, I'm not going to pre-conclude the situation that we're talking about. Again, it's a tragic incident. We obviously are very saddened to see what happened. But, again, I think Israel needs to investigate that. Could you clarify an answer that the Secretary gave to Representative Whitman in which he said that there's not a standard procedure to notify an MCC when the Secretary moves and I don't understand under what circumstances that notification happens. Can you help me get a better read on that? You mean in terms of when his situation? No, broadly. If I heard the question correctly, Representative Whitman was asking when you move, is an MCC notified a standard procedure? And the Secretary's answer was no, and I just didn't understand that under what if I understand it correctly, that is there to let everybody know where the Secretary is all the time. So if it's not being used consistently, how does it work? Well, you know, without part of this is situational dependent, right? If the Secretary is within the operational capital region, what level of information needs to be passed along to the NMCC versus if he's going outside, if he's traveling. So I think the key point here is that through this exercise, through this experience, the Department has had the opportunity to go back and look from one to end, okay, what are our current procedures? What are some things that we can improve upon and take steps to make sure that this kind of situation doesn't happen again? And so that's really what we're focused on. And as I talked about on Monday, we've already taken some initial steps and we have some others that we're going to take to make sure that that information is being shared. I'm sorry, I don't mean to belabor the point, but he was referring to it today, not in the past. The question was when you move today, when you move, is that notification happening? So I'm just trying to understand the procedure today. But it has to be met for that notification to happen. Well, again, if he's in the national capital region, and depending on the situation, it could vary, you know, again, without getting into specifics, you know, and I don't want to make up hypothetical situations or get into potentially sensitive situations, but if it's warranted that they know his exact location, then I'm sure that information will be passed. Largely speaking, they're going to be tracking if he's in the national capital region. Let me go to Tom here, and then I'll go to the phone. Thank you. Just going back to this morning, the 21,000 precision-guided munitions since the start of the war to Israel, does the U.S. track where those are being deployed? Do we know they're all in Gaza? Have some gone up to the north? Do you have any sort of visibility on that? No, I don't have any information like that to pass along, Tom. And then just going back to the I appreciate what you said about the 25,000 figure and how that was the Secretary citing a mass-controlled health ministry. How does it work in the Pentagon? Do you look at all open sources, say you would look at Israel's estimates on the one hand and the health ministry from Gaza on the other hand, and you would sort of just cite those figures, or would you make a determination about which one has the most capacity? Again, what I said earlier is I cannot verify the veracity of those figures and we're not able to corroborate them and so we don't have a lot of confidence in the information or in other words we're not able to corroborate or verify the statistics whether they're being provided from one entity to another without independently being able to verify them. Not too dissimilar from the way I'm sure that your outlet tries to gather and verify that information without the ability to be on the ground and independently assess it's challenging and so we do have to rely in large part on open source information that's out there. But as I said before, we're fairly confident that thousands of civilians have been killed and one innocent civilian being killed is too many. So again, it just underscores the tragic situation that's there and again, we're going to continue to work with partners in the region to try to ensure that humanitarian assistance can be delivered while at the same time communicating with our Israeli partners the importance of taking civilian safety into account. Why would the Secretary cite information he can't verify? Again, I'm just highlighting the context of the information and where it came from and what he was citing. Okay. Let me go to the phone here else I'm going to get in trouble from Jeff Schogel. Jeff Schogel task and purpose. Thank you. Earlier in the week you provided an update of how many targets have been struck in Yemen. Can you say what steps the military is doing to replenish the munitions that it's using in the Red Sea and to make sure the forces in Indo-Paycom have enough missiles, cruise missiles and other missiles in case of a war with China. Thank you. Thanks, Jeff. For operation security reasons, I'm not going to go into specifics other than to say we have a very proven detailed and elaborate process to ensure that our forces receive the ammunition and the supplies that they need to conduct the operations that they've been tasked to do around the world. And that includes in the Red Sea region and the broader Middle East as well as the Indo-Pacific. Let me go to Mike Glenn Washington Times. Thank you, Pat. A review of Aaron Bushnell's social media account indicates that he has some pretty strong anti-Zionist views, anarchist views. He said Israel didn't have a right to exist. He appeared to condone Hamas's October 7th attack on Israel. My question is the same question I asked last time. Under the Pentagon's definition of extremist, would he fall under that? Yeah, thanks, Mike. So as you've heard the Air Force say the matter is under investigation is as appropriate following the death of a service member. I'm not going to put a label on Aaron Bushnell. I do think it's fair to say that an act of suicide by self-immolation is an extreme act. But as for the specific circumstances surrounding his death we know it's been made public but we owe it to the Airman's family and to the service to