The church that is at Babylon, elected together with you, saluteth you; and so doth Marcus my son.
The ... at Babylon. Alford and Bengel, 'She that is elected together with you in Babylon;' namely, Peter's wife, whom he led about in his missionary journeys (cf. 1 Peter 3:7). But why she should be called 'elected together with you in Babylon,' as if there were no Christian woman in Babylon besides, is inexplicable. The sense is clear: 'that portion of the whole dispersion (1 Peter 1:1, Greek), the church of Christianized Jews, with Gentile converts, which resides in Babylon.' Since Peter and John were closely associated, Peter addresses the church in John's province, Asia, and closes with 'your co-elect sister church at Babylon saluteth you.' John similarly addresses the "elect lady" - i:e., the church in Babylon-and closes with 'the children of thine elect sister (the Asiatic church) greet thee' (cf. 'Introduction,' 2 John). 'Mark, who is in the place of a son to me' (cf. Acts 12:12 on Peter's connection with Mark); whence the mention of him with the church at Babylon, in which he laboured under Peter before he went to Alexandria, is natural.
Papias reports from the presbyter John (b. 3:, 39), that Mark was interpreter of Peter, recording in his gospel the facts related to him by Peter. Silvanus or Silas had been substituted for John Mark, as Paul's companion, because of Mark's temporary unfaithfulness (Acts 15:37-40). But now Mark restored is associated with Silvanus, Paul's companion, in Peter's esteem, as Mark was already reinstated in Paul's esteem. That Mark had a spiritual connection with the Asiatic churches which Peter addresses, and so naturally salutes them, appears from Colossians 4:10; 2 Timothy 4:11, "Babylon" - the Chaldean Babylon on the Euphrates. See 'Introduction,' ON THE PLACE OF WRITING, in proof that Rome is not meant. How unlikely that in a friendly salutation the enigmatical title of Rome given in prophecy (John, Revelation 17:5) should be need! Babylon was the center from which the Asiatic dispersion whom Peter addresses was derived.
Philo. 'Legat. ad Caium,' sec. 36, and Josephus, 'Antiquities,' 15:, 22; 23: 12, inform us that Babylon contained many Jews in the apostolic age, whereas those at Rome were comparatively few-about 8,000 (Josephus, 17:11) - so it would naturally be visited by the apostle of the circumcision. It was the headquarters of those whom he had so successfully addressed on Pentecost (Acts 2:9) - Jewish 'Parthians, dwellers in Mesopotamia' (the Parthians were then masters of Mesopotamian Babylon); these he ministered to in person. His other hearers-the Jewish 'dwellers in Cappadocia, Pontes, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia'-he now ministers to by letter. The earliest authority for Peter's martyrdom at Rome is Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, in the latter half of the second century. The desirableness of representing Peter and Paul, the two leading apostles, as together founding the church of the metropolis probably originated the tradition. Clement of Rome ('1 Epistola ad Corinthios,' secs. 4, 5), often quoted for, is really against it. He mentions Paul and Peter together, but makes it as a distinguishing circumstance of Paul that he reached both in the East and West, implying that Peter never was in the West. 2 Peter 1:14, "I must shortly put off this tabernacle," implies his martyrdom was near; yet he makes no allusion to Rome, or to any intention of visiting it.