Gospel of John

Introduction to the Gospel of John

First Quotation and Commentary

D.A. Carson writes^[1]:

“Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna and writing AD 120, clearly quotes from 1 John^[2]. If one concludes (as I do) that the Johannine Epistles were written after the Fourth Gospel, and by the same author, it is reasonable to suppose that Polycarp also knew the fourth Gospel, but there is no conclusive literary evidence. Apparently the gnostic Basilides (AD 130) quotes John 1:9 (‘the true light that gives light to everyman was coming into the world’) as a comment of Genesis 1:3 (‘let there be light), but this information is dependent on Hyppolytus (Refutation of Heresies vii. 22.4). If he is right, this is the first explicit quotation from John that has come down to us.

Thus the Gospel of Truth (AD 140), the product of either the gnostic Valentinus or of one of his disciples, apparently alludes to the Fourth Gospel several times, even if it does not explicitly quote it. We are told (26:4-8) that when the Word appeared ‘it became a body (soma)’- which is more than most Gnostics would concede, but probably ‘body’ was little later, Valentinus displays his true colours when he says of the Word that ‘those who were material were strangers and did not see his form or recognise him. For he came forth in flesh (sarx) of such as kind that nothing could block his progress’ (31:1-7): apparently there is a confusion between Jesus’ body during his ministry and his resurrection body (John 20:19). Heracleon, one of the disciples of Valentinus, wrote the first commentary on John on which we have any knowledge. It has not come down to us independently, but is constantly quoted by Origen in his third-century commentary on the Fourth Gospel.”

Note: The ethereal nature of the fourth Gospel, garnered the attention of much gnostic interest. This is evident in the fact that the first explicit quote of the text and commentary of John are by Gnostics.  

External Evidence for Authorship

D.A. Carson writes ^[3]

Of Course, the Gnostics were not the only ones to use John’s Gospel. Although several Fathers from the first half of the second century probably allude to the Fourth Gospel, the first writer in the orthodox stream actually to quote John, so far as our records go, is probably Justin Martyr, who as one point comments, ‘Christ indeed said, “unless you are born again you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” It is evident to all that those who have once been born cannot re-enter their mothers’ wombs’ (first Apology 61.4-5, AD 155). This is almost certainly a reference to John 3:3-5, though John is not actually named. Some scholar have wondered if this is merely a reference to oral tradition that came to Justin independently of the Gospel of John, since at a number of point where we might have usefully referred to John (e.g. in his teaching about the pre-existence of the Word of God) he fails to do so. Justin does not explicitly assign any of the canonical Gospels to a specific author, but he does refer to them as the ‘memoirs of the apostles’.

The first unambiguous quotation from the Fourth Gospel that ascribes the work to John is from Theophilus of Antioch (AD 180) , but even before this date several writers, including Tatian (a student of Justin), Claudius Apollonaris (bishop of Hierapolis) and Athenagoras, unambiguously quote from the Fourth Gospel as from an authoritative source. This pushes us back to Polycarp and Papias, information about whom derives primarily from Irenaeus (end of the second century) and Eusebius the historian of the early church (fourth century). Polycarp was martyred in AD 156 at the age of eighty-six. There is no reason therefore to deny the truth of the claims that he associated with the apostles in Asia (John, Andrew, Philip) and was ‘entrusted with the oversight of the Church in Smyrna by those who were eye-witnesses and ministers of the Lord.’

Irenaeus Knew Polycarp personally, and it is Polycarp who mediates to us the most important information about the Fourth Gospel. Writing to Florinus, Irenaeus recalls^[4]:

 “I remember the events of those days more clearly than those which happened recently, for what we learn as children grows up with the soul and is united to it, so that I can speak even of the place in which the blessed Polycarp sat and disputed, how he came in and went out, the character of his life, the appearance of his body, the discourses which he made to people, how he reported his intercourse with John and with the others who had seen the Lord, how he remembered their words, and what were the things concerning the Lord which he had heard from them, and about their miracles, and about their teaching, and how Polycarp had received them from the eyewitnesses of the word of life, and reported all things in agreement with the Scriptures.”

Most Scholars recognize that this ‘John’, certainly a reference to John the apostle, the son of Zebedee, is in the mid of Irenaeus none other than the John whom he emphatically insists is the Fourth Evangelists. For Irenaeus, that the Gospel should be ‘fourfold’ was a natural as that there should be four winds. Ass four the Fourth Gospel itself, he wrote: ‘John the Disciple of the Lord, who leaned back on his breast, published the Gospel while he as a resident at Ephesus in Asia. IN other words, the name of the fourth evangelists is John, and is to be identified with the beloved disciple in john 13:23.

The evidence of Papias similarly depends on secondary sources. Papias was a contemporary of Polycarp, and may himself have been a student of John. Certainly Eusebius insists that Papias quoted 1 John. That Eusebius does not mention that Papias cited the Fourth Gospel is irrelevant: Eusebius’ stated purpose was to discuss the disputed parts of the New Testament, as well as some of those people who linked the first century with what follows, rather than to provide a list of citations regarding ‘acknowledged’ books.

Another piece of evidence regarding Papias is harder to evaluate. About AD 140 an extreme follower of the writing of Paul, Marcion by name, who had become convinced that only this apostle had truly followed the teachings of Jesus while all the other had relapsed into Judaism, went to Rome to try to convince the church there of his views. He argued, unsuccessfully, that the proper New Testament canon was comprised of ten letters of Paul and one gospel, a mutilated version of Luke. Marcion was sufficiently dangerous that he succeeded in arousing responses. In particular, the so called anti-Marcionate prologues to the gospels have been viewed as part of these responses (though it must be admitted that some scholar think they emerged at a later period). The anti-Marcionate prologue to John has come to us in a rather corrupt Latin version. It informs us that the Gospel was published while John was still alive, and was written down at John’s dictation by Papias, a man from Hierapolis and one of John’s near disciples. As for Marcion, he had been expelled by John himself. This information, the prologue argues, derives from the five exegetical books of Papias himself: the reference is to his Exegesis of the Dominical Logia, which survived into the middle Ages in some libraries in Europe, but which is regrettably, no longer extant.