Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

MARK, JOHN

(Gk. Iōánnēs Márkos)

An early Jewish Christian who, in canonical literature, is identified explicitly as a companion of Barnabas and Paul, implicitly as a companion of Peter, and who, in later tradition, came to be regarded as the author of the Gospel of Mark. The NT provides few facts about John Mark, called by both his Jewish (Gk. Iōánnēs, from Heb. yôḥānān) and Roman (Gk. Márkos, from Lat. Marcus) names only in Acts (12:12, 25; 15:37).

John Mark was the son of Mary, at whose house in Jerusalem Christians gathered for prayer, and to whose house Peter came after his rescue from prison (Acts 12:12). After Barnabas and Paul elected to have John Mark accompany them on their journey, for some unexplained reason he parted from their company in Cyprus and returned to Jerusalem (Acts 13:13). Paul refused to take John Mark on the next journey, even though Barnabas wanted him to come (Acts 15:37), and this resulted in a parting of the ways: Barnabas and John Mark went to Cyprus, while Paul and Silas traveled to points in Asia Minor (vv. 39-41).

Paul himself does not speak of those events, but in two letters attributed to him and supposedly written from Rome Paul refers to “Mark the cousin of Barnabas” (Col. 4:10) and a “Mark” as being one of his fellow workers (Phlm. 24). That these references are to the same person, John Mark, is not implausible — evidence enough for some scholars to conclude that John Mark and Paul reconciled their differences prior to Paul’s imprisonment in Rome.

A Mark is mentioned in two other NT epistles, but because both letters are regarded as pseudepigraphs by many scholars, it is less than certain that these are trustworthy references to John Mark. 2 Tim. 4:11 builds upon the more reliable tradition that John Mark was a companion of Paul, while 1 Pet. 5:13 reflects the later tradition that a Mark was a companion of Peter, his “son” in the spiritual sense, in Rome (“Babylon”). Although it cannot be established that the latter is a specific reference to John Mark — who, it can be inferred from Acts 12, , knew Peter — early church tradition clearly assumes that all the NT passages name the same figure.

According to Eusebius (HE 3.39.15), Papias repeated the tradition that Mark served as Peter’s “interpreter” in Rome and that he recorded the Apostle’s recollections of the Lord’s words and deeds. However, this is not adequate proof that John Mark wrote the Gospel of Mark. Other church traditions claim that Mark was the first to evangelize Egypt and the founder of Alexandrian Christianity. Later legends depict Mark’s martyrdom and reburial in Venice. That John Mark is the “young man” of Mark 14:51, and that both the Last Supper and the events of Pentecost occurred in his mother’s home, are pure conjectures.

Bibliography. B. T. Holmes, “Luke’s Description of John Mark,” JBL 54 (1935): 63-72; V. Taylor, The Gospel According to St. Mark, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, 1981), 26-31.

Jeffrey T. Tucker

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

MARK, JOHN

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)