"THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN"

Its Author.— It is a weighty and significant fact that until the close of the last century the Johannine authorship of the fourth Gospel was never seriously challenged. Epiphanius, indeed (380 A.D.), tells us of a very small party who had ascribed it to Cennthus, a heretical contemporary of the Apostle John at Ephesus; but they seem to have had no other reason for rejecting it than their aversion to its teaching. During the present century no question has been the subject of more controversy; and scarcely any can be of more importance, considering its close bearing on the doctrinal aspects of Christianity, and especially on the divinity of Jesus Christ.

To a large extent the question is covered by the line of evidence already indicated in connection with the Gospels as a whole (see pp. 5-7). But in some respects the external evidence for this Gospel is stronger than for any of the others. It is specially quoted by such early Gnostic writers as Basilides (125 A.D.), Valentinus (145 A.D., whose favourite phrases were borrowed from its opening verses), and Heracleon (a disciple of Valentinus), who wrote a commentary on it— being the first known commentary on any part of the New Testament. Moreover, as John himself survived till near the close of the first century, a comparatively short interval was left between his death and the time when the four Gospels lie known to have been universally accepted by the Church (185 A.D.); and for this interval it so happens that we have a direct chain of testimony consisting of a very few strong and well-connected links. At the lower end of the chain we have Irenaeus, one of the most important witnesses to the general reception of the four Gospels towards the close of the second century. Born in Asia Minor, where John spent the last twenty or thirty years of his life, he became Bishop of Lyons in Gaul, which had a close ecclesiastical connection with his native land. Early in life he was brought into familiar contact with Polycarp (born 70 A. D), a disciple of the Apostle John, who was for more than forty years Bishop of Smyrna and was martyred 155 A.D. Among other allusions which he makes to Polycarp, he says, in a letter to his friend Florinus (177 A.D.), "I can describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp used to sit when he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings in, and his manner of life and his personal appearance, and the discourses which he held before the people, and how he would describe his intercourse with John and with the rest who had seen the Lord, and how he would relate their words. And whatsoever things he had heard from them about the Lord and about His miracles, Polycarp, as having received them from eyewitnesses of the life of the Word, would relate altogether in accordance with the Scriptures."

It is beyond dispute that this Irenaeus accepted the fourth Gospel as a genuine work of the Apostle John. Is it credible that he would have done so, if it had not been acknowledged by his teacher Polycarp, who had been. a disciple of John? And if it was accepted by Polycarp as a genuine writing, notwithstanding its marked dissimilarity to the other Gospels, what better evidence could we have that John was really its author, and that it was accepted as his, from the very first, by the leaders of the Church in Asia Minor?

It may be well to state here very briefly the principal facts in John's life, and the circumstances under which it is said to have written his Gospel.

The younger son of Zebedee, a Galilean fisherman who was in a position to have "hired servants," he WM a follower of the Baptist before joining Christ's fellowship. To his mother Salome, supposed by some to be the sister of the Virgin Mary (Mark xv. 40; John xix. 25), who was one of the most devoted followers of Jesus, he and his brother James seem to have been indebted for much of their enthusiasm. They were surnamed by Jesus "Boanerges" (sons of thunder), in allusion to the latent fervour and vehemence of their nature, of which we are not without tokens (Matt xx. 20-24; Luke ix. 49-54). During Christ's trial and crucifixion John was a close and deeply-interested observer, receiving a charge from his dying Master to act the part of a son to the bereaved Mary (John xviii. 15, 16; xix. 25, 26). After the resurrection we find him associated with Peter on several important occasions (Acts iii., iv.), but not a single discourse of his is recorded in the Book of Acts. He still continued, however, to be revered as a leader of the Church, for we find him referred to by St Paul (Gal. ii. 9), in connection with the Council of Jerusalem (50 A.D.), as one of those who were " reputed to be pillars." In his later life, after the fall of Jerusalem (70 A.D.), according to a general and well-supported tradition, John resided in Ephesus, as bishop of the Churches in Asia Minor which had been founded by Paul, and was banished under Domitian to the bland of Patmos (where he wrote the Book of Revelation, Rev. i. 9), returning to Ephesus in the reign of Nerva, and living there till after the accession of Trajan (98 A.D.)

