The Cradle, the Cross, and the Crown (70 page)

Subsequent to the Reformation, English deists as well as liberal German scholars initially preferred John's Gospel due to its lack of emphasis on demon exorcisms. But in the wake of the Enlightenment, from E. Evanson in England to K. Bretschneider and D. F. Strauss in Germany, attacks were mounted alleging contradictions between John's “spiritual Gospel” (Clement of Alexandria's term) and the Synoptics, pitting “history” against “theology,” as if a Gospel that stresses the importance of eyewitness testimony and the careful evaluation of evidence must necessarily bend historical fact for the sake of theological expediency.
⁶
In the twentieth century the towering figure of R. Bultmann enlisted John in his program of demythologization.
⁷

Also, efforts have been made in recent years to transfer John's Gospel from the mainstream of apostolic Christianity to the margins of sectarianism at the end of the first century. Some alleged that the “Johannine community,” “school,” or “circle” (rather than John the apostle) was responsible for compiling the Gospel in the wake of its struggles against a parent synagogue that expelled a portion of its members for their faith in Jesus as Messiah.
⁸
This reconstruction, it should be noted, is significantly based on the charge that the references to synagogue expulsion in John (esp. 9:22) are anachronistic.

Still more recently, however, the historical value of such reconstructions has itself come under serious scrutiny and has been increasingly questioned.
⁹
In a stunning “confession,” Robert Kysar chronicled the rise and fall of the Martyn/Brown-style “Johannine community hypothesis” and expressed personal regret for ever having endorsed it. While himself opting for a postmodern paradigm that acknowledges the validity of a variety of “readings” of the Fourth Gospel, Kysar's critique opened the way for a thorough reassessment of a paradigm that until recently was almost beyond question.
¹⁰

SIDEBAR 7.1: WAS JOHN'S GOSPEL WRITTEN BY ANOTHER “JOHN”?

A major challenge to the apostolic authorship of John's Gospel came from R. Bauckham. In his work
Jesus and the Eyewitnesses
, Bauckham argued persuasively that the Gospels reflect eyewitness testimony. According to Bauckham, the ideal source in ancient Greco-Roman literature was not the dispassionate observer but the eyewitness.
¹
The written Gospels, according to Bauckham, contain oral history related to the personal transmission of eyewitness testimony, not merely oral tradition resulting from the collective and anonymous transmission of material.
²
“In this context,” Bauckham contended, “the twelve served as ‘an authoritative collegium.’”
³

Especially important in this regard is the phrase “from the beginning,” which is found at several strategic points in the Gospels and the rest of the NT record (see Luke 1:2; John 1:1; 1 John 1:1). Several other literary devices are used to stress the Gospels' character of eyewitness testimony, such as “the
inclusio
of eyewitness testimony” (see Mark 1:16-18; 16:7 for Peter; and John 1:40; 21:24 for John). According to Bauckham, the transmission process of the Jesus tradition resulting in our written canonical Gospels is best understood as a formal controlled tradition in which the eyewitnesses played an important and continuing part.
⁴

With regard to John's Gospel, Bauckham agreed that the “disciple Jesus loved” should be regarded as the author, but he identified John the elder—not John the apostle, the son of Zebedee—as the author. His view is primarily (it seems) the result of his reading of patristic evidence (Papias, Polycrates, Irenaeus) and his understanding of the reference to the “sons of Zebedee” in John 21:2.
⁵
Regarding the latter point, Bauckham found the beloved disciple's anonymity throughout the Gospel an insurmountable obstacle to the apostolic authorship of John's Gospel since the “sons of Zebedee” are named. He believed the beloved disciple is one of the two unnamed disciples in that list.

This may be so, but there seems to be no good reason that John the apostle (if he was the author) could not have put himself inconspicuously at the scene without lifting his anonymity as the author. Put a different way, since the “disciple Jesus loved” must be one of the seven disciples mentioned in John 21:2, but since he cannot be Peter, Thomas, or Nathanael, there is at least a one-in-four possibility that he is John the son of Zebedee, and if his brother James is ruled out (as he should be; see above), the probability rises to one in three. The argument for John the apostle as the author becomes all the more compelling when one considers the following list of concerns with Bauckham's argument:
⁶

1. Mark 14:17-18 and Luke 22:14 clearly place the Twelve in the Upper Room with Jesus at the Last Supper; this militates against Bauckham's thesis that the author
was not one of the Twelve and seems to pit one apostolic eyewitness (Peter as the source for Mark) against another (that of the “disciple Jesus loved”).
⁷

2. Apart from the question of whether other persons may have been
presen
t
at the Last Supper, what is the historical plausibility of someone other than one of the Twelve being
at Jesus' sid
e
at the Last Supper, even more so as we know that Judas (one of the Twelve) was on Jesus' other side? The answer would have to be, “Slim to none.”

