This is the first appearance of the νεανίσκος τις, “certain young man,” in Mark’s Gospel. However, in so-called Secret Mark, two passages of which are preserved in a letter written by Clement of Alexandria (ca. 180 c.e.), Jesus first meets the young man in . If Clement’s testimony is accepted, this youth, raised up by Jesus in a manner that reminds us of , came to Jesus by night to be taught the secret of the kingdom of God (cf. ). That it is the same young man seems clear enough: ἔρχεται ὁ νεανίσκος πρὸς αὐτὸν· περιβεβλημένος σινδόνα ἐπὶ γυμνοῦ, “the young man comes to him, with a linen sheet wrapped around [his] naked [body]” (Clement, Letter to Theodore, folio 2, recto, lines 7–8; for Greek text, see M. Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 450, 452).
