Who wrote the Gospel of John?

Who wrote the Gospel of John? The Traditional Theory

John the Evangelist • Traditional Author of the Gospel of John: • =John, son of Zebedee • One of Jesus’ Twelve Disciples

Luke 6.12-16List of the 12 Disciples=Apostles • 12) Now during those days he went out to the mountain to pray; and he spent the night in prayer to God. 13) And when day came, he called his disciples and chose twelve of them, whom he also named apostles; 14) Simon, whom he named Peter, and his brother Andrew, and James, and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew, 15) and Matthew, and Thomas, and James son of Alphaeus, and Simon, who was called the Zealot, 16) and Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.

John is one of the • Four Evangelists: • Matthew

The Four Evangelists • Mark

The Four Evangelists • Luke

The Four Evangelists • John

Did you notice the Symbols Of the Four Evangelists In the Last Four Pictures?

Symbols of the Four Evangelists Matthew Mark John Luke

Symbols of the EvangelistsIvory Cover for a Manuscript of the Four Gospels (10th Century)The Metropolitan Museum, New York

One Artist’s Vision of the Four Evangelists,as Medieval Scribes

The Traditional View of the Identity of the Author of the Gospel of John:Sources: I Irenaeus of Lyon: Church Father who wrote Against All the Heresies (against the gnostics) around 180 CE • AH III 1.1 “Matthew also issued a written gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching in Rome, and laying the foundations of the church. After their departure, Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, also handed down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter. Luke also, the companion of Paul [see Col 4.14; Acts 16.11], recorded in a book the gospel preached by him. Afterwards, John, the disciple of the Lord, who also had leaned upon his breast, published a gospel during his residence at Ephesus in Asia.”

To What Chapter in The Gospel of John Does Irenaeus Refer?

The Beloved Disciple at The Last Supper John 13.21-22: “After saying this Jesus was troubled in spirit, and declared, ‘Very Truly, I tell you, one of you will betray me.’ The disciples looked at one another, uncertain of whom he was speaking. One of his disciples—the one whom Jesus loved—was reclining next to him…..He asked Jesus, ‘Lord who is it?’”

What Passage in the Gospel of John does this painting illustrate?

Note How Irenaeus identifies3 Figures as the same person: • John, the son of Zebedee • The Beloved Disciple of John 13 & 19 • The Fourth Evangelist=Author of Gospel of John

The Traditional View of the Authorship of Gospels:Another Source • Clement of Alexandria, Church Father who opposed the gnostics and interpreted the Bible in light of Greek Philosophy, writing around 200 CE (quoted in Eusebius, The History of the Church VI 14) • “And…Clement has inserted a tradition of the ancient elders about the order of the gospels, as follows. He said that those gospels were first written which include the genealogies, but that the gospel of Mark came into being as follows: When Peter had publicly preached the word at Rome, and by the Spirit had proclaimed the gospel, that those present, who were many, exhorted Mark, as one who had followed Peter for a long time and remembered what had been spoken, to make a record of what was said, and that he did this. . . . And that when the matter came to Peter’s knowledge he neither strongly forbade it nor urged it forward.”

Clement of Alexandria (cont.): On the Authorship of the Gospels “But John, last of all, conscious that the external facts had been set forth in the gospels, was urged on by his disciples, and, divinely moved by the Spirit, composed a spiritual gospel.” Tilman Riemenschneider 1490-1492

What Features in the Four Gospels Do you think Clement’s Theory of John as a “spiritual Gospel” is meant to explain?

Geography: Where was the Gospel of John Written? The Traditional Theory

John on Patmos • The prophet John on the island of Patmos, off the coast of Asia Minor (Turkey), receiving the revelation recorded in the Revelation to John • The Cloisters Apocalypse

To What Chapter in the New Testament Does this Illustration Refer?

Revelation 1 • According to the Traditional Theory of the Authorship of the GJ • The same author, John, son of Zebedee wrote Five NT books: • The GJ, the Revelation to John and 1-2-3-Letters of John

Geography:Revelation to John:written from the Island of Patmos Written to 7 cites on the coast of Asia Minor= modern Turkey

Patmos: Island off the WesternCoast of Asia Minor (=Turkey)

Asia Minor (Turkey)The Seven Cities of Revelation

Ephesus:The Theatre and the Harbor Way This view is from above the huge theater of Ephesus looking along the Arcadian Way to the silted-up harbor in the center background. On the plain at the upper right can be seen the remains of the Church of the Virgin Mary. According to an early Christian tradition, the Apostle John came to Ephesus, bringing with him the Virgin Mary, who had been placed in his care by Christ while on the cross (John 19:260. The building seen here was converted into a Christian church in commemoration of Mary's presence at Ephesus

The Temple of Artemis In Ephesus: One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

This view dramatizes the eventual success of the Christian missionary activity at Ephesus. On the crest of the hill rising above the water-logged ruins of the Temple of Artemis Oust to the left of the standing column) can be seen the remains of a major Christian church built by the Emperor Justinian in the 6th century A.D., deliberately designed to be some 30 feet longer than the once-great Artemisium. The church was dedicated to St.John, based on the tradition that he had built his homeon this hill.

Part II: Scholars’ View of the Authorship of the Gospel of John • Where to begin? • Not with the Tradition • But with Internal Evidence I.e. with the Text Itself

P 66: Bodmer Papyrus 2ca. 200 Cologny, Switzerland Bibliotheque BodmerThe Earliest Manuscript Witness to the Gospel of John

Martyn, Culpepper, Smith: The Fourth Evangelist was an otherwise unknown Jewish Christiana leader of a group of Jewish believers in Jesus who had been expelled from their local synagogue • John 9.22: “His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews; they the Jews had already agreed that anyone who confessedJesus to be the Messiah would be put of the synagogue.” • John 12.42: “Nevertheless many, even of the authorities, believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they did not confess it, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue.”

Composition of Gospel as Gradual Process • Jesus, circa 30 CE • Stories, teachings of Jesus circulate orally • one or more preachers in community behind GJ adds interpretations to these Jesus traditions (e.g. dialogues, minidramas, discourses) [perhaps this was the mysterious Beloved Disciple] • Fourth Evangelist (main author of gospel) collects Jesus traditions and interpretation to form John 1-20 • An editor (an associate of the Fourth Evangelist) adds chapter 21

Who wrote the Gospel of John?