3. Outwardness: As a good narrator, Mark describes

the outward course of the action, which the reader must interpret for himself. In 1:40, the leper is seen falling to his knees.

One must fear that he will fall out of weakness or clumsiness and infect Jesus, who is standing directly in front of him, with germs of disease.

It is only from the context that the reader learns that the leper kneels in homage to Jesus as if he were a ruler.

Matthew uses the technical term proskynesis for kneeling before the ruler and thus deprives the reader of the tension that Mark so skillfully builds.