§ 43. Traditions Respecting John.600
§ 43. Traditions Respecting John.600
The memory of John sank deep into the heart of the church, and not a few incidents more or less characteristic and probable have been preserved by the early fathers.
Clement of Alexandria, towards the close of the second century, represents John as a faithful and devoted pastor when, in his old age, on a tour of visitation, he lovingly pursued one of his former converts who had become a robber, and reclaimed him to the church.
Irenaeus bears testimony to his character as "the Son of Thunder" when he relates, as from the lips of Polycarp, that, on meeting in a public bath at Ephesus the Gnostic heretic Cerinthus,601 who denied the incarnation of our Lord, John refused to remain under the same roof, lest it might fall down. This reminds one of the incident recorded in Luke 9:49, and the apostle’s severe warning in 2 John 10 and 11. The story exemplifies the possibility of uniting the deepest love of truth with the sternest denunciation of error and moral evil.602
Jerome pictures him as the disciple of love, who in his extreme old age was carried to the meeting-place on the arms of his disciples, and repeated again and again the exhortation, "Little children, love one another," adding: "This is the Lord’s command, and if this alone be done, it is enough." This, of all the traditions of John, is the most credible and the most useful.
In the Greek church John bears the epithet "the theologian (qeolovgo"), for teaching most clearly the divinity of Christ (th;n qeovthta tou' lovgou). He is also called "the virgin" (parqevno"),603 for his chastity and supposed celibacy. Augustin says that the singular chastity of John from his early youth was supposed by some to be the ground of his intimacy with Jesus.604
The story of John and the huntsman, related by Cassian, a monk of the fifth century, represents him as gently playing with a partridge in his hand, and saying to a huntsman, who was surprised at it: "Let not this brief and slight relaxation of my mind offend thee, without which the spirit would flag from over-exertion and not be able to respond to the call of duty when need required." Childlike simplicity and playfulness are often combined with true greatness of mind.
Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus, at the close of the second century, relates (according to Eusebius) that John introduced in Asia Minor the Jewish practice of observing Easter on the 14th of Nisan, irrespective of Sunday. This fact entered largely into the paschal controversies of the second century, and into the modern controversy about the genuineness of the Gospel of John.
The same Polycrates of Ephesus describes John as wearing the plate, or diadem of the Jewish high-priest (Ex. 28:36, 37; 39:30, 31). It is probably a figurative expression of priestly holiness which John attaches to all true believers (Comp. Rev. 2:17), but in which he excelled as the patriarch.605
From a misunderstanding of the enigmatical word of Jesus, John 21:22, arose the legend that John was only asleep in his grave, gently moving the mound as he breathed, and awaiting the final advent of the Lord. According to another form of the legend he died, but was immediately raised and translated to heaven, like Elijah, to return with him as the herald of the second advent of Christ.606
John 21:22, 23. Milligan and Moulton in loc. The point of contrast between the words spoken respectively to Peter and John, is not that between a violent death by martyrdom and a peaceful departure; but that between impetuous and struggling apostleship, ending in a violent death, and quiet, thoughtful, meditative waiting for the Second Coming of Jesus, ending in a peaceful transition to the heavenly repose. Neither Peter nor himself is to the Evangelist a mere individual. Each is a type of one aspect of apostolic working—of Christian witnessing for Jesus to the very end of time."
1 Kings 19:11, 12.
1 Cor., ch. 13; 1 John 4:8, 16.
The name John, from the Hebrew @n:jwO;hyÒ or @n:h;w�y, i.e., Jehovah is gracious (comp. the German Gotthold), implied to his mind a prophecy of his relation to Jesus, the incarnate Jehovah (comp. John 12:41 with Isa. 6:1), and is equivalent to "the disciple whom Jesus loved," John 13:23; 19:26; 20:2; 21:7, 20. The Greek fathers call John oJ ejpisthvqio", the leaner on the bosom, or, as we would say, the bosom-friend (of Jesus).
Mark 1:20; 15: 40 sq.; Luke 8:3; John 19:27. Godet (I. 37) thinks that his home was on the lake of Gennesareth, and accounts thus for his absence in Jerusalem at Paul’s first visit (Gal. 1:18, 19).
According to the correct interpretation of John 19:25, that four woman (not three) are meant there, as Wieseler, Ewald, Meyer., Lange, and other commentators now hold. The writer of the Fourth Gospel, from peculiar delicacy, never mentions his own name, nor the name of his mother, nor the name of the mother of our Lord; yet his mother was certainly at the cross, according to the Synoptists, and he would not omit her.
