Some comments on John -- Adilbrand Noblesword's Hall of Warriors

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Date Posted: 00:59:06 03/21/02 Thu
Author: Adilbrand
Subject: Some comments on John
In reply to: Abba's Son 's message, "Re: Did jesus die? Or was he asleep?" on 15:52:03 03/20/02 Wed

1 John: This book deviates from the pattern of most epistles. It is more like a sermon, concluded by a doxology. Religious conservatives generally believe that the author was John, the beloved disciple of Jesus and author of the Gospel of John. Most other Biblical Scholars (those not hampered by Biblical Literalism) point out many style and theological differences between 1 John and the gospel. For example, the gospel assigns the advocate role to the Holy Spirit. In 1 John, he is Jesus. This hints strongly at a different author.

2 John: This letter was apparently written to a Christian woman and her children by the author who also wrote 1 John. Some theologians believe that the woman symbolizes a Christian congregation, and that the letter was written to a church rather than an individual.

3 John: This is a personal letter to a friend Gaius. Most scholars (barring extremely conservative ones) believe that someone other than the authors of 1 & 2 John, and someone other than the Gospel writer wrote this one due to stylistic differences.

Please note, 1,2 and 3 John contain no reference to authorship by the author(s) of the Gospel of John. That belief arose in the second century.

The early church father, Irenaeus, recorded the church tradition that this gospel was written by John, son of Zebedee. Others claimed that the author was an Elder John from Ephesus. Still others, attributed it to John, the "beloved disciple." Throughout most of the history of the church, the Gospel of John was believed to have been written by Jesus' disciple. Most scholars today believe that it was written by a group of authors.

There is speculation that much of the gospel was written by a single, unknown writer, and that a second, later individual reworked the text in order to make it conform to contemporary church teaching. "John" contains a great deal of anti-Jewish sentiment. It holds the Jews and their descendants responsible for the execution of Jesus. It has largely responsible for inspiring Christians to violent anti-Semitic acts in the centuries since it was written.

Because of its theological principles and the emphasis on Jesus as the Son of God, it rapidly became the favorite gospel. It has remained the favorite today, particularly among conservative Christians. It was probably written between 85 and 100 CE, after believers in Jesus were expelled from Jewish synagogues. Chapter 20 appears to be the original ending of the gospel. Chapter 21, describing the miraculous catch of fish, and the reinstatement of Peter, appears to be a later addition.

An early church father, Justin Martyr circa 150 CE linked the author of "Revelation" with the Apostle John. This belief was challenged by many Christian heretics late in the 2nd century and by many orthodox Christian leaders in the early 3rd century. But the belief prevailed. Apostolic authorship was an important factor in the acceptance of Revelation into the official canon. Most Biblical scholars point to the many differences in the style, vocabulary and theology between Revelation and the Gospel of John. They conclude that Revelation was written by an unknown author - perhaps a Jewish Christian whose primary language was Aramaic.

The writing of Revelation was motivated by persecution of the Christians by the Roman government. The Romans had revived the requirement that everyone worship the emperor as a living god. This practice was reinstituted by Emperor Domitian near the end of his reign, during the early 90's CE. Thus, the book of Revelation is assumed to have been written at about that time. Its main theme is to call for Christian solidarity to resist the demands of the empire and to refuse to worship the emperor.

The author of Revelation clearly anticipated the end of the world within a few years of the writing of the book. He writes in the first chapter about "things which must shortly come to pass" and "the time is at hand." Of course, it never happened.

Most Christians pay little attention to the book. They largely reject it because it portrays a God who is extremely hateful and bent on revenge against virtually all humanity. The God of Revelation bears no resemblance to the loving, kind Father who was worshiped by Jesus. The book describes armies fighting on horseback with primitive, first century weapons. It obviously has little relevance to us today. It was simply probably apocalyptic literature which was written to bolster the morale of 1st century Christians in seven churches, located in present-day Turkey.

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