allow for a full investigation to obtain the facts. So, leave it there. Let me go to Eunice. Thank you very much, General. You said that earlier today it was a tragic incident. Obviously, we think otherwise, you know, civilians being fired at while trying to get some piece of food. But there is someone in Israeli National Security Ministry says that they acted excellently, the IDF, and it's to deliver humanitarian aid to Palestinian civilians. And you've been saying that the president made it very clear that in this current bombing of Gaza and you've been speaking to your counterparts but if this is the government that you've been speaking to, is there any result that's been produced? Yeah, I can't speak for that individual. I can only respond on behalf of the department so I don't have anything to provide. You know, you've been having these conversations for months now but the result doesn't seem to be much on the ground. So is there a sense of urgency within the Department of Defense that perhaps we should change the way that we're talking to our Israeli counterparts? Look, I think we've been very transparent in terms of how we're communicating with our Israeli counterparts as well as our efforts to try to support the people of Gaza in terms of humanitarian assistance and ensuring that their safety is taken into account. But we also again recognize that Hamas plays a factor in all of this and Hamas has not given up and laid down their arms and are still threatening to attack Israel and conduct operations.  I'm not going to lay out specific operations that they're doing on a daily basis but we have seen them change some of their approaches and how they're conducting operations. But again, as I highlighted these civilians have been killed and so we'll continue to consult with them communicate with them and expect them to abide by the international humanitarian law and law of armed conflict. Yes, sir. Thank you very much, General. As you said today, Massour Barzani the Prime Minister of Kurdistan was here at the Pentagon. What can you tell us about your commitment to fighting ISIS and what is your view of the role of the Peshmerga in that? Yeah, look, as I highlighted at the top we very much appreciate that the role that Peshmerga have played for a very long time when it comes to security in the Kursan region of Iraq and also in fighting ISIS and we remain committed to working with the international coalition for the enduring defeat of ISIS. Again, it's why we have forces in the region right now working with international partners to include the Peshmerga. Thank you. Wafa. Thank you, General. On the jaws of question apparently communication with the Israeli and consulting with them is not helping much spare civilians in Gaza. Are there any concrete steps or measures the administration can take to press Israel on the matter of civilians in Gaza? And are there any discussions within the department to maybe pull the U.S. military assistance to Israel like a way to press Israel on this matter? Yeah, thanks Wafa. So again we continue to believe in Israel's inherent right to defend itself and we'll continue to support them in terms of their right to defend themselves. And we have from the very beginning been communicating actively on the importance of taking civilian safety into account and we will continue to do that. Secretary Austin just had a conversation with his Israeli counterpart this week as you saw and this was a topic of discussion. He talked with him last week as well and so they understand that this is important. I'm not going to speak for the Israelis but we will continue to urge and expect that this is something that's taken into account. Do you have any update on the U.S. military assistance to Israel? Is it like a daily shipments going to Israel? Like Secretary Austin today mentioned that there was about more than 21,000 munitions delivered to Israel? I don't have time to pass along to you Wafa, thank you. Let me jump back to the phone here, Tony Capasio-Bloomberg. Hi Peta, Ukraine question without Republican support for more aid in the supplemental what is the Pentagon's best assessment of the tactical military implications over the next two or three months to the Ukraine military in terms of air defense and artillery shortages? How greatly will those grow? Yeah well I mean they're obviously engaged in an active fight right now we continue to see Russia making some small but incremental gains as you know and so it's vital that we be able to receive the supplemental funding as well as a full year appropriation to be able to ensure that Ukraine has the assistance to include air defense and ammunition capabilities to be able to not only defend themselves but also take back sovereign territory and so the Ukrainians have proven themselves to be very innovative courageous fighters so we have no doubt that they're going to fight they're going to continue to fight very bravely but it's absolutely essential that we get them the resources they need now and not too late thank you, Chris. Thanks Pat, two questions on the Red Sea region first what is the coordination between the EU maritime mission and operation prosperity guardian does the right hand know what the left hand is doing so at the very least you are confused about which vessels are where and what they're trying to do Yeah I mean as I understand it they do coordinate and communicate on a daily basis you know we have obviously around the world have experience working closely with partners inside and outside of coalitions working coalitions side by side and of course many of the the countries that are resident within operation prosperity guardian and then the corresponding operation espadies we've all worked together for many years and many different places around the world and many of those countries are within NATO so when it comes to interoperability you know that's something that is a strength and then my second question the State Department's Special Envoy for Yemen said this week the State was working to expand the strike coalition against the Houthis and the Gulf States needed to do more but couldn't speak for the DOD so on behalf of the Pentagon is the DOD working to expand