It was in Ephesus, which had now become the chief centre of Christianity, and was beginning to be infected by the errors of which Paul had warned its elders at Miletus (Acts xx. 29, 30), that the earliest traditions represent John to have written his Gospel. He is said to have done so on the entreaty, and with the subsequent approval, of the Apostle Andrew and other leading members of the Church, in order to supplement the teaching of the three Gospels already published, and to counteract the errors which were beguiling some from the simplicity of the faith.

Turning now to the evidence of its authorship afforded by the Gospel itself, we may first of all note the fact that the whole tone of the book would give one the impression that it was written by some one who was familiar with the inner life of Christ and His apostles (i. 35-51; ii. 11, 17, 22; iv. 6, 8,27; vi. 5, 8, 68-71; iv. 3; xi. 16; xii. 21-22; xiii.; xviii. 16; xx.) All these passages point to one of the twelve disciples as the author — in accordance with the statement (i. 14), "We beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father," and the explicit declaration in the 24th verse of the last chapter (the whole of which seems to form a postscript added by the apostle and endorsed by his companions), — " This is the disciple which beareth witness of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his witness is true." As to which of the disciples is here referred to, we find a clue in verse 20 of the same chapter, where he is identified with **the disciple whom Jesus loved," who had been previously referred to in xx. 2, and xxi. 7, in association with Peter, and in xiii. 23, where he is described as "reclining in Jesus' bosom" at the Last Supper The presumption that the disciple thus designated was one of the sons of Zebedee, who were admitted along with Peter (as the other evangelists tell us) to a closer fellowship with their Master than the rest of the disciples, is strengthened by the remarkable circumstance that the two brothers are never mentioned in this Gospel, except in the second verse of the last chapter where they are referred to as "the sons of Zebedee." The position there assigned to them in the list of disciples is much lower than is usual in the other Gospels, and would lead OS to suppose that it was modesty that led the author to veil his own name (i. 35-42; xviii. 15, 16; xix. 26, 27), as well as that of his brother James and his mother Salome (whom he nowhere mentions unless at xix- 25), as he is in general very precise and explicit in his mode of designation. As between the two brothers, there can be no hesitation in assigning the authorship to John, since James early fell a victim to the I4erodian persecution 44 A.D. (Acts xii. 2).

If the Gospel was not written by John, it must have been written by some one who wished to pass for that apostle; and those who reject the Johannine authorship have the insuperable difficulty to encounter of finding a writer of the post-apostolic age possessed of the intellectual gifts and the spiritual elevation needed for the production of so sublime a work, and at the same time capable of claiming for his unscrupulous fabrications, in the most solemn terms, the authority of an eyewitness and apostle who had reclined in Jesus' bosom.

Besides the allusions to the inner life of Christ and His apostles which have already been referred to, there may be discerned in this Gospel, on a close examination, many other tokens of its apostolic origin.

(1) In its account of Christ's ministry it gives a faithful picture of the Messianic hopes of temporal sovereignty which existed among the Jews prior to the destruction of Jerusalem, as well as of the conflict which Christ waged with such expectations (i. 19-28; iv. 25; vi. 14, 15; vii; xi. 47-53; xix. 12); while we also find traces of acquaintance with the Temple arrangements of the same period (ii. 13-16; iv. 20, 21; x. 23).

(2) It shows a minute acquaintance with Jewish customs (ii. 6; iii. 25; vii. 22; xi. 55; xix. 7, 31), manners (iv. 9, 27; vii. 2, 37; x. 22; xi. 44; xviii. 28; xix. 40), and opinions (i. 46; vii. 35, 41, 52; ix. 2, 16; x. 19-21), frequently giving explanations as if it were written by a Jew for foreign readers.

(3) It also shows a minute acquaintance with the topography of Jerusalem (v. 2; viii. 20; ix. 7; xi. 18; xviii. 1, 15; xix. 13, 17, 41), and with the geography of Palestine generally (i. 28; iii. 23; iv. 5, 35; xi. 54).

(4) It is circumstantial in many of its statements, and bears the stamp of personal knowledge such as would be possessed by an eyewitness (i. 29, 35-43; ii. 1, 20;

iv. 6, 40, 53; vi. 16-24, x. 40; xi. 6, 39, etc.; xii. 1,, xviii. 10, etc.; xix. 25, xx. 1-10, etc)

(5) While written in Greek, it is Hebraic in its style and structure, abounding in parallels and contrasts, both in expression and arrangement (e.g. chap. i.), and frequently quotes from the Old Testament, sometimes directly from the Hebrew (xiii. 18; xix. 37, etc.)

