Who wrote the Gospels?

[Deadworm]

20 hours ago, PaulS said:

1. THE GOSPEL OF MARK: THE MEMOIR'S OF HIS DAD'S EYWITNESS TESTIMONY
I was originally planning to respond to Paul by drawing attention to the multiple independent lines of evidence for Mark as Peter's memoirs (1 Peter 5:13; Papias, and Justin of Rome).  There is good reason to embrace the tradition that Mark contains Peter's memoirs. But last night, as I was rethinking these issues a more wild and more fun theory just popped into my mind.  I realized that there are good grounds for taking this one step further and claiming that this Gospel represents the memoirs of Mark's Dad! Here is the 7-step reasoning process by which I reached that conclusion:

(1) Mark's account of the healing of Peter's mother-in-law implies that Peter was married (1:29-31).

(2) Paul reports that Peter's wife traveled with him on his missionary tours (1 Corinthians 9:5).
So Clement of Alexandria's tradition that Peter had children and that Peter's wife accompanied him to Rome, where both were martyred, are probably both true (Clement's Stromateis as quoted in Eusebius, HE 3:30).

(3) Writing from Rome [= "Babylon"], Peter identifies Mark as "my son (1 Peter 5:13)." In view of (1)-(3) above, it seems likely that Peter means that literally and that "my son" is not just a term of endearment for his travel companion Mark.

(4) Papias (c. 60-130 AD) reports that Jesus' disciple, John the Elder, is currently testifying to his knowledge that Mark was Peter's interpreter at Rome and recorded Peter's memoirs of Jesus in his Gospel.  Eusebius implies that in the many unquoted texts on the testimonies of Aristion and John the Elder, Papais makes it clear that he heard them both in person:
"Papias...says that he had actually heard Aristion and John the Elder. He often quotes them by name and gives their tradition in his writings Eusebius, HE 3:39)."

(5) Justin Martyr (c. 100-165 AD) lives in Rome and confirms the Roman tradition that Mark's Gospel in fact represents Peter's memoirs.

(6) The many Latinism in Mark lend added credence to the Gospel of Mark's origin in Rome.

(7) So Mark's Gospel likely preserves his Dad Peter's eyewitness testimony to Jesus' life and teaching.

 

Now suppose the scholarly consensus is true that Peter's "son" Mark is in fact the John Mark of Acts 12:12.  If I'm right, that would mean that this Mary is Peter's wife and that,, as one might expect,  Peter was just returning home to his family after his prison escape.  I will examine this other wild hypothesis in my next planned post.

 

 

 

[Deadworm]

So I theorize that Mark really was Peter's son and that Mark's Gospel is a son's record of his Dad's memoirs of Jesus' life.  This theory gets more complicated and thus more interesting when we ask the question, "Is Peter's Mark the same as John Mark in the Book of Acts?"  Luke can alternately name John Mark as just Mark (Acts 15:39) and the

In Luke's story of Paul's prison escape, he chooses to go the house of "Mary the mother of John, whose other name was Mark (Acts 12:12)."  why didn't he instead go to the house of the leader of the Jerusalem church, Jesus' brother James (12:17)?  Well, Peter was married, and so, it seems natural that his first impulse would be to go home and notify his family that he was OK and now free, but had to get out of Dodge.  If he did so, that would make Mary Peter's wife and Mark his son--which would corroborate Peter's reference to "my son Mark" in 1 Peter 5:13.

Why is this house referred to as Mary's house in a patriarchal society where we would expect her husband to be named?  Either Mary is divorced or widowed or she is Peter's wife.  But why doesn't Luke just say so?  Well, in Luke and the other Gospels, women are often identified by their sons (e. g. Mary the mother of..,) and Luke may want to prepare us for the missionary career of John Mark which he is about to mention in 12:25.  One might equally ask, "Who doesn't Luke ever tell us that James is Jesus' brother?"  Mary's status as Peter's wife may well have simply dropped out of the tradition available to Luke.  The John Mark who serves as Paul's missionary companion in Acts is named just Mark in Colossians 4:10, 2 Timothy 4:11, and Philemon 24.