Matthew 10:10 and Luke 9:3 / 10:4 record Jesus telling the disciples to take no staff and no shoes (sandals). Mark 6:8-9 records the opposite — "save a staff only" and "be shod with sandals." The same scene, the same instruction, three Synoptic Gospels and two incompatible packing lists.
Proposed answers
People have answered this in several ways; GEBible presents them as equal peers.
He told them to go barefoot, without a staff.
Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purse, Nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, neither shoes, nor yet staves. Matthew 10:10
And he said unto them, Take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor scrip, neither bread, neither money; neither have two coats apiece. Luke 9:3
Carry neither purse, nor scrip, nor shoes. Luke 10:4
8He commanded them that they should take nothing for their journey, except a staff only: no bread, no wallet, no money in their purse,9but to wear sandals, and not put on two tunics.
What follows is one scholar’s way of reading this disagreement— a critical-historical view that often concludes the texts genuinely disagree. It draws on the peer-reviewed sources listed below and stands as one position among the answers above, presented for transparency, not as GEBible’s position.
How critical scholarship weighs this: Widely regarded as a genuine contradiction
This summarizes where critical scholarship tends to land on this tension — a report on the field’s center of gravity, not GEBible’s own ruling.
The packing instructions for the disciples' mission are the textbook Synoptic-problem contradiction, and they are among the clearest demonstrations that the evangelists edited their sources rather than transcribed them. Mark, the earliest Gospel, has Jesus permit two items: "that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only (ei mē rhabdon monon)... but be shod with sandals (alla hypodedemenous sandalia)" (Mark 6:8-9). Matthew prohibits both: in the list of things not to provide he includes "neither shoes, nor yet staves (mēde hypodēmata mēde rhabdon)" (Matt 10:10). Luke 9:3 likewise forbids a staff ("neither staves"), and Luke 10:4, in the sending of the seventy, adds "carry... no shoes." Mark equips the missionaries with a staff and sandals; Matthew and Luke strip both away.
The directionality is significant. On the two-source hypothesis, where Matthew and Luke independently agree against Mark, source critics look for a shared cause. Here that cause is most plausibly the Q mission discourse, which transmitted a stricter, more radical form of the charge reflecting the wandering-charismatic ideal of voluntary destitution current in the communities behind Q. Matthew and Luke conflated Mark's instruction with the Q version and produced the more rigorous prohibition.
The apologetic harmonization, catalogued in Geisler and Howe and in Archer, leans on a lexical distinction in the verbs. Mark uses airō ("to take up, carry along") of the staff, whereas Matthew's list is governed by ktaomai ("to acquire, procure") — the prohibition opens at Matthew 10:9 with mē ktēsēsthe ("do not acquire"), and the staff, sandals, and the rest in 10:10 hang off that verb as its objects. So, the argument runs, Mark permits carrying a staff one already owns while Matthew forbids procuring a new one. Give the harmonizer his due, and give him the whole list: under the ktaomai reading the ban covers the sandals exactly as it covers the staff, since hypodēmata in 10:10 is just another thing not to procure. The move is internally consistent for Matthew on its own terms — it does not split apart on the sandals the way one might assume. The strongest form of the harmonization rescues Matthew across the board.
The trouble is that it cannot touch Luke or Mark, and that is where the contradiction actually lives. Luke 9:3 does not use ktaomai at all — it uses airete (present imperative of airō, "take"), the same carry-it-along verb Mark uses, and still forbids the staff outright (mēte rhabdon). There is no "acquire versus carry" wiggle room in Luke; the disciples are told to take nothing, and Luke 10:4 adds "no shoes" to the seventy. And Mark is not describing a future acquisition either. Mark 6:9 has the disciples already shod as they leave — hypodedemenous sandalia, a perfect middle participle of hypodeō (hypodeomai) describing their settled state of being bound into their sandals at the moment of departure. Set Mark beside Luke and the verb-distinction evaporates: Mark sends them out wearing sandals and carrying a staff; Luke sends them out (airō) forbidden to take either. That is a flat contradiction in departure conditions, and no "having versus acquiring" distinction reaches it, because both Mark and Luke are talking about what the missionaries leave with, not what they procure on the road.
Critical scholarship (Davies and Allison; Marcus; Fitzmyer; Hagner; Luz) reads the divergence as redactional intensification. Mark's relatively practical provision — a staff for the road and sandals for the feet, but no money, bread, or spare tunic — is sharpened by Matthew and Luke into a more austere image of the missionary, stripped even of the traveler's basic gear and wholly dependent on his hosts. The radicalization fits the prophetic-charismatic self-understanding of the communities that preserved the Q form of the charge. The airō/ktaomai distinction may save Matthew on its own terms, but that internal rescue buys the harmonizer nothing, because the contradiction is between Gospels, not inside one.
Where the critical reading lands: genuine contradiction arising from redactional intensification of Mark via Q — locatable squarely in the Mark–Luke clash, which the verb-distinction cannot reach.