the strike coalition against Houthis Like I don't have any specific announcements to make I mean we're always consulting with allies and partners in the region to address the international problem that's been created due to the Houthis illegal and reckless strikes against international shipping and mariners Overall are you trying to grow the coalition, either operation prosperity guardian or the strike coalition Look we're trying to address this as an international problem because you know it's affecting the international community and so this is the way that the United States operates we work with coalitions and we work with allies in order to achieve common goals and I think internationally everyone will agree that the Red Sea is a vital waterway 15% of global commerce transits through there and so this is something that we'll continue to keep after Let me go to yes ma'am Hi Sir Kimberly Underwood from FCS Technical Magazine you spoke about the Deputy Secretary's trip out west in part of which is to CJAD C2 and project conversions Can you talk about what this Secretary, Secretary Austin and W Secretary Hicks hope to see from that effort and the timeline of what's being achieved Yeah there'll be obviously a lot more to come out of that that event and so I'd encourage you to reach out to the Army as I'm sure you are but what you've seen over the last several years is things like project convergence or the advanced battle management system or the Navy's overwatch program project overmatch rather working together to look at how we can better integrate using various technologies when it comes to combined joint all-domain command and control and so they're going to have the opportunity to experiment with technologies operate at a theater level versus a tactical level but do it in a way that enables us to better synchronize and synthesize our operations when it comes to operating as a joint force and so really for the Deputy Secretary it's a great opportunity to see the continued progress that's being made and also again see as I mentioned see the specific outcomes as they can be applied to the broader joint force. Thank you sir. Turning to the budget a few weeks ago Secretary Kendall said that if there's no 24 appropriation basically the 25 request is irrelevant because it's building on 24 and there was debate then about whether to delay releasing the 25 request to give more time to see if there's going to be a 24 appropriation. What's the current thinking on that and process timeline for releasing 25? Yeah as I understand it the intent is still to release a fiscal year 25 budget I'd have to refer you to OMB to talk about specific timelines at this point since it is the President's budget but that is my understanding right now. And any reworking being considered inside the building to adjust for the fact that almost half the year has gone and CR is going to be happening for at least a few more weeks? Well I mean as I'm sure you can imagine one of the primary things the Pentagon does is work on budgets right and resourcing and so clearly that work is always being done whether it's you know this year's budget or future year's defense spending but to your point and it's something you've heard others talk about the fact that we continue to operate under CR's is not helpful. We need a full year appropriation in order to do the work that we've been asked to do and so certainly the longer we kick the can down the road the more challenging it becomes for the department to conduct the operations in support of our national security mission. All right time for a few more Nancy. I want to come back to your answer about what happened today in Gaza. I'm just trying to better understand the DOD position. The White House has said that it was tremendous, found the incident what happened tremendously alarming. The State Department said that it's urgently seeking more information and I just want to understand is there any sense of shock or urgency out of the Department of Defense or is it more reassured from the conversations it's having with Israeli counterparts? Well look I mean again we're watching the same images that you are on TV and it is alarming and it is you know very unfortunate and as I mentioned we're very sad at the loss of innocent lives here I mean these are human beings that are trying to feed themselves and so I think we're all kind of looking at that and saying you know what happened here and so again the White House has reached out and asked Israel to investigate this just leave it at that. I appreciate that but when you say we're all looking to find out what happened here what I'm trying to understand is what is DOD doing to find out what happened here? Look DOD is not currently operating in Gaza we're not at war in Israel against Hamas so our focus is what we've talked about before and that is working to protect our citizens it's working with Israel to ensure they have what they need to defend themselves it's working with them to enable the release of hostages and it's trying to prevent this conflict from spreading into a wider conflict where required we support the U.S. interagency you know in the past we've helped to deliver humanitarian assistance so that continues to be our focus as part of the broader U.S. Government okay Sir John my question will be about Jerusalem Ahrman who set himself on fire last Sunday in front of the Israeli Embassy saying that he doesn't want to be complicit in a genocide in his words so there are allegations that he decided to make this extreme act of protest after his clearance led him to see some information about the U.S. involvement in this so what can you tell us about this and you said there's an investigation what kind of investigation is that can you give us some more information about it yeah thanks John so anytime there's the death of an airman particularly in a suicide situation there is going to be an investigation into the circumstances and because it's under investigation I don't want to speculate about this particular airman and what he may or may not have been experiencing but what his mental state was it would just be pure speculation on my part so again we owe it to his family and we owe it