Serra., ii. 197), and when he reappears in the sacred volume it is pleasing to find him by the side of the apostle whose good opinion he had once seemed to have entirely lost—acknowledged by him as one of his few fellow-labourers unto the kingdom of God' who had been a comfort' to him in his weary imprisonment (Col. iv. to, I I ; Philem. 24). At that time Mark appears to have had in contemplation a journey into Asia Minor, and perhaps in consequence of his character having suffered from his previous desertion of the apostle, St. Paul thought it desirable to prepare the Colos sians to give him a friendly reception. We have a still further proof of the high esteem in which he was held by St. Paul towards the close of his life, in the request to Timothy, that on his approaching visit to Rome he would bring Mark with him, in asmuch as he was profitable' to him for the ministry,' which the aged apostle foresaw he was so soon to lay down (2 Tim. iv. sr). As St. Mark was at this time in Timothy's neighbourhood, we may infer that the projected journey to Asia Minor took place, and since we find him with St. Peter (I Pet. v. 13) in Babylon (which must certainly be taken in its plain sense, and not allegorised as sig nifying Rome—the subscription to a letter being the last place in which one would look for a mys tical meaning), it would appear probable that he rejoined his beloved father in the faith, and aided him in his labours among his own countrymen in that city, which at that time, and for some hundred years afterwards, was one of the chief seats of Jewish culture.
From this point we have nothing to guide us but the vague and often inconsistent indications of tra dition. On the intimate relation in which Mark and his gospel stood to St. Peter, however, all early writers, from Papias downward, are so unani mous, that if tradition is to be accepted at all it is hardly possible to gainsay it. (Papias apud Euseb. H. E., iii. 39 ; Irenx.us, ibid., v. S ; Clemens Alex., ibid., ii. 15 ; vi. 14 ; Euseb. Demonst. Evang. iii. 5 ; Tert. cont. Marc. iv. 5 ; Jerome ad Hedib. xi.) What is the exact signification of the word epanvetcrajr, the office which Mark is said to have filled to St. Peter, has been much controverted. Eichhorn, Bertholdt, Kuinoel, etc., took it in its modern sense, as though St. Mark had, as with modern missionaries, translated into Greek the original Aramaic discourses of his master. But it is far more probable that, in the words of Tholuck, he was the assistant of Peter, and either orally or in writing communicated and developed what Peter taught' (Valesius, Lange, Fritzsche, Meyer, Alford, etc.)
The tradition that St. Mark was the companion of St. Peter at Rome does not appear in Papias, but is of considerable antiquity. It may be traced up to Clemens Alex. (apuci. Euseb. ii. 15, vi. 14), who states that he received it from the presbyters of old time, raw civelcaeep grpecrOurepcev, after which time it becomes general. It is not, however, free from suspicion, as it is expressly connected with the erroneous identification of Rome with Babylon (Jerome de Vir. illust., c. S ; Euseb. II. E. ii. 15). According to Eusebius (H. E. ii. 16), after Peter's death Mark visited Egypt, and published the gospel he had written, and founded the church of Alexandria, in which city, according to a singular tradition of late date, he met with and excited the admiration of Philo, and where, according to Je rome (u. s.), he died in the eighth year of Nero. The late and credulous Nicephorus, and Simeon Metaphrastes, state that he suffered martyrdom. According to the legend his remains were obtained from Alexandria by the Venetians through a pious stratagem, and conveyed to their city, 827 A. D. Venice was thenceforward solemnly placed under his protection, and the lion, which medieval theo logy had selected from the apocalyptic beasts as his emblem, became the standard of the republic. The place of the deposition of his body having been lost, a miracle was subsequently wrought for its dis covery, A. D. 1094, which figures in many famous works of art. Where his remains now lie is, ac cording to the Roman Catholic Eustace, 'acknow ledged to be an undivulged secret ; or, perhaps, in less cautious language, to be utterly unknown.' In the above remarks we have identified the evangelist with the John Mark' of the Acts and the Mark' of the Epistles. It has, however, been maintained by Grotius, Calovius, Du Pin, Tillemont, Schleiermacher, Credner, Da Costa, and others, that they were two distinct persons. Kienlin has even ascribed the gospel to the Pauline and not the Petrine Mark, while Hitzig has been led by the identity of the name to propound the idea that John Mark was the author of the Apocalypse. But in the pithy words of Lightfoot, to suppose two Marks, one with Peter and another with Paul, is to breed confusion where there needeth none. It is easily seen how John Mark came into familiarity with Paul and Peter, and other Mark we can find none in the N. T. unless of our own invention' (Harm. of N. T., vol. i. p. 336).—E. V.