IV. Church Extension from Antioch and Apostolic Decree at Jerusalem (12:25–15:35)

A. Barnabas and Saul (12:25–13:3)

1. The Envoys from Antioch Return (12:25)

25Barnabas and Saul42 returned, having fulfilled their ministry at Jerusalem,43 they took along with them John, surnamed Mark.44

25 Barnabas and Saul’s famine-relief visit from Antioch to Jerusalem was related in 11:30 by way of completing the account of Agabus’s prophecy and the Antiochene Christians’ response to it. The response took the form of weekly contributions, and some time elapsed before the collection was complete and the need arose in Judaea. By the time Barnabas and Saul went to Jerusalem, Agrippa was dead. Their return, though not their setting out, is related in chronological order.

Both the textual variations and the syntax of this sentence have prompted many questions, to which diverse answers have been proposed.45 But, as it stands in Luke’s narrative, the sentence provides the transition from 11:30, where Barnabas and Saul go to Jerusalem, to 13:1, where they are in Antioch again. As for the reference to Mark, it provides the transition from 12:12, where Mark is by implication in Jerusalem, to 13:5b, where he accompanies Barnabas and Saul as they set out from Antioch to Cyprus. If (as is most probable) this is the Mark mentioned in Col. 4:10, the latter passage informs us that he was Barnabas’s cousin.