to the Air Force to have the time to be able to do that investigation and get ground truth thank you Thanks General I just wanted to follow up on the Houthis the U.S. is spending a lot of money to take down cheap drones do you think that's a sustainable strategy over a long period of time and do you have a strategy to maybe bring that up in some way hey look you know we're going to continue to work with the international community to safeguard international shipping and the lives of mariners that are transiting the Red Sea I think the fact that we've been able to save as many lives as we have it's kind of a null hypothesis you're asking me to prove here what would have been the cost of sunken ships lives lost environmental disaster had we not and were we not working with the international community to address this problem as I highlighted on Monday it's almost like the Houthis are trying to wreck their own neighborhood you know and ultimately in the long term not to their benefit to continue this let me go over to Courtney I wonder two different topics on Israel today does the Pentagon think it's appropriate for Israel to investigate itself in this attack today considering that most of the allegations from witnesses on the ground or that it was the IDF who were responsible for many of these deaths and injuries hey look Israel's a sovereign country in the same way if there were allegations in our own military of inappropriate actions or something that was problematic you know we conduct investigations in our military and there's methods and procedures to do that again I'm not going to speak for Israel in terms of who within the Israeli government would investigate or how they approach it and one would expect that it would be very similar on the secretary's testimony today there was one thing that I was confused about I'm confused now about who it was that made the determination on January 2nd for him to transfer authorities to secretary deputy secretary Hicks because he said at one point he said that his staff were advised by doctors they would not be able to gain access to him and maybe I misunderstood but it made it sound as if the staff were the ones whomever that was who made the decision for him to have to transfer authority and it was a communication thing as opposed to a medical necessity which I thought was what we were earlier told that the seriousness of the diagnosis and his medical condition was one of the reasons. As highlighted in the unclassified summary as we talked about on Monday it was the secretary's inability to access secure communications that prompted the staff to take the measures they had done previously when he was not able to secure communications and again taking the initiative saying well okay if the secretary is not able to access those communications procedure has been oh by the way procedures that are written and prescribed by the civilian leadership of the Department of Defense then we will transfer authorities to the deputy secretary and so that was the determination. Now again recognizing and looking back through all of this through the review process broadly that improvements could be made and so again we were undertaking those process and procedure improvements. But again so it was the staff and it would be great to know who the staff were because again and correct me if I'm wrong if I'm mixing up the timeline because I felt like some things were a little jumbled today I was under the impression that the SMA the chief of staff the public affairs head and one other person who it was who were all notified on January 2nd were told earlier in the day and that the transfer the authorities were transferred later in the day. So who were the staff members who have the authority to make the decision to say Secretary Austin's because I thought it was Austin it was Secretary Austin's decision to transfer authorities for whatever the reason is. Well again I'm just hesitating here because we talked about this ad nauseum on Monday so but again and if I'm wrong I'm happy to talk about this offline but I because Secretary I thought that it was Secretary Austin's ultimate decision to transfer the authorities for whatever the reason be communication or whatever but it's the staff who are the staff right what the review found and what we talked about previously was that when the secretary's doctor said that it would they recommended he go into the critical care unit it was clear that he was not going to be able to have access to secure communications and so as he's going into you know being prepared to go into that critical care unit his staff military aids make the determination based you know again recognizing that this is sort of an unprecedented situation based on the fact that if the secretary is not going to have access to communications checklist says it's time to start talking about a transfer of authority to the deputy secretary because we need to have positive control in terms of secure communications so the military aids took initiative to execute that to ensure that there was no gap in command and control and thus the fact that the review found there was no gap in command and control I don't have the review right in front of me so I don't want to say that in the summary of the review that we got because I don't believe it does I also want to point out when you guys talk about I appreciate that the the review was classified by the drafters whatever drafter means that the secretary said today but we've only received a summary of the review so there's a lot of details here that are still unclear to us and it gets muddy frankly when we have this very vague summary that's put out and then we have testimony from the secretary today that and without a clear timeline yeah thanks Courtney well again I appreciate that we're going to continue to try to provide as much information as we can as we highlighted earlier this week you know there are elements of that report that are classified and you know we've endeavored to try to give you as much unclassified information as was available to provide so thank you very much everybody appreciate it


