I. The Man
In
Acts xii. 12, 25,
a John Mark is named as one of the Christians of Jerusalem, at
whose mother's house the meetings of the community were held, who was also a companion of
Barnabas
and Paul on their missionary journey to
Antioch and Cyprus
(Acts xiii. 5)
but left them when they reached Asia Minor. Because of this
defection, Paul refused to take him along on the
second missionary journey, and this caused a separation between Barnabas and Paul, Barnabas and
Mark going together and Paul and Silas becoming
companions. A Mark is mentioned by Paul several
times in his epistles
(Col. iv. 10,
" Mark, the cousin of Barnabas ";
II Tim. iv. 11;
Philemon 24),
always in favorable terms. In
I Pet. v. 13
is mentioned one of the name as "Mark my son." These
notices do not suffice to prove the existence of two
men of the name (Schleiermacher and Kielen in
TSK, 1843), but the historicity of at
least one Mark is apparent. He was a Jew
(Col. iv. 11),
and, like the Jesus Justus of that passage and other Jews of
the period, took a Roman name in addition to his
Jewish name.
Acts xii. 12
suggests that his father was already dead in the early years of Christianity.
Mark appears to have been younger than Paul and
Peter, but still old enough to have been an adult
at the time of the
crucifixion. Tradition identifies
him with the man described in
Mark xiv. 13
as
"bearing a pitcher of water" and with the young
man of verses 51-52, and also makes him one of the
seventy disciples; it does not follow from
I Pet. v. 13
that he was converted and baptized by Peter.
His missionary activity is abundantly recognized by
Paul, and the last historical datum is that of his
presence in Rome about 63 A.D. Legend makes him the
founder of the Church in Egypt and bishop of
Alexandria (Eusebius, Hist. eccl., IV.,
xv.). The predicate "stump-fingered" applied to him in Hippolytus,
Hær., VII., xxx., is possibly a misunderstanding arising from the fact that the Gospel
ascribed to him is without such introduction and
conclusion as the other Gospels have.
