MARK, GOSPEL OF
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MARK, GOSPEL OF
cem (licitur ut sacerdotio reprobus haboretiir;" as if, by his desertion of the apostles (Acts xiii, 13), he had be- come tiguratively a " poUice trunciis" — a poltroon.
II. /Source of this Gospel. — Tlie tradition of the early Church asserts that Mark wrote his Gospel under the' special iuHuence and direction of the apostle Peter. The words of John the presbyter, as quoted by Papias (Eu- sebius, //. A', iii, 39), are explicit on this point: " This, then, was the statement of the elder : Mark, having be- come Peter's interpreter (ipfiiji'evrfic), wrote accurately all that he remembered {ifivrifxovevfft); but he did not record the words and deeds of Christ in order (oy fjiiv rot rd^fi Tu inro rou Xpiarov )j Xtx^ivra J) Trpa^^iv- Tci), for he was neither a hearer nor a follower of our Lord, but afterwards, as I said, became a follower of Pe- ter, who used to adapt his instruction to meet the re- quirements of his hearers, but not as making a connected arrangement of our Lord's discourses {aW ovx wffTrsp (Tvi'ra^iv T(jjv KvpiaKMV Troiovfievog Xuyojv); so Mark committed no error in writing down particulars as he remembered them {tvia ypa\l/ag wg cnrefwijuovevatv), for he made one thing his object — to omit nothing of what he heard, and to make no erroneous statement in them." The value of this statement, from its almost apostolic date, is great, though too much stress has been laid upon some of its expressions by Schleiermacher and others, to discredit the genuineness of the existing Gospel of Jlark. In addition to I'eter's teaching hav- ing been the basis of the Gospel, we learn from it three facts of the greatest importance for the right compre- hension of the origin of the Gospels : " The historic char- acter of the oral Gospel, the special purpose with which it was framed, and the fragmentariness of its contents" (Westcott, Introd. p. 18G). The testimony of later writ- ers is equally definite, though probably to a certain ex- tent derived from that of Papias. Justin quotes from the present Gospel under the title ra c'nrof^ivmtovtvj.iaTa Utrpov. Irenreus (//. E. iii, 1) asserts that Mark "de- livered in writing the things preached by Peter;" and Origen {ibid, vi, 25) that he " composed it as Peter di- rected him" (wf nirpog v(pi)yr\aaro avriii Troiqaavra). Clement of Alexandria enters more into detail, and, ac- cording to Eusebius's report of his words (//. E. vi, 14 ; ii, 15), contradicts himself. He ascribes the origin of the Gospel to the importunity of Peter's hearers in Rome, who were anxious to retain a lasting record of his preach- ing from the pen of his ipfxr]vEVTrjg, which, when com- pleted, the apostle viewed with approbation, sanctioning it with his authority, and commanding that it should be read in the churches; while elsewhere we have the inconsistent statement that when Peter kne^v what had been done '• he neither forbade nor encoiu-aged it." Ter- tullian's testimony is to the same effect: "Marcus quod edidit evangelium Petri affirmatur" {A dv. Marc, vi, 5) ; as is that of Eusebius (//. E. iii, 5) and Jerome {De Vir. ill. c. 8; ad Iledib. c. 2), who in the last passage writes, "Cujus (Marci) evangelium Petro narrante et illo scri- bente compositum est." Epiphanius says that, imme- diately after jNIatthew, the task of writing a Gospel was laid on Mark, " the follower of Peter at Rome" {Hcer. li).
Such, so early and so uniform, is the tradition which connects, in the closest manner, jMark's Gospel with the apostle Peter. To estimate its value we must inquire how far it is consistent with facts ; and here it must be candidly acknowledged that the Gospel itself supplies very little to an unbiassed reader to confirm the tradi- tion. The narrative keeps more completely to the com- mon cycle of the Synoptic record, and even to its lan- guage, than is consistent with the individual recollec- tions of one of the chief actors in the history ; while the differences of detail, though most real and important, are of too minute and refined a character to allow us to entertain the belief that Peter was in any way directly engaged in its composition. Any record derived im- mediately from Peter could hardly fail to have given us far more original matter than the slender additions made
by !Mark to the common stock of the Synoptical Gospels. It is certainly true that there are a few unimportant passages where Peter is specially mentioned by Mark, and is omitted by one or both of the others (i, 36 ; v, 37; xi, 20 ; xiii, 3 ; xvi, 7) ; but, on the other hand, there are still more numerous and more prominent instances which would almost show that Mark was less intimately acquainted with Peter's life than they. He omits his name when given by Matthew (xv, 15 ; comp. Mark vii, 17) ; passes over his walking on the sea (Matt, xiv, 28- 31 ; comp. Mark vi, 50-51), and the miracle of the trib- ute-money (Matt, xvii, 24-27; comp. Mark ix. 33), as well as the blessing pronounced on him by our Lord, and his designation as the rock on which the Church should be built (Matt, xvi, 17-19 ; comp. Mark viii, 29, 30). Although Peter was one of the two disciples sent to make ready the Passover (Luke xxii, 8), his name is not given by Mark (xiv, 13). We do not find in jNIark the remarkable words, " I have prayed for thee," etc. (Luke xxii, 31, 32). The notice of his repentance also, tTrifiaXiov (KXaie (xiv, 72), is tame when contrasted with the tS,tX^wp t^w tKXavcriv niKpHig of Matthew and Luke. Advocates are never at a loss for plausible rea- sons to support their preconceived views, and it has been the habit from very early times (Eusebius, Chry- sostom) to attribute these omissions to the modesty of Peter, who was unwilling to record that which might specially tend to his own honor — an explanation unsat- isfactory in itself, and which cannot be applied with any consistency. Indeed, we can hardly have a more strik- ing proof of the readiness with which men see what they wish to see, and make the most stubborn facts bend to their own foregone conclusions, than that a Gospel, in which no unbiassed reader would have dis- covered any special connection with Peter, should have yielded so many fancied proofs of Petrine origin.