A number of scholars argue that the story in Secret Mark is based on the Gospel of John. Other scholars argue that the authors of Secret Mark and the Gospel of John independently used a common source or built on a common tradition. The fact that Secret Mark refers to another Bethany than the one in the Gospel of John as the place for the miracle and omits the names of the protagonists, and since there are no traces in Secret Mark of the rather extensive Johannine redaction, or of other Johannine characteristics, including its language, militate against Secret Mark being based on the Gospel of John. Michael Kok thinks that this also militates against the thesis that the Gospel of John depends on Secret Mark and that it indicates that they both are based either on "oral variants of the same underlying tradition", or on older written collections of miracle stories. Koester thinks Secret Mark represents an earlier stage of development of the story. Morton Smith tried to demonstrate that the resurrection story in Secret Mark does not contain any of the secondary traits found in the parallel story in John 11 and that the story in John 11 is more theologically developed. He concluded that the Secret Mark version of the story contains an older, independent, and more reliable witness to the oral tradition.