Sources for this reading
W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison Jr., A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to Saint Matthew, Vol. 2 (Matt 8-18) (ICC; T&T Clark, 1991) pp. 168-180on the mission charge and the staff/sandal variation
Joel Marcus, Mark 1-8: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (AB 27; Doubleday, 2000) pp. 388-391on hypodedemenous sandalia and Mark's provision
Joseph A. Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke I-IX (AB 28; Doubleday, 1981) pp. 751-755on Luke's mission charge and the Q form
Donald A. Hagner, Matthew 1-13 (WBC 33A; Word, 1993) pp. 269-273on Matthew's intensification of the charge
Ulrich Luz, Matthew 8-20: A Commentary (Hermeneia; Fortress, 2001) pp. 73-78on redactional radicalization of the mission discourse
Gleason L. Archer, Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties (Zondervan, 1982) pp. 327-328representative harmonization (airō vs ktaomai)
Norman L. Geisler and Thomas Howe, When Critics Ask: A Popular Handbook on Bible Difficulties (Victor, 1992) pp. 350-351representative harmonization
Examining the tension
What follows is one scholar’s way of reading this disagreement — a critical-historical view that often concludes the texts genuinely disagree. It draws on the peer-reviewed sources listed below and stands as one position among the answers above, presented for transparency, not as GEBible’s position.
How critical scholarship weighs this: Widely regarded as a genuine contradiction
This summarizes where critical scholarship tends to land on this tension — a report on the field’s center of gravity, not GEBible’s own ruling.
The packing instructions for the disciples' mission are the textbook Synoptic-problem contradiction, and they are among the clearest demonstrations that the evangelists edited their sources rather than transcribed them. Mark, the earliest Gospel, has Jesus permit two items: "that they should take nothing for their journey, save a staff only (ei mē rhabdon monon)... but be shod with sandals (alla hypodedemenous sandalia)" (Mark 6:8-9). Matthew prohibits both: in the list of things not to provide he includes "neither shoes, nor yet staves (mēde hypodēmata mēde rhabdon)" (Matt 10:10). Luke 9:3 likewise forbids a staff ("neither staves"), and Luke 10:4, in the sending of the seventy, adds "carry... no shoes." Mark equips the missionaries with a staff and sandals; Matthew and Luke strip both away.
The directionality is significant. On the two-source hypothesis, where Matthew and Luke independently agree against Mark, source critics look for a shared cause. Here that cause is most plausibly the Q mission discourse, which transmitted a stricter, more radical form of the charge reflecting the wandering-charismatic ideal of voluntary destitution current in the communities behind Q. Matthew and Luke conflated Mark's instruction with the Q version and produced the more rigorous prohibition.
The apologetic harmonization, catalogued in Geisler and Howe and in Archer, leans on a lexical distinction in the verbs. Mark uses airō ("to take up, carry along") of the staff, whereas Matthew's list is governed by ktaomai ("to acquire, procure") — the prohibition opens at Matthew 10:9 with mē ktēsēsthe ("do not acquire"), and the staff, sandals, and the rest in 10:10 hang off that verb as its objects. So, the argument runs, Mark permits carrying a staff one already owns while Matthew forbids procuring a new one. Give the harmonizer his due, and give him the whole list: under the ktaomai reading the ban covers the sandals exactly as it covers the staff, since hypodēmata in 10:10 is just another thing not to procure. The move is internally consistent for Matthew on its own terms — it does not split apart on the sandals the way one might assume. The strongest form of the harmonization rescues Matthew across the board.
The trouble is that it cannot touch Luke or Mark, and that is where the contradiction actually lives. Luke 9:3 does not use ktaomai at all — it uses airete (present imperative of airō, "take"), the same carry-it-along verb Mark uses, and still forbids the staff outright (mēte rhabdon). There is no "acquire versus carry" wiggle room in Luke; the disciples are told to take nothing, and Luke 10:4 adds "no shoes" to the seventy. And Mark is not describing a future acquisition either. Mark 6:9 has the disciples already shod as they leave — hypodedemenous sandalia, a perfect middle participle of hypodeō (hypodeomai) describing their settled state of being bound into their sandals at the moment of departure. Set Mark beside Luke and the verb-distinction evaporates: Mark sends them out wearing sandals and carrying a staff; Luke sends them out (airō) forbidden to take either. That is a flat contradiction in departure conditions, and no "having versus acquiring" distinction reaches it, because both Mark and Luke are talking about what the missionaries leave with, not what they procure on the road.
Critical scholarship (Davies and Allison; Marcus; Fitzmyer; Hagner; Luz) reads the divergence as redactional intensification. Mark's relatively practical provision — a staff for the road and sandals for the feet, but no money, bread, or spare tunic — is sharpened by Matthew and Luke into a more austere image of the missionary, stripped even of the traveler's basic gear and wholly dependent on his hosts. The radicalization fits the prophetic-charismatic self-understanding of the communities that preserved the Q form of the charge. The airō/ktaomai distinction may save Matthew on its own terms, but that internal rescue buys the harmonizer nothing, because the contradiction is between Gospels, not inside one.
Where the critical reading lands: genuine contradiction arising from redactional intensification of Mark via Q — locatable squarely in the Mark–Luke clash, which the verb-distinction cannot reach.
Sources for this reading