3. Bauckham made nothing of the strong historical link between Peter and John the apostle in all of the available NT evidence (all four Gospels, Acts, and Galatians; see above). This is especially significant in light of the fact that Peter and the “disciple Jesus loved” are indisputably and consistently linked in John's Gospel.

4. The presence of the phrase “I suppose”
(oimai)
in John 21:25 as a device of authorial modesty (in keeping with the label “the disciple Jesus loved”) supports the integrity of the entire Gospel as from the same author, identified in the Gospel as an eyewitness at strategic points (e.g., 13:23; 19:35).
⁸

5. Methodologically, the question arises how legitimate it is to put a large amount of weight on one's reading of the patristic evidence over against the internal evidence of the Gospels themselves. It would seem that, in the end, the most plausible reading of the internal evidence ought to be given the most weight.

6. How likely is it, in light of Bauckham's own theory, that the primary eyewitness behind John's Gospel is not an apostle? In this regard the question arises whether the early church would ever have received such a Gospel, especially if written a generation after the Synoptic Gospels and in light of the crucial importance placed on apostolicity in the canonization process.

7. Why did the author leave out the name John, other than for the Baptist? Surely it is surprising that someone as important as John the apostle would not be mentioned in
the Gospel at all (apart from John 21:2). Would it not be considerably more likely that he is in fact the “disciple Jesus loved” and the author of the Fourth Gospel?

8. Which other John was ever credited with the authorship of the Gospel of John in the early church? Apart from the above-cited ambiguous Papias quote in Eusebius, and an extremely doubtful reference to a John mentioned in Acts 4:6 by Polycrates,
⁹
the answer is, once again, “None.”

9. The clear implication of John 21:2 is that the men listed are seven of the eleven apostles, which excludes the elusive “John the elder” altogether.

The cumulative force of the list suggests that Bauckham's argument, while generally sound in affirming the importance of eyewitness testimony for the Gospels, is unduly biased when examining the evidence for the authorship of John's Gospel. In fact, it is hard to avoid the impression that the nonapostolic authorship of the Fourth Gospel is all but assumed at the outset of Bauckham's argument. This is all the more surprising as apostolic authorship seems to be the most natural corollary of Bauckham's overall thesis. After all, Bauckham's point is not merely that eyewitness testimony—any eyewitness testimony—is important for the Gospels but that we are dealing here with
apostoli
c
eyewitness testimony, that is, eyewitness testimony that is credible because it comes from those who were closest to Jesus during his earthly ministry. In this regard it is hard to see how the testimony of one largely unknown “John the Elder”—not mentioned in any of the Synoptics or other non-Johannine NT writings—would satisfy Bauckham's own criterion. On the other hand, the apostolic authorship of John's Gospel would fit perfectly with Bauckham's overall theory.

For these and other reasons we welcome and concur with Bauckham's overall thesis regarding the Gospels' eyewitness character, yet we do not find his case against the apostolic authorship of John's Gospel convincing. Much more likely, in our opinion, is the view that John's Gospel, like the other three canonical Gospels, are founded on apostolic eyewitness testimony, and that John's, in fact, is the Gospel written by the apostle who was closest to Jesus during his earthly ministry. This claim, in turn, fits historically only with the apostle John, who, according to the unified witness of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, was one of three members of Jesus' inner circle together with Peter and John's brother James.

__________________________

¹
Bauckham,
Jesus and the Eyewitnesses
, 8–11.

²
See especially ibid., 36.

³
Ibid., 94.

⁴
Ibid., 264, and throughout.

⁵
But see the critique by A. J. Köstenberger and S. O. Stout, “The Disciple Jesus Loved: Witness, Author, Apostle: A Response to Richard Bauckham's
Jesus and the Eyewitnesses” BB
R
18 (2008): 209–32.