Acts 4:13, a[nqrwpoi ajgravmmatoi kai; ijdiw'tai.
John 1:35-40. The commentators are agreed that the unnamed of the two disciples is John. See my notes in Lange on the passage.
The well-known distinction made by Grotius between filovcristo" and filihsou'".
John 20:4; 21:7.
For an ingenious comparison between John and Salome, John and James, John and Andrew, John and Peter, John and Paul, see Lange’s Com on John, pp. 4-10 (Am. ed.).
Mark 3:17. Boanhrgev" (as Lachmann, Tischendorf, and Tregelles read, in. of Gr. Boanergev"), ie.,uiJoi; bronth'". The word is usually derived from vg,r, ynEB] (as pronounced in the broad Galilean dialect). vg,r, means a noisy crowd of men, but may have had the significance of thunder in Syriac. Robinson derives it from zg,ro which means tumult, alarm, and is used of the roaring noise of thunder, Job 37:2. The usual Hebrew word for thunder is r;['m (Ps. 77:19; 81:8; Job 26:14). This name completely dispels the popular notion of John. "Nichts,"says Hilgenfeld (Einleit., p. 393), "stimmt zu den synoptischen Evangelien weniger als jenes mädchenhafte Johannesbild, welches unter uns gangbar geworden ist."Comp. Godet’s remarks at the close of this section.
"The Lord thundered with a great thunder;" "The Lord shall send thunder and rain." See Ex. 9:23; 1 Sam. 7:10; 12:17, 18; Job 26:14; Ps. 77:18; 81:7; 104:7; Isa. 29:6, etc.
Luke 9:4-56. Some commentators think that this incident suggested the giving of the name Boanerges; but that would make it an epithet of censure, which the Lord would certainly not fasten upon his beloved disciple.
Acts 8:14-17.
Mark 9: 38-40; comp. Luke 9:49, 50.
Matt. 20:20-24; comp. Mark 10:35-41.
John 8:44; 1 John 1:6, 8, 10; 2:18 sqq.; 3:8, 15; 4:1 sqq.; 2 John 10 and 11.
Jerome (Com. ad Matth., Proaem., Opera, ed. Migne, Tom. vii. 19): Quarta [facies]Joannem evangelistam [significat], qui assumptis pennis aquilae, et ad altiora festinans, de Verbo Dei disputat. An old epigram says of John:
"More volans aquila, verbo petit astra Joannes."
The author of Supernat. Relig., II.400, says: "Instead of the fierce and intolerant spirit of the Son of Thunder, we find [in the Fourth Gospel] a spirit breathing forth nothing but gentleness and love." How superficial this judgment is appears from our text.
This is well shown in Gebhardt’s Doctrine of the Apocalypse, and is substantially even acknowledged by those who deny the Johannean origin of either the Apocalypse (the Schleiermacher School), or of the Gospel (the Tübingen School)."Es ist nicht blos," says Baur (in his Church History, vol. I. p. 147), "eine äussere Anlehnnung an einen vielgefeierten Namen, es fehlt auch nicht an innern Berührungspunkten zwischen dem Evangelium und der Apokalypse, und man kann nur die tiefe Genialität und feine Kunst bewundern, mit welcher der Evangelist die Elemente, welche vom Standpunkt der Apokalypse auf den freiern und höhern des Evangeliums hinüberleiteten, in sich aufgenommen hat, um die Apokalypse zum Evangelium zu vergeistigen. Nur vom Standpunkt dei Evangeliums aus lässt sich das Verhältniss, in das sich der Verfasser desselben zu der Apokalypse setzte, richtig begreifen."Schwegler and Köstlin make similar concessions. See my Hist. of the Apost. Ch., p. 425.
In this way the opposite views of two eminent Hebrew scholars and judges of style may be reconciled. While Renan, looking at the surface, says of the fourth Gospel: "John’s style has nothing Hebrew, nothing Jewish, nothing Talmudic," Ewald, on the contrary, penetrating to the core, remarks: "In its true spirit and afflatus, no language can be more genuinely Hebrew than that of John." Godet agrees with Ewald when he says: "The dress only is Greek, the body is Hebrew."