I've seen a lot of people try to automate tests and a lot of times the tests get abandoned and I feel very sad about it. The reason for why the test automation projects get abandoned is not because the team is not disciplined, it's because the team is resource constrained and the QA of whoever is doing testing is not able to justify the value of testing. So the reason why I'm giving this talk is to help you prioritize your tests based on how much value your test would give. So that's why we are here today. So let's start with the first question of why people get asking me where should I start and there's a lot of ways to start testing. A lot of people get a lot of teams get stuck here discussing should we why is the shortest path to 100% test coverage should we start from here should we start from there should we use this tool should we use that tool should we use this technique should we start from back end should we start from front end and so on and so forth. So this conversation is very familiar with for doing like and for me in my experience this is what the conversation often looks like so in fact a lot of the times people look at the testing period and for me what the testing pyramid means is mostly a description of what the structure of most tests project look like you have a lot of small unit tests because they are small and light they test your components and you have a few UI or integration tests just to test across the system which also test the components but more importantly you have a few of them just which will cover across your system. So this is for me I have a very simple interpretation of the test pyramid but a lot of the mistake that a lot of teams do is they look at the test period and they think is a guide to how to do testing so it's just like you're supposed to climb climb up the pyramid like start from the bottom from the simplest unit test and then once you have only write your integration test as you need but this is one school of thought this is one camp and I see a lot of teams debating about this like so this is one of the debates that I had in one of my previous company we should start from unit tests for our back end first because it's faster to write and we can get coverage of our core functionality across the system quickly sorry by the way it's my slides updating actually okay so a lot of teams get stuck here they wonder some of them would say oh we should start from unit test first because it's faster and lighter to create some of them would say oh no no we should start from UI test because our integration test because we can just write a few of them but they will cover a board strap and whatever the unit test will cover the integration test will also cover and more and the thing is both camps are right so that's the reason why a lot teams get stuck in this debate and the problem is they would get again this analysis paralysis and nothing nothing actually happens so so for a few months and this actually happens a lot it happened in my old company like the senior developers had a debate and and then nothing came away we made no decision and nothing happened so and every so why people get stuck in this conversation is because it's because the is the wrong conversation to has have right now so what you're trying to talk about unit test versus integration test is talking is you're trying to figure out how to test but the problem is is that putting the card before the horse you're trying to figure out how to test before you figure know what to test so what you should actually be talking about and how we should refrain the question of where should I start is not how to test but what to test so let's take a look at how do we figure out what to test and we should what we want to how we want to figure out what to test is to use priorities and we should prioritize how we want to test what what features we want to test first so and the reason why we want to do this is for two reasons one we want to be able to make sure that whatever we do in test automation delivers value as quickly as possible that's because I don't want to see test automation projects get cancelled so I always want the QA team or the developers who are writing the test if it's the developers to be able to communicate the management this is why testing is redundant and we should allocate resources to testing and the second reason is that once you have priority levels set on all your different features you're able to categorize your tests so that into tiers of level of monitoring and level of attention that you need to give to each tier so what we want to have at the end of the day is something that looks like this so you have a disaster managed disaster scale system and we want to have sorry sorry to interrupt your camera off again okay let me come back to my camera turn it on there you go do you see me now okay good so we want to have like a category if we want to tier our test into this group so that we know that the most important test gets the most monitoring done and the most attention if any failures happen within this tier itself so a lot of teams when once I reframe this question from how to test to what to test a lot of teams quickly have intuition from for what features they want to test first and for me my rule of time is to start with your scariest feature and the reason why I say this is because you probably have a very good reason why you think that feature is scary and for me the reason how I prioritize things is based on how much shit do I get into if this component doesn't work so I have a scareometer it's a very very simple framework it's just four questions that I will pose for each of the components that I want to test so the first one is what is the business impact of this component if it fails how frequently is the component used how complex is the component and how much domain expertise do you need to understand how this component works whether or not you want to develop it or whether or not you want to test it so we're going to rate this on a scale of one to five and use this for categorizing our test later so let's go through each of the question is very simple so first business impact how much does a failure would impact the business operation and revenue if a failure occurs so if very little impact