“But they understood not that saying, and were afraid to ask him.”
But they did not understand what he meant and were afraid to ask him about it — the disciples' double failure: they do not understand, and they are afraid to ask. The fear of asking communicates that they sense the answer will be unwelcome — that pressing for clarity about the passion prediction will force them to engage with a reality they are avoiding. The not understanding after the second passion prediction is more culpable than after the first: they have had time, they have had the first prediction, and still the incomprehension persists.
Church Fathers on Mark 9:32
It is after miracles that the Lord inserts a discourse concerning His Passion, lest it should be thought that He suffered because He could not help it.
He always mingles together sorrowful and joyful things, that sorrow should not by its suddenness frighten the Apostles, but be borne by them with prepared minds.
Capernaum means the city of consolation, and agrees with the former sentence, which He had spoken: 'And after that He is killed, He shall arise the third day.'
Read all 11 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain
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