Gal. 2:9, jIavkwbo", kai; Khfa'" kai; jIwavnnh", oij dokou'nte" stu'loi ei|nai ... aujtoi; eij" th;n peritomhvn. They are named in the order of their conservatism.
Gal. 2:12, tine;" ajpo; jIakwvbou. 1 Cor. 1:12, ejgwv eijmi Khfa'.
Acts 3:1 sqq.; 4:1, 13, 19, 20; 5:19, 20, 41, 42; 8:14-17, 25.
He is included among the "apostles," assembled in Jerusalem on that occasion, Acts 15:6, 22, 23, and is expressly mentioned as one of the three pillar-apostles by Paul in the second chapter of the Galatians, which refers to the same conference.
Acts 21:18. John may have been, however, still in Palestine, perhaps in Galilee, among the scenes of his youth. According to tradition he remained in Jerusalem till the death of the Holy Virgin, about a.d. 48.
Rev. 1:4, 9, 11, 20; 2 and 3. It is very evident that only an apostle could occupy such a position, and not an obscure presbyter of that name, whose very existence is doubtful.
Irenaeus, the disciple of Polycarp (a personal pupil of John), Adv. Haer. III. 1, 1; 3, 4; II. 22, 5, etc., and in his letter to Florinus (in Eusebius, H. E. V. 20); Clemens Alex., Quis dives salvetur, c.42; Apollonius and Polycrates, at the close of the second century, in Euseb. H. E. III. 31; V. 18, 24; Origen, Tertullian, Eusebius, Jerome, etc. Leucius, also, the reputed author of the Acts of John about 130, in the fragments recently published by Zahn, bears witness to the residence of John in Ephesus and Patmos, and transfers his martyrdom from Rome to Ephesus. Lützelberger, Keim (Leben Jesu v. Nazara, I. 161 sq.), Holtzmann, Scholten, the author of Supernatural Religion, (II. 410), and other opponents of the Gospel of John, have dared to remove him out of Asia Minor with negative arguments from the silence of the Acts, the Ephesians, Colossians, Papias, Ignatius, and Polycarp, arguments which either prove nothing at all, or only that John was not in Ephesus before 63. But the old tradition has been conclusively defended not only by Ewald, Grimm, Steitz, Riggenbach, Luthardt, Godet, Weiss, but even by Krenkel, Hilgenfeld (Einleitung, pp. 395 sqq.), and Weizsäcker (498 sqq.), of the Tübingen school.
"The maintenance of evangelical truth," says Godet (I. 42), "demanded at that moment powerful aid. It is not surprising then that John, one of the last survivors amongst the apostles, should feel himself called upon to supply in those countries the place of the apostle of the Gentiles, and to water, as Apollos had formerly done in Greece, that which Paul had planted." Pressensé (Apost. Era, p. 424): "No city could have been better chosen as a centre from which to watch over the churches, and follow closely the progress of heresy. At Ephesus John was in the centre of Paul’s mission field, and not far from Greece."
See his farewell address at Miletus, Acts 20:29, 30, and the Epistles to Timothy.
Bleek understands diav of the object: John was carried (in a vision) to Patmos for the purpose of receiving there the revelation of Christ He derives the whole tradition of John’s banishment to Patmos from a misunderstanding of this passage. So also Lücke, De Wette, Reuss, and Düsterdieck. But the traditional exegesis is confirmed by the mention of the qlivyi", basileiva and uJpomonhv in the same verse, by the natural meaning of marturiva, and by the parallel passages Rev. 6:9 and 20:4, where diav likewise indicates the occasion or reason of suffering.
Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, Eusebius, Jerome, etc.
Tischendorf, Reise in’s Morgenland, II.257 sq. A grotto on a hill in the southern part of the island is still pointed out as the place of the apocalyptic vision, and on the summit of the mountain is the monastery of St. John, with a library of about 250 manuscripts.
Irenaeus, Adv. Haer., V. 30, says that the Apocalypse was seen pro;" tw/' tevlei th'" Dometianou' ajrch'". So also Eusebius, H. E. III. 18, 20, 33; Chron. ad ann. 14 Domitiani; and Jerome, De vir. illustr., c. 9. This view has prevailed among commentators and historians till quite recently, and is advocated by Hengstenberg, Lange, Ebrard (and by myself in the Hist. of the Ap. Ch., § 101, pp. 400 sqq.). It is indeed difficult to set aside the clear testimony of Irenaeus, who, through Polycarp, was connected with the very age of John. But we must remember that he was mistaken even on more important points of history, as the age of Jesus, which he asserts, with an appeal to tradition, to have been above fifty years.