for example if our email customer feature broke it's just going to annoy people it's just a little bit inconvenient that we're just going to give you a score of one but let's say the checkout feature fail we're going to call it a high impact because we're going to lose customers and we're going to lose revenue and usually I would seek my product managers or business stakeholders to ask them to quickly list down to me like what are the 10 most important features that you want to make sure there are no failures that are happening there okay so frequently of use is pretty obvious this is related to business impact itself so the more often your users use these features of course they if it fails then the more complaints your customer support team will get so I would usually recommend using analytics if you have it to get a more objective data about the frequency of use because usually what you think users are or how you think your users are using product is not usually what you imagine or design for users would use it in ways that you didn't think of so try to get analytics if you have now complexity so complexity is measured by how many logical paths there is through a software for us in for us testers we usually call this test cases so usually the programmers they like to call this psychometric complexity if it's really straightforward you can explain it to a five year old we just give you a score of one if you need a little bit of knowledge to figure out how to test this feature for some maybe it's like as complex as assembling a subway sandwich then give a score of three if it's really really complex then there's a very good chance that if you get a new developer to add a new feature to this component you're gonna the developer is going to introduce a new bug because it's such a complex flow there's a lot if and else there's small loops a lot of cases and usually what I like to do is I like to go around asking the developer which code are you most afraid of touching and just get a list of 10 10 answers and that's usually a good place for you to start writing your test for and then the third one the last one is domain expertise so usually people overlook this domain expertise is do you need to get a specialist to explain to you how or to understand the requirements of this component itself so the reason why I ask this is because we want to make sure that if the original developers who worked on these components are no longer around they are automated tests so that if someone new comes on board to maintain a feature or add new functionality he's not going to screw up and introduce new bug so we can give you a score of one if it's very simple to understand like anyone who can understand how this software works give you a score of three if you need to know a little bit about the industry like for example accounting software you might need to know like why is accrual why is credit why is debit and and so and so forth if you need an industry specialist like for CAD software you might need to get the silver engineer sitting beside you to explain to you okay this is how I think the software should work then you can give you a rating of five so this is our four questions so and to put it in business terms this is what it would mean to the business the first question business impact and frequency is just how much would a failure cost to the business the complexity of the component would is more of like how likely would the component fail if we get a new programmer to make some changes to it if it's very complex there's a good chance that there's a new failure domain expertise is somewhat similar if it might be very expensive to always have to get your invite your silver engineer to sit down with you for uat to make sure that the component is working so you want to automate that and what we want to do now is to put our test into uh into tiers so what I usually do is to add all of this up and I try to keep it simple I just have three different tiers so sanity smoke test suite uh create critical test suite and full test suite so sanity smoke test suite I will monitor daily I will also automate this first the critical test suite I will automate I will run it every release and a full test suite I will just run it for major releases where because it's a really really long running test it might take a couple I might take a full day to complete our full automation test suite so you might just only test this for not for like hot fixes but we just want to test this for major releases and we keep that on uh like less frequent monitoring schedule like weekly for example so now we're going to try a very short exercise okay so let's imagine we have a transaction management system for a real estate agent and we're going to take a look at a few components of this system and try to give them a score so first we have login as an agent then we're going to try to add a property to our listings we are going to try to create a transaction as a sales person and create a lease agreement as well we're going to generate the invoice PDF and you're going to email it and we're going to calculate how much the agent receives every month for his commission so let's take a look at login as an agent so if the login feature fails how much is the business impact we'll give it a five because if the agent cannot login the system is completely useless and i'll give frequency of five because the agent is going to do that do this quite often but it's not a very complex feature and it doesn't require a lot of domain expertise to figure this out so overall this is a score of 12 now let's take a look at the next um feature uh add a property listing so uh if an agent is not able to add a listing today um it might annoy him a little bit it might like slow down his sales progress like but he could do it tomorrow and there might not be such a uh if he speaks that it might not be such a big impact it might add the new listing once or twice a week there's not a it's a somewhat complex feature to test because or to build because you need to test the number of bays number of uh bathroom if it's rental does the property allow pads on the property so there might be a lot knobs for you to test but it