⁶
This list is adapted from A. J. Köstenberger and S. R. Swain,
Father, Son and Spirit: The Trinity and Johns Gospe
l
, NSBT 24 (Downers Grove: InterVarsity 2008), 31-33.

⁷
R. Bauckham,
The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple: Narrative, History, and Theology in the Gospel of John
(Grand Rapids: Baker, 2007), 15, citing D. E. H. Whiteley, “Was John Written by a Sadducee?” in Wolfgang Haase, ed.,
AufstiegundNiedergangderRömischen Wel
t
2.25.3
(Berlin: de Gruyter, 1985), 2481–505, ventured the conjecture that the “disciple Jesus loved” at Jesus' side at the Last Supper was the host and owner of the Upper Room. This is certainly a novel hypothesis, but highly unlikely

⁸
See A. J. Köstenberger,
'“
I Suppose' (oμαι): The Conclusion of John's Gospel in Its Literary and Historical Context,” in
The New Testament in Its First Century Setting: Essays on Context and Background in Honour of B. W. Winter on His 65th Birthday
, ed. P. J. Williams, A. D. Clarke, P. M. Head, and D. Instone-Brewer (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), 72-88.

⁹
Adduced by Bauckham,
Jesus and the Eyewitnesses
, 439.

HISTORY

Author

John's Gospel, like the Synoptics, is formally anonymous.
¹¹
But the author left tantalizing clues in his Gospel (see Internal Evidence), which, when examined in conjunction with the testimony of the early church fathers (see External Evidence), points convincingly to authorship by John, the son of Zebedee and apostle of Jesus Christ.

Internal Evidence
The author identified himself as “the disciple Jesus loved” (21:20,24; frequently referred to as “the disciple whom Jesus loved”), a prominent figure in the Johannine narrative (13:23; 19:26; 20:2; 21:7,20).
¹²
Although this disciple's identity is elusive, he left sufficient clues in the narrative to ascertain it beyond reasonable doubt.
¹³
The first such clues appear in 1:14 and 2:11. The author used the first person in 1:14, “we have observed His glory,” revealing that he was an eyewitness to the accounts contained in his Gospel. The “we” of 1:14 refers to the same people as does 2:11, Jesus' disciples.
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Thus the writer was an apostle, an eyewitness, and a disciple of Jesus.

An examination of the phrase “the disciple Jesus loved” later on in the Gospel offers further clues to his identity.
¹⁵
The expression first appears in 13:23 at the Last Supper where only the Twelve were gathered (Matt 26:20; Mark 14:17; Luke 22:14), indicating that “the disciple Jesus loved” must have been one of the Twelve.
¹⁶
Since the author never referred to himself by name, he cannot be any of the named disciples at the Last Supper: Judas Iscariot (13:2,26–27), Peter (13:6–9), Thomas (14:5), Philip (14:8–9), or Judas the son of James (14:22).
¹⁷

The writer offered more clues to his identity in the final chapter of the Gospel, where he mentioned “the disciple, the one Jesus loved” as one of seven other apostles: “Simon Peter, Thomas (called ‘Twin’), Nathanael from Cana of Galilee, Zebedee's sons, and two others of His disciples” (21:2; see 21:7). In addition to Peter and Thomas who have already been eliminated (see above), Nathanael is also eliminated as a possible author since, as previously noted, the author remains unnamed in John's Gospel.

Thus the author must be either one of “Zebedee's [two] sons” or one of the “two other of [Jesus'] disciples.” Of the two sons of Zebedee, James and John, James can safely be ruled out since he was martyred in the year 42 (see Acts 12:2). The remaining three possibilities
are John the son of Zebedee and the “two other disciples.” These latter two could be Matthew (Levi), Simon the Zealot, James the son of Alphaeus, Bartholomew, or Thaddaeus.
¹⁸
Matthew is an unlikely candidate since a Gospel is already attributed to him.
¹⁹
Simon the Zealot, James the son of Alphaeus, Bartholomew, and Thaddaeus are unlikely candidates due to their historical obscurity and lack of historical support (see “External Evidence” below). This leaves John the son of Zebedee as the most likely option.