2

who appeals to an oral tradition of an individual belonging to the apostolic age, the presbyter John, reports, that the Gospel of Mark' was composed by the same person who accompanied Peter as an interpreter, for the purpose of preserving in writing what he had heard Peter narrate in his public addresses, and what had been impressed on his own memory. Now, it is evident that this account (whether it relates to that Gospel of Mark which is still extant, or to a lost original document of the evangelical history, which served for its basis) cannot be true in its full extent; for how can we suppose, that Mark the nephew of Barnabas, who at all events must have come when young to Jerusalem, and lived there in company with the apostles, could have first planned his evangelical narrative according to what he heard at a much later period, incidentally from the preaching of Peter? This account therefore is suspicious; but may it not be so far true, that Mark accompanied the apostle Peter to Rome, and acted there as his interpreter, for those persons who were familiar only with the Latin language? Yet after all, it is difficult to explain how such could have existed so early, unless there had been a tradition that Peter had left the scene of his labours in the Parthian empire at a later period, and visited Rome, especially since what Papias says rests on the report of a man in the apostolic age. As Silvanus, the early companion of Paul, joined Peter in the Parthian empire, so Mark might likewise remove thither from Lesser Asia, Coloss. iv. 10, and travel with him to Rome, although he was not the Mark whom Peter mentions in his first epistle. There is an ancient tradition preserved for us by Clemens of Alexandria, that when Peter saw his wife led to martyrdom, he called out to her, mentioning her name, "0

3

1 Although the marks attributed by Papias to the Gospel of Mark, do not agree with the form in which it has come down to us, it does not follow that Papias referred to another document; for in such a description of the qualities of a book lying before him, much depends on the subjective judgment, and we certainly cannot give Papias credit for the talent of acute and accurate observation.

2 See above, p. 95.

3 Φασί γ ̓ οὖν τὸν μακάριον Πέτρον θεασάμενον τὴν αὐτοῦ γυναῖκα ἀγομένην τὴν ἐπὶ θάνατον, ἡσθῆναι μὲν τῆς κλήσεως χάριν [καὶ τῆς εἰς οἶκοι ἀνακομιδῆς]· ἐπιφωνῆσαι δὲ εὖ μάλα προστρεπτικῶς τε καὶ παρακλητικῶς ἐξ ὀνόματος προσείπονται μεμνήσθω αὐτῇ τοῦ κυρίου. Clem. Αlex. Strom. vii. [vol. iii. p. 253, ed. Klotz. Lipsiæ, 1832.] The words I have enclosed in brackets

remember the Lord!" We have no reason for casting a doubt on the truth of such a simple tradition. But that characteristic traits of this kind were in circulation, agrees best with the supposition that his last years were not spent in the Parthian empire, between which and the Roman there was little intercourse. In the existing circumstances of the Parthian empire in reference to the mixture of native and foreign religions, it would be difficult to account for the martyrdom of a Christian woman. Hence, we are led to

refer it most naturally to the effects of the Neronian persecution at Rome.

are difficult, whether we understand by them that his wife, before she was led to death, came home once more, and then was thus addressed by Peter, or, more naturally, that she would be restored to him again, being redeemed from death. Yet, in the connexion there are great difficulties in either interpretation, and we must rather understand the words of a return to her heavenly home, if the reading be correct, and we ought not (which yet I do not venture to maintain) to read olкov οὐράνιον.

BOOK V.

THE APOSTLE JOHN AND HIS MINISTRY AS THE CLOSING POINT OF THE APOSTOLIC AGE.

THE ministry of the apostle John reaches to the limits of the apostolic age. He was the son of Zebedee, a fisherman (probably wealthy),' in the small town of Bethsaida 'or Capernaum, on the western side of the Sea of Gennesareth in Galilee. Many eminent men in all ages who have been great blessings to the church, have been indebted to their pious mothers for the first excitement of their dispositions to piety and the first scattering of the seeds of religion in their hearts, and this appears to have been the case with John. The

1 As we may conclude from Mark i. 20.

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2

* Compare Mark xv. 40, xvi. 1, and Matt. xxvii. 56. If an opinion, advocated with great acuteness and learning by Wieseler in the Studien und Kritiken, 1840, iii. p. 648, could be established, it would show that Salome and John were closely connected with Christ by the bonds of relationship. According to this view, not three women (as has hitherto been supposed), but four, are named in John xix. 25; the Mary the wife of Cleopas must be identified with the sister of the mother of Jesus, but is quite a different person. Hence it follows, that we have to search for the name of the remaining sister of the mother of Jesus. Now, since in Matt. xxvii. 56, Mark xv. 40, besides Mary of Magdala, and Mary the mother of James and Joses the wife of Cleopas, Salome also, or the mother of the sons of Zebedee, is named as present at the crucifixion, it would appear that the sister of Mary the mother of Jesus, whose name is not given by John, can be no other than Salome, his own mother. Thus the difficulty of the same name belonging to both sisters is entirely obviated. It would also follow that, in fact, James the son of Alpheus, or Cleopas, was not the sister's son of Mary the mother of Jesus, (consequently, not his cousin ;) and this would furnish fresh proof for our supposition, that James the brother of the Lord was not identical with the apostle. But the manner in which (John xix. 25) Mary the wife of Cleopas is mentioned without any connective particle, appears to me to imply that these words are only in apposition to distinguish the (otherwise) unnamed sister of the mother of Jesus. If the sister of the mother of Jesus, according to one of her names, was then a universally known person in the circle in which John wrote his gospel, I could then more easily conceive, that, by that collocation of the words,