All that can be alleged against the apostolic authorship of the fourth Gospel, on account of its marked divergence from the other Gospels in the representation of Christ's character and teaching, is sufficiently met by the fact that "the synoptical Gospels contain the Gospel of the infant Church; that of St. John, the Gospel in its maturity. The first combine to give the wide experience of the many; the last embraces the deep mysteries treasured up by the one." If we suppose the fourth Gospel to have been written about 85 A.D., an interval of more than half a century would thus have elapsed since the death of Christ. During that time Christianity had spread into many lands and furnished subjects for reflection to many minds, while the Jewish expectations and prejudices which had clung to many of the early members of the Church had been in a great measure dissipated by the fall of Jerusalem. In these circumstances it was inevitable that the truths of the Gospel should be viewed in new lights and assume more speculative forms; and in Ephesus, as the great meeting place of Oriental mysticism and Greek philosophy, the deeper questions and more theological aspects of the new religion would naturally claim a large measure of attention. (Cf. Paul's Epistles to the Colossians and the Ephesians, pp. 91, 99.)

We thus see that, as the other Gospels had reference to distinct types of thought for which they were severally adapted, so the fourth Gospel was designed to meet the demand for a more intellectual presentation of divine truth, which might serve as an antidote to the Gnostic speculations which were imperiling the recognition at one time of Christ's divinity, and at another time of His humanity. In God's providence a worthy exponent of this phase of the Gospel was found in the aged Apostle John, whose heart and mind had been so receptive of divine truth even in his youth as to win for him the place of closest fellowship with his Master, and who had since then enjoyed the teaching of the Holy Spirit for a longer period than any of his fellows, and amid more intellectual surroundings, and was thus singularly fitted for the great task which Providence had assigned to him.

Its Date.— 85-90 A.D., as indicated above.

Character and Contents.— Many of the remarks that might have been made under this head have already found place in this chapter, and at pages 11 and 14, where a contrast is drawn between the Synoptics and the fourth Gospel. On the whole perhaps no fitter epithet can be found for this Gospel than that applied to it by Clement of Alexandria at the close of the second century, vis. the spiritual Gospel. It may also be described as the doctrinal or theological Gospel. It represents Christ's person and work not with special reference to the Past, or the Present, or the Future; but generally with reference to Eternity, in which Past, Present, and Future are alike included.

Its great theme is set forth in the Prologue or Introduction (i. 1-18), which strikes the keynote of the whole Gospel. It represents Christ as the Manifestation of the divine Being, the only Source of life and light, m human form ("the Word was God" and "the Word became flesh"), and, as such, the object, on the one hand, of saving faith, and the occasion, on the other hand, of the world's unbelief. The whole book is an elaboration of this sublime thought, with a singular union of depth and simplicity— chiefly in connection with the Lord's visits to Jerusalem at the national feasts, when He had occasion to press His claims, as the Revealer of the Father, upon the teachers of religion. This Manifestation, attested by several forms of divine witness-bearing (including miracles, which are always called "signs " in this Gospel, as expressions of Christ's glory), may be said to reach a climax in xii. 37-40 ("though he had done so many signs before them, yet they believed not on him"), after which there is described, on the one hand, the downward course of the world's unbelief leading to the crucifixion, and on the other, the perfecting of the disciples' faith, which attains its final and typical expression in the slowly matured but deep - rooted confession of the doubting Thomas, "My Lord and my God" (xx. 28).

As already indicated, the fourth Gospel contains very few incidents of the ministry in Galilee. In this respect, as well as in many of its unexplained allusions (i. 32, 40; iii. 5, 13, 24; vi. 62, 70; xx. 17), it takes for granted acquaintance with the earlier Gospels. The matter which it contains in common with each of the three other Gospels is very limited in extent, but of the most profound significance, viz. the Miraculous Feeding of the Multitude and the Death and Resurrection of Christ. A crucified and risen Saviour who can say of Himself, "I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall not hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst," — this is the essence of the four Gospels, as it is the essence of Christianity symbolised in the Lord's Supper; and the final object of the whole New Testament is summed up by the last of the apostles when he says, "These are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that, believing, ye may have life in his name" (xx. 31).