Mark's Gospel was the first of the New Testament gospels. It was written anonymously in Greek Koine and only attributed to the apostle whose name it now bears later in the second century. While we do not know exactly how Mark was developed, there is some information available that could provide some insight to help us understand what might have occurred.
Mark is written in a poor grammatical style, as if by someone of a low level of literacy, yet it involves an amazingly complex and sophisticated structure that proves it really to have been written by someone of considerable talent. It has been suggested that the use of poor grammar might have been a device to make the gospel more appealing to poor gentiles, if they were the intended audience. Alternatively, this might have been designed to hide the true identity of the author, or for literary reasons.
Dennis R. MacDonald (
The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark) has identified many parallels between Mark's Gospels and the
Iliad and
Oddysey of Homer. He believes that these parallels prove that much of the content of
Mark was actually inspired by Homer's epics. There are also some parallels to Paul's Epistles to the Galatians and Corinthians, written at least ten years before
Mark, making it possible that this author was able to establish some key names and events that would harmonise his gospel with Paul's epistles. Of course,
Mark could be based on real events in the life of Jesus, but this can not be confirmed by the other New Testament gospels, since it is now known that they were based largely on Mark's Gospel.
From an examination of the text, scholars say that
Mark was written approximately 70 CE, just as the First Roman-Jewish War was ending, with the destruction of the Temple and much of Jerusalem. The coincidence that
Mark was written just at this time, rather than in earlier or later years, suggests that the destruction of Jerusalem was a reason for writing the Gospel. It could be that the author really did believe that this terrible war presaged the end of the world, as described in chapter 13, where Jesus described his second coming, on clouds of glory, within the lifetimes of some of those to whom he was speaking. Or it could be that in the dangerous times that followed this upheaval, the Christians needed something to prove that their faith was no threat to the Romans.
There are many potential reasons for Mark to write a book apparently inspired by Homers's epics and Paul's epistles. He could simply have been writing a novel to impress his friends; he could have written a 'secret' gospel to hide from Roman eyes what his early Christian sect really believed; or no matter how improbable they are, these parallels might have simply been coincidences. Which leaves the chiasitic structure of Mark's Gospel. No real historical sequence of events could ever follow such a neat, almost mathematical pattern. The historicity of the Gospel must remain a mystery.
Mark wrote his Gospel by most likely relying partially on information from Peter, of whom he was an associate. He may also have personally known Jesus. Christians believe this and other scripture was also written with the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.