In his

manner in which his mother Salome united herself to the company which was formed round the Saviour leads us to attribute to her the predominance of a pious disposition, and from the petition which she made to the Redeemer, we may conclude, that her mind was filled with the expectation of the approaching manifestation of the Messiah's kingdom, an expectation which had been so vividly excited in the devout part of the Jewish nation, by the predictions of the prophets and the exigencies of the age: we may therefore imagine how strenuously she endeavoured to inflame her son's heart with the same earnest desire. The direction thus given to the mind of the youth impelled him to join John the Baptist, by whose guidance he was first led to the Saviour; John i. 37. company he spent several hours,' but Christ wished not to bind him to himself at once. He allowed him to return for the present to his usual occupation. He drew him, like Peter, gradually into closer communion with himself, and his operations on his mind were intended to call forth an anxiety for a such an ambiguity might be occasioned; but I do not believe that such a supposition is justifiable and was it not to be expected from John. that though he had not mentioned the sister of the inother of Jesus by name, he yet would have pointed her out more definitely as the mother of the disciple whom Jesus loved? Also, it does not seem probable to me, since the relationship of John to Jesus would be so important for explaining the early and peculiar connexion in which he entered with Christ, that no trace of it should make its appearance in the narrative of our gospels, where there was so often an opportunity of mentioning it. The origin of later accounts of such a relationship between the apostle John and Christ, may be easily explained without the supposition of an historical foundation.

:

1 In order to know the length of time spent by John in this first interview with the Redeemer, we must determine the mode of computing the hours adopted in John's Gospel. According to the commonly received mode of reckoning, it could not have been more than three hours; and then it is remarkable that John should say, "they abode with him that day," of which only so few hours were left. On the contrary, if, like some of the older writers, (see Wolfii Cura on John xix. 14.) and more recently Retteg (in the Studien und Kritiken, 1830, part i. p. 106), we suppose that John adopted the Roman mode of counting the hours from midnight, the length of time would be from ten in the morning to sunset. Yet the words of John, as a more negligent mode of expression, may be understood according to the common interpretation; and the passage in John iv. 6, favours our thinking that he reckoned time in the. usual manner. And, in itself, it is more probable that the first impression which the Redeemer made on John's mind resulted only from a short interview.

more intimate connexion. And when he had for some time been wishful after an abiding nearness to Him who had wrought with such power on his inmost soul, when the call at last was issued, Matt. iv. 22, he was ready at once to forsake all and follow Him. What distinguished John was the union of the most opposite qualities, as we have often observed in great instruments for the advancement of the kingdom of God,the union of a disposition inclined to silent and deep meditation, with an ardent zeal, though not impelling to great and diversified activity in the outward world; not a passionate zeal, such as we may suppose filled the breast of Paul before his conversion. But there was also a love, not soft and yielding, but one seizing with all its might, and firmly retaining the object to which it was directed, vigorously repelling whatever would disgrace this object, or attempt to wrest it from its possession, and this was his leading characteristic. Yet this love had a selfish and intemperate tincture, of which we have several instances, as when he wished to call down divine judgments on the Samaritans, who had not shown due honour to the Saviour; and when he expressed his displeasure that some persons who had not united themselves to the disciples of the Lord, had performed similar miracles to their own by calling on his name; and when his mother, in concert with her two sons, presented a petition to Christ for stations of eminence in his kingdom. Probably the title "Son of Thunder," which the Redeemer bestowed upon him, related not less to his natural temperament than to what he became by its purification and transformation in the service of the gospel. But this ardent love with which he devoted himself wholly to the service of the Redeemer, became now the purifying principle of his whole being, while he sought to form himself on the model of that holy personality. And hence he could receive the image of it on the side which corresponded with his peculiarly contemplative mental tendency, and reproduce it in a living form.

John was certainly distinguished from James the brother of the Lord, in this respect, that from the first his communion with Christ was independently developed on the peculiar basis of Christian consciousness; the fountain of divine life which had appeared among mankind, became at once the central point of his spiritual existence : yet he did wholly agree with