Tacitus congratulates Agricola (Vita Agr., c. 44) that he did not live to see under this emperor "tot consularium caedes, tot nobilissimarum feminarum exilia et fugas." Agricola, whose daughter Tacitus married, died in 93, two years before Domitian.
Suetonius, Domit., c. 13: "Dominus et Deus noster hoc fieri jubet. Unde institutum posthac, ut ne scripto quidem ac sermone cujusquam appellaretur aliter."
Hegesippus in Eusebius, Hist. Eccl., III., 19, 20. Hegesippus, however, is silent about the banishment of John, and this silence has been used by Bleek as an argument against the fact.
Dion Cassius in the abridgment of Xiphilinus, 67, 14.
So the title of the Syriac translation of the Apocalypse (which, however, is of much later date than the Peshitto, which omits the Apocalypse): "Revelatio quam Deus Joanni Evangelistae in Patmo insula dedit, in quam a Nerone Caesare relegatus fuerat."Clement of Alexandria (Quis dives salv., c. 42, and quoted by Eusebius, III., 23) says indefinitely that John returned from Patmos to Ephesus after the death of "the tyrant" (tou' turavnnou teleuthvsanto"), which may apply to Nero as well as to Domitian. Origen mentions simply a Roman basileuv". Tertullian’s legend of the Roman oil-martyrdom of John seems to point to Nero rather than to any other emperor, and was so understood by Jerome (Adv. Jovin. I. 26), although Tertullian does not say so, and Jerome himself assigns the exile and the composition of the Apocalypse to the reign of Domitian (De vir. ill., c. 9). Epiphanius (Haer. LI. 33) puts the banishment back to the reign of Claudius (a.d. 41-53), which is evidently much too early.
Neander, Gieseler, Baur, Ewald, Lücke, Bleek, De Wette, Reuss, Düsterdieck, Weiss, Renan, Stanley, Lightfoot, Westcott.
600 These traditions are reproduced in a pleasing manner by Dean Stanley, in his Sermons and Essays on the Apost. Age, pp. 266-281 (3d ed.). Comp. my Hist. of the Ap. Ch, pp. 404 sqq.
601 Or Ebion, according to Epiphanius, Haer., xxx. 25.
602 Stanley mentions, as an illustration of the magnifying influence of fancy, that Jeremy Taylor, in relating this story, adds that "immediately upon the retreat of the apostle the bath fell down and crushed Cerinthus in the ruins" (Life of Christ, Sect. xii. 2).
603 parqevno" usually means a virgin (Matt. 1:23; Luke 1:27; Acts 21:9; 1 Cor. 7:25; 28, 34), but is applied also to men who never touched women, Apoc. 14:4, and in patristic writers.
604 Augustin, Tract. 124 in Joh. Evang. (Opera III. 1976, ed. Migne) "Sunt qui senserint ... a Christo Joannem apostolum propterea plus amatum quod neque uxorem duxerit, et ab ineunte pueritui castissimus vixerit."He quotes Jerome, Contr. Jovin. l.c., but adds: "Hoc quidem in Scriptuis non evidenter apparet."According to Ambrosiaster, Ad 2 Cor. 11:2, all the apostles were married except John and Paul. Tertullian calls John Christi spado.
605 In Euseb. H. E. III. 31, 3; V. 24, 3: jIwavnnh" ...o}" ejgennhvqh iJereu" to; pevtalon peforhkw;" kai;mavrtu" kai; didavskalo" ou|to" ejn Efevsw, kekoivmhtai. Epiphanius reports (no doubt from Hegesippus) the same, with some ascetic features, of James the brother of the Lord. See Stanley’s remarks, pp. 276-278, and Lightfoot on Galat., p. 345 note, and Philipp. p. 252. "As a figurative expression," says Lightfoot, "or as a literal fact, the notice points to St. John as the veteran teacher, the chief representative, of a pontifical race. On the other hand, it is possible that this was not the sense which Polycrates himself attached to the figure or the fact; and if so, we have here perhaps the earliest passage in any extant Christian writing where the sacerdotal view of the ministry is distinctly put forward." But in the Didache (ch. 13) the Christian prophets are called "high priests."
606 Augustin mentions the legend, but contradicts it, Trad. 224 in Ev. Joann.