doesn't require a lot of domain expertise to test this feature or to develop this feature so i give it the overall is a score of 10 now let's go to the third one so here i'm creating a transaction so i would give this a five because if there's a one day delay the agent might lose his sale he might do this uh create transaction creation once or twice a week or maybe three times a week it's um fairly complex because the agent we need to under um there might be the stem duty or tax or um inheritance um some transaction or idline items based on what kind of transaction it is you might need to know a little bit of domain expertise just to understand the local regulations to be able to develop and test this feature okay so now generating invoice pdf i would say that it's pretty important um you'll do it as often as you do the transaction it's somewhat complex it doesn't require a lot of expertise overall 13 yeah i'm sorry to god we are running out of time now actually okay so i'm going to um get uh skip to the towards the end then so let me just um skip through the last few features that we have so so we have uh rated all of our features over here so what i would do is i would then put them into our different tier so this is one of the features i'll put into the smoke and sanity test based on how many points i give and i'll in our critical test will have the the added property listing calculate monthly sales commission and our full test will just have the email invoice because it's not that critical if it fails we'll just test it once again so this is um this is how we'll start we'll start automating tests from our sanity test would uh then to the critical test then to the full test and after that once you have figured what you want to test it's actually pretty easy to figure out how you want to test if you look at login maybe some teams would want to go for it go at go at it from a lot api perspective or from a ui testing point of view but for calculating the the commissions for example um unit testing might make more sense so it's actually pretty easy to figure out how you want to test each components when you figure out what what you want to test okay so anyway this is just a um a guideline so and you can change it according to what your company uh or your team needs so you can add more questions like how much time does it take type the test uh you can change the weights you can use a different sale some maybe you just want to use a yes or no scale or maybe you want to add like a a bcd with an s class for extreme difficulty um or you might want to add more tiers for example um but my rule of thumb or as well as the don't don't make it too complicated it should be something a framework should be like you know for you to quickly decide and last thing i want to say as well is it will always seem very scary and overwhelming when you have a very big project and to start with but focus on one thing at a time focus on one feature at a time and if you focus on the thing that is most scary to start with it actually gets very easy so that's that's all thank you and uh is there any questions yeah thank you so much li um we are actually under the uh we are sitting in between people coffee break so people would be wanting to have the coffee uh but meanwhile people still hanging around with us uh having the sipping the coffee on the chairs and they like to listen to the questions answered but maybe we can take a one or two questions so i'll read back to you so there's a question uh from kathike about how to find feasibility of any application test cases where we can achieve 100 percent automation so i usually will actually say that it is very difficult to achieve 100 percent um automation and in fact i will actually would ask the team like which uh features do you have stable and which features are not yet stable and prioritize the automation of stable features first because if it's you have unstable features you're going to spend a lot of time um going back and forth with the marketing team with the the design team on picking um the test according to the how the design changes so so i would say um um try not to get too fixated on 100 percent test automation and i think um prioritize or think about uh i think the the key question or the key objective for your test automation would be what is the highest value i can give to the company yeah that's helps me answer uh next question is how to decide priority between manual and automated tests during short release cycles well if you have very short release cycle sometimes it can't be helped to uh do manual testing because frankly there are times when um writing the automated test it just takes longer than doing the ordinary uh manual testing but if it's gonna not uh if doing this is not going to just be a one-off manual testing thing but if it's gonna happen like every week uh it's gonna all this manual testing time is going to add up and i would strongly suggest negotiating with your manager to give you more time uh like just give you two weeks to sit down and automate this thing so that you can save more time in the future so you should have to try to convince your your management to invest in time to allocate you time to sit down and do the automation rather than forcing you to stick to a schedule yeah so yeah that's the that's where we end now and thanks a lot Ray i just truly could relate with your slides uh from how to start to actually want to start with and that's something amazing like love love your talk and and i'm sure um i have personal questions with you maybe i should also go to the vip section now so for all uh she will be available in the vip section you can uh search her name and hit enter and we will be all be meeting with her again and this stage will be occupied for the next speaker now so and also um this talk was uh uh brought to us by gage so we would like to thank them to sponsoring us and um you can also go to the launch section and meet other people talk to them and learn more from them so thanks a lot for all joining in and and before going do not uh hit the polls uh give the polls uh to us so that we can uh improve upon our sessions yeah thank you hey thank you puja thank you everyone